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Tim Whitehead

Too Young to go Steady

Home Made HMR 051

Recorded live (from one unedited set) at the Pizza Express Jazz Club in Soho in July 2007, this quartet album (tenor player Tim Whitehead joined by pianist Liam Noble, bassist Oli Hayhurst, drummer Milo Fell) necessarily betrays all the judicious programming appropriate to the occasion, consisting of an accommodating standard (the title tune), three Whitehead originals and an 'escape' from popular music, the Cardigans' 'Love Fool'.

Whitehead has been in the front rank of UK saxophonists since he first came to public attention with Loose Tubes in the 1980s, and this absorbing album, on which he himself notes that the band is captured 'telling our stories together and revealing something of the moment in which we are playing with a real passion, dialogue, development and humour', he thoroughly justifies this status: his is an attractively sinewy yet characterful, occasionally fruity tone, and the imaginative vigour with which he approaches his material is simply exemplary. In Noble, he has a fine foil, a pianist capable of producing economical, highly individual ä even quirky ä solos that contrast tellingly with the saxophonist's more straightforward blowing.

Whitehead has always been a tasteful selector of bandmates ä his albums with the late lamented Pete Jacobsen, Arnie Somogyi and Dave Barry are well worth seeking out ä and this is a highly listenable sample of the work of another great working band in action. Recommended.