Mesmerism, Tyshawn Sorey, CD

Mesmerism is drummer and MacArthur Fellow Tyshawn Sorey's critically-acclaimed program of jazz standards featuring his swinging trio with pianist Aaron Diehl (Cécile McLorin Salvant) and bassist Matt Brewer (SF Jazz Collective). Originally self-released in 2022 by Sorey in a small pressing, the album nonetheless gained wide critical acclaim, with rave reviews in Pitchfork, NPR, Downbeat, JazzTimes and The Wall Street Journal, who called it "far more than an exercise in nostalgia; it advances contemporary trends." The release was voted #4 album of the year in the influential Francis Davis Jazz Poll of over 150 critics. Quite unlike Sorey's other works, which tend towards the cutting-edge, Mesmerism is a happy return to his musical roots: the joy of improvising over songs from the Great American Songbook as well as by some of his other favorite composers and practitioners of the art, including Bill Evans, Duke Ellington, Horace Silver, Muhal Richard Abrams, and Paul Motian.