The Cuban revolution

Cuban horn-player Arturo Sandoval's new album, Trumpet Evolution, chronicles the jazz trumpet's odyssey from its flowering in New Orleans to its present reincarnation. But how do you put an end to an album of that title? Once you stop, the evolution's over. How do you kill the trumpet?

Fortunately, where it ends is a bit of a mystery; that it ends at all is questionable. The album begins with King Oliver's classic, "Dippermouth Blues." "Later," a Wynton Marsalis composition, is the last song, but by the time you get there, Sandoval has appropriated every master's style as his own. He seems to have out-Roy Eldridged Roy Eldridge and out-Marsalised Marsalis. Does the evolution end, then, with Marsalis the meticulous intellectual, the thoughtful understater, or with Sandoval, the technically brilliant pastiche-artist, the hell-raising entertainer?

You'll know what I mean by Sandoval being an exciting, fiery musician when you hear him live at Jazz Alley, where he plays until Sunday night with a band that includes Robert Rodriguez on piano, Dennis Marks on bass, Samuel Torres on percussion, Felipe Luis LaMoglia on saxophone and Ernesto Simpson on drums.

Yet so diverse is his music that he's essentially a muralist, with his technical brilliance being his most recognizable style.

Ever since he met Dizzy Gillespie in 1977, Sandoval has been soaking in the essences of his idols. He's Diz's heir, as well as being Louis', Fats Navarro's, Clark Terry's, Miles Davis' and classicists like Rafael Mendez's and Maurice Andre's. Sandoval was a founding member, along with the great Cuban pianist Chucho Valdes, of Irakere, one

of the greatest Afro-Cuban bands of the island. His 1988 album with Valdes, Straight Ahead, was a triumph.

But being quite prolific, many of Sandoval's records can be passed over, which is a stark contrast to today's album-oriented industry. To refute those who say Sandoval is an uninspired recorder, one need only to look at the pre-bop old-timers like Louis, Bix Beiderbecke, Brown, Navarro and Eldridge, whose catalogues, whether large or small, were chaotic.

Trumpet Evolution, however, is not to be passed over, if only that it makes the ambitious statement that Sandoval is today's reigning master of the trumpet, and that he has many bags to carry with that honor. He's of course not making the preposterous claim that he's the crowning achievement of biological progress, nor is he saying that Marsalis is. Where the epic ends is unknown, and we hope it never will. We're waiting for The One, not to kill the trumpet, but give it its glorious life again. That's Sandoval's bag, and we hope his next album will be a Trumpet Revolution, on par with the greats he so loves.