Product Description

Drummer Pete Zimmer and his quintet s third CD Judgment features the master tenor saxophonists George Garzone and Joel Frahm. Their first two releases Common Man and Burnin Live at the Jazz Standard have been receiving much critical acclaim throughout many parts of the world since September of 2004.

Track Listing

1. The Mingus That I Knew
2. Down Or Up
3. To My Papa
4. 8 A.M. Wednesday Spirit
5. Judgment
6. Dot Dot
7. Bye Bye Blackbird
8. Tutti Italiani
9. Cut Off

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #245841 in Music
• Published on: 2006
• Released on: 2006-10-31
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 59 minutes

Review
Judgment is packed with memorable pieces --Down Beat

Review
Expect to hear more than a few appealing tunes from JUDGMENT. --Washington Post - Mike Joyce

Customer Reviews

Not just cheesehead and Miller-lite country.
Les Paul, the "Wizard of Waukesha," may be the better-known musician, but the guitarist's spirit of innovation and entrepreneurship is clearly evident in a fellow Waukesha native, drummer Pete Zimmer. Unable to find a studio to record his music, Zimmer founded his own label, frequently featuring other Wisconsinites (Rich Germanson, John Sullivan, Joel Frahm) and, on this date, tenor legend and former teacher George Garzone. "Judgment," the third Zimmer-produced project, is a record of the young musician's meteoric development as well as an album of undeniable substance.

Zimmer is no Art Blakey, cracking the whip on his talented troops, but a leader more likely to entrust the reins to his players, complementing their initiatives or offering his own suggestions from "within" the music's center. On his own neo-boppish "Down or Up," he invokes a muse less beholden to Bu than Philly Joe with crisp, melodic statements over the horns' vamp. A duet featuring him with only Garzone, "8 A. M. Wednesday Spirit," is at once a satisfying Coltrane-like lament suggestive of "Alabama" and a striking demonstration of empathy between mentor and protégé.

The centerpiece, Zimmer's "Judgement," a kind of extended blues in G minor, allows pianist Toru Dodo to stretch out on a melodically clean, harmonically adventurous solo before playing some Tyner-like clusters that segue nicely to an animated, invigorating exchange between Garzone and Frahm, both players exhibiting a command of the altissimo register so complete as to make a listener wonder if the alto saxophone is doomed to obsolescence.

Given the combination of an oversupply of new CDs along with diminishing sales (my students no longer buy them), my counsel to the drummer-leader and other musicians in a similar situation is to work the names of the other "known" musicians into the group or title name. For example, had Pete placed the names of Garzone and Frahm in such a prominent position, he would have gotten at least 3 times as many hits on Google as well as encouraged readers familiar with any one of the names to open a link and read the review.

For anyone who's made it this far, my judgement is that, musically speaking, everyone wins on this date.