Ron Carter — Where? (2024 OJC Remaster)
Qobuz reissue review (March 2024)
Ron Carter’s debut as a leader is one of the great almost-lost classics of the post-bop era. Although it’s been reissued a handful of times, Where? was largely forgotten until the first wave of “Original Jazz Classics” brought it back into print in the early ’90s. That first run of OJC reissues was far more expansive than this decade’s decidedly more “audiophile essentials” version, and Where?’s reissue felt more like a rescue mission for completists and diehards, rather than a canonical cornerstone. By 1961, when Where? was recorded, New Jazz Records had established itself as the more adventurous arm of Prestige Records (which is ironic, considering that “New Jazz” was the original name for Prestige), releasing boundary-pushing LPs from Dorothy Ashby, Steve Lacy, Yusef Lateef, and, of course, Eric Dolphy. It was Dolphy that brought Carter into the New Jazz fold, having featured the bassist on Out There (recorded the previous year), and, unsurprisingly, Dolphy’s alto sax, bass clarinet, and flute feature prominently throughout Where?.
This was a somewhat less adventurous outing than Dolphy’s solo material, with Carter tentatively balancing two of his own compositions with two by Randy Weston and two requisite standards (“Softly, As In A Morning Sunrise” and “Yes, Indeed”). Of course, the playing throughout by the group is impressive, with Dolphy and Carter being accompanied by Mal Waldron and Charlie Persip, and, when Carter swaps his bass for a cello, George Duvivier on bass. (Wildly, for a bassist’s debut album, first track “Rally” features Carter playing cello and George Duvivier on bass.) Carter gamely attacks his bass both as a plucked, percussive foundation as well as a bowed melodic device, and his facility is impressive and often daring. The two Weston numbers on the second half — the title track and “Saucer Eyes” — are invigorating and idea-dense, and Carter’s cello work on “Where?” is particularly noteworthy, as incisive as it is groove-oriented. (This cut is the only one without Dolphy and his absence gives it a noticeably spare dynamic.) Well-received upon its release, but ultimately overshadowed in the canon by Dolphy’s solo work and Carter’s later work with Miles Davis, Where? nonetheless stands as a fantastic document of yet another dimension of jazz’s early ’60s transition into more and more progressive sounds, and this incredible remaster puts it on the pedestal it should have been on all along.
