Prieto, Dafnis : About the Monks

Description

Product description Brand New .com Since arriving in New York from Cuba in the late 1990s, the phenomenal young drummer Dafnis Prieto has enlivened everything he has touched, ranging from the tradition-socking bands of Eddie Palmieri and Chico O'Farrill to the boldy innovative outfits of Steve Coleman and Henry Threadgill. About the Monks, the first album under his name, is a sparkling debut that is conveniently labeled Latin jazz, but never sits still long enough to fit that description. Leading a terrific band including trumpeter and Latin jazz specialist Brian Lynch, saxophonist Yosvany Terry and oncoming Venezuelan pianist Luis Perdomo (whose new debut, Focus Point, is highly recommended), Prieto stages a stylistic carnival. His compositions are sly charmers, thriving on the expected clave beats, but also march rhythms, bursts of Colemanesque bop-funk and slashing stops and starts. Here making like Elvin Jones with his intricate, powerfully self-contained orchestrations, there providing visceral punch with a timbales-like sound, Prieto simply won't permit a dull moment to intrude on the music. --Lloyd Sachs