Money Jungle: Provocative in Blue

Drummer and bandleader Terri Lyne Carrington won a Grammy in 2012 for her genre-blurring Mosaic Project, which blended the voices and instruments of an all-female cast in a series of bold musical statements. Here Carrington turns her sights toward revisioning a legendary meeting of jazz minds on the recording of 1963's Money Jungle by Duke Ellington, Charles Mingus, and Max Roach. Accompanied by pianist Gerald Clayton, bassist Christian McBride, and a host of guests, Carrington not only reinterprets that album, she adds to its discourse with two of her own compositions and another by Clayton.Carrington's title, Money Jungle: Provocative in Blue, is apt. She reveals the pervasive nature the blues in the original album's compositions and intent, and underscores how their importance resonates in jazz's present tense. And nothing brings the blues like money -- especially the lack of it. But Ellington himself stated that "... the music will be there when the money is gone." Amen. AMG.