Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you? Her distant and almost stern tones accurately convey the fear and pain Orual's endures, and her voice sounds sometimes harsh and human, sometimes fiercely metaphysical. She is able to embody the hollow desperation of Orual's life, and the intensity of her love for Psyche, without making it overdramatic or cliche. What about Nadia May’s performance did you like? Contrary to my normal opinion, I was able to become more intrigued by and absorbed in the story as I heard it as if from the lips of an old traveling bard, spinning a web of a story for me in vivid detail and yet piercing opaqueness. Would you consider the audio edition of Till We Have Faces to be better than the print version? This is Thomas' best moment on record thus far, and a casebook example of reinterpreting the jazz genre.Gripping, emotionally jarring, and elegant! Murphy's piano is all that holds the tune in place as Thomas and Metheny mutate and re-form it in their own image. The set ends with a radically reworked 'You Don't Know What Love Is,' where the harmonics of the tune get turned inside out and the rhythmic accents shift away form the backbeat time and time again.

Metheny's comping on this cut, with its distortion, adds depth and edginess to the rhythm section. His flute playing on Horace Silver's 'Peace,' along with the rhythmic invention put forth by Moss in the intro, throws the listener when the beat comes kicking back Latin and Thomas moves into high gear. The beautiful acoustic guitar intro to 'Lush Life' whispers with Thomas' tenor, as the saxophonist offers up one of his most breathtaking and profoundly lyrical performances ever put on tape. When the band kicks it all the way in, it's a hard bop sprint with a killer bass solo by Cox. The ripping intro to 'Angel Eyes' sounds like an outtake from Interstellar Space. Metheny leaves his euphoria-driven approach in the wings this time and becomes an impressionist, offering knotty counterpoint on 'The Best Thing for You' as Carrington double- and triple-times the band, all the while pushing the syncopation into ever more angular directions.

As such, his own reed and woodwind playing and Metheny's guitar in the front line are perfect foils for one another. Thomas' methodology is one of tearing everything out but the tune's original melody and restructuring it from inside.

Thomas assembles a stellar cast on this outing, including guitarist Pat Metheny, pianist Tim Murphy, alternating bassists Anthony Cox and Ed Howard, drummer Terri Lyne Carrington, and percussionist Steve Moss. This set, a collection of jazz and pop standards radically reharmonized and annotated rhythmically, is no exception. Saxophonist Gary Thomas' records have been nothing if not provocative.

Till we have faces review