Joshua Redman, Brad Mehldau, Christian McBride & Brian Blade LongGone LP

Jazzwise The 20 Best Jazz Albums of 2022 - Rated 6/20!
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The members of the legendary original 1990s Joshua Redman Quartet - Redman (saxophone), Brad Mehldau (piano), Christian McBride (bass), and Brian Blade (drums) - reunited after 26 years for 2020's RoundAgain; they return in 2022 with LongGone, featuring six original songs by Redman.

RoundAgain, the group's first recording since 1994's MoodSwing, debuted at No. 1 on the Current Traditional Jazz Albums chart in the US and at No. 1 on the Jazz & Blues chart in the UK. The album received two Grammy nominations. NPR called it "a flawless effort," stating that the four musicians have "only gotten better in that time" and are each "at the very top of his game now."

"Musicians with a scary level of talent playing into the moment," says the New York Times. "The blend of outside influences into a consensual jazz language, the polyrhythmic play, the scholarly bravado: All those things felt fresh for these musicians in the 1990s ... There's something undeniable - consoling, even - about hearing them remain true to it today."

Redman says of his first group as a bandleader, which was together for approximately a year and a half: "I realized almost immediately that this band wouldn't stay together for very long. They were without a doubt, for our generation, among the most accomplished and innovative on their respective instruments. I knew better than anyone else just how incredibly lucky I was to have even that short time with them."

It's the closing 12-minute live take, 'Rejoice', that steals the show in its cryptically telling tenor blurts, hustling Mehldau-shadowed countermelodies, one-touch call-and-response and hurtling time-playing. As if all four were tuned into Sonny Rollins' mindset in his prime, it almost feels like the tunes are incidentals to this one-off band's dynamism.

The second album from Joshua Redman's reunited '90s quartet, 2022's LongGone is another warmly relaxed affair showcasing the group's seasoned sophistication.

LongGone ultimately isn't about the dexterity of the individual. Like the two previous efforts by this esteemed quartet, it's a textbook display of what happens when a group of musicians—each a leader in his own right—understand and trust one another enough to let the music go where it must.