New Standards, Vol. 1

As founding director of the Berklee Institute of Jazz and Gender Justice, drummer Terri Lyne Carrington has sought to expand the jazz canon, in part by creating a repository of works by women composers. The book *New Standards: 101 Lead Sheets by Women Composers* is a major step in that direction. With the album *New Standards, Vol. 1*, Carrington begins her effort to record every tune that she and her colleagues have compiled. Co-produced by guitarist Matthew Stevens, the album covers a wide aesthetic range, richly representative of jazz in its time, from tonal harmony to free improvisation, from ballads to driving grooves and much in between. The featured composers are also diverse, from the late and unheralded Sara Cassey (“Wind Flower”) to the iconic Abbey Lincoln (“Throw It Away”); from such veterans as Carla Bley (“Two Hearts \[Lawns\]”), Marilyn Crispell (“Rounds”), and Eliane Elias (“Moments”) to younger blood including Anat Cohen (“Ima”), Brandee Younger (“Respected Destroyer”), Marta Sanchez (“Unchanged”), Gretchen Parlato (“Circling”), Shamie Royston (“Uplifted Heart”), and Patricia Zarate Perez (“Continental Cliff”). The stellar core quintet grows to include many guests: standouts include Somi and Melanie Charles in a shared vocal feature on “Throw It Away” and Julian Lage in an increasingly rare acoustic guitar turn on “Ima.”