One By One

Recorded over two evenings live at Boxley's Jazz Club, Bernie Jacobs is featured on both hi-energy flute and down home bluesy vocals. He leads his quartet through some familiar songs in fresh new ways. Often compared to Lou Rawls or Joe Williams, Jacobs sites influences of Jack Kerouac, Roland Kirk, James Moody, Sly Stone, and Hubert Laws. Jacob's musical offerings blend straight-ahead jazz with rhythm and blues, layered with funk and yodeling. Yes, yodeling - coming out of Leon Thomas and John Coltrane. Jacobs explains Thomas had a great tenor and baritone voice and had mastered the art of yodeling. To me it was similar to what Coltrane would do with his horn - jumping intervals. The in-the-pocket quartet proves a strong and funky foundation that sits firmly in the footings of jazz.