Steven Bernstein’s Millennial Territory Orchestra

Dyes in Time (Community Music, Vol. 1)
Good Time Music (Community Music, Vol. 2)
Potato royal family

Dauntless is a word that’s used a little too easily, and it’s certainly thrown around more often than it should be in music reviews. But in the case of Millennial Territory Orchestra trumpeter/bandleader/composer Steve Bernstein, the epithet really fits. After all, in today’s fragile market, he just pushed back the making and release of four new albums with the honk of the horn.

Those who’ve been lucky enough to catch Bernstein live, say with Midnight Ramble Band at Levon Helm Studios, or maybe with a funky little combo like Sex Mob at Hudson’s Club Helsinki, know the man is also capable of magic. . And let’s add generous to the list of descriptors, because, god knows, the man gives his generous talents freely through the grooves of these two albums, borrowing the spirits and sounds of New Orleans, Kansas City and Saint -Louis on the way.

good time musicthe second in the series, joins the traveling brass man with vocalist Catherine Russell for a set of dirty cards, meandering Mississippi guitar and a relentlessly confident and sexy vocal, especially on the swampy, violin-inflected “Yes We Can” by Allen Toussaint. ” Dyes over time, the initial breath, is instrumental, both in its musical nature and in its intrinsic value. Let’s call it Americana, rather than jazz. New York sneaks here in the Midwest, like a mad scientist at a barbecue. “Quarter of Relativity” is avant-garde, but so true: from the brain to the soul of the second disc.