Alexa Tarantino, The Roar and the Whisper Review

by Jeff Becker

With The Roar and the Whisper, Alexa Tarantino unveils her fifth studio album and first for Blue Engine Records. The composer, saxophonist, and flutist traverses jazz’s elemental dialectic with an outstanding cast of musicians.

Tarantino leads with commanding elegance and expressive curiosity, drawing from a quartet of remarkable players: pianist Steven Feifke, bassist Philip Norris, and drummer Mark Whitfield Jr. Together, they form a supple ensemble capable of ferocity and finesse, bolstered by guest appearances from Cécile McLorin Salvant and the imaginative percussionist Keita Ogawa.

Opening with “Inside Looking Out,” Tarantino’s soprano saxophone announces itself with lyrical clarity and rhythmic exuberance. The shifting between swing and straight eights gives the piece a seamless elasticity. This serves as an expressive setting for a rhythmic gambit and a thematic metaphor: identity is fluid, and Tarantino inhabits this space with gleeful adaptability. Her solo is rhythmically articulate and buoyant, riding Feifke’s clean harmonic support and Norris’s sinuous bass line. Whitfield Jr., as ever, is alert and alive to every gesture.

The title track, “The Roar and the Whisper,” opens with a darker and searching timbre. Tarantino crafts a modern tone poem, her alto saxophone filled with sighs, bends, and expressive falls. Emulating, one might say, both a whisper’s breath and a lioness’s growl. Norris contributes a gorgeously melodic solo. The quartet’s cohesion is intuitive and telepathic.

The inclusion of Wayne Shorter’s “This Is for Albert” is no accident. Tarantino’s reading of this tune is a spirited engagement with post-bop lineage. Her solo swings with joy and angularity, a nod to Shorter’s own harmonic daring. Feifke’s improvisation is texturally vibrant as his post-bop vocabulary fluently builds with strong phrasing. The quartet performs with intention, crafting a version that honors the style and lineage.

“Portrait of a Shadow,” a lilting waltz, offers a platform for Tarantino’s compositional and improvisational expression. On soprano saxophone, she reveals a refined melodic intelligence, articulating phrases with the subtle rubato of a lieder singer. One hears kinship with modernists and the jazz titans of the past, for whom quietude is as expressive as exaltation.

On “Luminance,” she shifts to flute, and the tonal world moves into a pastel palette. Her phrasing is a reflection of breath control, tone production, and timbral variation. In her hands, light Latin jazz feel becomes a stylistic compositional and improvisational canvas for nuance and lyricism.

The album’s two collaborative highlights with Salvant, “Moon Song” and “Tigress,” function as thematic color variations. On the former, a luminous ballad penned by Salvant, the pairing of flute and voice is sublime. Salvant’s delivery is crystalline yet intimate, every word weighed with care. Her range is dynamic and registral; it is matched by Tarantino’s patient, supportive flute work, which surrounds and occasionally dovetails her lines. Feifke, too, proves a master of restraint, his voicings never crowding but always enhancing.

On “Tigress,” a Strayhorn composition reimagined with Salvant and Ogawa, the narrative shifts. Salvant scats with playful abandon, Ogawa infuses the track with percussive vitality, and Tarantino switches fluidly between soprano saxophone and flute. The transitions are effortless, and the tonal balance between voice, winds, and rhythm yields a textural richness that quartets achieve only through deep listening. This is jazz in the truest sense: interactive, alert, and alive.

In “Back in Action,” the quartet adopts a funky hybrid groove as Tarantino’s alto cuts through with soulful articulation, riding atop Feifke’s syncopated comping and Norris’ nimble bass lines. The groove is multilayered and kept in the pocket with Whitfield Jr.’s deft command of propulsion.

“Provoking Luck,” the album’s first single, returns to hard-bop roots with infectious swing and ensemble interplay. Tarantino’s improvisation is particularly commanding with rhythmic punch and jazz melodic invention. One hears that she is not quoting the past, but channeling it into something distinctly her own. “All Along” presents another moment of repose. A ballad that Tarantino brings her vocal quality to her alto phrasing. Delicate, unhurried, deeply felt lines flow through the harmony.

With The Roar and the Whisper, Alexa Tarantino has crafted an intelligent, emotionally resonant album that explores a field of dynamic jazz forces. Her playing is technically immaculate, but more importantly, it is generous and searching. The ensemble is uniformly superb, and the guest appearances and variety in the project. And if The Roar and the Whisper teaches us anything, it is that the beauty of jazz isn’t just in the notes that are played, but in the spaces between, creating the roar… and the whisper.