Waiting For Brown – Ryan Kisor

Waiting For Brown adds meter changes to the melodic and harmonic challenges endemic to Ryan Kisor's compositions. This song is built around a vamp in 7/4, though the rest of it is in 4/4. The vamp is an undulating, arpeggiated F minor figure played by piano and bass in octaves (and tenor sax, on this recording). Ryan adds a second line over this vamp, an alternation of F and C that in the end of each measure becomes a trumpet-istic 16th-note "shake."

The form of the head is a 6-measure A section in 4/4, 2 measures of the 7/4 vamp (B), 4 more measures in 4/4 (C), and 4 more of the vamp (D). The changes are chromatic rather than tonal, with some half-step root motion of maj7(♯11) chords in the A section and minor seventh chords of the C section. The A and C section melodies snake through the changes in the angular Kisorian vein. The last two measures of the C section have a stop-time rhythm section figure.

Solos are on a different form from the head, based on the A and B sections but stretched out. The chords from the A section's first two measures are extended to four measures each, followed by a six-measure section with the same chords as the A section's third through fifth measures twice as slow. The solo form concludes with four measures of the vamp. The vamp is used as an intro, but not an ending; the out head concludes at the end of the C section.

The title probably refers to drummer Jason Brown; this is the only recording so far with Brown and Kisor together. "This Is Ryan" was only the second album that Brown played on; the first was pianist Ezra Weiss' "Persephone" from 2004. Brown and John Webber also recorded together in 2011 on alto saxophonist Gilad Edelman's debut album, "My Groove, Your Move" (named for the Hank Mobley song), with trumpeter Joe Magnarelli and pianist David Hazeltine.