CHICAGO — If its title didn’t already tip you off, “Tenor Time” — out on jazz label AFAR Music this Friday — declares what it’s all about from the very first track. An uptempo rhythm section, flavored with sly chromaticism by pianist and AFAR founder and owner Richard D. Johnson, plugs along before not one, not two, but three tenor saxophonists punch to the fore: Geof Bradfield, Scott Burns and John “Wojo” Wojciechowski.
Scarcely does one see multiple tenors in the same configuration. For their decades of overlap in a city with a much-hailed tenor tradition, Bradfield, Burns and Wojciechowski can only call to mind one instance when all three of them shared a bandstand, for a Von Freeman tribute at Andy’s. (Even then, Wojciechowski was subbing on alto.) Hearing Bradfield, Burns, and Wojciechowski play tenor on the same record — deftly backed by Johnson, bassist Clark Sommers and drummer Greg Artry — is the Chicago tenor sax equivalent of a fantasy football team.
“There’s a lot of mutual respect,” Burns says. “It was a real treat to play with each other, and it’s definitely the first time that all three of us have recorded together.”
