*** Steve Lacy Trio

BYE-YA

(Free Lance/Harmonia Mundi)

Here's a typical program from the venerable soprano-saxophonist: two Monks (the title track and "Trinkle Tinkle"), two settings of poetry to music, and a handful of originals new and old. By now, the only reference point for Lacy's music is himself. His deliberate, stepwise writing and improvising would be worlds away from the flowing lines and blues of mainstream jazz but for his love of deep grooves (provided by drummer John Betsch and bassist Jean-Jacques Avenel) and an unmistakable blues feeling.

The title is intentionally elegiac -- farewells to friends and to Paris (his home for the past 25 years). Tempos range from medium to dirge. The themes are Lacy's typical four- or five-note up-and-down repetitions, worked over, bent, twisted, and given flight. Sometimes he plays over straight swing, sometimes the ensemble creates its own minimalist kabuki theater of squeaks and chimes and tolling bass notes. There's a lyrical, fairytale piece where Lacy duets with Avenel on African kora (a 21-string harp); there's Irene Aebi's earthy, unaffected singing of the poems (by Tom Raworth and Paul Potts); and, of course, there's Lacy's soprano. Especially in its lower, chest-tone registers, it's one of the unique, beautiful sounds in jazz.

-- Jon Garelick