Naturally, curisoity is aroused as to the origin at the MSQ. To determine how it emerged as a band, it is necessary to begin with its founder/leader Vladimir Zaremba, who is a professor of saxophones at the Moscow Institute of Culture. Primarily a tenor saxophonist, though he also plays other woodwinds, his background includes training at the Glessin Music Institute—the famous pedagogical institution—and experience playing with a good number of small jazz groups and symphony orchestras. Born in Magnitogorsk in 1949, Zaremba was turned on to recordings and left his home city in his teens to travel with a group, and later played in the army band before moving to Moscow. In 1987 he formed the MSQ at the Moscow Philharmonic Society. He recruited his band musicians carefully, selecting the cream of the crop of the time. And they carry an impressive scroll of academic credentials and experience. MSQ performed frequently at concerts and festivals, on USSR Central Radio and on television.

A fortuitous string of circumstances led up to this disc at hand. The pivotal role player in this odyssey was John Garvey, professor emeritus of the University of Illinois, who boasts a considerable reputation as a brilliant jazz educator/jazz ensemble director. He was clearly the catalyst. Inquisitive and motivated, he has made 22 trips to Russia since 1969. "I was introduced to Vladimir Zaremba, leader of the MSQ. He gave me a tape of his group playing various arrangements he had written. The group performed with a very good singer from California—Margie Baker," recalls Garvey. "I'd never met her but I was impressed with her and with MSQ." This writer has been acquainted with Dr. Margie Baker's jazz singing talent and activities in education for 25 years, as she also lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. Baker said "I was invited to sing at the first Miss USSR contest in Moscow—a prelude to the Miss World Contest. They loved Ella Fitzgerald and wanted a jazz singer." The trip was the product of an official collaboration of the U.S. State Department and the Russian government. Baker added, "I also participated in the judging rituals during my three weeks there. Since I was invited alone with no accompanying U.S. instrumentalists, I was accompanied by a Russian pianist and bassist who could play mainstream jazz. The MSQ played its set and a couple of the sax players would join my group while I sang. They were wonderful. Listening to the MSG, you just know they had really studied Charlie Parker and other great jazz saxophonists. When they found out I could sing the lyrics to Parker's "Mood," they freaked out: Russians just love the blues!"

When Garvey returned home with the MSQ tape, he shared it with Bill McFarlin, executive director of IAJE, and got McFarlin to invite the MSQ to play at the New Orleans Convention. The convention-goers were grateful he did, especially Bob Karcy—president of V.I.E.W. Video and Arkadia Records—who was so blown away by the sounds of MSQ that he decided to capture them for posterity. With the help of interpreters, he was able to put together a 5-camera video production and a 24-track audio recording of the band's concert performance at Northeastern Illinois University in Chicago, the final stop of their first American visit. The result is this recording, The Moscow Quintet"The Jazznost Tour."

As for the music per se—of significant interest is its firm harmonic foundation featuring the five saxes voiced in 5-part harmony vis-à-vis the transcribed improvised solos from some of the Charlie Parker epics, recalling the conceptual approach of the Supersax band of Los Angeles. Upon first hearing, there is a natural pavlovian response, prompted by echoes of Supersax, whose eight recordings make it the chief model in this genre, influencing writers, arrangers and numerous bands who've adopted the distinctive harmonic approach. (For history's sake it was Woody Herman's "Second Herd"—the Four Brothers band that originally recorded "I've Got News for You" on December 22, 1947 on which Parker's chorus of Dark Shadows was transcribed and voiced for the saxophones, pre-dating the Supersax format by 25 years.) MSQ was attracted to Parker's resourceful vocabulary and genius, and the technique of contrafaction, i.e., taking standards and inventing new melodies over the existing harmonic framework.

A perfect example is the celebrated "Donna Lee" (recorded by Parker with Miles Davis, Bud Powell, Tommy Potter and Max Roach in 1947). Based on the chord structure of "Back in Indiana," it is taken at a furiously swift tempo by the MSQ. Rivalling many other versions, it serves as a testament to the band's control and to its rapier-like precision. On the other end, MSQ tackles and captures the blend of bebop intensities in the solid slow blues of Parker's "Mood," which was first recorded by Bird in 1948 with John Lewis, Curley Russell and Roach. The MSQ promptly alerts the listener to the trademark two-measure opening phrase. The interpretation surfaces the undercover beauty and reveals MSQ's familiarity with the blues. "Yardbird Suite",vintage 1946, "Chasin' the Bird"—one of myriad contrafacts of "I Got Rhythm"—and "Bloomdido" (1950, with Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk, Curley Russell and Buddy Rich) are the other songs MSQ has drawn from the domain of Parker classics. The Muscovites are adroit handlers of Bird's magic.

Beyond the Parker fold, the MSQ dipped into the Woody Herman bebop bandbook of 1947 and chose "Four Brothers". A melody fitted with arpeggios, it is a popular Jimmy Giuffre four saxophone swinger, which reflects the smooth forward motion of a Lester Young solo with bebop elements. The Russian "Five Brothers" play it with much confidence and fluency crowned by good solos.

Attention is directed to the arrestingly beautiful original by Estonian composer U. Nayssoho entitled "Your Eyes"; it offers an emotionally lyrical solo feature by altoist Alexander Boychuk whose artistry smacks of the heavy, and favorable, influence of Phil Woods' earlier Parker-derived dialect. Expressively strong, Boychuk is a heady player!

Of the other tunes unconnected with Parker, the most distinguished performances, featuring pinpoint accuracy, are played without a rhythm section . The conception and delivery conjures up the fine work of such superb groups as the New York Saxophone Quartet, Marcel Mule and the French Quartet, the Rova Sax Quartet, the World Saxophone Quartet, the 29^th Street Saxophone Quartet and even Saxology-the sax quartet from Eastman School of Music. Beginning with Bill Evans' notably lovely "Waltz for Debby," the MSQ is equal to the sophistication and sensitivity on this classic of durable popularity. Likewise with Lennon-McCartney's "Michelle". The intrinsic beauty of these melodies receives a gorgeous treatment. Most outstanding is the MSQ's lithe, flexible tone in the tradition of Fats Waller on "Smashing Thirds"—a shout piece recorded by Waller in 1929. A blith pièce de resistance, it readily evokes respect for the group's skills and for its understanding of the intent and ambiance of the music.

A saxophone quintet is literally a sax section, and the one indispensible essential to any great section is balance. The floor-to-ceiling blend creates an aura of depth, and the merger of five heartbeats and intertwining lines with the band's own inherent rhythmic equipment make the MSQ a cohesive unit of penetrating satisfaction. Its warm glowing textures and timbres weave opulent fabrics of sound and to judge by its palette, no music seems beyond the grasp of this band. As the impact of jazz continues to widen and deepen, groups like the MSQ will emerge and propagate the idiom and blur the international boundaries of music.

—Dr. Herb Wong