The Lights Are Always On by Lynne Arriale
Current events and social issues continue to inspire jazz musicians’ instrumental work. Pianist and Milwaukee native Lynne Arriale is on that track and comes to cautiously hopeful equanimity on her latest, The Lights Are Always On. The title number salutes frontline workers who labor(ed) throughout the COVID-19 pandemic with the kind of upliftingly melodic lilt so often characterizing her compositions.
And unlike her two previous albums heading up three-piece ensembles, this set’s exclusion of guest vocalists and pop remakes puts the musical conversation between Arriale, bassist Jasper Somsen and drummer E.J. Strickland at the forefront. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Representative John Lewis, DACA dreamers, journalists and other subjects spur tributes in which Arriale and company voice humane and adventuresome spiritedness in rigorous, but easygoing form. The calm achieved by the album's end culminates in a satisfy listening experience, but one might hope that Arriale need not glean from such tumult and melancholy next she visits the recording studio.
