"Choices" is a Mike Stern composition recorded for Michael Brecker's 1987 self-titled debut album on Impulse! Records. The track features Brecker on tenor saxophone delivering two commanding choruses over an 80-bar AAB form in C major with a straight-eighth feel, followed by pianist Kenny Kirkland's inventive single-chorus solo. Brecker's playing demonstrates the qualities that made him arguably the most influential tenor saxophonist since John Coltrane: an enormous, burnished sound, seamless technique across the entire range of the instrument, and an improvisational vocabulary that synthesized elements of Coltrane, Sonny Rollins, and Joe Henderson into something entirely personal. Kirkland, one of the most gifted pianists of his generation, responds with a solo marked by rhythmic daring and harmonic sophistication. The composition by Stern, who was a close collaborator and fellow musician in many of the same New York jazz circles, provides a spacious framework that allows both soloists room to develop extended musical narratives. Charlie Haden on bass and Jack DeJohnette on drums anchor the performance with their characteristically responsive and creative rhythm section work.
