About
Joshua Redman tears through five and a quarter choruses of tenor saxophone on Charlie Parker's "Moose the Mooche," a bebop classic built on the chord changes of "I Got Rhythm." At a blistering 294 BPM, the 32-bar AABA form in B-flat becomes a test of technical command, and Redman rises to the challenge with cascading eighth-note lines, rhythmic displacement, and blues-drenched phrases that honor the composition's origins. The piece is a contrafact based on the chord changes of "I Got Rhythm," reharmonized with a new melody. As the sole soloist on this track, his extended, uninterrupted statement builds in intensity across more than five choruses, connecting his playing directly to the bebop tradition even as his modern sensibility pushes the vocabulary forward. The choice to include this Parker staple on Wish was a statement of intent, placing Redman squarely in the lineage of the music's founders.
Joshua Redman was 23 to 24 years old at the time.
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