What’s New? Reimagining Benny Goodman – Oran Etkin

Jazz’s historical memory often freezes its icons inside a showcase of untouchable virtuosity. Dismantling that architecture to see what remains of its essence is the risk that clarinetist and saxophonist Oran Etkin takes in What’s New? Reimagining Benny Goodman. Here, the music moves in the opposite direction of nostalgic replica and, above all, archaeological reverence toward the 1930s; Etkin uses the legacy of the "King of Swing" as a pretext to delve into contemporary possibilities.

From the opening track, the ensemble—completed by Sullivan Fortner on piano, Steve Nelson on vibraphone, and Matt Wilson on drums—operates under a logic of free deconstruction. On iconic pieces like “Sing, Sing, Sing,” the group eludes the central motif for minutes, inhabiting an almost abstract melody before allowing Wilson's rhythm to force an entry into the familiar theme. The language becomes fragmented: “Dinah” becomes a completely new piece through Etkin’s bass clarinet within a space of unpredictable cadences.

The vocal presence of Charenee Wade brings a dramatic vein that expands the album's emotional arc. Her intervention in “Why Don’t You Do Right” floats over a deliberately unstable rhythmic texture, almost hostile to convention, which contrasts with the bluesy twilight of “After You’ve Gone.”

It is in this oscillation between the reflective poetics of the title track, “What’s New?”, and the collective friction where the album finds its most honest pulse. Etkin proves that Goodman’s true legacy does not reside in the polish of his surface, but in the urgency of his vitality.