Noah Preminger: Haymaker

Noah Preminger's interest in boxing puts him in exalted company. The young US saxophonist's mentor, Dave Liebman, has talked about Miles Davis's fascination with the pugilist's art and its relationship to improvisation – the feint, the jab, the knockout punch. There's an agility and power in Preminger's delivery that wouldn't be out of place in the ring. Preminger is mature for his 26 years and, possessed of a big, voluble sound, is ascending to the heavyweight division of inventive tenor players in a lineage that stretches back through Joe Lovano and Joshua Redman to Joe Henderson and Sonny Rollins. With a set of arresting original compositions, and a quartet that includes the excellent Ben Monder on guitar, Preminger's third album as leader will confirm that ascent. noahpreminger.com