Pianist Aaron Parks returns to Blue Note with By All Means. The quartet includes drummer Billy Hart and bassist Ben Street who, as a trio, recorded 2017’s excellent Find the Way on ECM. The newcomer is saxophonist Ben Solomon, best known for his stint with Wallace Roney’s band between 2012 and 2017; he joined this group in 2023.
Simply put, By All Means is a straight-ahead jazz date. Parks has been pursuing the creation of a body of compositions in his own post-bop vernacular. He did it first with drummer Eric Harland and bassist Matt Brewer on the self-released Volume One and Volume Two in 2022. While each of those albums contained standards and tunes by the trio’s members, By All Means was composed entirely by the pianist.