Batiste, Alvin – “Centennial One” – [Big Red NOLA Publishing]

Alvin Batiste is a jazz clarinetist who was the founder of the Jazz Institute at Southern University in New Orleans.This CD features a 1980 recording (just released in 2012) with that institute’s Jazz Ensemble. The first five tracks are good funk with vocals cuts, but the fine playing of Batiste cuts loose on tracks 6 to 10 which lean more toward jazz.