The presence of producer Larry Klein on any recording is always a marker of artistic excellence, and such is the case with The Passion of Charlie Parker. Featuring Parker's music with newly appended lyrics by singer-songwriter David Baerwald, Klein has created a musical play that depicts the narrative arc of Parker's life. Paying fulsome tribute to many of Parker's seminal works, the album features US film, TV and stage actor Jeffrey Wright in the role of Parker as narrator, with vocals provided by Wright and a host of other top flight vocalists. The album's many highlights include the brilliantly atmospheric reworking of ‘Visa’ (here renamed ‘The Epitaph of Charlie Parker’) performed by Canadian soprano and conductor Barbara Hannigan, the mellifluous tones of Gregory Porter wrapping themselves around ‘Yardbird Suite’, plus Kurt Elling's breezy-yet-sinister ‘Moose The Mooche’ (renamed ‘Los Angeles’). Vibrating between the sung and the spoken, Wright's two contributions, ‘K.C. Blues’ (‘So Long’) and ‘Segment’ (‘Fifty Dollars’) are both standouts, the former seeing Parker giving the two-fingered salute to his birthplace. Klein's stated aim for the recording was to take a new approach to highlighting the immense impact Bird had on the music, and in this he has surely succeeded.