Polarization (album)

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[2]
The Penguin Guide to Jazz	[3]

The editors of AllMusic awarded the album 4 stars, with reviewer Richard S. Ginell writing: "This is an often engaging record from a trombonist too seldom heard as a leader".[2]

The authors of The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings noted that the album finds the musicians playing "in a spacious modern idiom, with carefully deployed electronics," and stated that "individual pieces are atmospheric but without sacrifice of linear energies."[3]

A writer for Billboard called the music "lovely, often haunting," and commented: "Priester's flutters, stops, deep tones glide easily through the six compositions."[4]

Writing for Between Sound and Space, Tyran Grillo remarked: "Polarization delivers in its many moods and emotional travels. The musicians don't so much feed off as feed into one another, nourishing a delicate conversation in which agreement is the norm. Their harmonies are tender, the synergy relaxed and intuitive, acute yet soft around the edges."[5]

All compositions by Julian Priester

1. "Polarization" - 5:01
2. "Rhythm Magnet" - 8:31
3. "Wind Dolphin" - 8:59
4. "Coincidence" - 3:38
5. "Scorpio Blue" - 9:36
6. "Anatomy of Longing" - 8:29

• Recorded at Tonstudio Bauer in Ludwigsburg, West Germany in January 1977

• Julian Priester - trombone, ARP String Ensemble
• Ron Stallings - tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone
• Ray Obiedo - electric guitar, acoustic guitar
• Curtis Clark - piano
• Heshima Mark Williams - electric bass
• Augusta Lee Collins - drums