Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Bill Evans Loose Blues (1962)



This long-lost session, not released initially until 1982, features pianist Bill Evans, tenor saxophonist Zoot Sims, guitarist Jim Hall, bassist Ron Carter, and drummer Philly Joe Jones interpreting seven of the pianist's recent originals. Due to some difficulties during the recording process (none of the sidemen were familiar with the often complex numbers), the results were originally shelved and lost for a couple of decades. This CD reissue shows that the music was actually much better than originally thought. While "Time Remembered," "Funkallero," and "My Bells" would become Evans standards, it is quite interesting to hear such forgotten obscurities as "Loose Bloose" (heard in two versions), "There Came You," "Fun Ride," and "Fudgesickle Built for Four"; a couple of the songs could stand to be revived. It is a pity that Evans and Sims (a logical combination) never did record together again. 
Review by Scott Yanow
http://www.allmusic.com/album/loose-blues-r159313

1. Loose Blues
2. Loose Blues (altern. take)
3. Time Remebered
4. Funkallero
5. My Bells
6. There Came You
7. Fudgesikle Built For Four
8. Fun Ride




Monday, November 21, 2011

Curtis Amy Mosaic Select: The Complete Pacific Jazz Recordings (1960-1963)


Of all the volumes in the Mosaic Select series -- as of this writing there are eight -- none is more welcome or unexpected than this set by the late saxophonist, composer, and arranger, Curtis Amy. What these three CDs contain are Amy's entire six-album output for the Pacific Jazz label which includes his masterpiece, Katanga!. Amy's star continued to shine in different contexts after he left the label, as a tough tenor with Gerald Wilson and Ray Charles, as a soloist on the Doors' Soft Parade and L.A. Woman albums, and of course, as an arranger and bandleader in R&B singer Merry Clayton's group (the pair were married).

But it is the material here which cements Amy's place in the jazz pantheon. Amy hailed from Houston, and is very much a part of the rich and varied Texas tenor tradition. He migrated to Los Angeles to work, and fronted numerous soul-jazz bands there before recording these six albums for Pacific Jazz. The titles include the Blues Message and Meetin' Here (co-led with organist Paul Bryant), Groovin' Blue (co-led with drummer Frank Butler), and Way Down, Tippin' on Through, and Katanga! (the latter three as a solo leader), all of them issued between 1960 and 1963. The first three albums in this set offer the view of Amy as a bluesed-out soul wailer in a scene dominated by the latter heyday of cool jazzers and West Coast hard boppers. The players on these three recordings offered a glimpse into the deep R&B roots of the Sunset Strip jazz club scene: along with Bryant and Butler, trombonist Roy Brewster, drummer Jimmy Miller, Bobby Hutcherson on vibes, and bassists Jimmy Bond and Clarence Jones played on these sessions, all of them stalwarts on that steaming but criminally undocumented scene. The fourth album in the set, Way Down, features some new faces, most notably Marcus Belgrave before his stint with Charles Mingus, and vibist Roy Ayers before he went solo. Other players on the date include bassist George Morrow, and pianist Victor Feldman. Tippin' on Through is a Live at the Lighthouse date, and Amy pulled out all the stops with Larance Marable, Brewster, Bobby Whitlock, and pianist John Houston. On all of these sessions, Amy is deeply rooted in the rhythm and blues and soul traditions of the Texas tenors. His combo work is restricted rhythmically perhaps, but it is harmonically brilliant in the way it stretches these forms to the breaking point at the front line, and the pieces on the live set dovetail and turn back on themselves -- dig the large modal frames Houston lays down under Ayers' vibes: Ayers then extrapolates them for the horns to jump off from. Texturally too, the way solos are layered and dovetail and turn back on themselves dynamically is quite remarkable, in that many of the New York soul-jazz dates didn't get to this place until 1966 or so. Finally, Amy was already deeply under the sway of Coltrane on Tippin' on Through: his own solos take the modal approach, and wind around one or two phrases and blow them from the inside out, exploding into torrents of sound without moving away from the blues.

Katanga! is a case in point all by itself. It remains a jazz classic for its wondrously extrapolated and striated harmonics, its knotty sense of interval, and Amy's melodic sophistication, which was deeply saturated with Latin and African scalar considerations. This set also features the trumpet playing of the little-known and under-recorded Dupree Bolton, the elegant funk of guitarist Ray Crawford, and features Amy on soprano, an instrument that he mastered and became an original voice on, despite the fact that he had played it for such a brief time previous to this session. Here, despite the elongated compositional structures, the blues are never out of the limelight entirely. The title track, written by Dupree Bolton, and "Lonely Woman" (Amy's version, not Ornette Coleman's) are the highlights here, but there isn't a weak millisecond on this slab. In all, this collection is its own revelation -- not only of Amy's overlooked artistry, but of the city of L.A. teeming with fresh sounds and approaches before the steamroller of rock and roll overshadowed it.
Review Thom Jurek - allmusic.com 






Disc 1

1. Searching
2. Going Down, Catch Me A Woman
3. The Blues Message
4. Come Rain Or Come Shine
5. This Is The Blues
6. Meetin' Here
7. Early In The Morning
8. If I Were A Bell
9. One More Hamhock Please
10. Angel Eyes
11. Just Friends

Disc 2

1.Gone Into It
2. Annsome
3. Bobblin'
4. Groovin' Blues
5. Beautiful You
6. Way Down
7. Liberia
8. 24 Hours Blues
9. Lisa
10. A Soulful Bee, A Soulful Rose
11. All My Life
12. Bells and Horns

Disc 3

1. Tippin' On Through
2. Funk In The Evening
3. For Ayers Only
4. In Your Own Sweet Way
5. Summertime
6. Set Call
7. Katanga
8. Lonely Woman
9. Native Land
10. Amyable
11. You Don't Know What Love Is
12. A Shade Of Brown
13. Very Frank

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Hampton Hawes Quartet All Night Sessions Vol. 3 (1956)



Vol. 3 of the Hampton Hawes Quartet's All Night Session contains three spontaneously improvised variations on the blues, one very cool extended rendition of Duke Ellington's "Do Nothin' 'Till You Hear from Me" and a strikingly handsome treatment of Harold Arlen's "Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea." The briskly paced "Blues #4" is especially progressive and exciting. Apparently "Blues of a Sort" was a warm-up performance, as voices are audible (discussing a football game!) in the background during the bass solo. For this one-take marathon late-night session of November 12 and 13, 1956, Hawes chose to share the studio with guitarist Jim Hall, bassist Red Mitchell and drummer Eldridge "Bruz" Freeman, who had replaced Chuck Thompson following that musician's sudden inability to continue touring with the group earlier that year. "We gave Chuck what money we could and left him sitting on a hospital cot in a white bathrobe." This grim image, like much of Hawes' autobiography Raise Up Off Me, paints a stark picture of the narcotics epidemic among jazz musicians during the '50s. Although this was the first peak of his career, Hawes later admitted that "during the fall of 1956 I was messing up consistently -- showing late on gigs or missing them altogether." He had lots of offers for work, including the possibility of providing music for a film soundtrack: "Wanted to do it, would have paid good, but at the time I didn't even have the bread to get high enough to get to the studio to see what they had in mind." One of the great incongruities of bop is the fact that Charlie Parker and the musicians who were most directly influenced by him were able to be so creative and prolific while grappling with addictions that confounded, immobilized, and eventually slew them. All of these insights quietly swarm beneath the surface of what added up to more than two hours of exceptionally fine quartet jazz.
Review by Arwulf Arwulf
http://www.allmusic.com/album/all-night-session-vol-3-r154503/review


1. Do Nothing Until You Hear From Me
2. Blues # 3
3. Between The Devil And The Sea
4. Blues # 4
5. Blues Of A Sort

Hampton Hawes (p) Jim Hall (g) Red Mitchell (b) Eldridge Freeman (d)

Hampton Hawes Quartet All Night Sessions Vol. 2 (1956)


This is the second of three albums that came about as the result of an all-night recording session that took place in Los Angeles on November 12 and 13, 1956. Although Hampton Hawes spontaneously created five original tunes at this extraordinarily inspired date, everything on Vol. 2 comes directly out of the standard bop musician's working repertoire. The quartet, with bassist Red Mitchell, guitarist Jim Hall, and drummer Eldridge "Bruz" Freeman, collectively improvise their way through four attractive standards ("I Should Care" turned out to be the only slow ballad of the entire session) and three of Dizzy Gillespie's most refreshing creations. In 1958 Hawes was quoted as saying "It's hard to put into words how good it feels to play jazz when it's really swinging...I've reached a point where the music fills you up so much emotionally that you feel like shouting hallelujah -- like people do in church when they're converted to God. That's the way I was feeling the night we recorded All Night Session!"
Review by Arwulf Arwulf
http://www.allmusic.com/album/all-night-session-vol-2-r140368


1. I'll Remember April
2. I Should Care
3. Woody 'n You
4. Two Bass Hit
5. Will You Still Be Mine
6. April In Paris
7. Blue 'n Boogie

Hampton Hawes (p) Jim Hall (g) Red Mitchell (b) Eldridge Freeman (d)

Hampton Hawes Quartet All Night Sessions Vol. 1 (1956)


On the night of November 12 and into the morning of November 13, 1956, a quartet led by pianist Hampton Hawes recorded enough material to fill three long-playing phonograph record albums. This studio session contained many elements associated with a live gig: the work took place during regular nightclub performing hours, the improvisations were mostly extended, and there were no alternate takes. A remarkable freshness and spontaneity prevailed throughout the session. Although controversy continues regarding the original sequence of titles, Duke Jordan's "Jordu" and Dizzy Gillespie's "Groovin' High" are superb openers for this first of three volumes. In addition to an invigorating run down "Broadway," Hawes improvised two original themes: "Takin' Care" and a bluesy walk entitled "Hampton's Pulpit" that stretched out for more than 11 minutes, making it the longest track of the entire all-night session. Collaborating with the pianist on this historic date were guitarist Jim Hall, bassist Red Mitchell, and drummer Eldridge "Bruz" Freeman. The interplay between these four men is marvellous, particularly when heard with headphones or through a sound system allowing for a full appreciation of the stereophonic balance achieved by the recording engineers.
Review by Arwulf Arwulf

http://www.allmusic.com/album/all-night-session-vol-1-r154501/review


1. Jordu
2. Groovin' High
3. Takin' Care
4. Broadway
5. Hampton's Pulpit

Hampton Hawes (p) Jim Hall (g) Red Mitchell (b) Eldridge Freeman (d)

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Hampton Hawes The Green Leaves of Summer (1964)


Pianist Hampton Hawes' first recording after serving five years in prison finds Hawes evolving a bit from a Bud Powell-influenced bop pianist to one familiar with more modern trends in jazz. Reissued on CD, this trio date finds Hawes interacting closely with bassist Monk Montgomery and drummer Steve Ellington (making his recording debut). Hawes had lost nothing of his swinging style while in prison, as can be heard on such numbers as "Vierd Blues," "St. Thomas" and "Secret Love," and he was just starting to hint at moving beyond bop. Recommended.
Scott Yanow
http://www.allmusic.com/album/the-green-leaves-of-summer-r140365 

1. Veird Blues
2. The Green Leaves Of Summer
3. Ill Wind
4. St. Thomas
5. Secret Love
6. Blue Skies
7. The More I See You
8. G.K. Blues

Hampton Hawes (p) Monk Montgomery (b) Steve Ellington (d)

Sunday, November 13, 2011

Jackie McLean & Co Introducing Ray Draper (1957)


Although altoist Jackie McLean's Prestige recordings of the 1950s are not as significant as his Blue Notes from the '60s, he did record quite a bit of enjoyable hard bop material during this era. This CD is unusual for, in addition to a conventional quintet (with trumpeter Bill Hardman, pianist Mal Waldron, bassist Doug Watkins and drummer Art Taylor), the young tuba player Ray Draper is heard on three of the five group originals. Draper played his instrument as part of the frontline rather than in the rhythm section and, even if he was not on the level of McLean and Hardman, he gives some needed color to this set. Waldron, who contributed two of the five selections (the others are by McLean, Watkins or Draper) really sets the melancholy mood for much of the music and is an important force behind the scenes. An interesting CD.
Scott Yanow
http://www.allmusic.com/album/jackie-mclean-and-co-r143545 

1.Flickers
2. Help
3. Minor Dream
4. Beau Jack
5. Mirage

Jackie McLean (as) Bill Hardman (tp) Ray Draper (tuba) Mal Waldron (p) 
Dough Watkins (b) Art Taylor (d)


Sunday, November 6, 2011

Junior Mance Happy Time (1962)

Pianist Junior Mance was in excellent company on this inspired 1962 session with bassist Ron Carter and drummer Mickey Roker. Its unfortunate this trio only recorded together on this one date as their unity propels the blues, gospel, and bebop ideas Mance consistently feeds them. The program is highlighted by three Mance originals "Out South," "Taggie's Tune," and the torrid joy of the opening theme "Happy Time," along with versions of "Jitterbug Waltz," "Tin Tin Deo," and Mance at his soulful bluesy best on Clark Terry's "The Simple Waltz." 
Review by Al Campbell

http://www.allmusic.com/album/happy-time-r143064


1. Happy Time
2. Jitterbug Waltz
3. Out South
4. Tin Tin Deo
5. For Dancers Only
6.Taggie's Tune
7. Azure Te
8. The Simple Waltz

Junior Mance (p) Ron Carter (b) Mickey Rocker (d)

Saturday, November 5, 2011

Buddy De Franco Qu4rtet with Sonny Clark Complete Recordings (1954)

Disc 1
1. Jack The Fielstalker
2. Cable Car
3. I Wish I Knew
4. If I Should Lose You
5. Lover Man
6. Tenderly
7. Deep Purple
8. Monogram
9. Yesterdays
10. Blues In The Closet
11. Mine
12. You Go To My Head
13. Gerry's Tune
14. Now's The Time
15. Titoro

Disc 2
1. Autumn Leaves
2. Titoro
3. The Bright One
5. Sonny's Idea
6. Laura
7. Everything Happen To Me
8. I'll Remember April
9. Willow Weep For Me
10. Minor Incident
11. Foggy Day
12. What Can I say Dear
13. Moe



Buddy De Franco (cl) Sonny Clark (p) Gene Wright (b) Bobby White (d)