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One of the bonafide curiosities in the history of jazz, this was originally an album recorded in the mid-sixties and listed under the name of the music's most powerful, dominating drummer (with all apologies to the inarguable chops of B.R.), Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers. Why the album was instantly forgotten and never reissued is mystifying (and frustrating, to those of us who searched many years for it on auction sites). In fact, the date is far from a curiosity if you're either a Jazz Messengers fan or an admirer of Buddy DeFranco: it belongs in the "essential" category. The ensemble sound and percussion work on this 1964 session recorded at the United Recording Studios in Hollywood, California, strike me as closer to the familiar Messengers' approach than a couple of dates Art made with Sonny Stitt (e.g. "A Jazz Message," on Impulse). Unlike the Englewood Cliffs studio sound, none of the horns is "enhanced"--trumpet, trombone and bass clarinet sound absolutely "true"; Victor Feldman's piano has a natural presence, his touch and vocings captured to a degree not present on reproductions of the piano's sound on other Messengers recordings, and Victor Sproles' bass is a joy throughout, each note clear, each string ringing in response to the audible sound of calused fingers attacking the strings. Moreover, Art's hi-hat is at least as audible as his ride cymbal, helping spread the feeling of joyful swinging to the listener.
But who would have guessed Art would have made an album with two trumpeters (one is his main man, Lee Morgan), trombone (Curtis Fuller), and, brace yourself, the best-known, and arguably best (with apologies to Eddie Daniels and Mort Weiss), successor to Benny and Artie: modern jazz clarinetist Buddy DeFranco. Though Buddy made an album with the Oscar Peterson Trio, never was he featured in such a hard-core, hard-bop context. Moreover, he delivers--but on bass clarinet. So in one sense the recording is disappointing (leaving answered the question: can an "ordinary" clarinet hold its own in the context of a sound like Blakey's Messengers?). In another sense, it's a potential heads-up to listeners who assume the only jazz bass clarinetist worth listening to is Eric Dolphy.
Buddy doesn't employ the elliptical phrasing and aggressive attack for which Dolphy was so well known. As might be expected, compared to Dolphy he's "in the pocket" melodically, harmonically, and rhythmically. At the same time, he's not overly smooth and glib but exhibits an adventurousness unlike that of his other recording sessions. There are even some Coltrane-like altissimo shrieks and wails from his instrument. The program ranges from blues and jazz standards (Strayhorn's "Rain Dance," Monk's "Straight No Chaser") to more adventurous, even experiemental, fare (by Diz, Ornette, and Leonard Feather). But never is it esoteric or non-swinging--and when DeFranco takes an extended solo over a single chord, or "tonal center" ("Kush"), he's as tasteful and imaginative technically impressive (his forte is less the mid- and hi- range and the horn's low range, which he handles with the fluency of a clarinetist like, well, Benny). Had this album been promoted, it may have been successful commercially and even changed the critical thinking about the role of the bass clarinet in jazz over the past half century (in a word, it's been reduced to one word: Dolphy).
Basically, a mainstream, enjoyable record, with no concessions made by the Jazz Messengers to an "unlikely" musical guest and jazz star (who would no doubt be a "pop star" were jazz as widely accepted as swing music was during the active periods of Goodman and Shaw). As it is, since the late '40s the clarinet has languished in comparative obscurity due to the public's sudden apathy to the instrument (Shaw must have had clairvoyance to know enough to walk away from the music before half his life was over). Only with the emergence of Don Byron in the '90s and Anat Cohen in the present millennium have younger players awakened among an audience of appreciable size renewed interest in the instrument --unfortunate, since the work of many fine players (Goodman and Shaw as well as DeFranco and Daniels) went shamefully unnoticed for 40 or more years. As a bonus, the CD features another fine set listed under the name of the still-active, still-swinging drummer, Louis Hayes (on several Cannonball Adderley Riverside albums and later a member of the Oscar Peterson Trio (a formidable challenge for any drummer). And you can't ask for a better rhythm section than Hayes in the company of Barry Harris and Sam Jones (who had played alongside Hayes in the Adderley group as well as the Peterson Trio). Both Yusef Lateef (still active, and a true gentleman possessed with uncommon wisdom) and the late Nat Adderley (who along with Lateef completed the frontline when Cannonball expanded from a quintet to a sextet) are on hand to ensure strong ensemble and solo work, affording the listener an opportunity to compare two very similar groups, one featuring bass clarinet, and the other Lateef's tenor (of which, I'm afraid we've heard far too little, partly because Yusef has preferred to experiment with many different woodwind instruments and musical genres). On this occasion, he proves that he was a player worthy of at least the same amount of recognition as Jug, Dexter, Getz or either Sonny (Stitt or Rollins).
Nat Adderley also shines on this 1960 recording (though listeners are likely to be more familiar with his playing than the surprising Lateef's). And besides his flare for drama (finding the stratosphere at the most appropriate, climatic moment) he manifests more humor than I've ever heard from his horn (his half-valving goes beyond Lee Morgan's, practically equalling that of Diz--or Rex Stewart). Both Sam Jones and Barry Harris are a joy to hear, soulful, gritty, in full ownership of the "groove" (but for those who remain puzzled by the aforementioned comments about the sounds of acoustic piano, compare the piano sound as engineered in the New York studio with that of the DeFranco date. Then, if necessary, compare both to the sound of an actual piano).
Of course, there's one musician who is simply 'beyond comparison": Art Blakey himself. Say what you will about the technical mastery of a Rich, the metrical wizardry of a Morello, the polyrhythms of Elvin, the bebop thunder of Roach, etc. etc., no one has ever played with the power and forcefulness of Blakey. To hear modern reunion and tribute groups honoring Art Blakey (who is to small combos what Duke Ellington was to large ensembles), is invariably a disappointment. However celebrated and capable the newer, younger drummer is, he can't help but sound like a pale reflection of the original. With Blakey, the music was always on fire; without him, the flame, necessarily, is dampened, and not by a little.
Spitzenrezensionen aus anderen Ländern
Samuel
Less a curiosity than essential if rare music
Rezension aus den Vereinigten Staaten vom 14. Dezember 2011
Jazzrook
Two neglected classics from the '60s on one CD.
Rezension aus dem Vereinigten Königreich vom 5. April 2012
John R. Santiago
Worth it just for Kush. But both albums really ...
Rezension aus den Vereinigten Staaten vom 11. Februar 2015
R. Bawden jazz fan
Great bass clarinet playing from Buddy de Franco.
Rezension aus dem Vereinigten Königreich vom 28. Mai 2014Kenneth J. Morris
A rare event in jazz.
Rezension aus dem Vereinigten Königreich vom 10. September 2013