The Guide to Classic Recorded Jazz (49 page)

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Authors: Tom Piazza

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BOOK: The Guide to Classic Recorded Jazz
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Page 196
augmented by conga player Carlos "Patato" Valdes; the first five tracks are full of excellent solos by the horns over a churning background set up by Blakey and Valdes and anchored by bassist Oscar Pettiford. The remaining four tracks, sans Valdes and Johnson and with Percy Heath in place of Pettiford, are in a more straight-ahead groove but are also top-notch. Throughout this set, which is a smoker from start to finish, you can hear what made Dorham special: an expressive sound that sometimes became grainy or smoky, an extroverted rhythmic sense coupled with an appealing lyricism, and a witty melodic vocabulary. He is at his most dexterous here; his up-tempo ride on "La Villa" is impressive, as is his work on all five tracks with the conga, especially the two takes of his own "Minor's Holiday."
Una Mas
has Dorham with some of the next generation's most exciting and important players, including pianist Herbie Hancock, drummer Tony Williams, and tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson, with Butch Warren on bass. The tunes are longer here than on
Afro-Cuban
, where they range from four to six minutes; the title track on
Una Mas
is a fifteen-minute exploration of a samba-based vamp/riff tune with gospel overtones. Dorham seems to love working off the accents in Latin-based music; the seventeen-year-old prodigy Tony Williams gives him plenty to work with here, and he plays and plays. Henderson's solo work (it was his first recording) is outstanding as well. "Sao Paulo" alternates between swing and Latin rhythms, but the aptly named "Straight Ahead" is fast bebop-style swing all the way, based on a familiar riff often used, as Dorham points out in the album notes, as a background for soloists in jam sessions. It is not unlike the little figure on which "Una Mas" is based. Dorham really deals out some interesting playing on ''Straight Ahead," constantly engaging Williams, feeding him little rhythmic figures to work off of. Check out the way the baton is handed to Henderson here, by the way - very slick. The set is rounded out by a lovely version of Lerner and Loewe's "If Ever I Would Leave You."
Trompeta Toccata
(Blue Note 84181) looks like a good set, with personnel including Henderson and piano master Tommy Flanagan, but Dorham's chops are in iffy shape; at times he picks off assured high notes, and at other times his articulation is weak even in the middle register. Still, he plays some very interesting stuff throughout a set with two vamp-based tunes (the title track and Henderson's "Mamacita") and slow and fast straight-ahead tunes ("Night Watch" and "The Fox," respectively). Dorham is very strong on the punishingly fast "The Fox."
Another, very different meeting between Dorham and Tommy Flanagan is
Quiet Kenny
(New Jazz/OJC-250), on which Dorham plays beautiful versions of standards like "Alone Together," "Old Folks," and "I Had the Craziest
 
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Dream" in a quartet setting rounded out by bassist Paul Chambers and drummer Art Taylor. This is a rewarding, intimate album. The excellent
Kenny Dorham Quintet
(Debut/OJC-113) also shows off Dorham's way with ballads on "Darn That Dream," "Be My Love,'' and two fabulous versions of Thelonious Monk's "Ruby, My Dear." But my favorite things on this are two tracks on which the quintet (with Jimmy Heath on tenor, Walter Bishop, Jr., on piano, Percy Heath, and Kenny Clarke) cook to the boiling point - "An Oscar for Oscar" and, especially, "Osmosis."
Two very promising-looking albums for Riverside -
Blue Spring
(Riverside/OJC-134) and
Jazz Contrasts
(Riverside/OJC-028) - are disappointing, although each has its moments. The sound leaves a lot to be desired after the Blue Notes, but there are other problems. On
Blue Spring
, Dorham doesn't sound very inspired, and the rhythm section is muddy-sounding. Alto saxophonist Cannonball Adderley is the guest star here, and he gets some fire started, but most of the album doesn't take off. The exceptions are two tracks - "Spring Cannon" and "Passion Spring" - on which Philly Joe Jones replaces Jimmy Cobb at the drums and the focus sharpens.
Jazz Contrasts
looks truly formidable, and about half of it almost is, featuring, as it does, tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins, pianist Hank Jones, Oscar Pettiford on bass, and Max Roach on drums. "Falling in Love with Love," "I'll Remember April," and "La Villa" are all good performances, but one can't escape the feeling that they should have been great. Rollins plays well, but he isn't inspired, and he isn't well miked either. Dorham plays very well, though. On the three other tunes, a harp is inexplicably added; it must have seemed like a good idea at the time, but it really wasn't.
Dorham was very much in demand as a sideman during the 1950s and, as with Lee Morgan, some of his best records were made under others' leadership. Some of the best of the best are three sets recorded mostly in 1955 with a group including Hank Mobley, Horace Silver, bassist Doug Watkins, and Art Blakey:
Horace Silver and the Jazz Messengers
(Blue Note 46140) and
The Jazz Messengers at the Cafe Bohemia, Volume 1
(Blue Note 46521) and
Volume 2
(Blue Note 46522). These sides, which are discussed in some detail in the Ensembles section, are cooking, swinging, small-group hard bop at its best and most typical. Dorham is in extremely good form; his chops are in shape, and his invention runs high. All are worth picking up.
Dorham was teamed with Sonny Rollins frequently, both on Rollins's own mid-1950s records and in the Max Roach quintet, where Dorham replaced Clifford Brown after Brown's death. Dorham can be heard on the Rollins albums
Moving Out
(Prestige OJC-058) and
Rollins Plays for Bird
(Prestige/OJC-214).
Sonny Boy
(Prestige/OJC-348) lists Dorham as playing on "The House I
 
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Live In," but he takes no solo.
Moving Out
is one of Rollins's lesser albums, a 1954 quintet performance with the rarely heard Elmo Hope on piano, recorded before Rollins had really come into his own, although he sounds very good. Dorham is featured on two up-tempo tunes, "Moving Out" and "Swingin' for Bumsy," but his best playing is on the medium-tempo blues ''Solid," on which he plays an idea-packed solo that ranges over the entire horn.
Rollins Plays for Bird
was recorded in 1956 by the Roach quintet under Rollins's leadership; Rollins had, by this time, turned into himself. The main event of the album is a twenty-seven-minute medley of standards associated with Charlie Parker, on which Dorham is featured for "My Melancholy Baby" (Bird recorded it with Dizzy Gillespie in 1950), "Just Friends," and "Star Eyes." His tone is very clear and his chops in excellent shape; his playing has more than a little hint of Clifford Brown's style in it here. Dorham also plays a good solo on the sweet waltz "Kids Know."
Two albums by the Max Roach quintet that recorded
Rollins Plays for Bird
, but with pianist Wade Legge replaced either by Ray Bryant or Bill Wallace, are
Jazz in 3/4 Time
(Mercury 826 456-2) and
Max Roach Plus Four
(Mercury 822 673-2).
Jazz in 3/4 Time
is, as the title states, an album of swinging waltzes. Included are a blues ("Blues Waltz"), the well-known Rollins original "Valse Hot," and several popular standards done as waltzes ("Lover," "I'll Take Romance," and "The Most Beautiful Girl in the World").
Unique as these performances are,
Max Roach Plus Four
works a lot better, set, as it is, in a much more straight-ahead groove; everyone in the band sounds as if they were out for blood that day. Ray Bryant was probably the strongest pianist the Roach quintet ever had, and he provides a very swinging center to the group. Dorham is at his best throughout, making sense even on the ridiculously breakneck-tempoed "Just One of Those Things" and taking cogent, imaginative solos on "Woody'n You," "Body and Soul" (an especially beautiful spot), and "Ezz-Thetic," although he is a bit overshadowed by Rollins. This is a hot album.
Another hot album is
Presenting Ernie Henry
(Riverside/OJC-102), a 1956 showcase for the little-known altoist that features Dorham in absolute top shape, with a rhythm section of pianist Kenny Drew, bassist Wilbur Ware, and drummer Art Taylor. Consisting mainly of Henry originals along with the standards "Gone with the Wind" and "I Should Care," the album is well recorded and features Dorham in truly inspired form.
Two of the most interesting albums featuring Dorham as a sideman are Joe Henderson's 1963
Page One
(Blue Note 84140) and a 1964 masterpiece by pianist-composer Andrew Hill,
Point of Departure
(Blue Note 84167). The Hill album also features Henderson, as well as multireed man Eric Dolphy, drum-
 
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mer Tony Williams, and bassist Richard Davis, in a program of compositions which are never predictable and which engage the intellect as well as the emotions and body. Dorham takes all kinds of chances throughout; the material obviously inspired him.
Page One
includes what is probably Dorham's most famous composition, "Blue Bossa," along with Henderson's famous "Recorda Me." Dorham plays strongly on everything, from the two bossa novas through a fast blues called "Homestretch" and the pretty ballad "La Mesha." This album features pianist McCoy Tyner as well. Dorham also wrote the album's notes.
True Dorham freaks will want to pay attention to his work on nine 1952 tracks on
Thelonious Monk - Genius of Modern Music, Volume 2
(Blue Note 81511), four little-known 1954 tracks with alto saxophonist Lou Donaldson on Donaldson's
Quartet/Quintet/Sextet
(Blue Note 81537), including the smoker "Caracas," Tadd Dameron's fine large-band
Fontainebleau
(Prestige/OJC-055), and a good 1962 set by vibist Milt Jackson,
Invitation
(Riverside/OJC-260), on which Dorham makes the most of limited solo space.
Art Farmer
One of the most lyrical trumpet voices of the 1950s and since, Art Farmer was part of a half generation that was a little younger than the front-line bebop players like Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro, and Kenny Dorham and yet older than the firebrands like Lee Morgan and Freddie Hubbard who came along in the late 1950s. Farmer's sound, delicate and a little grainy, contains almost no elements of the explosiveness of the latter-named men. Although he can swing very hard and play at the fastest tempos, he is basically an introverted, exquisitely melodic player.
A good all-around introduction to his playing is the appropriately named
Portrait of Art Farmer
(Contemporary/OJC-166), a quartet date from 1958 featuring Farmer in front of a great rhythm section of Hank Jones on piano, Farmer's brother, Addison, on bass, and Roy Haynes on drums, performing a mixed program of blues, rarely done standards (Dietz and Schwartz's "By Myself" and Jerome Kern's "Folks Who Live on the Hill"), Benny Golson's jazz standard "Stablemates," and various originals by Farmer and composer George Russell. Fans of straight-ahead, chord-changes-based blowing will like this honest, horn-with-rhythm set. And it is always a great pleasure to hear Hank Jones in this kind of setting.
Even better in some ways is
Live at the Half-Note
(Atlantic 90666-2), a 1963 set recorded at a famous New York City club, on which Farmer plays the more mellow-toned fluegelhorn in the company of guitarist Jim Hall, bassist Steve
 
Page 200
Swallow, and drummer Walter Perkins. It is a more sprawling, relaxed set, featuring the popular standards "What's New," "I Want To Be Happy," and "I'm Getting Sentimental over You," along with "Stompin' at the Savoy" and a version of Miles Davis's "Swing Spring,'' on all of which Farmer's legato approach is demonstrated to perfection. This set also demonstrates a high degree of group interaction; the breaking down of foreground and background in group playing that the avant-garde players of the time were making their business was having its effect on more traditional ensemble playing as well.
A very good 1955 date is
The Art Farmer Quintet Featuring Gigi Gryce
(Prestige/OJC-241), on which the Bird-influenced alto master joins Farmer and a rhythm section of pianist Duke Jordan, bassist Addison Farmer, and the mighty Philly Joe Jones in a program of Gryce originals (plus one by Jordan) with unusual structures and interesting metric devices. This is an extremely rewarding album, many cuts above the average "let's just get into the studio and blow" type of session. Farmer is at his most inventive here.
Farmer may also be heard in two challenging, thoughtful small-group sessions that still sound fresh today:
Art Farmer/Benny Golson - Meet the Jazztet
(MCA/Chess CHD-91550) and
The George Russell Smalltet - Jazz Workshop
(RCA/Bluebird 6467-2-RB). The former is a 1960 date by one of the best small bands of the time, an extremely varied and rich session distinguished above all by saxophonist Golson's writing, which makes the three-man front line (filled out by trombonist Curtis Fuller) sound as full as a big band on standards like "Avalon," "Easy Living," and "It Ain't Necessarily So," as well as on originals like "Blues March," the wonderfully atmospheric "Killer Joe" (on which Farmer's haunting muted statement of the main theme and ensuing solo are truly masterful), and Golson's ballad "Park Avenue Petite," which deserves to become a jazz standard. Farmer plays great stuff throughout in one of the best integrated, most satisfying programs on record.
The Russell set was a very adventurous record for its time (1956), and it still makes interesting listening, full of unorthodox harmonic and rhythmic elements, arranged backgrounds for solos, breaks, riffs, and other elements of jazz combined and used in an unusual way. Much so-called experimental work of that time sounds contrived or forced today, but this set, for the most part, sounds fresh and natural. Farmer and saxophonist Hal McKusick are the horns, and pianist Bill Evans is featured extensively in this program of originals by one of jazz's most respected and individualistic composers.
Pianist Sonny Clark's
Cool Struttin'
(Blue Note 46513) contains some fine blowing by Farmer in a straight-ahead, bop-oriented context. His front-line partner here is Jackie McLean, and the very strong rhythm section includes Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones. This is an extremely swinging set (in-

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