Jazz Articles about Horace Parlan

Horace Parlan: Up and Down – 1961

by Marc Davis
June 9, 2016

I have a new hero: Pianist Horace Parlan. Until recently, I had heard of Parlan, but never really heard him. I certainly never knew his back story. It's inspirational--and his music is pretty damn good, too. Parlan had a handicap. As a child, he lost some function in his right hand due to polio. Various bios disagree on the extent of the loss. Some say two fingers, others three. Either way, it's the kind of injury that makes ...

Dexter Gordon: Doin' Allright

by Matt Marshall
August 20, 2009

Dexter Gordon Doin' Allright Blue Note / Music Matters 2009 (1961)

From the first track of this record--in Blue Note's 45rpm double-disc reissue series--tenor saxophonist Dexter Gordon certainly seems to be doing just fine. That opener, “I Was Doing All Right," lilts along with a nice 'n' easy, early 1960s treatment of an insistently positive George Gershwin melody. Gordon doesn't rush his solo, but allows it to intensify naturally from the surrounding breeze. He ...

Horace Parlan: The Complete Blue Note Horace Parlan Sessions

by C. Andrew Hovan
August 1, 2000

Aside from the obvious heavyweights who came through the Blue Note fold, there’s that whole cast of musicians who fall under the category of “talent deserving of wider recognition”. Arguably, Blue Note might have been even more proficient at expounding the work of these neglected artists. Although not an exhaustive list, some of the names to be mentioned in this camp would have to include Dodo Greene, Fred Jackson, John Patton, Harold Vick, Tina Brooks, Freddie Roach, George Braith, Bennie ...

Dexter Gordon: Doin' Allright

by Jim Santella
March 1, 1997

Dexter Gordon played smooth jazz before that description took on a whole new meaning. Coming up from the Lester Young and Coleman Hawkins tradition, and playing an active role in the start of bebop, Gordon spent a long, albeit interrupted, career keeping his popular tenor saxophone voice before the jazz public. In May of 1961, when this session took place, Freddie Hubbard had recently signed with Blue Note and had just begun his stay with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers.

This ...