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Jazz Articles about Horace Silver

About Horace Silver

535

Interview

My Conversation with Horace Silver

by AAJ Staff
December 18, 2003

Horace Silver's popularity should be on the same level as the band that came up with the genius buzz word “nookie," but that would be a perfect world and for the time being I am content with having the honor of speaking with him about his stellar recording career (which is mammoth for all of you who want to start a Horace Silver record collection), his sidemen (one of whom was trumpet/composer Tom Harrell ), and his latest album for ...

707

Book Review

Blue Note Records: The Biography

by Victor L. Schermer
May 15, 2003

Blue Note Records: The Biography Richard Cook Justin, Charles, and Co. 2003 ISBN: 1932112103 The early development of modern jazz owes a large debt to a handful of idealistic entrepreneurs who worked in the background with a love of the music and a desire to promote and support genuine talent that far transcended financial ambition. One thinks, for example, of Norman Granz, who catapulted artists like Oscar Peterson, Ella Fitzgerald, ...

380

Album Review

Horace Silver: Finger Poppin

Read "Finger Poppin" reviewed by Rex Butters

by Rex Butters
May 14, 2003

Horace Silver’s trademark features--often sunny compositions and treacherous, tight arrangements as well as his preferred quintet format and enthusiastic embrace of bop, Latin, blues, and folk melodies--mark him as a mid-century creative wellspring that continues to inform jazz. Along with Art Blakey, Silver helped create what became known as the Blue Note sound. Swing era listeners intimidated by the “Chinese music” of bop found plenty to love in Silver’s inclusive synthesis. Only Lee Morgan compares as a composer of catchy, ...

307

Album Review

Horace Silver: Paris Blues: Olympia Theater, Paris, 1962

Read "Paris Blues: Olympia Theater, Paris, 1962" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
April 22, 2003

This is the classic Horace Silver Quintet. It existed and recorded here while Miles was between his two great quintets, just before Art Blakey recorded Caravan with Curtis Fuller and Wayne Shorter, and while John Coltrane was assembling his classic quartet. This concert takes place almost half way between Finger Poppin' With the Horace Silver Quintet and Song for My Father. In essence, this is hard bop reaching perfection, neither al dente nor over-cooked. All of the songs are lengthy ...

353

Album Review

Horace Silver: Jazz Has A Sense Of Humor

Read "Jazz Has A Sense Of Humor" reviewed by John Sharpe

by John Sharpe
November 1, 1999

Listening to any new release by Horace Silver is a lot like hearing your favourite comedian tell a joke for the umpteenth time—you know the punch line, but you laugh anyway! Since he left Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers in 1956, Silver has written and produced a number of classic tunes that have become jazz standards. Over the years his famous quintets have always featured dynamite trumpet/tenor tandems—Blue Mitchell /Junior Cook, Woody Shaw/Joe Henderson and the Brecker Brothers—and this album is ...

405

Album Review

Miles Davis: Walkin'

Read "Walkin'" reviewed by Douglas Payne

by Douglas Payne
November 1, 1999

This bop-era classic finds trumpeter Miles Davis (1926-91) leading two groups from two sessions in April 1954: a superb sextet and a compelling quintet. Both groups center on a blue-chip rhythm section consisting of pianist Horace Silver, bassist Percy Heath and drummer Kenny Clarke. But despite the rock solid foundation and substantial decoration these three provide, Walkin' is all about the horn players. Trombonist J.J. Johnson and tenor saxophonist Lucky Thompson (returning to music after the first of ...

243

Album Review

Horace Silver: Retrospective

Read "Retrospective" reviewed by C. Andrew Hovan

by C. Andrew Hovan
October 1, 1999

We really don't have many living jazz legends walking around these days, but fortunately we're lucky enough to still have Horace Silver going strong (just check out his new release, Jazz Has a Sense of Humor, if you need proof) and maintaining the jazz tradition that he's so intimately tied to. Over the course of 26 years, Silver recorded extensively for Blue Note and during the label's 60th anniversary year it would appear logical that he would receive the “boxed ...