The Henry Cook Band with Bobby Ward: Live at Montreux Detroit

Cook wrote four of these tracks, and Ward contributed two. These are all fine hard bop and post-hard bop heads full of terrific soloing, but perhaps the best entrée into the music of this ensemble is their roundhouse, flat-out take of Charles Mingus' "Fables of Faubus," on which the complementary distribution of each of the horn voices is easiest to spot. Washington's tenor is as powerful as Clifford Jordan's on some of the original Mingus takes of this grand piece, and he and the band ably navigate the shifting tempos of the theme. He's followed no less capably by the others (most notably the leader on a great gravelly baritone) - if only this piece had gone as long as Mingus sometimes let it go!

There is a loose and relaxed feel to this live date; clearly the musicians are getting the crowd excited and then feeding off that excitement. As Neil Young said and this disc proves yet again, "Live music is best. Bumper stickers should be issued."

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