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Oliver Nelson With Eric Dolphy: Screamin' the Blues
by Samuel Chell
Screamin' the Blues is an apt description of the soloists' approach on this 1960 session, here reissued as an RVG remaster, the first of three matching leader Oliver Nelson with avant-gardist Eric Dolphy. Although not as well-known as Nelson's masterpiece, Blues and the Abstract Truth (1961), the date is characterized, above all, by “generosity" on the ...
Kenny Werner: Lawn Chair Society
by Samuel Chell
It would be an exercise in futility to attempt to classify this music. When standard tunes from the American Songbook and jazz idioms such as swing and bebop spark little to no recognition among the general public, music that could once be called “experimental" or “avant-garde" necessarily defines the modern mainstream. If there are similarities with ...
Etta Jones: Don't Go To Strangers
by Samuel Chell
Etta Jones Don't Go To Strangers [Remastered RVG Edition] Prestige 2006 Mention Etta Jones to casual followers of the jazz vocal scene, and brace yourself for a quizzical expression in return. Or if the name produces a spark of recognition, wait long enough for the frequent retraction ("Oh, I thought ...
Tight: Johnny O'Neal Trio in Concert
by Samuel Chell
Johnny O'Neal Trio Tight BoJazz Productions 2006 “It don't mean a thing..." If Duke Ellington's criterion for meaning were to be strictly enforced, most of the sounds that pass for music wouldn't rise above nihilism. Pianist Johnny O'Neal knows the difference between “keeping time" and “swing," which is as much ...
Lee Morgan: The Gigolo
by Samuel Chell
Lee Morgan The Gigolo Blue Note Records 2007 As we observe the 35th anniversary (Feb. 19) of the death of the talented trumpeter who would also become the major player in one of American music's more noteworthy Frankie and Johnny stories, the title of this Lee Morgan session and several ...
Thelonious Monk: Thelonious Monk / Sonny Rollins
by Samuel Chell
Since a 50th Anniversary edition of this recording was released only several years ago, it's possible that this recent RVG edition was seen by the parent company, Concord, as an opportunity to capitalize on the success--critical and popular--of the Monk/Coltrane Carnegie Hall concert (Blue Note, 2005). Regardless, this early meeting of masters, while yielding music of ...
Lee Morgan: Tom Cat
by Samuel Chell
As a cat owner, I've learned the hard way that the outdoor variety of felines quickly exhaust their nine lives. Lee Morgan's Tom Cat must be the exception. Recorded in 1964, the session was first released in 1981 (too late, even, to count as “posthumous"), before its most recent reincarnation as an RVG remaster. Blue Note's ...
Blossom Dearie: Blossom Time at Ronnie Scott's
by Samuel Chell
Several years ago Blossom Dearie said that of all her recordings, this on-location session from 1966 was her personal favorite. Although artists are notoriously unreliable critics of their own work, it's hard to quarrel with the singer/pianist's preference given the evidence on this reissue. Anyone who has yet to discover the inimitable, Lolita-like voice of this ...
Lee Morgan: City Lights
by Samuel Chell
This album may not enjoy the same status as Charlie Chaplin's revered movie of the same title, but it's a session that evokes similar feelings. Like the beloved Tramp, Lee Morgan wins our respect with a performance of exceptional warmth and dignity, grace and beauty, sprinkled with moments of gentle humor. His playing on this session ...
Horace Silver Quintet: Silver's Serenade
by Samuel Chell
What's with the producers at Blue Note/EMI? Or is it engineer Rudy Van Gelder who decides what gets reissued? Silver's Serenade is vintage, nicely representative music by the pianist-composer's best known ensemble, but it was never out of print. By contrast, one of the few Silver sessions for which the term “inspired" might apply--Further Explorations by ...
