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Blue Note has released five more CDs in "The Rudy Van Gelder Edition" series.
The series consists of Blue Note classics that have been 24-bit remastered by their original engineer,
sound wizard Rudy Van Gelder. This edition of the series consists of five eagerly
awaited out-of-print items from
Horace Silver, Jimmy Smith, Jackie McLean, Hank Mobley
and
Horace Silver
Six Pieces of Silver (Blue Note RVG edition) Sept 12
The Jazz Messengers helped define both the hard bop era and Blue Note records.
The original version the Jazz Messengers was a cooperative band with
Horace Silver and Art Blakey. After the breakup of the original group in 1956, Art Blakey kept the name and Horace Silver kept the musicians
(trumpeter Donald Byrd, tenor saxophonist Hank Mobley, bassist Doug Watkins).
Horace Silver's 1956 Six Pieces of Silver has the above-mentioned musicians along with drummer Louis Hayes. The album includes the lively "Señor Blues," which became a hit. (The CD also includes of 45-version of the song, plus a 1958 singles version with vocals by Bill Henderson.) A highlight of the album is the lyrical ballad "Enchantment" with especially nice Byrd and Mobley solos.
Silver's carefully composed tunes are funky, swinging, and upbeat, with plenty of room built-in for solos. Many of these catchy tunes, such as "Señor Blues," have gone on to become standards.
1. Cool Eyes /
2. Shirl /
3. Camouflage /
4. Enchantment /
5. Senor Blues /
6. Vergo /
7. For Heaven's Sake /
8. Senor Blues (45 version) /
9. Tippin' /
10. Senor Blues (vocal version)
Jimmy Smith
The Sermon (Blue Note RVG edition) [LP sequence]
Jimmy Smith, the first important jazz organist, was also an important part of the 1950s
Blue Note sound and recorded many sessions for them from 1956 to 1963. His playing fused blues and bebop with rhythm & blues and gospel.
The title track of The Sermon opens the CD with a blues recorded February, 1958 that stays in the groove for twenty minutes and doesn't falter, with great solos from Smith, Kenny Burrell, Tina Brooks, Lee Morgan and Lou Donaldson. "Flamingo" is a beautiful ballad by Lee Morgan that features solos by Morgan and Burrell. Morgan's work on this piece make me think of some of his later ballads for Blue Note in the 1960s. Smith's working trio of Eddie McFadden and Donald Bailey are joined on "Jos" from an August, 1957 session by Lee Morgan and George Coleman.
1. The Sermon / 2. J.O.S. /03. Flamingo
Jackie McLean
A Fickle Sonance (Blue Note RVG edition) Sept 12
Jackie McLean
was one of the more advanced hard bop alto players in the late 1950s. He plays with urgency and has a recognizably sour tone. Attempting to break away from stereotypical hard bop composing and playing around the end of the decade, he began to listen to modal jazz and Ornette Coleman. A bit later in the 1960s experimented with concepts from free jazz on albums such as 1962's Let Freedom Ring.
His 1961 session, A Fickle Sonance, has still not broken away from bop, but has adventurous writing and playing, nevertheless. McLean has distributed the songwriting duties among the players, with two tunes each by McLean and Sonny Clark and one each by bassist Butch Warren and trumpeter Tommy Turrentine. (Note that some have attributed Clark-credited "Five Will Get You Ten" to Thelonious Monk.) It's good to finally have the first U.S. CD release of this session.
1. Five Will Get You Ten / 2. Subdued /
3. Sundu
/ 4. Fickle Sonance
/ 5. Enitnerrut
/ 6. Lost
Hank Mobley
No Room For Squares (Blue Note RVG edition) [LP SEQUENCE]Playing in the 1950s at time of giants such as John Coltrane and Sonny Rollins, Hank Mobley was perhaps not as well known as he might have been otherwise. His 1963 album No Room For Squares comes from his first sessions as leader after leaving Miles Davis, who he played with from 1961-62. The album has four tunes by Mobley and two by Lee Morgan from two sessions in 1963.
The March, 1963 session with Lee Morgan, a young Andrew Hill, John Ore and Philly Joe Jones contributes four tunes starting with Mobley's catchy opener "Three Way Split" which has a long, intense Mobley solo. His great tune "No Room For Squares" has a lyrical, modal Mobley solo and some excellent drum breaks. Lee Morgan contributes a beautiful ballad "Carolyn" and a blues entitled "Me 'N You." The CD includes alternate takes of "Carolyn" and "No Room For Squares."
The October, 1963 session has two Mobley tunes: "Up a Step" and "Old World, New World," which has an excellent drum solo. Donald Byrd, Herbie Hancock and Butch Warren take over the trumpet, piano and bass chair respectively on this session.
1. Three Way Split (Mobley) 6:55 /
2. Carolyn (Mobley) 6:42 /
3. Up A Step+ (Mobley) 7:50
Wayne Shorter
The All Seeing Eye (Blue Note RVG edition) Sept 12
Wayne Shorter was a very busy musician in 1964 and 1965. Besides ending his five year tenure with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers and joining the Miles Davis Quintet on September 18, 1964, Shorter recorded six albums in eighteen months during 1964 and 1965.
The All Seeing Eye, recorded in October 1965, was Shorter's largest acoustic recording, with four horns (Freddie Hubbard, Wayne, Grachun Moncur III and James Spaulding) and a rhythm section (Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Joe Chambers). The CD has five compositions by Wayne and one by his seldom-heard brother, trumpeter Alan Shorter, who also performs on that composition, the closing piece "Mephistopheles."
The album is a programmatic musical journey about creation. The playing show a modal influence and is more freely structured than traditional bop tunes. Wayne plays throughout with an intense, urgent, almost vocal intensity on his asymmetrical compositions. His playing anticipates his stand-out performance on Miles Davis's Complete Live at the Plugged Nickel two months later. Joe Chambers is also especially impressive, urging on and conversing with soloists with a wash of sound from Chambers.
1. All Seeing Eye / 2. Genesis / 3. Chaos / 4. Face of the Deep / 5. Mephistopheles
— Alan Lankin, 2 Oct 2000
[Discographical notes: The titles on the Jimmy Smith and Hank Mobley CDs match the original LP releases, which were both assembled from several different sessions. Instead of following the original order, the first CD releases were arranged by session. These new reissues go back to the original LP order. Rudy Van Gelder prefers the LP order because that follows the preferences of the original producer Alfred Lion.
Jimmy Smith's August, 1957 and February, 1958 sessions were used on both The Sermon and House Party. The latter is being released in an October, 2000 RVG edition. It's reported that a third, yet to be title CD, will be released with the additional tracks from the session.
Four sessions from 1963 and 1965 were used to compile Hank Mobley's No Room For Squares, The Turnaround, and Straight No Filter. A Blue Note Connoisseur edition of Straight No Filter was released in February, 2001 and has the remaining uncollected tracks.]
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last update 21 December 2000