After Hours - A Great Blowing Session

I recently listened to an obscure Prestige album from 1957 called After Hours. It is a group blowing session without a true leader but with a stellar lineup: Thad Jones (trumpet), Frank Wess (flute and tenor sax), Kenny Burrell (guitar), Mal Waldron (piano), Paul Chambers (bass), and Arthur Taylor (drums). (In the record store, it will probably be filed under Thad Jones, as his name is first on the cover.) This is a wonderful collection of blues, from fast to slow, all composed by pianist Waldron and with terrific playing from everyone involved.

     It starts out with a tune called “Steamin’,” a cooker to open the album featuring flute and trumpet. “Blue Jelly,” the second number, is a medium-tempo, shimmering tune, with Jones opening on a muted trumpet, then Burrell announcing the melody, followed by Wess on flute. Jones, Burrell, and Wess have a playful three-way conversation that repeats throughout the song.

     My favorite tune is “Count One,” a Basie-inspired blues that opens, appropriately, with an extended solo by Waldron on piano. Wess has a terrific tenor solo followed by Jones and Burrell. Both Wess and Jones are veterans of the Count Basie Orchestra. The final number is “Empty Street,” a slow twelve-minute moody piece that really evokes that “after hours” feeling. Burrell sets the low-down tone, followed by Wess on obligato flute and Jones on the muted trumpet. You can definitely hear the bluesy influence of the Detroit contingent - Burrell, Jones (Pontiac, Michigan), and Chambers.

     All in all, After Hours is not your typical blowing session. Waldron’s tunes hold this talented group of musicians together for a memorable album of blues.

Happy Birthday, Kenny Burrell!

Kenny Burrell on guitar playing "Jeannine" during a gig broadcast on Japanese TV in 1990, with Bob Magnuson on bass and Sherman Ferguson on drums.

The Cats

The Cats is a somewhat obscure Prestige Records all-star session from 1957 that purrs like a well-fed kitten. And well-fed it is with a savory line-up that includes John Coltrane on tenor and Kenny Burrell on guitar. Although recorded by Rudy Van Gelder in his Hackensack studio, the record has a Detroit vibe – Burrell and the rhythm section of Tommy Flanagan on piano, Doug Watkins on bass, and Louis Hayes on drums are all natives. Burrell always has a bluesy Motor City tinge to his playing. Coltrane is in transition at the time of this recording. Having recently been booted from the Miles Davis Quintet, he is trying to clean up his act and will soon begin a collaboration with Thelonious Monk. Here, he sounds energized in his solos, perhaps feeling free to be more expressive than he was with Davis. His so-called sheets of sound style is in full flower, with some wonderful melodic lines morphing into impressive double-time arpeggios. This album is probably overlooked (the felines on the cover definitely want some attention) because both Burrell and Coltrane were about to enter a very creative and prolific period in their respective careers.
     But the real cat-in-chief on this date is Flanagan. His compositional skills are on display in four of the five tunes, and his playing is the focus of the other one. The album opens with “Minor Mishap,” a medium-paced hard bop song with solos from Coltrane, Burrell, and Idrees Sulieman (on trumpet). (There’s a wonderful version of Flanagan playing this song from later in his career on YouTube.) “How Long Has This Been Going On?” features Flanagan in a trio in a lovely version – listen to Hayes’ brush work on drums - of this Gershwin classic. The Caribbean-flavored “Eclypso” and “Solacium” are on the cool side of bop. But the highlight of The Cats has got to be the aptly named “Tommy’s Tune,” an extended (twelve minutes) song that gives everyone room to work out their ideas and really shine.
     Flanagan (1930-2001) was mostly known for being the accompanist of Ella Fitzgerald for many years, from the early 1960s to the late 1970s. He worked as a sideman on a number of seminal jazz recordings, including Coltrane’s Giant Steps, Sonny Rollins’ Saxophone Colossus, and Art Pepper’s Straight Life. He also recorded regularly as a leader later in his career. He deserves to be more widely recognized for his masterful piano playing and The Cats is an excellent place to start.

In Praise of Mr. T

Tenor saxophonist Stanley Turrentine was born in Pittsburgh in 1934. He came from a musical family – his father, mother, and brother all played instruments. He played with rhythm and blues bands in the early 1950s before moving into jazz with Earl Bostic, Max Roach, and others. Throughout his career, he recorded with Blue Note, CTI, Fantasy, and other labels. He died in 2000.
     The original “Mr. T” is one of my favorite musicians, particularly for his Blue Note albums in the 1960s. He is underappreciated as a sax player, probably because of the more popular, cross-over material he did in the 1970s and 1980s. And perhaps he did become too commercial - success has its price, I guess. My feeling is that the material Turrentine did with Blue Note is so outstanding that he deserves reconsideration.
     Turrentine did some excellent work as a sideman with organist Jimmy Smith. Back at the Chicken Shack, Midnight Special, and Prayer Meetin’ show a great rapport between the two as they exchange bluesy solos. Also as a sideman, Turrentine appeared on one of my favorite albums of all time, guitarist Kenny Burrell’s Midnight Blue (1963). This deeply grooving album is the very definition of the Blue Note sound at this time, and Burrell and Turrentine try to top each other throughout. There’s not a dud on the album.
     His albums as a leader with Blue Note are also winners, a kind of soul-jazz soundtrack for the Sixties. His first, Look Out!, contains some great blues licks and that big tenor sound of his, particularly on Stan’s own compositions “Little Sheri,” “Minor Chant,” and the title tune. He has a very masculine and smooth tone, never harsh. A more subdued but still bluesy Stan can be heard in small group settings on Up at Minton’s and Blue Hour.
     One of my favorites is his album Hustlin’ from 1964. The great B-3 organist Shirley Scott (also Stan’s wife at the time) and Kenny Burrell set the ground groove, with Stan bubbling above on sax. It opens with a great version of “Trouble” followed by a gospel-tinged number by Scott called “Ladyfingers” with powerful solos by both Scott and Stan. “Goin’ Home,” based on the Largo movement from Dvorak’s New World Symphony, provides a lilting and melancholy coda to the album. Hustlin’ showcases both his fat burnished sound on ballads and his more earthy, blues sensibility.
     Perhaps Turrentine was more of a straight-ahead player than a virtuoso, but his polished yet blues-drenched solos provided a distinctive voice on the sax for half a century. His place in the jazz pantheon ought to be moved up an octave.