#everybodydigs is a series of posts about Jazz, Funk, Soul & R’n’b albums released from the 20s to the 90s, you can read a brief description/review and listen to a small preview (when it’s possible). everybodydigs# is like when someone tells you “hey you should listen to this album!” and nothing less, enjoy.

One of Charles Mingus’ most ambitious efforts and among the finest albums from the last stage of his career, this 1972 recording features extended compositions for jazz orchestra. Let My Children Hear Music songs It’s serious, sophisticated, modernist music that still swings hard. Soloists include Charles McPherson, James Moody, and Sir Roland Hanna, with arrangements and orchestrations beautifully handled by Sy Johnson. Mingus called this his personal favorite among all his recordings.

Rappamelo’s favorite track.

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everybodydigs# is a series of posts about Jazz, Funk, Soul & R’n’b albums released from the 20s to the 90s, you can read a brief description/review and listen to a small preview (when it’s possible). everybodydigs# is like when someone tells you “hey you should listen to this album!” and nothing less, enjoy!

By 1970, pianist Ahmad Jamal’s style had changed a bit since the 1950s, becoming denser and more adventurous while still retaining his musical identity. With bassist Jamil Nasser (whose double-timing lines are sometimes furious) and drummer Frank Gant, Jamal performs two originals (playing over a vamp on “Patterns”), the obscure “I Love Music,” and four jazz standards. These are intriguing performances showing that Ahmad Jamal was continuing to evolve.

Rappamelo’s favorite track.

everybodydigs# is a series of posts about Jazz, Funk, Soul & R’n’b albums released from the 20s to the 90s, you can read a brief description/review and listen to a small preview (when it’s possible). everybodydigs# is like when someone tells you “hey you should listen to this album!” and nothing less, enjoy!

The seven-song Unique Thelonious Monk (1956) platter was the pianist’s second during his remarkable five-year tenure on Riverside. His debut for the label was the aptly titled Plays Duke Ellington (1955) and once again, on this disc, Monk’s song selection did not feature any original compositions. Rather, the well-chosen standards included exemplify and help further establish the pianist and bandleader within the context of familiar melodies at the head of a trio — consisting of Oscar Pettiford (bass) and Art Blakey (drums). Regarding the personnel, while Pettiford had also accompanied Monk on the Ellington sides, Blakey replaces Kenny Clarke. The trio struts and glides as Monk’s intricate fingering simultaneously displays his physical dexterity as well as his ability to play so deftly in the moment. Both attributes would resurface ten-fold once Monk began to animate his own compositions on the genre-defining Brilliant Corners (1956). (allmusic)

Personnel: Thelonious Monk (piano); Oscar Pettiford (bass); Kenny Clarke, Art Blakey (drums).

Rappamelo’s favorite track.

everybodydigs# is a series of posts about Jazz, Funk, Soul & R’n’b albums released from the 20s to the 90s, you can read a brief description/review and listen to a small preview (when it’s possible). everybodydigs# is like when someone tells you “hey you should listen to this album!” and nothing less, enjoy!

Everybody Digs Bill Evans was a landmark recording for the young pianist and sported a unique album cover, featuring written-out endorsements from Miles Davis, George Shearing, Ahmad Jamal, and Cannonball Adderley. At a time approximate to when Evans was performing with the famous Kind of Blue band of Davis, Adderley, and John Coltrane, and actually departing the band, Evans continued to play the trio music he was ultimately best known for. With the unmatched pair of former Miles Davis drummer Philly Joe Jones and bassist Sam Jones (no relation), Evans was emerging not only as an ultra-sensitive player, but as an interpreter of standards second to none. The drummer is quite toned down to match the dynamics of the session, while the ever-reliable bassist lays back even more than usual, but at the expense of his soul. Though not his very best effort overall, Evans garnered great attention, and rightfully so, from this important album of 1958. (allmusic)

Rappemelo’s favorite track.

everybodydigs# is a series of posts about Jazz, Funk, Soul & R’n’b albums released from the 20s to the 90s, you can read a brief description/review and listen to a small preview (when it’s possible). everybodydigs# is like when someone tells you “hey you should listen to this album!” and nothing less, enjoy!

Although this album marks Thelonious Monk’s sole recording as a member of Art Blakey’s celebrated Jazz Messengers, the pianist and drummer were very close friends who understood each other well on both a personal and musical level. In fact, Blakey was present on both Monk’s first and last studio sessions, spanning a period of 24 years from the 1947 quintet and trio recordings to the last sets taped in London in 1971, when Blakey and Monk were touring with the group called the “Giants of Jazz” (which also included Sonny Stitt, Dizzy Gillespie, Kai Winding and Al McKibbon). In fact, all of these recordings (the 1947 sessions debuting the very personal musical conception of Thelonious Monk, this amazing 1957 session with the Messengers made during the zenith of Monk’s career and the 1971 London session) are true masterpieces in their own right. Art Blakey’s presence on all of these recordings was not purely accidental as he and Monk shared a common artistic feeling. Blakey never made a secret of his admiration for Monk both as a pianist and as a composer. With the exception of Johnny Griffin’s “Purple Shades”, all of the compositions on this album are classic Thelonious Monk tunes. “I always record some of my songs over again”, explained Monk during a 1965 interview with Les Tomkins, “but it’s not going to be the same because I don’t think of playing it the same way as I thought of playing it before. And then it might be with a different instrumentation. Like, some things I might play with the tenor now had alto before. I have to think differently of voicing the tenor, so that automatically eliminates the alto sound. That’s why I think there’s no harm in doing things over- because these songs are supposed to live.” The addition of the trumpet here is a departure from Monk’s typical classic quartet format, and all of the musicians featured here are different as well, making this music sound completely fresh.

Rappamelo’s favorite track.

everybodydigs# is a series of posts about Jazz, Funk, Soul & R’n’b albums released from the 20s to the 90s, you can read a brief description/review and listen to a small preview (when it’s possible). everybodydigs# is like when someone tells you “hey you should listen to this album!” and nothing less, enjoy!

Sorcerer, the third album by the second Miles Davis Quintet, is in a sense a transitional album, a quiet, subdued affair that rarely blows hot, choosing to explore cerebral tonal colorings. Even when the tempo picks up, as it does on the title track, there’s little of the dense, manic energy on Miles Smiles — this is about subtle shadings, even when the compositions are as memorable as Tony Williams’ “Pee Wee” or Herbie Hancock’s “Sorcerer.” As such, it’s a little elusive, since it represents the deepening of the band’s music as they choose to explore different territory. The emphasis is as much on complex, interweaving chords and a coolly relaxed sound as it is on sheer improvisation, though each member tears off thoroughly compelling solos. Still, the individual flights aren’t placed at the forefront the way they were on the two predecessors — it all merges together, pointing toward the dense soundscapes of Miles’ later ’60s work. (allmusic)

Rappamelo’s favorite track.

everybodydigs# is a series of posts about Jazz, Funk, Soul & R’n’b albums released from the 20s to the 90s, you can read a brief description/review and listen to a small preview (when it’s possible). everybodydigs# is like when someone tells you “hey you should listen to this album!” and nothing less, enjoy!

Following the release of A Love Supreme, John Coltrane entered into a year of furious creation, including the recording of dramatic, iconic works such as Ascension and Meditations. While many of his fans couldn’t make the leap of faith required for a sojourn into Coltrane’s emotive new sound, those who surrendered to the dramatic outside interplay of his classic quartet bore witness to spiritual transformations of enduring innovation. Recorded on August 26, 1965 (and not released until after his death), Sun Ship is Coltrane’s final recorded date with his famed quartet. Pharoah Sanders would join the group the following month, and pianist McCoy Tyner and drummer Elvin Jones would depart in January of 1966 to be replaced by Coltrane’s wife Alice and Rashied Ali. It is also one of the saxophonist’s most intense performances as well as a testament to the maturity and resourcefulness of his rhythm section. Sun Ship is also a fervent prelude for Coltrane’s final period of brave — and often musically perilous — transformation.

Personnel: John Coltrane (tenor saxophone); McCoy Tyner (piano); Jimmy Garrison (bass); Elvin Jones (drums).

Rappamelo’s favorite track.

everybodydigs# is a series of posts about Jazz, Funk, Soul & R’n’b albums released from the 20s to the 90s, you can read a brief description/review and listen to a small preview (when it’s possible). everybodydigs# is like when someone tells you “hey you should listen to this album!” and nothing less, enjoy!

Grant Green’s 1964 Street Of Dreams date with organ guru Larry Young is an entirely different affair than Talkin’ About, the session the pair recorded earlier that year. It features four lengthy meditations that find Green and Young (not to mention vibraphone viscount Bobby Hutcherson) unfurling thoughtful, low-key riffs that establish an autumnal, introspective feel, as opposed to the more hard-bop-tinged tracks on the previous album. Green may be known as a master of soul jazz, but Street Of Dreams proves he’s got plenty more strings to his bow, and sounds oddly contemporary, as though it could have been released on a label like ECM some 20 years later.

Rappamelo’s favorite track.

everybodydigs# is a series of posts about Jazz, Funk, Soul & R’n’b albums released from the 20s to the 90s, you can read a brief description/review and listen to a small preview (when it’s possible). everybodydigs# is like when someone tells you “hey you should listen to this album!” and nothing less, enjoy!

Moonbeams was the first recording Bill Evans made after the death of his musical right arm, bassist Scott LaFaro. Indeed, in LaFaro, Evans found a counterpart rather than a sideman, and the music they made together over four albums showed it. Bassist Chuck Israels from Cecil Taylor and Bud Powell’s bands took his place in the band with Evans and drummer Paul Motian and Evans recorded the only possible response to the loss of LaFaro — an album of ballads. The irony on this recording is that, despite material that was so natural for Evans to play, particularly with his trademark impressionistic sound collage style, is that other than as a sideman almost ten years before, he has never been more assertive than on Moonbeams. It is as if, with the death of LaFaro, Evans’ safety net was gone and he had to lead the trio alone. And he does first and foremost by abandoning the impressionism in favor of a more rhythmic and muscular approach to harmony.

Rappamelo’s favorite track.

everybodydigs# is a series of posts about Jazz, Funk, Soul & R’n’b albums released from the 20s to the 90s, you can read a brief description/review and listen to a small preview (when it’s possible). everybodydigs# is like when someone tells you “hey you should listen to this album!” and nothing less, enjoy!

In an unusual setting for a groove/soul jazz setting, B3 organist extraordinaire big John Patton creates a band around himself that includes Grant Green, drummer Otis Finch, and vibraphonist Bobby Hutcherson. It’s truly weird to think of vibes on a groove date, but the way Patton’s understated playing works, and the way Green is literally all things to all players, Hutcherson’s role is not only a clearly defined one, but adds immeasurably to both depth and texture on this date. What also makes this possible is the symbiotic relationship between Patton and Green. This is one of the least appreciated of Patton’s records, and there’s no reason for it; it is great. (allmusic)

Rappamelo’s favorite track.