Hank Mobley: Thinking of Home

by Robert Gilbert
November 3, 2002

Hank Mobley’s conclusion to his long and storied association with Blue Note Records has finally made it to CD through the label’s Connoisseur series. Thinking of Home, which was recorded on the last day of July in 1970 but not made available until ten years later, shows that the tenor saxophonist was still building on his trademark hard-bop style. A three-part suite that opens the album features Mobley dabbling with long-form composition and “Justine” has him providing a stimulating framework ...

Woody Shaw (32 Jazz: Imagination

by C. Michael Bailey
July 1, 1999

Let Me Reintroduce.... Woody Shaw (1944 – 1989) was a popular yet never fully appreciated trumpeter during the 1970s and 80s. Largely influenced by Freddie Hubbard, Shaw is considered by jazz musicologists to be a bridge between Hard Bop and Avant-garde trumpet playing. He played and recorded with Eric Dolphy, Horace Silver, Dexter Gordon, Andrew Hill, and Jackie McLean. In spite of this exposure, he was overshadowed by other period trumpeters. This is unfortunate, because Shaw is a very exciting ...

Joe Henderson: In Pursuit of Blackness / Black is the Color

by Robert Spencer
June 1, 1999

Rather famously, Joe Henderson released a series of albums for Milestone in the early Seventies that courted popular acceptance in a variety of ways: most notably, he played modal proto-world music with Alice Coltrane and added an electric piano and other frou-frou to his ensembles in order to catch the fusion crowd. Nothing worked, and these albums are generally regarded as inferior both to the series of Blue Notes that preceded them and the Grand-Old-Man Verve releases of the present ...

Woody Shaw: Blackstone Legacy

by Douglas Payne
June 1, 1999

Trumpeter Woody Shaw (1944-89) was 26 in 1970 when he recorded this, his official solo debut, for Contemporary Records. Originally a double LP, the six longish originals (four by Shaw and the disc's two best by the keyboardist on the date, George Cables) make it on to one CD due to some imperceptible editing on two tracks. An earlier Shaw solo recording eventually surfaced: a 1965 session featured on 32 Jazz's Last of The Line. But Shaw officially got his ...

Woody Shaw: Imagination

by Jim Santella
October 1, 1998

Originally released by Muse in 1987, this album features the talented quintet of trumpeter Woody Shaw, trombonist Steve Turre, pianist Kirk Lightsey, bassist Ray Drummond, and drummer Carl Allen. Steve Turre, who worked with Woody Shaw for about 16 years, had already developed the same sort of natural style for which we remember Shaw. In his original liner notes, Howard Mandel says of the trumpeter, “Clarity and economy are his goals; frills and flourishes are stripped away so the essentials ...

Woody Shaw: Two More Pieces Of The Puzzle

by Jim Santella
June 1, 1998

Recorded in 1976 and 1977, two Muse LPs are reissued in one package: The Woody Shaw Concert Ensemble At The Berliner Jazztage and The Iron Men. Trumpeter Woody Shaw, who passed away in 1989 at the age of forty-four, was blessed with a remarkably pretty trumpet tone. His fast and furious hard bop sound, coupled with excursions into new and advanced harmonic areas, made him a favorite among serious jazz fans.

Recorded live at the Berlin Jazz Festival in 1976, ...

Woody Shaw: Dark Journey

by Robert Spencer
January 1, 1998

Dark Journey is a 2-CD compilation of some of the best recordings by the great trumpeter Woody Shaw. Tracks are gathered from recordings dating from 1965 to 1987, and most impressive is the breadth of the guest list: Anthony Braxton, Muhal Richard Abrams, Cedar Walton, Kenny Garrett, J. J. Johnson, Joe Henderson, Horace Silver, Larry Young, Elvin Jones, Herbie Hancock, Paul Chambers, and Ron Carter, along with Shavians like Steve Turre and Onaje Allen Gumbs.

Anyone unfamiliar with the astoundingly ...