"In 1962 Dexter Gordon who, after his famous recordings made at the beginning of the fifties, lived more or less obscurely and without much attention paid to in Los Angeles, had a brilliant come-back with his Blue Note album 'Go!'. Since that time numerous Dexter Gordon records were produced both in the USA and Europe - nearly all in quartet or quintet format in order to attain the success of 'Go!' or even to surpass it.
"The 'new thing' of this 1969 MPS record is the face that here Dexter is presented for the first time in an arranged frame for three horns, drafted by Slide Hampton. This collaboration between arranger/trombonist Slide Hampton and Dexter Gordon became possible since Slide's arrival in Europe last year. He and Dexter often played together with great inspiration and enthusiasm and often expressed the wish to make a record together.
"Dexter Gordon who played in the bands of Lionel Hampton and Louis Armstrong, made his first successful record with the Bill Eckstine Big Band in 1945: the famous 'Blowing the Blues Away'. His breakthrough however came with a range of tenor-battles with Wardell Gray, who in 1955 was found dead in the desert near Las Vegas. How important Gordon's influence was became clear at the end of the fifties when - having been nearly forgotten by the great mass of Jazz fans - pioneering musicians such as Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane mentioned him as their special 'inspiration'.
"In 1963 Dexter came to Europe travelling through many European countries until finding a real home in Copenhagen. When last year - after some bad experiences the great tenorist had in Paris - the Danish authorities refused to give him a license card hundreds of young people marched on Copenhagen's Radhus-Plads demonstrating: 'We want Dexter! We want Dexter!'
"This happened about the same time when Slide Hampton came to Europe. Slide belongs to a younger generation than Dexter. In the mid-fifties he became known for his playing with Buddy Johnson and Lionel Hampton, but his breakthrough came through both his trombone-playing and his arrangements for Maynard Ferguson's 1957/59 orchestra. His most famous piece at this time was his well known 'Fugue' - perhaps the most swinging of all the Jazz fugues (the author of these notes is using it for nearly 10 years as theme-song for the SWF-Jazz-Sessions, the Jazz concert series of the Southwestern German Radio and TV Network). How brilliantly Slide can score for medium-sized bands is fully demonstrated on the records he made under his own name for RCA-Victor and Atlantic. There are recordings with an octet having the power and richness in sound of a big band (e.g. the successful 'Sister Salvation').
"Slide wrote all the arrangements for our record - with the exception of Dexter's improvised quartet contribution 'The Shadow of Your Smile'. He also composed three of the selections. A typical example for the rich sounds Slide knows to get from only three horns is 'A Day in Vienna', dedicated to the Jazz-Workshop of the Austrian Radio Network in Vienna.
"'A New Thing' is - judged by the stylistic standards many listeners may associate with the terms 'New Thing' - a complete 'Old Thing'. 'I only called it 'New Thing' because it was the newest I had written for the date with Dex' (says Slide). And it was this new-old 'New Thing' the musicians liked best when making the record.
"'My Blues' was Slide's first composition after coming to Europe in 1966; he says: 'It gave us a chance to get away from the complex chord patterns of some of the other music on the date'.
"Let's also hear what Slide himself has to say about 'What's New': 'I remember this song from many great artists, but most of all from Clifford Brown with Strings. I knew all the cats were hip to this one... it is written in a 12/8 rhythm...'
"'You Don't Know What Love Is' finall is - as every interpretation of this beautiful melody - a tribute to Billie Holiday. Slide Hampton: 'When playing this we all thought about Billie and her great album 'Lady in Satin' and also about a later recording by Miles Davis. I changed the tempo but tried to keep the same beautiful melodic and harmonic concept that Billie and Miles used.'
"The third horn on our album is Jamaica-born Dizzy Reece who sincce 1948 has been living in Europe - apart from a short American interlude - alternately in England, Germany, France and Holland, a trumpeter having been praised by such critical colleagues as Miles Davis and Dizzy Gillespie.
"And last not least as rhythm section we decided on the Kenny Drew Trio, to whom Dexter Gordon is since long especially accustomed from playing with at Copenhagen's 'Jazz-Hus Montmartre': Kenny Drew on piano and Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen on bass and guest drummer Art Taylor from Paris." (Joachim E. Berendt, tr. Wolf-Dieter Wagner. From the liner notes.)
Performers: Dexter Gordon (t-sx), Slide Hampton (tb), Dizzy Reece (tp), Kenny Drew (pi), Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen (bs), Art Taylor (dr)
A1. My Blues
A2. You Don't Know What Love Is
A3. A New Thing
B1. What's New
B2. The Shadow Of Your Smile
B3. A Day In Vienna
No comments:
Post a Comment