Exploring vintage jazz vinyl with a focus on label and pressing details, discographical information and critical musings on the music found within the grooves.
Roy Haynes steps out of his usual role as a master sideman to lead an exciting and adventurous session that features the outsized talents of Roland Kirk. It's an under-appreciated gem of a record from jazz's golden age that also showcases the playing of Tommy Flanagan and Henry Grimes.
Read MoreWhile Fats Navarro didn't leave us a large body of work to appreciate, his true lasting legacy is the influence he had on the trumpeters that would come after him in the '50s and '60s. It would not be incorrect to say that as far as the jazz trumpet style and sound we know and love, all roads lead back to Fats Navarro. The double-LP Prime Source focuses on what is generally considered his finest period - the years 1947 to 1949 - when he worked with Tadd Dameron and Bud Powell, as well as in a group he co-led with his close friend and mentor Howard McGhee.
Read MoreA true all-star affair, The Blues And The Abstract Truth finds Oliver Nelson leading a group of legendary jazz musicians on a record that just about sums up the essence of the hard bop sound that had been building momentum since the mid-1950s.
Read MoreSarah Vaughan's EmArcy sides are exciting and vibrant, and show off her talents while she was making the kind of music she enjoyed the most. In The Land Of Hi-Fi adds a nice twist to the usual high-standards of her EmArcy recordings, in that one of the featured players is a young Cannonball Adderley. According to the liner notes (where he is still referred to as the Florida Flash), he "flew north with alto under arm especially to take part on these sides."
Read MoreOliver Nelson will always be best known for his 1961 masterpiece The Blues And The Abstract Truth on Impulse!, but he also made some excellent records for Prestige in the years just preceding that release. One of the lesser known ones is Nocturne, an LP released on the Moodsville subset of Prestige in 1960.
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