John Scofield - 1977 [1987] "Live"

John Scofield Live is a live album by jazz guitarist John Scofield, featuring pianist Richie Beirach, bassist George Mraz and drummer Joe LaBarbera. It was recorded on November 4th, 1977 in Munchen, Germany.

This set features some high-quality post-bop guitar playing by the immediately distinctive John Scofield. The four lengthy selections -- three originals and an over 15-minute rendition of "Softly as in a Morning Sunrise" -- find Scofield, pianist Richie Beirach, bassist George Mraz and drummer Joe LaBarbera really stretching out. The music holds one's interest throughout and shows how mature a player the guitarist was even during his early pre-Miles Davis period.

Mid-price reissue of 1977 live album by guitar great John Scofield, alongside pianist Richie Beirach, bassist George Mraz and drummer Joe LaBarbera.

"Spirited soloing and studio savvy stand as trademarks of 28-year-old John Scofield, a jazz guitarist who in a few short years already has garnered an impressive catalogue of gigs and LPs with top jazzers like Billy Cobham, George Duke, the late Charlie Mingus, Gerry Mulligan, Chet Baker, and a host of others.

John Scofield Live, which captures him in a modern jazz setting with pianist Richie Beirach, bassist George Mraz, and drummer Joe LaBarbera.

Single lines possessing a horn-like fluidity and sweetness abound, while his chord voicings articulate a natural, unstilted approach to the electric guitar.

So whether he's soaring on flights of improvisational fantasy, or getting down to some smoking bebop, John Scofield has come of age in the world of electric jazz."

Track listing:

All tracks are written by John Scofield except where noted.

1.    "V."         10:33
2.    "Gray and Visceral"         14:54
3.    "Leaving"    Scofield, Richie Beirach    14:35
4.    "Air Pakistan"         9:41
5.    "Jeannie"         8:22
6.    "Softly, as in a Morning Sunrise"    Oscar Hammerstein II, Sigmund Romberg    15:11

Personnel:

    John Scofield – electric guitar
    Richie Beirach – piano
    George Mraz – double bass
    Joe LaBarbera – drums

John Coltrane - 1965 [1992] "The Major Works of John Coltrane"

The Major Works of John Coltrane is a compilation album by jazz musician John Coltrane, released in 1992 by GRP Records. It features extended compositions, all recorded in 1965 with expanded ensembles, and originally released by Impulse! Records on Ascension, Om, Kulu Sé Mama, and Selflessness: Featuring My Favorite Things. Both editions of Ascension are included.

This two CD set brings together some very intense and transitional music recorded by John Coltrane in 1965. This was a fascinating period in his career, as his longtime quartet with McCoy Tyner on piano, Jimmy Garrison on bass and Elvin Jones on drums was in the process of dissolving, and his role as a mentor to the younger “New Thing" musicians led him to seek out new collaborators like Archie Shepp, Pharoah Sanders and Rashied Ali.

On the recordings collected here, the quartet is joined by a rotating cast of additional musicians which allow for a larger palette to be used in the ambitious music Coltrane was working toward. The two takes of Coltrane's monumental “Ascension" dominate this collection. As a big band free jazz performance it was unique in the jazz canon at the time, akin to Ornette Coleman's “Free Jazz" but separate in its ambition and execution. Spiritual concerns were paramount to the final period of Coltrane's career, and it is possible to see “Ascension" as his musical impressions of a man's journey to the afterlife. But much like William Blake's spiritual poetry, it is a harrowing journey.

This is a transitory, experimental work and should be viewed as such. Allowing the music to wash over you with the ebbs and flows of the soloists and groups is one of the most intense experiences in jazz, and broke new ground for the likes of Peter Brotzmann and the ROVA Saxophone Quartet (who have recorded two of their own interpretations of “Ascension") to continue the exploration. “Om" is one of the most daunting performances in Coltrane's music for listeners to comprehend.

Over the course of two crucial discs, The Major Works of John Coltrane compiles the saxophonist's most important extended free jazz pieces from 1965. This is the material that made Coltrane a giant of the avant-garde, completely casting off the limits of melody, harmony, and tonality that he'd been straining against.

All the performances feature Coltrane's classic quartet augmented by Pharoah Sanders and several others, depending on the session. Literally and figuratively, the biggest piece here is of course "Ascension," the album-length, 11-piece free improvisation that finally picked up the gauntlet thrown down by the release of Ornette Coleman's Free Jazz four years earlier. Present in both of its two takes, it's among the most frightening jazz performances ever committed to tape, pairing Coltrane's search for spiritual transcendence with a screeching ferocity (courtesy of five saxophones) that never lets up.

Ascension was far more abrasive and visceral than Free Jazz, benefiting from four years of development in jazz's avant-garde, which helped make each individual player's voice more suited to this kind of chaotic, textural music. Not all of Coltrane's free work was this consistently extreme, but it did come close in isolated moments.

The incantatory "Om" expands on Ascension by contrasting the same sort of passionate, banshee-scream ensembles with eerie, meditative passages, bookending the piece with poetic recitations. "Kulu Se Mama," based on a song by percussionist/vocalist Juno Lewis, further explores the ritualistic dimension of "Om" with subtle hints of danceability and Creole/Caribbean flavor. "Selflessness" is the most conventional of the pieces, starting out like a standard Coltrane Quartet piece before moving into the large-ensemble explorations. There's a lot to digest here, but as an encapsulation of Coltrane's freest and most challenging music, there's no better place to turn.

Track listing:

Disc 1:

    "Ascension - Edition I" — 38:37
    "Om" — 28:49

Disc 2:

    "Ascension - Edition II" — 40:31
    "Kulu Se Mama" — 18:57
    "Selflessness" — 15:09

Personnel:

Recorded June 28 and October 1965.

    John Coltrane — tenor saxophone
    Pharoah Sanders — tenor saxophone
    Archie Shepp — tenor saxophone (disc 1: track 1, disc 2: track 1)
    Marion Brown — alto saxophone (disc 1: track 1, disc 2: track 1)
    John Tchicai — alto saxophone (disc 1: track 1, disc 2: track 1)
    Freddie Hubbard — trumpet (disc 1: track 1, disc 2: track 1)
    Dewey Johnson — trumpet (disc 1: track 1, disc 2: track 1)
    Joe Brazil — flute (disc 1: track 2)
    Donald Garrett — clarinet[nb 1]/bass (disc 1: track 2, disc 2: tracks 2,3)
    McCoy Tyner — piano
    Jimmy Garrison — bass
    Art Davis — bass (disc 1: track 1, disc 2: track 1)
    Elvin Jones — drums
    Frank Butler — drums (disc 2: tracks 2,3)
    Juno Lewis — percussion/vocals (disc 2: tracks 2,3)

Notes:

The credits on the album jacket state that Garrett played bass clarinet on the recording. However, the authors of The John Coltrane Reference, who occasionally present updates to the book on their website (http://wildmusic-jazz.com/jcr_index.htm), provided an update dated 2008 which states that Dutch musician Cornelis Hazevoet sent the following information via an email to author Yasuhiro Fujioka: "Over the years, in liners, books and lists, Don Garrett has been attributed with playing bass clarinet. This is wrong. The man only played bass and clarinet (the small and straight horn, that is)... In 1975, Garrett played in my band and I've specifically asked him about it (because I already felt something was wrong with it). He most specifically and pertinently told me that he never played bass clarinet in his entire life, only the small, straight horn (which he played in my band too)... Perhaps, the error originated from the fact that Garrett was listed somewhere as playing 'bass, clarinet', which subsequently evolved into 'bass clarinet'. Whatever is the case, Garrett did not play bass clarinet on any Coltrane record nor anywhere else.

Herbie Hancock - 1973 [1997] "Head Hunters"

Head Hunters is the twelfth studio album by American pianist and composer Herbie Hancock, released October 26, 1973, on Columbia Records. Recording sessions for the album took place in the evening at Wally Heider Studios and Different Fur Trading Co. in San Francisco, California. The album was a commercial and artistic breakthrough for Hancock, crossing over to funk and rock audiences and bringing jazz-funk fusion to mainstream attention, peaking at number 13 on the Billboard 200. Hancock is featured with his ‘Mwandishi’ saxophonist Bennie Maupin and new collaborators – bassist Paul Jackson, percussionist Bill Summers and drummer Harvey Mason. The latter group of collaborators, which would go on to be known as The Headhunters, also played on Hancock's subsequent studio album Thrust (1974). All of the musicians (with the exception of Mason) play multiple instruments on the album.

Head Hunters followed a series of experimental albums by Hancock's sextet: Mwandishi, Crossings, and Sextant, released between 1971 and 1973, a time when Hancock was looking for a new direction in which to take his music:

    I began to feel that I had been spending so much time exploring the upper atmosphere of music and the more ethereal kind of far-out spacey stuff. Now there was this need to take some more of the earth and to feel a little more tethered; a connection to the earth. ... I was beginning to feel that we (the sextet) were playing this heavy kind of music, and I was tired of everything being heavy. I wanted to play something lighter.
    — Hancock's sleeve notes: 1997 CD reissue

For the new album, Hancock assembled a new band, the Headhunters, of whom only Bennie Maupin had been a sextet member. Hancock handled all synthesizer parts himself (having previously shared these duties with Patrick Gleeson) and he decided against the use of guitar altogether, favoring instead the clavinet, one of the defining sounds on the album. The new band featured a tight rhythm and blues-oriented rhythm section composed of Paul Jackson (bass) and Harvey Mason (drums), and the album has a relaxed, funky groove that gave the album an appeal to a far wider audience. Perhaps the defining moment of the jazz-fusion movement (or perhaps even the spearhead of the Jazz-funk style of the fusion genre), the album made jazz listeners out of rhythm and blues fans, and vice versa. The album mixes funk rhythms, like the busy high hats in 16th notes on the opening track "Chameleon", with the jazz AABA form and extended soloing.

Of the four tracks on the album "Watermelon Man" was the only one not written for the album. A hit from Hancock's hard bop days, originally appearing on his first album Takin' Off (1962), it was reworked by Hancock and Mason and has an instantly recognizable intro featuring Bill Summers blowing into a beer bottle, an imitation of the hindewho, an instrument of the Mbuti Pygmies of Northeastern Zaire (this is also reprised in the outro). The track features heavy use of African percussion. "Sly" was dedicated to the pioneering funk musician Sly Stone, leader of Sly and the Family Stone. "Chameleon" (the opening track) is another track with an instantly recognizable intro, the introductory line played on an ARP Odyssey synth. "Vein Melter" is a slow-burner, predominantly featuring Hancock and Maupin, with Hancock mostly playing Fender Rhodes electric piano, but occasionally bringing in some heavily effected synth parts.

Heavily edited versions of "Chameleon" and "Vein Melter" were released as a 45 rpm single.

The album was also re-mixed for 4-channel quadraphonic sound in 1974. Columbia released it on LP record in the SQ matrix format and on 8-track tape. The quad mixes feature elements not heard in the stereo version, including an additional 2-second keyboard melody at the beginning of "Sly". Surround sound versions of the album have been released a number of times on the Super Audio CD format. All of these SACD editions use a digital transfer of the original four-channel quad mix re-purposed into 5.1 surround.

Until George Benson's Breezin' (1976), it was the largest-selling jazz album of all time.

The Headhunters band (with Mike Clark replacing Harvey Mason) worked with Hancock on a number of other albums, including Thrust (1974), Man-Child (1975), and Flood (1975), the latter of which was recorded live in Japan. The subsequent albums Secrets (1976) and Sunlight (1977), had widely diverging personnel. The Headhunters, with Hancock featured as a guest soloist, produced a series of funk albums, Survival of the Fittest (1975) and Straight from the Gate (1978), the first of which was produced by Hancock and included the big hit "God Make Me Funky".

The image on the album cover, designed by Victor Moscoso, is based on the African kple kple mask of the Baoulé tribe from Ivory Coast. The image is also based on tape head demagnetizers used on reel-to-reel audio tape recording equipment at the time of this recording. Hancock is represented by the man wearing said image while playing the keyboard, and positioned clockwise around him from lower left are Mason, Jackson, Maupin and Summers.

In 2005, the album was ranked number 498 in the book version of Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. While it was not included in Rolling Stone's original 2003 online version of the list, nor the 2012 revision, it was ranked number 254 in their 2020 reboot of the list. Head Hunters was a key release in Hancock's career and a defining moment in the genre of jazz, and has been an inspiration not only for jazz musicians, but also to funk, soul music, jazz funk and hip hop artists. The Library of Congress added it to the National Recording Registry, which collects "culturally, historically or aesthetically important" sound recordings from the 20th century.

Track listing:

01 Chameleon     15:41
02 Watermelon Man 6:29
03 Sly             10:18
04 Vein Melter      9:10

Personnel:

    Herbie Hancock – Fender Rhodes electric piano, Hohner D6 Clavinet, ARP Odyssey & ARP Pro Soloist synthesizers
    Bennie Maupin – tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone, saxello, bass clarinet, alto flute
    Paul Jackson – bass guitar, marímbula
    Harvey Mason – drums
    Bill Summers – agogô, balafon, beer bottles on Watermelon Man, cabasa, congas, gankogui, hindewhu, log drum, shekere, surdo, tambourine