“A Caddy for Daddy” Hank Mobley A classic, timeless, quintessential mid-sixties cover from the oft-quoted Blue Note graphic designer Reid Miles. Here’s something as beautiful on the inside as on the outside. Hank Mobley, Lee Morgan, Curtis Fuller, Bob Crenshaw and Billy Higgins at the top of their form. Artists of the highest order creating in a world of their own. Turn someone on today. Here’s the swinging, rumprolling title cut: A Caddy For Daddy
“J’aime danser sur le Jazz” Vogue Records A French compilation of swing jazz with Sidney Bechet, Buck Clayton, Coleman Hawkins and others. Many were ex-pats living in France during the forties and fifties.
Art Blakey Salute to Birdland EmArcy Records EP (1954) Buhaina the master, with Bernard Griggs, Joe Gordon, Gigi Gryce and Walter Bishop! Tracks are: Minority, Salute to Birdland, Eleanor, Futurity
Harry Carney with Strings (1954) Clef Records Arranged by Ralph Burns. Cover illustration by David Stone Martin! Carney on baritone and bass clarinet with fellow Duke Ellington sidemen including: Ray Nance on trumpet and violin; Tony Miranda on French horn; Jimmy Hamilton on clarinet and tenor sax; Leroy Lovett on piano; Billy Bauer on guitar; Wendell Marshall on bass; and Louie Bellson on drums. (You won’t find this album if you search for it by its original title. That’s because its tracks have been folded into a Ben Webster CD calledMusic for Loving. The last eight tracks on the second disc make up the Carney album.
In the early 60’s Riverside Records put together two beautiful pin-up puzzles filled with some of Jazz’s greatest musicians playing songs from the American Songbook. Six records of the music of Richard Rodgers, Cole Porter, Jerome Kern (top) and George Gershwin, Harold Arlen and Irving Berlin (bottom) interpreted by Thelonious Monk, Bill Evans, Cannonball Adderley, Sonny Rollins. Wes Montgomery, Blue Mitchell and on and on. Having these six records would be a fine foundation for any collection. And look at these women – moanin’, rollin’, writhin’, groovin’ and movin’ with the music!
“Fill Your Head With Jazz” 25 All-Time Giants of Jazz A groovy, two-record compilation from the vaults of Columbia Records. I had this as a kid and it introduced me to a lot of these cats. I pulled it out this past winter to play the Lambert, Hendricks and Ross vocal of “Moanin'” for my friend. Sadly, in my excitement, I laid it on the radiator and the remaining disk got baked and warped into an ashtray. And I don’t smoke. Now I’m really moanin’!