The Prestige All Stars - Roots (1957/2013/FLAC)

 

Roots is an album by the Prestige All Stars nominally led by trumpeter Idrees Sulieman recorded in 1957 and released on the New Jazz label. More big-band bop with a stellar cast, it includes Cecil Payne, Pepper Adams, and Idrees Sulieman on saxes and Bill Evans on piano.

It features two classic 1957 jam sessions, with trumpeter Idrees Sulieman and bassist Doug Watkins the commom links. The disc leads off with the 27 minute long title track, recorded on December 6th, with all the musicians – Sulieman, Watkins, Pepper Adams, Bill Evans, Louis Hayes and little known trombonist Frank Rehak – getting tons of room to stretch out. The other two numbers, from October 25th and featuring Cecil Payne, Jimmy Cleveland, Tommy Flanagan and Elvin Jones joining Sulieman and Watkins, are more succinct timewise, but overall just as impressive. If you find this now OOP CD as inexpensively as I did, then it should definitely be time to get back to your "Roots."

• Idrees Sulieman - trumpet
• Jimmy Cleveland - trombone
• Frank Rehak - trombone
• Pepper Adams - baritone saxophone
• Cecil Payne - baritone saxophone
• Bill Evans - piano
• Tommy Flanagan - piano
• Doug Watkins - bass
• Louis Hayes - drums
• Elvin Jones - drums

Clifford Jordan - The Complete Strata - East Sessions [6 CD, 2013/FLAC]

 

A really amazing set of work from tenorist Clifford Jordan – a player who first rose to fame in the hardbop scene of the late 50s, but who moved into tremendous new territory with these Strata East recordings of the late 60s and early 70s! Jordan was a Chicago contemporary of players like Johnny Griffin and Von Freeman, but he was never content to rest on his laurels – and stretched out on these records with a spiritual vibe that he'd never expressed before – and which would go onto inspire countless other musicians in years to come! This set brings together all the Dolphy Series recordings that Jordan recorded – either as an artist or producer – two of which were never issued on record at the time. Jordan's own albums for the label are wonderful enough – the double-length Glass Bead Games, one of our favorite records ever – and the killer In The World, which is great too. But this set also adds in other Strata East albums that really help illustrate the scene in which Jordan was working – including the excellent Pharoah Sanders non-Impulse session, Izipho Zam; the modern music of Charles Brackeen on Rhythm X, with Don Cherry on trumpet and Brackeen on tenor; and the great Cecil Payne album Zodiac, which has some of the last trumpet work ever from Kenny Dorham. Plus, the set also features two extremely rare albums – the never-issued Shades Of Edward Blackwell – led by the drummer, with Don Cherry on trumpet and Luqman Lateef on tenor, plus a bit of log drum from Jordan – and the obscure Super Bass album from Wilbur Ware, which features Jordan on tenor, in a quartet with Ware on bass, Don Cherry on trumpet, and Ed Blackwell on drums! These two albums are worth the price of the package alone – even if you have other Strata East albums in your collection – and the whole thing features the usual sublime Mosaic package and booklet.