Horace Parlan – The Other Part of Town (Blue Note Records, 1961)

Horace Parlan – Piano
Booker Ervin – Tenor Sax
Grant Green – Guitar
George Tucker – Bass
Al Harewood – Drums

The Us3 Trio of Parlan, Tucker, Harewood were the house band at Minton’s for jam sessions at the time of this release and were often accompanied by Ervin and Green for extended workouts of theme. I believe Up’n'Down is their only quintet recording together however and this track is mainly a feature for Grant Green.

Bop and Beyond’s 50 Personally Indispensable Jazz Albums:

Monty challenged me to come up with my own list of 50 personally indispensable jazz albums in response to the Amazon 100 list.

The criteria was simple, name the 50 jazz albums I personally could not live without. That’s it… a list of favorite albums (not necessarily the greatest albums either). Anyone who has followed this site knows my taste so most of these albums won’t come as much of a surprise anyway.

Monty’s list is posted here: http://rightheredude.blogspot.com/2009/05/my-top-50-jazz-albums-of-all-time.html

In the meantime, here’s mine…

01. Miles Davis – Kind of Blue

02. Duke Ellington – Money Jungle

03. Clifford Brown & Max Roach – A Study In Brown

04. Thelonious Monk – Monk’s Dream

05. Billie Holiday – Lady Day: The Master Takes

06. Louis Armstrong & Duke Ellington – The Great Summit

07. Coleman Hawkins – Body and Soul

08. Ornette Coleman – At The Golden Circle

09. Miles Davis – In A Silent Way

10. Peggy Lee – Black Coffee

11. John Coltrane – Coltrane’s Sound

12. Alice Coltrane – Ptah, the El Daoud

13. Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers – Like Someone In Love

14. Ahmad Jamal – The Legendary Okeh and Epic Recordings

15. Curtis Amy – Katanga!

16. Von Freeman – The Great Divide

17. Mary Lou Williams – Black Christ of the Andes

18. Paul Chambers – Bass on Top

19. Alice Coltrane – Journey in Satchidananda

20. Charlie Rouse – Bossa Nova Bacchanal

21. Thelonious Monk – Misterioso

22. Booker Ervin – The Freedom Book

23. Ike Quebec – Blue and Sentimental

24. Sonny Rollins – Saxophone Colossus

25. John Coltrane – A Love Supreme

26. Miles Davis – Ascenseur Pour L’echafaud (Lift to the Scaffold)

27. Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers – Au Club St. Germain

28. Duke Ellington – Fargo, 1940

29. Coleman Hawkins – Night Hawk

30. Mal Waldron – The Seagulls of Kristiansund

31. Herbie Nichols – Love, Gloom, Cash, Love

32. Jimmy Smith – Back at the Chicken Shack

33. Pharoah Sanders – Jewels of Thought

34. The Jazz Crusaders – Freedom Sound

35. Django Reinhardt – Paris and London

36. Dexter Gordon – Our Man In Paris

37. Andrew Hill – Smokestack

38. Stanley Turrentine – Jubilee Shout!!!

39. Don Byas – Laura

40. Clifford Brown – With Strings

41. Grachan Moncur III – Evolution

42. Earl Hines – Once Upon A Time

43. Horace Parlan – Speakin’ My Piece

44. Lou Blackburn – The Complete Imperial Sessions

45. Sonny Rollins – East Broadway Run Down

46. Carmell Jones – Jay Hawk Talk

47. The Curtis Counce Group – Carl’s Blues

48. Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers – Free For All

49. Paul Gonsalves – Boom Jackie Boom Chick

50. Kenny Burrell – Midnight Blue

Download Last Week’s Booker Ervin Program:

Last week’s Booker Ervin show as a good one, download it below:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=6MI42AC8

The Heavy Soul of Booker Ervin (Revisited): Friday, 03.06.09, on WSVA Radio

Last year, I did a show called Heavy Soul! that I wasn’t entirely satisfied with so I decided to redo it. This Friday, 03.06.09, I’ll be revisiting a unique spirit whose fiery music still burns strong:

This Friday at 6pm on WSVA Radio I will attempt to spin as much Booker Ervin as possible in two hours (music from both his solo career and his work with Charles Mingus, Horace Parlan, Randy Weston, and Dexter Gordon).

Also, here’s a link to a story about the recently recovered original sheet music and score for Booker Ervin’s Booker ‘N’ Brass album on Pacific Jazz:

http://kroner-music.dk/erling/booker.html

The essay contains some great anecdotes and insights into Ervin’s extremely gentle and generous demeanor, a marked departure from his somewhat militant image and tough Texas style tenor playing.

And finally, some excellent expatriate footage of Booker in Europe playing a gig for European television:

Booker Ervin – tenor sax / Pony Poindexter – alto sax / Nathan Davis – flute / Ted Curson – trumpet / Kenny Clarke – piano / Jimmy Woode – bass / Edgar Bateman – drums /  Title Unknown / Recorded in 1966

Booker Ervin: Heavy Soul! / Johnny Griffin: Flyin’ Fingers!

Bop and Beyond pays tribute to two supremely gifted saxophone players…

Booker Ervin:

Booker Ervin had a unique sound. One that caught the ear of Charles Mingus and set his Jazz Workshop on fire. A legendary solo run on Prestige followed. 

Johnny Griffin:

At one time considered the fastest man alive on his horn, when Johnny Griffin sat in with Thelonious Monk at the Five Spot, magic happened.

Join me tonight as these two tenor players demonstrate their gifts.

Bop and Beyond, 6pm to 8pm on WPIR: Pratt Institute Radio

Download program here: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=GF2ROJVL