For over thirty years, Hank Jones led The Great Jazz Trio, its various incarnations creating some tremendously diverse and exhilarating jazz. While Hank remained a consistent force at piano, the bass and drum chairs alternated frequently after founding members Ron Carter and Tony Williams departed. My favorite line-up was the one that paired Hank with his brother Elvin:
Yesterday was Ron Carter’s 73rd birthday. He is one of the most recorded musicians in all of jazz, with over 2,500 sessions to his credit. He is also a master bass player with a unique and instantly identifiable style.
Here’s Ron Carter in Switzerland in 1984 with a beautiful solo rendition of “Willow Weep For Me.”
“But you should never limit your mind. With the new thing coming in, I’m one of those who prefer to swing a lot. But I’ve experimented with free forms, like on Grachan Moncur’s ‘Evolution’ and Andrew Hill’s ‘Grass Roots’ — playing without the rhythm, against the rhythm, disregarding it — the whole freedom thing.” — Lee Morgan, Downbeat Magazine, 1970
Lee Morgan, trumpet – Grachan Moncur III, trombone – Jackie McLean, alto sax – Bobby Hutcherson, vibes – Bob Cranshaw, bass – Tony Williams, drums
Lee Morgan’s playing on this track is fascinating. He broods almost morosely over a trilling vibes pattern before setting off into the stratusphere once Tony Williams starts pushing him. This is Morgan at his freest, finding a way to weave the frenetic pace of his attack into a statement that is both dissonant and melodic at once. He is a surprisingly sympathetic player for this type of music and one wonders what would’ve come had he stuck with it.
Grass Roots finds Morgan in the company of Booker Ervin and Andrew Hill, two fine gentleman at ease in the idioms of both bop and the avant-garde. This record is a more natural fit for Morgan as the music tends to sway more inside than the almost painterly abstractions of Moncur. Yet Hill’s music is just as exactingly structured even if it does swing a little harder. “Venture Inwards” is perhaps the most adventurous of the bunch and Morgan acquits himself nicely, flitting along the outskirts of the song’s structure, though Ervin easily tops him along the same lines.
Lee Morgan, trumpet – Booker Ervin, tenor sax – Andrew Hill, piano – Ron Carter, bass – Freddie Waits, drums
It seems that Morgan was re-discovering this avenue right around the time of his death as his last recordings feature a bracing rethink of the hard-bop idiom and contain elements clearly culled from his experiences with Hill and Moncur. Nowhere is this more evident than on his Live At The Lighthouse album from Pacific Jazz in 1970. Here’s an excerpt from the blazin’ “Absolutions” featuring Bennie Maupin on tenor, Harold Mabern on piano, Jymie Merritt on bass, and Mickie Roker on drums:
Between this live set and Morgan’s last session in 1971, a lot of forward thinking, vital music was recorded. It seemed that Morgan was done repeating himself ad infinitum and was ready to move into all sorts of interesting directions. We’ll never really know though because he was gunned down on February 19th, 1972. The music found here, and on those rare guests spots above, show beyond doubt that the promise of Morgan’s Messenger work and other early 50′s recordings was finally being fulfilled beyond the cloying, stultifying limits imposed by “The Sidewinder.” In fact, check out the Lighthouse band’s interpretation of that number, they totally rework it to the point where all staleness has worn off. The scales fell from my ears with that one:
Yesterday was Ron Carter’s 73rd birthday. He is one of the most recorded musicians in all of jazz, with over 2,500 sessions to his credit. He is also a master bass player with a unique and instantly identifiable style.
