Johnny Griffin - A Blowin' Session
Released - August 1957
Recording and Session Information
Van Gelder Studio, Hackensack, NJ, April 6, 1957
Lee Morgan, trumpet; John Coltrane, Johnny Griffin, Hank Mobley, tenor sax; Wynton Kelly, piano; Paul Chambers, bass; Art Blakey, drums.
tk.2 Smokestack
tk.3 The Way You Look Tonight
tk.4 Ball Bearing
tk.5 All The Things You Are
Session Photos
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| Johnny Griffin, John Coltrane and Hank Mobley |
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| Lee Morgan |
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| John Coltrane, Johnny Griffin, and Hank Mobley |
Photos: Francis Wolff
Track Listing
| Side One | ||
| Title | Author | Recording Date |
| The Way you Look Tonight | Jerome Kern, Dorothy Fields | 06/04/2957 |
| Ball Bearing | Johnny Griffin | 06/04/1957 |
| Side Two | ||
| All the Things You Are | Jerome Kern, Oscar Hammerstein | 06/04/1957 |
| Smoke Stack | Johnny Griffin | 06/04/1957 |
Credits
| Cover Photo: | FRANCIS WOLFF |
| Cover Design: | |
| Engineer: | RUDY VAN GELDER |
| Producer: | ALFRED LION |
| Liner Notes: | IRA GITLER |
Liner Notes
During the course of the liner notes for his first Blue Note album (BLP 1533), Johnny Griffin was quoted as saying that he preferred to "make it at home" (home being Chicago). Since the time of that LP's release, Johnny has changed his mind at the urging of Art Blakey and with his presence in the drummer's Messengers has swelled the group to sextet size.
When the augmented Messengers came to New York, it so happened that several other of the top small groups were also in town, either playing or laying off. Most of the musicians in these combos are friendly with each other and enjoy playing together. When someone like Johnny Griffin comes to town and causes much comment, the others are quite anxious to blow with him. What you hear here is exactly that... a blowing session among the various leading lights of some of the East's important jazz organizations.
At the center of the session is the tenor sax triumvirate of Griffin, John Coltrane and Hank Mobley. Mobley is the former Messenger star who is now doing his shining with the Horace Silver quintet while Coltrane is the young man who rose to prominence in 1956 with the now disbanded Miles Davis quintet.
The three have similar backgrounds in many ways. All of them have payed their dues in rhythm and blues bands. They also played with orchestras. Griffin with Lionel Hampton and Coltrane with Dizzy Gillespie. Trane also payed with a Gillespie combo as did Mobley. Hank was with Max Roach before that and Griffin spent two fruitful weeks with Thelonious Monk in Chicago.
Despite the fact that they grew up musically in the same environment and have been influenced, in general, by some of the same musicians, the three tenors have very different conceptions, however forceful they may all be.
Griffin is more extrovert in a raucous manner and his rapid fire delivery stamps him as one of "the fastest guns alive". Mobley has a big, round edged sound and an even, logical conception. Coltrane is the most unconventional of the three with his vocal tone and very personal idea patterns.
To add some brass bite to the session comes Lee Morgan, the extremely youthful trumpeter from the Dizzy Gillespie band. Lee is a newcomer but through his Blue Note records (BLP 1538, 1540, 1541, 1557) and solo appearances in the Gillespie organization he has already carved out a reputation for himself. He comes from the tough, brilliant side of the modern trumpet tree out of Gillespie, Navarro and Clifford Brown.
Another member of the Gillespie organization who lends his ample talent in both solo and ensemble is pianist Wynton Kelly. Wynton, who has been with the Art Farmer - Gigi Gryce group and accompanist to Dinah Washington, is another of the many modern musicians who made their solo debuts on Blue Note. Here he offers several sparkling solos in the Bud Powell idiom and blends perfectly in to the rhythm section sparked by Messenger chieftain Art Blakey and former Miles Davis bassist Paul Chambers.
Two originals and two standards comprise the raw material for the blowing. As in any session, the standards are ones which are familiar to all in order to facilitate improvisation. The originals are by Griffin.
Johnny opens a breakneck tempo version of Jerome Kern's The Way You Look Tonight with a chorus of melody before going into three febrile improvisatory cantos. Lee has two swift, brassy ones before Hank takes over for one quick chorus. Coltrane comes sailing in for two before Griffin and Art Blakey enter into a heated exchange that highlights each one's virtuosity. Johnny then carries the theme out with the rhythm section coming to the top for the bridge.
Coltrane has the first solo on Ball Bearing and makes the most of the intriguing harmonic pattern. Morgan follows in a wonderful groove as the rhythm section lays down a straight and wide carpet to walk on. Griffin then has two choruses that will awaken your senses and Mobley continues the excellent mood. All the tenormen are in fine form on this one. Kelly, who has the next solo spot is no less effective. After a short bit by Blakey, the last part of the theme is restated.
Another Jerome Kern evergreen, All The Things You Are, opens side two. Griffin carries the melody chorus again in a medium up setting. He then has three choruses of improvisation, reaching a peak in number three. Coltrane follows with his singular interpretation and Morgan's trumpet sings a couple before Mobley states his case clearly and emotionally. Kelly's chorus is a joy both rhythmically and melodically. Chambers then has his first solo of the session before Griffin and Blakey have a brief word or two and Johnny takes it out.
Smoke Stack, a blues, has an introduction by Kelly followed by its simple line and an immediate catapulting into action by Griffin who is both fast and funky. Morgan, cooking hotly, is next followed by eight choruses of Mobley and seven of Coltrane. Kelly has four before four by Chambers. Griffin and Blakey then converse tersely and the theme is riffed to completion.
- IRA GITLER
Photo by HAROLD FEINSTEIN and FRANCIS WOLFF
Recording by RUDY VAN GELDER
RVG CD Reissue Liner Notes
A NEW LOOK AT A BLOWIN' SESSION
Blowing sessions are supposed to be spontaneous, and this classic example of the genre has an even more impromptu angle than most. Johnny Griffin re-called during a 1995 interview that he and several of the other musicians were standing in front of Birdland, waiting for a ride to the original (Hackensack) Van Gelder Studios when they ran into John Coltrane. The presence of two tenor players already did not deter Griffin and Alfred Lion from inviting Coltrane to join in, which brought the instrument's two most technically audacious stylists (Griffin and Coltrane) together for the only time on record, while also completing a progression of multi-horn jams that Coltrane and Mobley had launched on Prestige (where they are the Two Tenors in the session so retitled after originally being issued as Informal Jazz under pianist Elmo Hope's name, and half of the Tenor Conclave completed by Al Cohn and Zoot Sims). This version of what contemporary publicists would no doubt dub The Three Tenors provides a glimpse of both the horn's early Jazz Messenger history (Mobley/Griffin) and what would soon become the line of succession in Thelonious Monk's quartet (Coltrane/Griffin).
Then again, as Ira Gitler's notes point out, Griffin's second Blue Note album was an occasion for all manner of friends and playing associates to get together. The septet includes two then-current members of the Jazz Messengers (Griffin and Art Blakey); the drummer's former associate Hank Mobley, now in the employ of fellow original Jazz Messenger Horace Silver; Lee Morgan and Wynton Kelly from the Dizzy Gillespie big band; and, representing the recently disbanded Miles Davis quintet, John Coltrane (like Mobley also a Gillespie alumnus) and Paul Chambers. Every one of these musicians had been or (in Coltrane's case) shortly would be a Blue Note leader, and several would go on to forge even closer ties. Coltrane and Kelly, who had not recorded together previously, found themselves and Chambers in the 1959 edition of the Miles Davis band, around the same period that Morgan and Mobley (already frequent studio collaborators) shared the front line in Blakey's group; while this first-time pairing Of Mobley and Kelly also presaged a later Davis band with Chambers, plus a string of Blue Note masterpieces under Mobley's name.
The music Griffin selected for the date, two standards by Jerome Kern and two of his own lines, provides an inspiring variety of harmonic material for the soloists. Only "The Way You Look Tonight" presents a challenge in terms of tempo, one that all save Mobley handle quite comfortably. A test of a different kind, "Ball Bearing" contains fresh chord changes, and everyone acquits themselves well. (The tune was also recorded by the Messengers in another memorable version under the title "Krafty," on a session for Bethlehem six months later.) Mobley, who sounds much better on the moderately paced titles, plays a blues solo on the master take of "Smoke Stack" that is a session highlight, while Griffin is on his game throughout and shows the greater consistency and concentration one expects of the date's leader. If Coltrane appears somewhat perfunctory on the master take of "Smoke Stack," he makes amends on the alternate (released here for the first time) with a more characteristically urgent improvisation. Note also that the solo order is modified on the alternate take, with Mobley and Morgan flip-flopping their turns and Chambers's bass solo omitted.
Despite the obvious desire of each musician to play at his peak, this blowing session is no cutting contest. When asked about the encounter, which placed him alongside the only tenor saxophonist who could match his speed and complex phrasing, Griffin emphasized that neither he nor Coltrane approached the date with a notion of outblowing the other. "That was not Coltrane's attitude, or mine either," Griffin insisted, adding that Sonny Stitt was the tenor player who stood out in his mind as always bringing a competitive mindset to the bandstand. Here everyone wins and a newly discovered "Smoke Stack" provides listeners with a bonus prize.
- Bob Blumenthal, 1999
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