BLP 4075

Donald Byrd - The Cat Walk

Released - January 1962

Recording and Session Information

Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, May 2, 1961
Donald Byrd, trumpet; Pepper Adams, baritone sax; Duke Pearson, piano; Laymon Jackson, bass; Philly Joe Jones, drums.

tk.2 Say You're Mine
tk.5 Hello Bright Sunflower
tk.8 Each Time I Think Of You
tk.10 Duke's Mixture
tk.14 The Cat Walk
tk.15 Cute

Session Photos

Photos: © Francis Wolff/Mosaic Images 
https://www.mosaicrecordsimages.com/

Track Listing

Side One
Title	Author	Recording Date
Say You're Mine	Duke Pearson	02 May 1961
Duke's Mixture	Duke Pearson	02 May 1961
Each Time I Think Of You	Donald Byrd, Duke Pearson	02 May 1961
Side Two
The Cat Walk	Donald Byrd	02 May 1961
Cute	Neal Hefti	02 May 1961
Hello Bright Sunflower	Duke Pearson	02 May 1961

Liner Notes

THE continuing growth of Donald Byrd as a uniquely melodic improviser with authoritative command of his instrument has not been sufficiently underlined, it seems to me, in the past couple of years. Several critics have, however, been cognizant of Byrd’s increasingly substantial achievement. Frank Kofsky, for one, noted in Down Beat that “the history of Byrd’s recording career has been one of consistent improvement”; and the British critic, Michael James, has observed in The Jazz Review that Byrd’s “tone sings loud and clear throughout the range of his horn, and his invention has more than kept pace with his improved technique.... There is not a hint of the blandness technical confidence will sometimes bring.”

Byrd himself continues to study and experiment. He has attended classes at the Manhattan School of Music, has acquired an M.A. in music education, and is now working on a Ph.D. between road trips with his impressive quintet which includes Pepper Adams and Laymon Jackson. An indication of Byrd’s thorough knowledge of his horn — aside from his playing itself — was his lucid essay in the January 1961 Down Beat which displayed a thoughtful, well-researched understanding of the various problems of brass playing. Byrd, in short, is a striking representative of the new generation of jazzmen who have acquired considerable technical and theoretical knowledge while losing none of the spontaneity and individuality that have always been endemic to the jazz tradition.

In this album, Byrd demonstrates a further stage in his career. His sense of dynamics, for instance, is acutely evident throughout the set together with his capacity to construct fresh melodic patterns. Also heartening is the fact that Byrd does not find it necessary to pound home the point that he has roots. A blues feeling courses through everything he plays, but he is also able to range through a much wider variety of moods than are several of his more self-consciously “hard” contemporaries. There is in Byrd a linkage to sunny, light-hearted jazz playing as well as to vigorously assertive self-expression.

Duke Pearson’s Say You’re Mine with its sinuously inviting theme serves as o framework for an evocative muted solo by Byrd in which he tells his story unhurriedly and with warm expressiveness and authority. Pepper Adams, his co-holder of the front line (and long-time colleague from their apprenticeship in Detroit to the present), follows with a supple, intimate statement that indicates how much Pepper too has evolved. Adams has been able to make the challenging baritone into a flowing extension of his musical personality and he no longer finds it necessary to show how many notes per second he can execute. This tasteful use of space and the knowledge of what to omit has been characteristic of Atlanta-born Duke Pearson ever since he came to New York in 1959 and received his first forum on Blue Note. Pearson has a totally pianistic approach to his instrument; and in addition to his clarity of sound, here is a consistent logic and lyricism in his conception. Worth noting throughout the opening track and throughout the album are Philly Joe Jones’ deft proddings of the soloists and his capacity to create a constantly alive background of cross-accents over a deeply pulsing rhythm wave.

Pearson is also responsible for Duke’s Mixture, a cheerfully jumping theme which he introduces. The horns enter with o riff that reminds me of the hipper dancers I’ve seen while underneath, Philly Joe sets up a whirlpool of a beat. Byrd’s solo illuminates how confidently brassy a tone he now commands. His articulation is precise, his lines are bitingly clear, and he swings without effort. Pearson meanwhile is a remarkably helpful and unobtrusive accompanist and Laymon Jackson’s bass is steady and full-bodied. Pepper here is robust but in firm control while Pearson’s solo shows how it is possible to be graceful and forcefully swinging at the same time.

Byrd and Pearson collaborated in Each Time I Think of You, a tune that combines both yearning and sprightliness. It contains one of Pepper Adams’ most ardent solos and a darting, incisive contribution by Byrd. Pearson is characteristically lithe in the way he structures his improvisations, and his time is infectiously resilient. In the brisk exchanges between Philly Joe, Byrd, and Adams, Joe spurs the hornmen into quick-wilted invention.

Donald Byrd’s The Cat Walk is one of the more provocative originals on the date. The theme is deceptively simple and quite tensile, thereby making it productive for blowing. After the quasi-march-like, exhortatory opening, there is a fascinating stop-time interplay between Byrd and Philly Joe which moves into a regular pulsation, returns to stop-time, and then swings ahead. Byrd’s solo emphasizes his increased ability to make the horn “talk”. I don’t mean that he imitates vocal mannerisms, but rather his command of a very personal way of thinking and feeling music that becomes translated into highly individual phrasing and manipulation of rhythm. Adams’ solo underlines again how much he has learned about judicious selection of notes and about how to make silence on integral part of the way a solo grows. Pearson is agile and again, is more intense than his lightness of touch might at first indicate.

Neal Hefti’s Cute is begun explosively by Philly Joe. After a trialogue with the horns, Byrd leaps into a swift ascent that continues to be a good deal more than running changes. The solo has order, developing tension, and a final release; and despite the fierce tempo, Byrd does not lose sight of dynamics. Adams is fiery, and then Philly Joe plunges into a masterfully controlled and brilliantly developed solo in which the changing textures he draws from his kit complement the shifting rhythmic motifs.

The final Hello Bright Sunflower by Duke Pearson is for me the most engaging theme in the album because of its almost innocent airiness. Philly Joe is reminiscent of the late Big Sid Catlett, a major influence on his work, in his brush conversation with the horns. Byrd constructs o light-hearted solo with song-like naturalness of line; Pearson is crisply fluent; Adams is complementarily good-humored; and the album ends — as it began — with a feeling of buoyant order and the communication by all of how much fun it is to play jazz.

In his Down Beat article, Donald Byrd Talks to Young Trumpeters, Byrd pointed out that “the well-rounded musician should be able to ploy both as an individual and as part of a section; on the one hand, he must be able to stand on his own and, on the other, he must be able to submerge himself in a group sound, without sticking out like a sore thumb through bad intonation, a conspicuous tone, or a general lack of stylistic adaptability.”

Donald Byrd, as this album makes fully clear, is indeed a well-rounded musician — and on increasingly individual one.

—NAT HENTOFF

Cover Photo by FRANCIS WOLFF
Recording by RUDY VAN GELDER

RVG CD Reissue Liner Notes

A NEW LOOK AT THE CAT WALK

Donald Byrd made a lot of recordings, and a lot of history, with Blue Note Records. In the realm of commerce, his 1972 Black Byrd was an unprecedented success; in terms of innovation, his and arranger Duke Pearson's use of voices with a small jazz ensemble on A New Perspective in 1963 set a standard rarely matched. In the realm of a start-to-finish inspired album, the present set has to stand right at the top of Byrd's output. It features an excellent program created with two of his most important musical partners.

During the period 1958—61, baritone saxophonist Pepper Adams was more often a co-leader than a secondary soloist when he worked with Byrd. Adams received leader's credit when the team was first featured on record (Riverside's 10 to 4 at the 5 Spot) and top billing on Warwick's Out of this World) shortly before The Cat Walk was recorded. The muscular baritone sax was an ideal complement to the more considered direction Byrd's trumpet had taken at this point. The contrast is particularly effective here when the trumpeter employs a mute on "Hello Bright Sunflower," and when he holds a lyrical course on the otherwise explosive "Each Time I Think of You. "

Duke Pearson was another valued Byrd colleague from the pianist's first sideman appearance in 1959 on Fuego. He would continue to provide not just playing but also writing and production support into Byrd's early electric period a decade later. Pearson also sustained a lengthy relationship with Adams, who was featured in the pianist's big band and several of the studio projects mounted at Blue Note later in the decade. By the time of the present session, Pearson was frequently replaced as the quintet pianist by the young Herbie Hancock, who had made his recording debut on the Warwick session and then taped an April 1961 Blue Note session first released in 1979 as Chant. A month after that visit to Van Gelder's studio, Pearson is again the pianist here. As Hancock has explained, "Donald and Pepper didn't break off their relationship with Duke for several reasons. He was a friend and a very good player, and he was writing some great tunes in that period."

The quality of Pearson's writing alone elevates this set among Byrd/Adams recordings, even if two of those contributions might be considered re-writes. "Say You're Mine" is quite similar to Byrd's "Here Am I," included on the Byrd in Hand album two years earlier. Pearson gives the melody a lustrous character of its own, with Philly Joe Jones's tom-toms and the composer's piano vamp creating an exotic underpinning for Byrd's muted horn. Pearson recorded "Say You're Mine" twice in trio form, later in '61 on a session that ultimately appeared on Black Lion and on the 1968 Blue Note The Phantom. The spry "Hello Bright Sunflower" derives melody and chord sequence from the first 24 bars of "Lullaby of Broadway," a connection underscored at the fade. Here, the omission of the source's final "Good night, ladies" strain creates another distinctive mood. "Duke's Mixture" features a fresh slant on the shuffle beat, outstanding Adams baritone, and a galvanizing shout chorus. The unaccredited arranger did a brilliant job of transforming Neal Hefti's "Cute" from a fantasy for flute, reeds, and brushes on Basie Plays Heftito its explosive present incarnation.

Another significant feature of this album is Philly Joe Jones. His swing, in each of the various moods that the material evokes, makes The Cat Walk an essential volume in the library of recorded jazz drumming. The program's pace is both unusual and effective, with two distinct medium grooves before the tempo increases on "Each Time I Think of You," then the marching title track leads to the incendiary "Cute" and a graceful finale. Neither Jones nor Adams led their own album on Blue Note, yet each is an important contributor to the label's legacy. That makes four musicians here who can claim The Cat Walk as an essential album in their respective discographies.

— Bob Blumenthal, 2006