Freddie Hubbard - Breaking Point
Released - August 1964
Recording and Session Information
Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, May 7, 1964
Freddie Hubbard, trumpet; James Spaulding, alto sax, flute; Ronnie Mathews, piano; Eddie Khan, bass; Joe Chambers, drums.
1345 tk.3 D Minor Mint
1346 tk.10 Far Away
1347 tk.11 Breaking Point
1348 tk.14 Blue Frenzy
1349 tk.23 Mirrors
Session Photos
Track Listing
| Side One | ||
| Title | Author | Recording Date |
| Breaking Point | Freddie Hubbard | 07 May 1964 |
| Far Away | Freddie Hubbard | 07 May 1964 |
| Side Two | ||
| Blue Frenzy | Freddie Hubbard | 07 May 1964 |
| D Minor Mint | Freddie Hubbard | 07 May 1964 |
| Mirrors | Joe Chambers | 07 May 1964 |
Liner Notes
THIS is a most unusual album, even by Blue Note standards. In the first place, it marks a turning point in Freddie Hubbard’s career, since it ¡s the first session recorded with his own organized group. Secondly, it is the most significant record yet in terms of Hubbard’s development as a composer.
By now it is probably no news to his followers that Freddie left Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers a few months ago, after two and a half years on the international road with that group. It was not an easy or safe time at which to strike out on his own; opportunities for the young jazz group seem to be diminishing. A few years ago, had he wanted to get started, it would have been easy to break in by playing as the second attraction opposite a big name at one of the leading jazz clubs.
This kind of employment ¡s rare nowadays, because the major jazz names no longer play clubs at all, and because there are comparatively few clubs of any consequence left to play. Nevertheless, aware of the obstacles that faced him, Freddie made up his mind that at 26 he was ready, willing and eager to run the risks of leadership.
The men he selected are all young, ambitious and obviously fired by the kind of enthusiasm that can generate an aura of creative excitement.
“I dig the young guys who are trying to push ahead,” says Freddie. “These fellows in my group are my own special cats, and we’re trying to say something a little bit different. Not just because it is different, but because jazz, like the world, has to progress.”
Though optimistic about the future, Hubbard is cautious about predicting immediate success for the quintet. As he told Ray Coleman in an interview for the London Melody Maker, “We don’t expect everybody to accept us immediately. We know that people are fast to put down the new guys. They say drummers don’t swing like they used to, and bass players don’t walk like they used to. But who wants to go on duplicating what went on before?
“Sure, some of the earlier things were great, but not everything. And not all of what’s going on now is great, but a lot of it is.”
The quintet’s instrumentation is not new in itself; except that the saxophonist doubles on flute, the set-up is the same as that of the Dizzy Gillespie Quintet of the bebop generation — trumpet, alto, piano, bass and drums. But the flute, and more essentially the general concept of the group as guided by the leader and his compositions, makes the vital difference. In this combo new ideas tip the delicately balanced scales that weigh the established values of sameness against the calculated risk of difference.
James Spaulding will already be familiar to those who heard Freddie’s Hub-Tones album (Blue Note 4115). He has been working gigs with Freddie off and on for over a year. As Joe Goldberg noted in his comments on the previous album, there is evidence of a Coltrane influence, though at times — particularly during his solo in the title number of the present set — I was impressed by the thought that if Charlie Parker were still alive, and had continued to evolve and progress, he would probably sound today very much the way Spaulding sounds.
Pianist Ronnie Mathews, a graduate of the Manhattan School of Music, is a Brooklynite who emerged in the middle 1950s, when he sounded like a junior league Horace Silver. Later he worked with several New York groups, including Max Roach’s and Kenny Dorham’s, and made some sessions with Roy Haynes and Booker Ervin. From his Silver phase he has branched out with an extraordinarily flexible style.
Eddie Khan has an unusual background in that he is one of those rare musicians who made a switch from a horn to a rhythm instrument. Originally known as o tenor saxophonist around San Francisco, he took up bass only a few years ago and has developed a remarkable firmness of beat and roundness of sound, as well as a technique that is extraordinary for someone whose acquaintance with the instrument is comparatively short. He was o powerful component of Jackie Mclean’s One Step Beyond (Blue Note 4137).
Joe Chambers will be a new name to many listeners. Only 22 at this writing, he is a Philadelphian who studied at Howard University. "I met him when he was with the JFK Quintet,” says Freddie, “and was immediately impressed with him. He’s not only a good drummer but a fine composer, as you can tell from Mirrors.”
The excitement and importance of the album is established with the title tune. What impressed me immediately about Breaking Point — and the impression grows stronger with each hearing — was the ingenuity with which Hubbard linked the tension and surprise of the free-form atonal passages with the simplicity and melodic charm of a Calypso-like melody that emerges here and there by way of contrast. Despite the experimental nature of the Composition Hubbard never loses sight of such basics as the driving swing that has always characterized his work. The timing and placing of Mathews’ chords, backing Freddie’s first long solo, should also be studied closely in their relationship to the overall sound.
Eddie Khan’s solo, even in these days when double and triple stopping has become almost commonplace, betokens rare inventiveness and skill. Joe Chambers’ intermittent and rhythmically oblique support of Khan during this passage also lifts it out of the conventional boss solo rut. After the unpredictability and vivid movement of what has preceded it, the finale strikes a sober note ¡n attractive contrast.
For Away, after establishing o triple meter immediately with Khan and Chambers, hovers between 3/4, 6/4 and 12/8 in the course of an exotic performance that owes much of its color to Spaulding’s remarkable flute work. The theme as first outlined by Spaulding and Hubbard is played with such sensitivity and unity of sound that it is hard to realize two horns ore playing. There is a montoona-like consistency to the harmonic character and mood of the whole track, and especially to Mathews’ solo as it builds up from single-note lines into fiery chording.
Blue Frenzy ¡s perhaps the most straight-ahead of the five tracks. Its form is a 24 measure blues waltz based on a figure in triplets, repeated rhythmically but varied to match the chord changes. While Chambers lays down a firm, melodically compelling three-beat, the soloists, — Freddie, Jimmy on alto, then Ronnie — blow in o spare, bluesfully lyrical style. Ronnie is so much the essence of funk here that this thought aoccurred to me: not too many years ago, when youthful talents of this caliber were not available, the piano work on Breaking Point, Blue Frenzy and D Minor Mint, in order to beat any substantial resemblance to the three solos heard here, would have had to be played by three different pianists. This is a tribute not to Mathews’ eclecticism but to his adaptability, his depth and breadth of imagination.
The lively D Minor Mint is an intriguing 32-bar theme. The tempo is not fast enough to induce confusion, but just bright enough to bring out the technical application as well as the inspiration of the three soloists. Freddie’s work has all the qualities we have come to associate with him: the beat, continuity, control, and a maturely developed sound.
Mirrors, as Hubbard points out, demonstrates Joe Chambers’ impressive talent as a writer. It also serves to point up the concern Hubbard continues to show for musical beauty in the established sense of the term. After a rubato piano introduction, noteworthy for its mood-setting quality, the theme is played, featuring Spaulding on flute. It is tonal and melodic; the voicing of the two horns is quite remarkable and Freddie is at his most lyrical.
“Some musicians don’t seem to care about technique,” he says, “but to me there’s more in playing trumpet than just working to your own capacity. I want to keep developing, and I want to be able to play the whole range of the horn any time I feel like it. When a certain idea occurs to me, I want to be able to execute it. That’s what I’ve been working on ever since I started playing. It’s no use having a whole bunch of ideas floating around in your mind and then not being able to express them.”
By practicing what he preaches, Freddie Hubbard has advanced to the front rank of contemporary trumpet players. By applying the same principles to the performances of his new group, he is making on important new contribution to modern combo jazz.
Innovation for its own sake clearly is not the objective of this unit; on the contrary, it aims at newness for a pragmatically valid reason: in the hands, horns and pens of serious, dedicated artists, provided their talent is grounded in academic skill and complete technical equipment, newness becomes freshness, experiment becomes adventure, trial becomes triumph.
—LEONARD FEATHER
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