BLP 4018

Walter Davis - Davis Cup

Released - October 1960

Recording and Session Information

Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, August 2, 1959
Donald Byrd, trumpet; Jackie McLean, alto sax; Walter Davis Jr., piano; Sam Jones, bass; Art Taylor, drums.

tk.6 Minor Mind
tk.14 'S Make It
tk.17 Loodle-Lot
tk.21 Millie's Delight
tk.23 Rhumba Nhumba
tk.24 Sweetness

Session Photos

Photos: Francis Wolff

Track Listing

Side One
Title	Author	Recording Date
S Make It	Walter Davis Jr.	02/08/1959
Loodle-Lot	Walter Davis Jr.	02/08/1959
Sweetness	Walter Davis Jr.	02/08/1959
Side Two
Rhumba Nhumba	Walter Davis Jr.	02/08/1959
Minor Mind	Walter Davis Jr.	02/08/1959
Millie's Delight	Walter Davis Jr.	02/08/1959

Liner Notes

A PROBLEM that frequently confronts jazz musicians is the basic one of what to ploy. Jazz has always consisted on what is, for the most part, a borrowed repertoire. The first jazz bands played marches and quadrilles, and today you hear mostly popular and show tunes. Fortunately, there are certain musicians with the gift for composition, who are able to supply their own material, thereby making a musical statement completely their own, rather thon borrowing from a storehouse of music they might find less suitable.

Of course, every jazz musician is a composer in a sense; in fact, some people define a jazz solo as spontaneous composition. Some solos have been turned into compositions by other hands—Lester Young and Charlie Parker have both received this tribute, and a phrase of Dizzy Gillespie’s, for instance, was reworked by Tadd Dameron into the lovely If You Could See Me Now. And the world of jazz history is full of so-called “originals,” most of them vanishing with the same speed it took to write them. Occasionally, though, one of these “originals” achieves some degree of permanence, and some of them have passed into the basic repertoire—Milt Jackson’s “Bags’ Groove,” for example.

But beyond this, there are a few men who can rightly be called jazz composers, and, perhaps not so surprisingly, four of the most important of them have been pianists: Jelly Roll Morton, Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, and John Lewis. In speaking of any of these men, you con always get a good argument going about which aspect of their careers are most important—their music, their groups, or their piano playing. To take this very brief discussion right down to the present, what amounts to a new school of jazz composition is to be found in the person of Horace Silver. The conjunction of Silver and the Jazz Messengers, and the music Silver has written for that and subsequent groups, is probably the single greatest impetus to the “funky” school. Some examples of this work have achieved enormous popularity, such as Senor Blues on Blue Note 1539, and other instances are scattered liberally throughout the Blue Note catalogue, but the one record that may have been the start of it all is Blue Note 1518, which includes such near-standards as The Preacher.

And here, on this album, is a young man, another pianist, composing in the same tradition—Walter Davis Jr. On his first Blue Note album, Jackie McLean’s New Soil (BLP 4013) he contributed three tunes, notably the bouncing, humorous Greasy. On this, his first album as leader, he contributed all the music. There is a difference between composition and the mere sketching out of riffs, and Walter Davis Jr. has gone a long way toward achieving this distinction. It is practically a parlor game in some circles to put the newest “original” on the phonograph and then sit around and figure out what song it really is—what standard has had its harmony lifted to provide the basis. This music will afford little satisfaction to players of that game. They are truly compositions, varied in mood, rhythm, and harmony.

One of the things that Walter Davis Jr. has kept in mind on this album is one of the best lessons of the great Duke Ellington, a lesson so simple it is often overlooked—write for the men who are going to play your music. As I mentioned, Davis is in the Silver tradition. At present, he is pianist with Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, a job which Silver once held down, and he has chosen as soloists two men associated, at various times, with these musicians—Donald Byrd and Jackie McLean.

These two constitute an ensemble in themselves— they have worked together, on and off, for several years, in clubs and on records, and know each other’s minds as closely as is possible for musicians to do. On the New Soil album, they proved to be excellent interpreters of Walter Davis’ music, and I think you will find that he was wise to choose them this time. Both men continually improve with every record, in the direction of a greater sureness of approach. Byrd, it seems, grows more lyrical with time. And McLean, in particular, seems bent on exploring the individual possibilities of each tune he plays, rather than simply “running the changes.” Notice, for instance, on Rhumba Nhumba, how he takes the tune’s offhand reference to Hawaiian War Chant, alters it to become his own expression, and plays with it for all it is worth.

Sam Jones and Art Taylor, on bass and drums, are veterans of several Blue Note sessions, and provide here their usual sympathetic support. And then, of course, there is Walter Davis Jr.’s piano playing. On Sweetness, to take just one example, he performs a feat that is, unfortunately, much too rare these days. He performs a ballad without resorting to the device of double liming, and at the same time avoids making it sound like a funeral procession. And if this were not difficult enough, he has the restraint to let his song stand for itself on the first chorus. He likes it, with justice, and plays it without embellishments.

Walter Davis Jr. has been around a long time for a young musician. Born September 2, 1932 ¡n East Orange, New Jersey, he was working with a Max Roach group as long ago as 1952. When Dizzy Gillespie made his famous State Department tours of the Middle East and Europe, Walter was his pianist. And at present, as I said, he is with the Jazz Messengers. Walter has had forma! training in composition and theory, but feels that his own reading of books on the subjects has done more for him. That way, he says, he can “go his own way” and avoid being overly influenced by a teacher. Writing, he feels, is “the best way to express yourself.”

When I asked Walter the by now standard question, who was his favorite piano player, he had the answer very decisively before I had even finished asking. “Tatum,” he said. “Tatum. Tatum. Tatum. And then Bud Powell.” As for the men on this date, Walter could not be happier. “Jackie is the most spontaneous alto player around,” he says. “And Donald — he can really interpret your music.” In many ways, as a matter of fact, this album got its start well over a year ago, when Donald Byrd and Arthur Taylor took a group to Europe, with Walter on piano, when many of his tunes were used.

Walter Davis Jr. is still a young man, and has a long way to go, a way that has a very impressive beginning to it. Perhaps, in time, he will join the inner circle of true jazz composers, the ones who have enriched us with works of the stature of ‘Round Midnight and The Preacher.

—JOE GOLDBERG

Cover Photo by FRANCIS WOLFF
Cover Design by REID MILES
Recording by RUDY VAN GELDER

RVG CD Reissue Liner Notes

A NEW LOOK AT DAVIS CUP

The jazz life lived in semi-obscurity is too common to shock, but when it occurs to a musician as talented as Walter Davis, Jr., it can still depress. The pianist would live 30 more years after recording Davis Cup, yet if we measure success by appearances as a leader on major American labels, this "very impressive beginning" can be considered the pinnacle of the Davis's career.

Davis was already a young if little-heard veteran when this music was made. Prior to his recording debut with Max Roach on Debut, he had worked with Babs Gonzales and Charlie Parker, and spent valuable time in the presence of his idols Thelonious Monk and Bud Powell. (Davis claimed to be present in the Manhattan penthouse when Powell composed "Glass Enclosure.") While he traveled internationally with the 1956 Dizzy Gillespie big band and with the Donald Byrd-Art Taylor combo that visited Europe in 1958, his U.S. profile remained virtually nonexistent until a spate of activity in 1959. In the three months that separated Jackie McLean's New Soil and the present session, Davis was also featured on Byrd's Byrd in Hand and Taylor's Prestige/NewJazz session, Taylor's Tenors. Each of these albums included at least one Davis composition, and all but New Soil featured him in the company of Taylor and Sam Jones, who were the rhythm section in Thelonious Monk's quartet at the time.

Circumstances were in place, in other words, for Davis to emerge as one of the era's prominent pianist-composers when Davis Cup was conceived, yet the obvious compatibility of the quintet members and the freshness of Davis's music did not make much of an impact. There was work, however, at least for a time. When Bobby Timmons interrupted his tenure with Art Blakey to join Cannonball Adderley, Davis became the Jazz Messengers pianist, then left to join the quintet of Philly Joe Jones when Timmons returned. He continued to work primarily as a sideman, appearing on a handful of albums of which the most notable was far and away McLean's Let Freedom Ring from 1962. By decade's end, however, Davis had withdrawn from music and began work as a tailor, a painter, and a designer. Between 1968 and 1975, his recorded appearances were limited to three Archie Shepp discs and one Sonny Rollins session.

The Rollins affiliation in 1973 marked Davis's return to steadier activity, if not a higher profile. Much of his work was with the giants who had showcased him in the past. Returning to the Jazz Messengers during 1975—77, he became the band's primary composer and his writing, now attuned to modal forms and the kind of percussively accented melodies designed to highlight Art Blakey, came to define the Messengers sound of the period. A few years later, Davis's comprehensive knowledge of modern jazz made him the ideal pianist for Philly Joe Jones's mid-sized Dameronia. Gillespie also brought Davis back into his small group around this time, and when Blue Note held its legendary 1985 Town Hall concert to mark the reactivation of the label, Davis not only filled the piano seat in the Jazz Messengers, but had the honor of playing a trio set dedicated to Bud Powell. Of equal importance was the affiliation Davis established with the legendary Bradley's in Greenwich Village, where his many performances reminded at least the musical community of his skills.

Despite the excellence of the present music, there had been no sequel on Blue Note or on any other label until the Japanese Denon imprint began recording the pianist in 1977. This led to a brief period of activity as a leader on various Japanese and European labels for the remainder of the decade, followed by more neglect. When Davis cut his only other American album, a posthumously released 1987 solo tribute to Monk for Mapleshade, it was his first session in seven years. Two trio dates followed, but at the time of his death in 1990, he remained, as he had been when Davis Cup was recorded, waiting for the wider world to catch up with his abundant talents.

It should be noted that there is a Davis composition entitled "Davis Cup," which appears on McLean's New Soil, but not on the present volume.

— Bob Blumenthal. 2006