BLP 4026

Donald Byrd - Fuego

Released - June 1960

Recording and Session Information

Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, October 4, 1959
Donald Byrd, pocket trumpet; Jackie McLean, alto sax; Duke Pearson, piano; Doug Watkins, bass; Lex Humphries, drums.

tk.3 Lament
tk.8 Amen
tk.14 Fuego
tk.15 Low Life
tk.17 Bup A Loup
tk.18 Funky Mama

Session Photos

Photos: Francis Wolff/Mosaic Images

Track Listing

Side One
Title	Author	Recording Date
Fuego	Donald Byrd	04/10/1959
Bup A Loup	Donald Byrd	04/10/1959
Funky Mama	Donald Byrd	04/10/1959
Side Two
Low Life	Donald Byrd	04/10/1959
Lament	Donald Byrd	04/10/1959
Amen	Donald Byrd	04/10/1959

Liner Notes

Five eventful years have passed since Donald Byrd established himself on the New York scene. Don was several months short of his twenty-third birthday when he landed his first major jazz combo job here, playing with George Wallington's quintet at the Bohemia.

The interim has seen many changes: in Donald, a maturing of the elements that were apparent in his style from the first; in jazz, a strengthening concentration on the more masculine qualities of the music, seen through the eyes, ears and embouchures of the hard-bop merchants, along with a unique advance-regression that has brought primitive funk to modern harmony, basic chords to contemporary techniques.

As Joe Goldberg appropriately pointed out in his commentary for Donald’s first Blue Note LP as a leader (Off to the Races, BLP 4007), the recognition he ultimately earned was awarded a little prematurely when, in the summer of 1957, he won out over Art Farmer in the New Star trumpet division of the Down Beat annual critics’ poll. It is interesting, in retrospect, to observe which of us were in the advance guard for Donald at that point (my own vote went to Clark Terry): the Byrd boosters were Don Gold, Wilder Hobson, André Hodeir, Barry Ulanov, Erik Wiedemann, Arrigo Polillo and the Pittsburgh Courier’s George E. Pitts. During that year, and in the period immediately following his salute from the critics, Donald was registering more achievements in musical terms than on the level of economic security. He gigged around New York with Coltrane or Lou Donaldson, sometimes with his own combo, occasionally under the leadership of Art Taylor or Red Garland. Recognition came a little more readily in 1958, when he was invited to take his own group to Europe and, like many musicians of his school, found more heavily concentrated pockets of enthusiasm in France and Sweden than at home.

When Alfred Lion gave me the test pressing of this set for audition before and during the writing of the liner notes, he pointed out that this session was different in that Don plays a B Flat piccolo trumpet. l can’t say I was overwhelmed by this information, since over a period of years I have found that many musicians taking the blindfold test have been unable (like me) to make any positive assertion that they are listening to a comet, or a fluegelhorn, or any of the other related instruments, rather than a trumpet. I had also been subjected to a barrage of publicity about a so-called pocket horn played by Don Cherry.

A first hearing of Fuego didn’t seem to indicate that any startling difference had been effected by Byrd’s choice of a piccolo (Italian for small) horn. But then I played Off to the Races - and I recommend that you do the same. There is indeed a distinct difference; the little horn has a mellower, more compact sound, and though the notes he plays and the manner in which he phrases them still remain at least 90% of the essence of any soloist’s personality, the subtle change in tonal delivery admittedly is a nuance worth examining, and one that seems to add something to the overall content.

I need add little concerning the sidemen. John Lenwood (Jackie) McLean a frequent colleague of Donald’s since 1955, when they were both with Wallington, has been using the Rudy van Gelder studios as a virtual second home and the Blue Note label as his personal badge of honor. His most recent successes are Swing Swang Swinging’ on 4024 and the album of music from The Connection with Freddie Redd on 4027.

Duke Pearson was impressively introduced to Blue Note listeners in his solo album debut, Profile, on 4022. Lex Humphries, drummer on the present sides, also took part in that project. Doug Watkins, the strong right arm of many a date in these environs, was a Detroit schoolmate of Donald’s and is 15 months his junior. He was a member of the combo Don took to Europe in the summer of ’58.

The title tune, Fuego (fire in Spanish) inaugurates the set with a flaming intensity to which the title is ideally suited. Notice how the opening rhythmic figure is sustained, after the introduction, under the exposition of the theme, which is stated first in unison and then in thirds by the two horns. The overall presence is superb as Lex rides majestically through it all with his cymbal underline. Donald’s solo is basically very simply, drawing much of its strength from the effective use of repetition. Jackie McLean’s thoughts seem to gravitate around the dominant as he maintains the general fervor, and then Duke brings the level down with a relatively cool passage. The whole track has a vital and surging mood and may well be the most successful recorded example to date of Byrd as composer.

Bup a Loup is one of those themes in which the manner of delivery is more important than the matter of the melody; it's stated by the whole group, mainly in staccato notes on the first and third beats. McLean here is fleet and original; it becomes increasingly clear that he can speak through his horn with his own voice, no longer a ventriloquist for Parker, if he ever was. Donald's instrument tends to lend a slightly Milesish flavor to his solo, in tonal texture if not in phrasing.

Funky Mama is a 12-bar blues, opening with two choruses by Watkins and one by Pearson. During Jackie's four choruses it is interesting to note how Duke supports him with a chorded background that seems to be composed simply of straight quarter notes much of the way; there is some slightly Red Garlandish chording in his own ensuing solo. Donald’s solo is brilliantly constructed, the first two choruses relatively uncluttered, the third building in drive with the help of the rhythm section, the fourth and fifth each devoting their first four measures to a series of triplets in a manner that too often has been bastardized into a rock ’n’ roll effect, though its use here is perfectly timed and placed.

Low Life is a minor theme, based on the blues pattern, and evoking Sonny Rollins - especially to those of us for whom any melody that starts with two sixteenth notes, off on their own, automatically reminds us of Sonny. Jackie is at his most fluent here, and Donald has moments when one is reminded of Clifford Brown - less in terms of actual notes or tone than in soul and general approach.

Lament is another striking example of Don's melodic compositional gifts. Though there is nothing complex about the line itself, the relationship with the harmonic structure gives it a great charm and an exotic quality. The melody centers on the fourth and the tonic. Though the solos are up to the high level of the other tracks, it was the theme itself that I found most memorable in this generally engaging performance.

Amen is just the kind of sanctified opus you would expect with some of the chord progressions that have come to be associated with church-inspired compositions (E Flat to G 7th to C Mi etc.), and with the soloists blowing against a familiar repeated figure:

that has also acquired this type of identification.

This album will, I believe, serve a double purpose. It will show that whether they are delivered via cornet, fluegelhorn or a trumpet of no matter what size or shape, the improvised statements of Donald Byrd are consistently direct, honest and musically valid. Secondly, in his efforts as a composer he is capable no less through these written inventions of devising moods that have mucho fuego.

- LEONARD FEATHER

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

RVG CD Reissue Liner Notes

A NEW LOOK AT FUEGO

A proper mix of the familiar and the unexpected provided the recipe for success on many of Blue Note's memorable sessions. This album, the third to appear on the label under Donald Byrd's name, is but one example of how elements known and unknown could be blended into a program of excellent music.

The "something old" at the heart of these tracks is the longstanding relationship of the leader with Jackie McLean and Doug Watkins. As noted by Leonard Feather, the trumpeter and saxophonist had been collaborators on the bandstand and on record since their September 1955 stint at the Café Bohemia as the front line in pianist George Wallington's quintet. One month later, they visited a studio for McLean's debut as a leader, with Watkins on bass — a three-way partnership that was sustained over the next two McLean albums. From there the connections multiplied, with Byrd joining Watkins in the Jazz Messengers and each running into one or both of the others on a slew of albums by the likes of Gene Ammons, Kenny Burrell, Jimmy Raney, Hank Mobley, and Arthur Taylor. When Byrd and McLean both became Blue Note artists late in 1958, they continued to be paired on such memorable dates as Byrd's Off to the Races and McLean's New Soil. The last time they met on record was on the saxophonist's 1963 Vertigo session. Watkins, who was killed in a highway accident in 1962, made some of his last recorded appearances with Byrd (Chant) and McLean (Bluesnik) a year earlier.

It is the presence of newcomer Duke Pearson, however, that lends Fuego its historical importance. Pearson, age 27 at the time, was a native of Atlanta who had studied the piano as a child and then given it up for the trumpet, only to return to the keyboard following an inspirational encounter with Wynton Kelly during their years of military service. After moving to New York at the beginning of 1959 and waiting out his union card, Pearson was hired by Byrd. This was Pearson's first recording session, and he made enough of an impression on producer Alfred Lion to be given two trio dates of his own, Profile and Tender Feelin's, by year's end. Both of those albums, as well as a pair he subsequently recorded for the Jazzline label, included drummer Lex Humphries; but the more important partnerships Pearson established here were with Byrd and Lion. In addition to playing on and contributing music to Byrd's next three albums, Pearson was responsible for the arrangements and some of the compositions on the trumpeter's groundbreaking A New Perspective and I'm Trying to Get Home, which featured vocal choirs. He was also the electric pianist when Byrd switched on in 1969—70 on such projects as Fancy Free and Electric Byrd. For his part, Byrd was featured on two Pearson albums, a two-trumpet Jazzline date with Johnny Coles in 1962 and Wahoo! on Blue Note in '64. By that time, Pearson had become Lion's production liaison (a role formerly held by the late Ike Quebec) and in-house arranger for numerous medium and large ensemble projects.

Given the writing talent that Pearson would demonstrate so soon after Fuego was recorded, it is surprising to find that the leader is responsible for all of the music on the present program. Byrd was not known for his composing at this point in his career, and this as much as any other aspect of the album signaled the increased maturity in his overall concept as both a writer and (through the balance once again of old and new strains in the six tracks) bandleader.

Familiar elements can be detected at the program's core. A new melody is fitted to an established chord sequence (in this case "Love Me or Leave Me") on "Bup a Loup," a practice made popular by the first modernists, while the themeless medium-slow blues format of "Funky Mama" was a staple of earlier Byrd—McLean sessions. "Low Life" puts a different spin on the blues, and as Feather mentions evokes Rollins (think "Decision" from the Blue Note album Sonny Rollins, Volume 1, where Byrd is featured, or the theme Rollins would contribute to the film Alfie six years after this session). "Amen" is a gospel-tinged period piece, but a superior one, with a most effective introduction/interlude.

The title track and "Lament" find Byrd looking ahead in his writing. "Fuego" is a modal blowing structure, one of the first to follow the early recordings of George Russell and the seminal Miles Davis session Kind of Blue. "Lament," which serves as the ballad performance of the date, creates an evocative atmosphere through its harmonic structure that would come to be identified with both Byrd and Pearson as their partnership grew over the ensuing years.

— Bob Blumenthal, 2005