BLP 4047

 Art Taylor - A.T.'s Delight

Released - January 1961

Recording and Session Information

Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, August 6, 1960
Dave Burns, trumpet; Stanley Turrentine, tenor sax; Wynton Kelly, piano; Paul Chambers, bass; Art Taylor, drums; 'Potato' Valdez, congas #3,4,6.

tk.3 Syeeda's Song Flute
tk.9 High Seas
tk.11 Move
tk.21 Epistrophy
tk.24 Blue Interlude
tk.26 Cookoo & Fungi

Track Listing

Side One
Title	Author	Recording Date
Syeeda's Song Flute	John Coltrane	06/08/1960
Epistrophy	Kenny Clarke, Thelonious Monk	06/08/1960
Move	Denzil Best	06/08/1960
Side Two
High Seas	Kenny Dorham	06/08/1960
Cookoo and Fungi	Art Taylor	06/08/1960
Blue Interlude	Kenny Dorham	06/08/1960

Liner Notes

ARTHUR TAYLOR may have an outward veneer of aloofness, but don't let it fool you. No one is more involved or more serious about his music when he starts to play. He has the grace of a panther, but coupled with it is the intensity of the tiger.

A. T. is not a flashy drummer but you always know he is there. "A drummer should keep time and swing while doing it," he told me during an interview for a Down Beat article (October 13, 1960).

This statement is not particularly startling, but Art gives it meaning by living up to it. His has been a growth from a nervous young kid, so anxious to swing that he rushed tempos, to a mature, polished artist. This is not a recent development. A. T. has been an important part of the combo scene in New York for quite a while now. His recordings, as a sideman, are countless. As a result, he has been written about on numerous album liners. The usual information states that he was born in New York City in 1929, played in a neighborhood band with Sonny Rollins and Jackie McLean while growing up in Harlem and is stylistically descendant from Max Roach and Art Blakey. That he has played with such important musicians as Bud Powell, Miles Davis, and Thelonious Monk is well known, too. Sometimes one takes it for granted that everyone knows these facts and is loath to repeat them again. But there are always new listeners and this is Taylor's first Blue Note album as a leader.

A. T. is one of the most sought after drummers in highly competitive New York jazz circles. It is, however, more than this relative security that keeps him from putting together a group of his own. With the rise of the drummer-combo leader in the past few years, certain people have been urging him to front his own quintet. Art feels he isn't ready; the main reason being the impossibility of getting, on a permanent basis, the musicians he would want leading a recording group is a different matter. You can get the people you want and Art did that here. In Wynton Kelly and Paul Chambers, both regular members of the Miles Davis Quintet, he has the aid and support of two of the best in jazz today. In their playing they offer a combination of youth and experience. As a rhythm section, the three, who have played together on many occasions in the past, blend beautifully.

"Potato" Valdez, the steel-fingered congero who is heard on three numbers, is no stranger to Blue Note listeners. His first jazz date after coming here from Cuba was Kenny Dorham's Afro-Cuban (Blue Note 1535). He was also a member, along with A. T. , of the large and varied battery of percussionists who helped Art Blakey on Orgy in Rhythm (Blue Note 1554 & 1555). Since the time of those recordings, "Potato" has cooked with Herbie Mann and is currently with the Afro-Jazziacs.

The reason for the presence of the two particular hornmen stems from a gig Art played in Newark, New Jersey during 1960. "Dave [Burns] and Stanley [Turrentine] were on it. I dug them and decided to use them when and if I did my next date."

Stanley Turrentine is a young tenorman from Pittsburgh, PA who came to prominence with Max Roach's group in 1959-60.

He is a big-toned, hard driver who remembers to be lyrical. Stan first liked the playing of Don Byas and Ben Webster; in recent years he was moved by Sonny Rollins. All these influences have been well assimilated. The end result is a modern player who does not blow any one way because it is fashionable. Turrentine can be heard in his own quartet session, Look Out! on Blue Note 4039.

Although he has been in jazz longer than any of the other musicians on this date, Dave Burns is probably the least known. This is because he has sequestered himself in New Jersey during the past few years. I first heard Burns when he was a young trumpeter in the 1946 Dizzy Gillespie band at the Spotlite on 52nd street. When he would blow, you would think you were hearing an echo of Diz. Although he was aping his idol, Dave's latent talent was obvious. It didn't show up again until the Fifties in James Moody's small band. He had retained some of Gillespie and had listened to Clifford Brown but essentially he was expressing himself.

When he left the Moody band a few years ago and announced his retirement from music, I doubted if someone with his talent for (and love of) jazz would stay away indefinitely. It took a while, but time proved me right. His playing in this album takes him right into the upper echelons of the trumpet division. I think you will be as gassed as A. T. was on the night he heard Dave in Newark.

By his selection of tunes, Art shows himself to be as astute a leader as when he chose the men to play them.

"Syeeda's Song Flute" is by John Coltrane. A. T. made the original recording of this with Trane and has been in love with the song ever since. It is a minor-key opus with a 32-bar pattern that is stated in an A-B-A-B fashion rather than the usual A-A-B-A used in conventional 32-bar songs. Burns and Turrentine interchange solos as each blows on two separate occasions. Kelly comes on with his swift and melodic single line, and listen to Chambers and Taylor pulse behind him. Paul's pizzicato solo leads back into the theme. Coltrane's piece, dedicated to his young daughter, shows the influence of his former leader, Thelonious Monk.

Monk, who was also Taylor's leader at one time, makes his presence even more strongly felt when his composition "Epistrophy" is played. A. T. always manages to inject some of Monk's material whenever he leads a session. Monk's theme is taken in loping stride as "Potato" ushers it in. The use of the conga here does not give "Epistrophy" a Latin flavor. Rather it is a complement to Taylor's basic beat. Everyone gets a chance to work out on this one with Burns especially expressive. It is climaxed by a duet of the two drummers working in close conjunction as A. T. solos brilliantly over and under "Potato's" continually moving backdrop.

The inspiration for "Move" comes from an old Dial recording of Denzil Best's jazz standard by Fats Navarro and Max Roach. Here it is Burns with Taylor and Valdez backing him. This rips right along with terrific swing and will carry you right along with it. Of Dave's muted work, Art says, "l wish he had played a longer solo."

Turrentine comes tearing in to continue the mood, however, and Kelly has a short but crisp bit before wailer Taylor takes over. Then Art backs "Potato" before returning for another spirited solo that leads back into the theme "High Seas" and Interlude" are a direct result of Art's asking Kenny Dorham to contribute two tunes to the date. Kenny is not only one of the best trumpeters in jazz, he is also a writer of more than passing talent.

"High Seas," which begins side two, is a simple but effective minor-key, 32-bar theme that would fit the character of Horace Silver's group without any trouble. Burns, Turrentine„ and Kelly all offer fine solos as Chambers and Taylor pulse along with strength in depth. After an articulate solo by Paul, A. T. punctuates an ensemble passage leading back into the final theme.

The side closer, "Blue Interlude," is a dark blue, minor blues, again with direct, uncluttered statements from the horns and Kelly with the rhythm section generating an intense drive behind them. As on "High Seas," Paul has a short plucked solo and A. T. weaves his solo comments in and out of an ensemble figure just prior to the return of the original melody.

In between the Dorham pieces lies an excursion to the islands for some "Cookoo and Fungi." These words describe a West Indian dish and with "Potato" helping in the kitchen, it is cooked well, the spice of the Indies flavoring it distinctively. After the drummers inaugurate the calypso beat, Turrentine starts wailing without any theme statement. The two drummers move to the center after Stan's solo for some interaction and some especially effective sticks on snares by A. L in an extended solo. Turrentine returns for some free blowing until he is faded out like the sun sinking behind the tropical foliage. Kelly is not along on this trip.

This album contains many fine individual moments but, more importantly, has a fine overall feeling. Good programming and pacing help to accomplish this. Arthur Taylor is the steady supporter that every drummer should be. He exhibits much controlled strength and is always interesting. When his solo spots come, he fills them with well structured, crisply executed thoughts. As a leader, he takes care of the non-playing details with equal aplomb. Clearly, A. T. 's Delight is our delight as well.

— IRA GITLER

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

Wynton Kelly and Paul Chambers perform by courtesy of Vee-Jay Records.

RVG CD Reissue Liner Notes

A NEW LOOK AT A. T.' S DELIGHT

Given both the quality of this recording and his enormous previous discography, the most amazing aspect of Art Taylor's subsequent career is how little of it was recorded. As a model second-generation modern drummer who learned his musical lessons from Kenny Clarke, Max Roach, and Art Blakey — and who, unlike those greats, never held an exclusive contract that limited his availability — Taylor was one of the most recorded musicians on any instrument. To the list of associates Ira Gitler enumerates in the original liner notes, Howard McGhee, Coleman Hawkins, Buddy DeFranco, George Wallington, Lennie Tristano, Donald Byrd, and Gigi Gryce (separately and together in the Jazz Lab), John Coltrane and Red Garland (separately and together in Garland's quintet) are among the most significant of Taylor's other frequent associates both on bandstands and in the studios.

Then the scene began to change, and the frequent visits Taylor made to Europe led to an extended residency beginning in 1963. For the next two decades, he played frequently but recorded less often with other expatriates and Europeans of various generations and styles. Taylor also produced the book Notes and Tones: Musician-to-Musician Interviews (1977, expanded edition 1993), a collection of uncommonly frank exchanges with many of his most prominent associates. Together with A. B. Spellman's Four Lives in the Bebop Business and Valerie Wilmer's As Serious as Your Life, the volume is part of an invaluable oral history of the period. Taylor returned to American recording studios in 1982 and his native New York as a permanent resident two years later, but kept a low profile. He formed the quintet Taylor's Wailers in 1991. The band served as a proving ground for several emerging talents and was recorded on two occasions before the Taylor's death in 1995.

A. T.'s Delight. the third of only five albums issued under the drummer's name, lives up to the high standards of program, personnel, and performance established by his previous Taylors Wailers (Prestige, 1957) and Taylor's Tenors (Prestige/New Jazz. 1959). Those sessions looked to Monk, Gigi Gryce, Ray Bryant, Jackie McLean, Walter Davis, and Charlie Rouse for material, and Taylor programmed a similar mix here. In the notes to his subsequent Mr. A. T. (Enja, 1991), Taylor relates how Charlie Parker taught him that a band got the most out of material that everyone enjoyed playing. (Taylor also commented on that occasion that "l have recorded hundreds of albums and there is no doubt in my mind that Rudy Van Gelder is the finest recordings engineer I've ever worked with.") The mutuality of the delight in the present material — which includes the first cover version of "Syeeda's Song Flute," a Denzil Best classic, two characteristic gems from Kenny Dorham and a Taylor calypso — is audible.

One signature of Taylor's first albums was an emphasis (two tracks each) on the music of Thelonious Monk. Monk himself is credited with providing the arrangements and conducting on Wailers, while Taylor and sidemen Charlie Rouse (also heard on Wailers) and Sam Jones were in Monk's employ when Tenors was made. "Epistrophy," an early example of rumba para Monk, is one of three present tracks featuring a second percussionist, known as "Potato" Valdez in jazz circles at the time but correctly as Carlos "Patato" Valdes over the course of an extensive and influential career. Taylor often found himself drumming alongside Candido, Ray Barretto, and other percussion greats in the period, and he deepens the pocket to accommodate Valdes here.

With or without conga drums, the rhythm section here is as exceptional as their collective reputations promise. Kelly and Chambers, an oft-inseparable pair, did most of their work together with either Philly Joe Jones or Jimmy Cobb. As a unit with Taylor, their only other documented appearances are on some of the Miles Davis/Gil Evans Miles Ahead tracks and on Dizzy Reece's Star Bright. Stanley Turrentine, at the start of his illustrious recording career, also recorded Duke Jordan's Flight to Jordan with A.T. two days earlier. Given the Monkish groove, sound and attack reveal a greater similarity to Charlie Rouse than usual; and his rhythmic force enlivens "Cookoo and Fungi," where trumpet and piano lay out.

Dave Burns, little more than a modern jazz footnote at present, deserves all of the enthusiasm that Gitler expresses. Burns did some of his best work on Blue Note, with James Moody (1948) and George Wallington (1954), as well as here, in what was his first recording in nearly five years. A spattering of additional appearances, including two Vanguard albums under his own name, followed through 1963, after which Burns turned to teaching.

— Bob Blumenthal, 2006