BST 84314 (NR)

Booker Ervin

Released - 2005

Recording and Session Information

Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, May 24, 1968
Woody Shaw, trumpet; Booker Ervin, tenor sax; Kenny Barron, piano; Jan Arnett, bass; Billy Higgins, drums.

tk.2 In A Capricornian Way
tk.7 Den Tex
tk.9 Lynn's Tune
tk.11 204
tk.12 Gichi

See Also: BN-LA-488-H2

Track Listing

Side One
Title	Author	Recording Date
Gichi	Kenny Barron	May 24 1968
Den Tex	Booker Ervin	May 24 1968
In a Capricornian Way	Woody Shaw	May 24 1968
Side Two
Lynn's Tune	Booker Ervin	May 24 1968
204	Booker Ervin	May 24 1968

Liner Notes

Texas has produced a wealth of great, big-toned saxophonists since Herschel Evans left Denton for Kansas City in the '30s. The sound of a Texas tenor — particularly those who emerged in the '50s like Curtis Amy, David "Fathead" Newman, Booker Ervin, and Wilton Felder — is unmistakable. The tone is strong, clean, and biting, almost to the point of overblowing. The playing is passionate almost to the point of frenzy, but always vulnerable to the degree that a bent half-note can break your heart. The improvisations are crystalline and precise.

As a child, Booker Telleferro Ervin, born on October 31, 1930 in Denison, Texas, started out on his father's instrument — the trombone. At the age of 20, with no particular direction to his life, he joined the U. S. Air Force, where he happened upon a tenor saxophone in an officers' club. He taught himself the instrument by ear and instinct, and found his own voice in the process. He woodshedded for the next two years while based in Okinawa.

Upon discharge, he paid his dues, working the R&B circuit and studying at Boston's Schillinger House (which became the Berklee School of Music). Booker soon assimilated the influences of Lester Young, Buster Smith, Dexter Gordon, and Sonny Stitt into a style that was all his own. By 1958, Booker was ready and headed for New York. He looked up Horace Parlan, whom he'd met in Pittsburgh. Parlan was working with Charles Mingus and recommended the tenor saxophonist to him.

Mingus's band was the perfect showcase for Booker Ervin's many talents. His sound was loud and strong; his playing could convey jubilance or sorrow with equal power; he had complete command of the blues and bebop and wasn't shy about leaving Earth's orbit for unchartered territory. And he swung as hard as Mingus did. Albums like Jazz Portraits, Blues and Roots, and Mingus Ah Um give testimony to what a perfect fit he was with the bassist's band.

Booker spent the next three years working with the volatile bassist as well as Horace Parlan's trio. In 1963, he began working with Randy Weston and signed with Prestige Records. There, producer Don Schlitten put him together with Jaki Byard, Richard Davis, and Alan Dawson to record The Freedom Book. And this rhythm section in its own way was as elastic, innovative, and exciting as the trio of Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter, and Tony Williams, which Miles Davis was incubating at the time. The album would be Ervin's career masterpiece.

The Freedom Book caused a lot of excitement in New York, as did sequels like The Blues Book and The Space Book and his appearance on Randy Weston's African Cookbook the following year. But to the detriment of jazz, New York isn't America. Ervin led the life of a respected New York freelancer, which meant triumphs were mixed with incomprehensible dry spells. So at the end of 1964, Booker moved his family to Europe, where he found plenty of work, but few musical challenges. Eighteen months later, he returned to New York. One highlight of that period was an October 1965 live album in Munich that brought Booker together with his idol, Dexter Gordon, and his favorite rhythm section (Jaki Byard and Alan Dawson) for Settin' the Pace.

In September 1966, Booker made his last album for Prestige and headed to the Monterey Jazz Festival to perform with Randy Weston (a stunning concert that was ultimately released on Verve). Richard Bock of Pacific Jazz heard him there and signed him to his label. That December, he cut Structurally Sound in L. A., followed by Booker and Brass the following September in New York. By this time, both Pacific Jazz and Blue Note had been bought up by Liberty Records. Booker, being a New York artist, was transferred to Blue Note where he made The In Between in January 1968.

Six months later, this second Blue Note session took place and, although it was given a catalog number, it was never released at the time. Its first appearance was as part of a double-album entitled Back from the Gig in 1976, which was filled out by a previously unreleased Horace Parlan Blue Note album with Ervin.

The personnel is a blend of Blue Note regulars and people involved in Ervin's musical world. Billy Higgins had been an important Blue Note regular since his feet hit New York sidewalks in 1961. Woody Shaw had recently completed a Evo-year tenure with Horace Silver and was freelancing with such Blue Note artists as Hank Mobley and Jackie McLean. Kenny Barron first worked with Ervin in 1962 when his brother Bill Barron recorded a two-tenor session for Savoy entitled Hot Line. Kenny was also the pianist on Booker and Brass. Czech bassist Jan Arnet had recently moved to New York and was a member of Chico Hamilton's group at the time (he would soon join Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers). Arnet had worked with Ervin in Germany in '65.

Kenny Barron first recorded his "Gichi" eighteen months earlier with the quintet he co-led with Jimmy Owens for Atlantic. The rest of the material, including woody shawls "In a Capricornian Way," was introduced here.

It should be noted that "204" is not the Randy Weston tune of the same name. It refers to the street number of the apartment that Booker inherited from Randy in the '60s. "Den Tex" was named for his hometown and "Lynn's Tune" is a dedication to his daughter.

The date is clearly a success in terms of material and performance (Kenny Barron is especially inspired), so it was most likely the sales of his previous Pacific Jazz and Blue Note albums that caused this session to sit in the vaults for so long.

That August, Booker and Lee Morgan comprised the front line for Andrew Hill's Grass Roots. The following January, he was reunited with Byard, Davis, and Dawson on alto saxophonist Eric Kloss's In the Land of the Giants for Prestige. With that session, his discography came to an end. On July 31, 1970, the 39-year-old saxophonist died of kidney disease in New York.

In the liner notes to the re-release of his African Cookbook album in 1973, Randy Weston wrote: "Booker Ervin is no longer with us physically, but he is still with us spiritually. He will live in musical memory as long as his playing can be heard, with its vitality, strength, and power, with its tenderness and poignancy. He was a uniquely creative artist, greatly missed by us all. African Cookbook was named for Booker; his sound always reminded me of North Africa. I wrote 'Portrait of Vivian' for my mother, but it wasn't really 'created' until Booker played it and left us a masterpiece of the tenor saxophone — a classic."

— MICHAEL CUSCUNA 2005