BST 84421

Bobbi Humphrey Dig This!

Released - 1972

Recording and Session Information

A&R Studios, NYC, July 20 & 21, 1972
Bobbi Humphrey, flute; George Marge, oboe, English horn; Seymour Berman, Paul Gershman, Irving Spice, Paul Winter, violin; Julian Barber, viola; Seymour Barab, cello; Eugene Bianco, harp; Harry Whitaker, electric piano; Paul Griffin, electric piano, Clavinet; William Fontaine, David Spinozza, guitar; Ron Carter, bass; Wilbur Bascomb Jr., electric bass; Alphonse Mouzon, drums, bell tree, arranger; Warren Smith, percussion; Wade Marcus, Horace Ott, arranger.

10187-12 Lonely Town, Lonely Streets
10188-8 Is This All
10189-7 Smiling Faces Sometimes
10190-2 Virtue
10191-4 I Love Every Little Thing About You
10192-9 Love Theme From "Fuzz"
10193-2 El Mundo De Maravillas
10194-15 Nubian Lady

Track Listing

Side One
Title	Author	Recording Date
Lonely Town, Lonely Street	Bill Withers	July 20/21 1972
Is This All?	Henry Johnson	July 20/21 1972
Smiling Faces Sometimes	Barret Strong, Norman Whitfield	July 20/21 1972
Virtue	Alphonse Mouzon	July 20/21 1972
Side Two
I Love Every Little Thing About You	Stevie Wonder	July 20/21 1972
Love Theme from "Fuzz"	Dave Grusin	July 20/21 1972
El Mundo de Maravillas	Alphonse Mouzon	July 20/21 1972
Nubian Lady	Kenny Barron	July 20/21 1972

Liner Notes

...

Real Gone CD Reissue Liner Notes

Jazz flautist Bobbi Humphrey was born in April 1950 in Texas. Trained in both classical and jazz styles in her high school in Dallas, she continued her formal training at Southern Methodist University. It was there that she caught the ear of trumpet maverick Dizzy Gillespie, who suggested she move to New York City to kick start her career. She arrived in the Big Apple in June of 1971 and immediately began pounding the pavement. She approached Atlantic Records, who told her that they had used up their budget for that quarter, and suggested that she return in September. Knowing that without steady income that she wouldn't last that long, she kept wandering the streets of New York until she stumbled upon of the offices of Blue Note Records on 7th Avenue. She gave the secretary at the door a reel-to-reel demo tape that made its way to the ears of George Butler, the president of Blue Note. Being the glory days when record companies actually listened to unsolicited demo tapes, Humphrey received an offer directly from Butler within weeks of her arrival in New York. He was so enamoured with her abilities from the moment he heard the recordings, that he took a gamble on a completely unknown artist!

Butler wasted no time getting her into the studio (putting himself in the producer's chair), and thus in the Fall of 1971, she recorded her debut album Flute In at Rudy Van Gelder's studio in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, the site of countless historic sessions including John Coltrane's A Love Supreme and Freddie Hubbard's Red Clay. Although her repertoire consisted of (at least some) contempory pop material by Bill Withers ("Ain't No Sunshine"), Carole King ("It's Too Late"), and Jerry Leiber and Phil Spector's "Spanish Harlem," the album also had its fair share of instrumental-based themes by the likes of Lee Morgan (via his jazz standard "The Sidewinder") and the Eddie Harris composition "Set Us Free." Idris Muhammad (session man for Lou Donaldson and Pharaoh Sanders amongst others) played drums, while Blue Note trumpeter Lee Morgan performed on several songs including his own "Sidewinder." Heavyweight tenor sax player Billy Harper (fresh from both Art Blakey and Elvin Jones' bands) contributed as well. According to some historians, the album was a landmark moment in the history of Blue Note, as Humphrey was the first female ever signed to the seminal jazz label. As far as debut LPs go, it was a solid beginning that saw arranger Wade Marcus blend popular hit songs and original material in an attempt to appeal to both traditional jazz fans and those seeking more modern flavors. Above all, Flute In certainly displayed Bobbi's abilities as a dynamic soloist.

Recorded in July 1972, again with George Butler in the producer's seat, her second album Dig This repeated some of the debut's formula by including another Bill Withers song, the less widely known "Lonely Town, Lonely Street," and other contemporary pop songs including "Smiling Faces Sometimes" (written by the Motown duo of Barrett Strong and Norman Whitfield) and made famous by the vocal group The Undisputed Truth. Also included was a version of Stevie Wonder's "I Love Everything About You" (from his Music of Mind LP). A couple of years later, Humphrey would find herself playing flute on Wonder's Songs in the Key of Life album. As she explained in 2006 to Rico Washington of Wax Poetics magazine, "Stevie and I have been good friends since I first came to New York. He became my daughter's godfather. In 1975 or 1976, he told me he was working on this album he was planning to call Songs in the Key of Life and wanted me to come out to California and play on the record. But I'd never worked with him and I knew he was a perfectionist. I came to the studio, went in, and did my part, and he said, 'Okay, that's it.' I couldn't believe it! I thought I'd have to do it at least thirty times for him. So I did 'Another Star' in one take, In terms of a friendship, I get teary eyed I think about how that brother has stood with me. After he had the car accident in 1973, he told me something really deep. He said the sound of my flute led him out of his coma."

Unlike her debut album, Dig This was recorded not at Rudy Van Gelder's place, but at A&R Studios in New York City, responsible for a string of classics including Burt Bacharach's 1960s hits with Dionne Warwick and Bob Dylan's heart-wrenching Blood on the Tracks LP. In classic Blue Note fashion, a diverse stable of musicians were incorporated into the sessions, including Miles Davis' sideman Ron Carter on bass, drummer Alphonse Mouzon (a co-founder of Weather Report, a long time member of Larry Coryell's Eleventh House, and a Blue Note solo artist in his own right), guitarist David Spinozza (who just a year before was the guitarist on Paul and Linda McCartney's Ram LP, before the husband and wife duo had set Wings into motion), and keyboardist Paul Griffin, who can be heard playing piano on a slew of classic Dylan numbers including "Like a Rolling Stone," "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues," and "Positively Fourth Street."

With a pedigree like that, it's no wonder that Dig This was such a heady blend of pop and jazz music. And that blend has weathered the passage of time well; Humphrey's version of "Smiling Faces Sometimes" was sampled by Common on the song "Puppy Chow" on his 1992 album Can I Borrow A Dollar? Over a period of time, Common sampled several different Bobbi Humphrey 1970s recordings, and then on his 2002 Electric Circus album, he asked Humphrey to come into the studio and perform live on the song "Between You, Me and Liberation." Humphrey was ecstatic to be honored by a younger generation of African American artists as well as pleased to be financially rewarded. As she mentioned in the 2006 interview in Wax Poetics, she views hip-hop music as a way for "African Americans to improve our economic situation, in terms of having control of our own destiny as artists and businesspeople."

With Bobbi Humphrey's sophomore Blue Note album having been a semi-obscure, yet important influence on contemporary Black music, it has been long overdue for a CD reissue. We're pleased to present it to you now. Dig This indeed!

Pat Thomas
Aalborg, Denmark
October 2012