The Jazz Messengers at the Café Bohemia - Volume 3
Released - June 21,1984
Recording and Session Information
"Cafe Bohemia", NYC, 2nd set, November 23, 1955
Kenny Dorham, trumpet #2; Hank Mobley, tenor sax #2; Horace Silver, piano; Doug Watkins, bass; Art Blakey, drums.
tk.9 What's New
tk.11 Deciphering The Message / The Theme
"Cafe Bohemia", NYC, 3rd set, November 23, 1955
Kenny Dorham, trumpet; Hank Mobley, tenor sax; Horace Silver, piano; Doug Watkins, bass; Art Blakey, drums.
tk.13 Just One Of Those Things
tk.14 Gone With The Wind
"Cafe Bohemia", NYC, 4th set, November 23, 1955
Kenny Dorham, trumpet; Hank Mobley, tenor sax; Horace Silver, piano; Doug Watkins, bass; Art Blakey, drums.
tk.17 Hank's Symphony
tk.18 Lady Bird
Track Listing
| Side One | ||
| Title | Author | Recording Date |
| Lady Bird | Tadd Dameron | November 23 1955 |
| What's New | Burke-Haggart | November 23 1955 |
| Deciphering The Message | Hank Mobley | November 23 1955 |
| Side Two | ||
| Just One Of Those Things | Cole Porter | November 23 1955 |
| Hank's Symphony | Hank Mobley | November 23 1955 |
| Gone With The Wind | Magidson-Wrubel | November 23 1955 |
Liner Notes
Although The Jazz Messengers has been the title for Art Blakey's various groups since 1956, the original Jazz Messengers was a co-operative group, consisting of Horace Silver, Hank Mobley, Kenny Dorham, Doug Watkins and Blakey. The band's origins are as unique as its members' music.
Horace Silver made his debut as a leader for Blue Note in late 1952 with trio sessions that included Blakey. The pianist and drummer continued to appear together sporadically on various dates for the label by Lou Donaldson, Miles Davis and others. In February of 1954, Alfred Lion, owner and producer of Blue Note, put together an all star band to be recorded live at Birdland under Blakey's direction. Horace was not only the pianist, but the composer of three of the tunes.
In November of the same year, Lion approached Silver about recording again as a leader, but this time with horns. When Lion asked who he would ideally like on the date, he asked for Hank Mobley and Doug Watkins, who had recently been working in his quartet and Minton's and to round out the quintet Kenny Dorham and Art Blakey, thinking that would be impossible. But to Horace's delight and surprise, Lion assured him that there would be no problems. And that quintet was soon rehearsing for the first of two sessions that would eventually be issued as Horace Silver And The Jazz Messengers (BLP 1518).
The second session took place in February of 1955 and so did their first live engagement, which was at a Philadelphia club fittingly called the Blue Note. A month later, the group without KD recorded Hank Mobley's first album (10" BLP 5066). At the same time, KD's first Blue Note sessions featured Mobley, Silver and Blakey at the core of an expanded group (BLP 1535).
In 1947, Art Blakey had led a big band known as the Messengers, refering to the fact that most of its members were of the Moslem faith. That same year, he used that name for his first Blue Note date with a septet that included KD. The name lay dormant until this very special quintet assembled for the Horace Silver date. They resurrected the name, adding the word jazz to it. Art Blakey explained the modified name to Nat Hentoff in Down Beat, "In jazz you get the message when you hear the music. And when we're on the stand and we see that there are people who aren't patting their feet and aren't nodding their heads to our music, we know we're doing something wrong." With a repetoire of Mobley and Silver originals as well as standards and with the combined drive of Blakey, Silver and Watkins, it would be hard to imagine anyone nodding on this music.
Leonard Feather best described the Cafe Bohemia in his liner notes to Volumes I and II of this collection: "Cafe Bohemia was just an obscure Greenwich Village club dedicated apparently forever to the education of the visiting fire-eaters who sought the girliest of girlie shows. In the spring of 1955, a big change came over the club and over the thinking of Jimmy Garofolo, its owner. Jimmy had no previous knowledge of jazz, but when a couple of musicians wandered in off the street and sat in for a stimulating jam session, Jimmy was impressed. He was better then impressed when Charlie Parker fell by one night. Even to the point of deciding on a jazz policy, and on Bird himself for the opening attraction. Alas, the sign advertising Charlie Parker's initiation of jazz at Bohemia lay unused. (Parker died shortly before the date.) The Bohemia, a somewhat long and narrow room with a bar at one end and a small bandstand at the other, is on street level on Sheridan Square. Musicians have embraced it..."
On November 23, 1955, Alfred Lion and Rudy Van Gelder moved into the club to capture the Jazz Messengers live, ten months after the band's first live gig.
The fruits of that evening are now history thanks to AT THE BOHEMIA Volumes I and II (BLP 1507 and BLP 1508). And now we have unearthed a third volume from that very special night.
Included are two Mobley originals, Deciphering The Message and Hank's Symphony, both of which the Messengers would record in this studio six months later for CBS, although only the latter would be issued. And like the CBS album, Hank's Symphony, an attractive and exotic theme, with Blakey on mallets, is basically a drum feature. Deciphering The Message is a delightful, boppish cooker with a rousing Mobley solo. At times, he sounds as if he is almost parodying the JATP style of crowd pleasing tenor. Another example of his wry humor is his artful incorporation of a Bye Bye Blackbird quote at one point. KD and Horace are also powerful and interestingly show their Dizzy Gillespie and Bud Powell roots respectively to a greater degree than is evident in most of their work. The tune ends with a brief version of The Theme.
Tadd Damerson's Lady Bird is a happy performance on which everyone solos. KD is just singing, skipping along with that feel that only he could have gotten. Mobley is a master of fluency.
Doug Watkins solos on both Deciphering and Lady Bird, but his real featured number on What's New on which he plays the melody and takes the only solo to the accompaniment of just piano and drums. Watkins was truly a master of instrument with a rich tone, great soloing ability, brilliant choices of notes and a rhythmic drive that could keep up with Blakey's. It would be sad if history overlooks the contributions of a man such as this.
On the bandstand, What's New was played in conjunction with Alone Together (BLP 1507) which spotlighted Mobley and Yesterdays (BLP 1508) which spotlighted KD.
This record is completed with two perennials, Just One Of Those Things and Gone With The Wind, with the solo space on both given to KD, Mobley and Silver in that order. Despite from minor fluffs on the outthemes of both standards, the performances certainly merit release. Check out especially Mobley's non-stop, stream of creativity of Things.
Soon after this date, Kenny Dorham would leave the Jazz Messengers to begin forming his own band the Jazz Prophets, which coincidentally would record live at the Cafe Bohemia for Blue Note six months later.
His replacement was Donald Byrd. And it was under Byrd's name for the Transition label that the Messengers with trumpeter Joe Gordon added would record again in December of 1955.
In 1956, the group continued to work and signed a record deal with CBS, which resulted in one album. By June, the Jazz Messengers has ceaased to exist. Blakey took the name and formed a new band. Silver took Byrd, Mobley and Watkins and formed his own quintet. To fill out their contractual obligations with CBS, both band leaders made their own albums for the company.
The Horace Silver Quintet, now with Louis Hayes on drums, returned to the Blue Note fold in November to record the classic, Six Pieces Of Silver (BLP 1538). In early 1957, Hank Mobley resurrected the Jazz Messengers in a sense, making two albums with the Silver-Watkins-Blakey rhythm section, one of which included Milt Jackson (BLP 1544) and one with Art Farmer (BLP 1550).
Mobley continued as a member of the Silver band during 1957, and, in 1959, he rejoined Blakey for eight months. All the members of the original Jazz Messengers continued to cross paths in every conceivable combination at Blue Note dates. But that first group in that first year seems to have contributed an extraordinary amount of creative input to the history of jazz and the direction that it would take for many years to come.
-Michael Cuscuna
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