Jazz On The Beach 103
Duke Pearson, Ezra Collective and this week's playlist
This week’s Jazz On The Beach features a track from one of my favourite musicians, Duke Pearson. A prodigious pianist, composer, arranger, producer and A&R Man for Blue Note, he recorded over 15 albums as a leader and contributed to countless sessions throughout the sixties, including eight albums with Donald Byrd and classics like Grant Green’s Idle Moments and Bobby Hutcherson’s The Kicker. Pearson’s name may not be as well known as some of his contemporaries, but his influence is huge - his arrangement of Byrd’s Cristo Redentor from A New Perspective (Blue Note, 1963) is a masterpiece.
The selected track is Los Malos Hombres from the album The Right Touch (Blue Note, 1968), a great composition which has terrific solos from tenor saxophonist Stanley Turrentine, alto saxophonist James Spaulding, trumpeter Freddie Hubbard and Pearson himself. This album was recently reissued in the Blue Note Tone Poet series and sounds fantastic. Also recommended is his I Don’t Care Who Knows It (Blue Note 2018), a double album of previously unreleased tracks recorded between 1968-70 that features both his hard bop and Brazilian sides.
New releases this week include Samara Joy’s sensational self-produced single of Betty Carter’s Tight (Verve), pianist Art Hirahara’s beautiful Aoi Blu from Echo Canyon due next month (Positone), The Outer Worlds Jazz Ensemble’s deeply groovin’ Beg, Borrow, Play (ATA, single) featuring the cream of Leeds latin/funk/afrobeat players with Chip Wickham on baritone saxophone.
Also, there’s Something Old Something New, the first single from Myele Manzana’s purely acoustic Crisis and Opportunity Vol. 4 - Meditations (DeepMatter, Nov), and something I missed from drummer Tyshawn Sorey, whose sprawling (and very heavy) version of Wayne Shorter’s Reincarnation Blues from Continuing (Pi Recordings) was released in June.
We mark the sad passing at 93 of the great double bassist Richard Davis with two exquisite tracks: Elvin Jones’ Ballade from Dear John C. (Impulse! 1965) and Davis’ duet with Eric Dolphy on Duke Ellington’s Come Sunday from Iron Man (Douglas International, 1968). May his memory be a blessing.
And as you probably know by now, the mighty Ezra Collective won the Mercury Music Prize for their album Where I’m Meant To Be (Partisan, 2022). It’s the first time a jazz artist has won the prize since it started 31 years ago, so huge congratulations to Femi and T.J. Coleoso, Ife Ogunjobi, Joe Armon-Jones and James Mollison and to all the people and organisations who helped them (and so many others) including Tomorrow’s Warriors’ Gary Crosby and Janine Irons, Kinetika Bloco (founder Mat Fox would be so proud), Jazz Re:freshed and AudioActive. We’re celebrating with, what else, Victory Dance!
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