This Blue Note CD reissue is a rarity in its own way for it features the R&Bish singer Marlena Shaw in a more spontaneous setting than usual with a trio led by pianist George Gaffney at the 1973 Montreux Jazz Festival. It is not too surprising that Shaw found her greatest successes in pop/soul music…
For 1973’s dynamite Realization and Inside Out, trumpeter Eddie Henderson reassembled most of the legendary Herbie Hancock sextet he’d been part of. In 1975 after leaving Capricorn for Blue Note, he kept elements of that group together for Sunburst, his label debut, with some major changes: George Dukeplayed keyboards in place of Hancock; bassist Paul Jackson was replaced by Alphonso Johnson, and…
Switching over to Blue Note, which was then reaping a fortune with Donald Byrd’s R&B outfit, Eddie Henderson pursued a harder, earthier, more structured, funk-driven sound on his first album, while maintaining some of his marvelously spacier instincts for spice. Henderson continued to keep several components of the Herbie…
Like any other installment in Blue Note’s Cover Series, Portrait of the Isley Brothers: Harvest for the World finds a contemporary jazz artist — in this case, Ronnie Laws — reinterpreting an entire pop or soul album as a jazz album. Laws decided to cover the Isley Brothers’ popular…
Ronnie Laws’ performs eight songs associated with the late, great saxophonist Eddie Harris. In some spots Laws (whose other recordings are in the worlds of jazz-funk and pop) closely copies his early inspiration, but when he tries to sound like himself, he comes across as a fine improviser. Laws…
Ronnie Laws has always been an R&B-oriented saxophonist miscast in the jazz world, starting with his early association with the rapidly declining Blue Note label. His debut album (reissued on CD) has a couple of decent melodies (the opening “Always There” is the most memorable), some soulful tenor and…
When Ronnie Laws first started recording as a leader in 1975, one of the saxman’s strongest allies wasWayne Henderson. That trombonist and founding member of the Crusaders (originally the Jazz Crusaders) was an expert when it came to combining the accessibility of soul and funk with the freedom of jazz, and his guidance proved…
Acoustic guitarist Earl Klugh has always had an appealing sound, but so many of his recordings are sleepy affairs that do not raise themselves above the level of background music. This early session definitely falls into that category, and its reissue as a Blue Note CD reminds one of…
