Search - Barry Harris :: Bull's Eye

Good, not great

that opinionated guy | 02/19/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"this barry harris sextet cd is worth a listen if you're a fan of the pianist but it's not essential listening by any stretch of the imagination.

considering the time it was recorded, it's pretty unadventurous music. all but one of the songs are harris originals and none of them are especially surprising or unusual. two of the tracks are performed by harris with bass and drums and they sound a bit out of place after the full sound of the sextet.

the other soloists on the date are pepper adams on baritone sax, kenny dorham on trumpet and charles mcpherson on tenor sax. dorham was pretty much on the decline by this point in his career and mcpherson is playing the tenor instead of his usual alto and seems inhibited by this. this leaves pepper adams as the only soloist besides harris who performs at the top of his game.

this isn't a bad album, but if you must have a barry harris sextet cd, i'd recommend "luminescence" which was recorded a year earlier with a mostly different line-up, though pepper adams is on that one too."