Search - Cannonball Adderley :: Sextet in New York

World Class Session by the Adderley Brothers

Samuel Chell | Kenosha,, WI United States | 04/07/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I've always considered the dates featuring the Adderley brothers' group as funky, grooving, highly communicative sessions but lacking in substance compared to the dates exclusively under Julian's name ("Somethin' Else," "In Chicago," "Cannonball Takes Charge," "Know What I Mean," "Things Are Getting Better") or featuring him with Miles ("Kind of Blue," "Milestones," "Newport '58," "Jazz Track"). Of all the former sessions, "In New York" is the most consistently rewarding. It may not have yielded a hit single on the order of "Dis Here," "Sack O' Woe,' "Jive Samba" or "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy" (all of which we as musicians in college copied off the Adderley brothers' records and played every chance we got), but it's the only recording by the group that I still return to (thank goodness Keepnews saw fit to reissue it).



Compositionally, the highlights are the opening tune (Jimmy Heath's bi-modal 6/8 blues, "Gemini"); "Dizzy Business," a bebop gem by the great Basie arranger Ernie Wilkins; and yet another blues in Bb but a good one: Zawinul's "Scotch and Water." Yusef Lateef's compositions are not especially memorable in themselves but, along with his playing, they provide richness, depth, and resonance that is lacking on the other recordings by the brothers. And his tenor playing is so good on the group's abbreviated chaser, Sam Jones' "Cannon's Theme," that I'm always left wishing the recording would continue for at least another five minutes.



Admittedly, I may be partial to the recording for personal reasons: I was in Birdland when the same sextet performed there (the present session was recorded at the Vanguard). But it was while sitting next to Yusef Lateef, front row left side of the bandstand, during a set break that I received a valuable lesson in courtesy and respect. One of the musicians in the sextet appeared in the row behind us and was soon filling Lateef's (and unavoidably my) ear with nothing but dismissive talk concerning the intermission pianist--a talented, even virtuoso musician, but rushing the tempos and ostensibly rattled. "Putting down" other musicians was so de rigueur among the crowd I knew that the trash talk didn't strike me as that remarkable. What I've never forgotten, though, was Lateef's turning a deaf ear to his bandmate who, sensing his denigrating diatribe was going nowhere, issued a final insult and walked off. By contrast, Yusef remained for the guest pianist's entire set, at the conclusion of which he loudly applauded, much to the visible appreciation if not shock and relief of the struggling pianist.



Yusef Lateef brings the same class to the music of this session, perhaps the single most indispensable recording by the Adderley brothers."