Our thing
| Our thing | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Studio album by Joe Henderson | ||||
|
Publication |
||||
| Label (s) | Verve Records | |||
|
Format (s) |
CD |
|||
|
Title (number) |
5/6 |
|||
|
running time |
38:41 (LP) / 45:51 (CD) |
|||
| occupation | ||||
|
Studio (s) |
Rudy Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs , New Jersey |
|||
|
||||
Our Thing is a jazz album by Joe Henderson . It was recorded on September 9, 1963 in Englewood Cliffs , New Jersey and released on Blue Note Records . It was Henderson's second album under his own name.
The album
In 1963 Joe Henderson appeared in a quintet together with trumpeter Kenny Dorham on the jazz scene with albums such as Page One or Una Mas (the latter also appeared on Blue Note, but under Dorham's name). In the 17 months of their collaboration, a total of five albums were created, three under Hendersons, two under Dorham's name. The jazz critic Nat Hentoff compared the partnership of the two musicians with the collaboration of Joe Venuti and Eddie Lang , Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie , Cannonball Adderley and Nat Adderley and Miles Davis with John Coltrane . The two winds will be accompanied in their third session together by the young Andrew Hill , who played his first session for Blue Note here; then Alfred Lion gave him the opportunity the following year to record a number of albums under his own name, such as Judgment! and Point of Departure , also with Henderson and Dorham as horns. Other members of the rhythm section were the relatively unknown bassist Eddie Khan , who had previously worked with Max Roach , and the drummer Pete LaRoca .
The first track on the album, Henderson's composition “Teeter Tooter”, has a 12-bar blues theme, similar to how Charlie Parker conceived his pieces; the following track "Pedro's Tune" by Kenny Dorham is a medium-tempo blues with a Latin touch. “Pedro's Tune” takes up the ideas of his compositions “Una Mas” or “Blue Bossa”. The title track "Our Thing" is by Henderson; the term (in a similar form also New Thing ) was the leitmotif of the young jazz avant-garde of the early 1960s. The swinging "Back Road" written by Kenny Dorham recalls initially to the Blues March of the Jazz Messengers and then surprises with subtle changes of tempo; the last piece, "Escapade" again written by Dorham, is kept in a lyrical mood.
Rating of the album
Bob Blumenthal wrote about the new edition of the album in 2000 that the album impressed with the playing of its two outstanding brass instruments; the “inner” structures of the music and the harmonic knowledge of the band are combined with a basic discovery attitude regarding the sound and structure of the music, without just filling the blues jam ; an attitude that should become the standard for later Blue Note sessions.
Richard Cook and Brian Morton count Our Thing among the most important albums of the early Joe Henderson and awarded it the highest rating in the Penguin Guide to Jazz ; it is the "central work" in the triptych of the albums with Dorham; they highlight the unusually consistent session, also captivating with Andrew Hill's “cryptic” contributions and the excellent contributions by Khan and LaRoca.
At that time, Henderson developed an “ inside-outside ” approach to playing. That is, he moved in and out of the chord changes , and did so with a breadth of free play in which he added split tones to his phrasing, as in his composition "Teeter Totter" or in Dorham's "Escapade". Henderson receives a stimulus from Andrew Hill who, whether playing the solos or just accompanying them, always ensures the abstraction of the contours of the material by inserting chords or fragments of the melody that point in a different direction.
In his essay on three major Blue Note albums of this era, David Adler praises Our Thing for the legendary interplay between Dorham and Henderson, the relatively rare appearance of the pianist Andrew Hill as an accompanying musician at this session and the participation of the almost forgotten Sidemen Eddie is also important Khan and Pete La Roca, who were part of the label's “stable” at that time. Our Thing is a jewel, says Adler, an inspired message from musicians, few of whom have great recordings. Despite his age, Henderson had already developed his own highly individual style.
The titles
- Joe Henderson Quartet - Our Thing (Blue Note BLP 4152 and BST 84152)
- Teeter Tooter (Henderson) 8:30
- Pedro's Time (Dorham) 10:01
- Our Thing (Henderson) 6:17
- Back Road (Dorham) 6:17
- Escapade (Dorham) 8:02
- Teeter Tooter (alternate take) 7:10
Literature / sources
- Richard Cook , Brian Morton : The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD . 6th edition. Penguin, London 2002, ISBN 0-14-051521-6 .
- Bob Blumenthal: Liner Notes 2000 (new edition)
- Nat Hentoff, Original Liner Notes 1963.
Web links / sources
- Our Thing at Allmusic (English)
- David Adler
- qblog.nov.ru