Analogue Productions (Prestige)
Part of the ultimate audiophile Prestige stereo reissues from Analogue Productions — 25 of the most collectible, rarest, most audiophile-sounding Rudy Van Gelder recordings ever made. All cut at 33 1/3 and also released on Hybrid SACD
All mastered from the original analog master tapes by mastering maestro Kevin Gray. 180-gram LPs pressed at Acoustic Sounds' state-of-the-art pressing plant, Quality Record Pressings, plated by Gary Salstrom
Tip-on jackets on thick cardboard stock
Posterity remembers Oliver Nelson (1932-1975) primarily as an arranger/conductor. When he first began to attract attention with a series of albums for Prestige and its subsidiaries, however, Nelson was hailed as a versatile leader of small groups and a composer/instrumentalist who could refresh the music's traditional verities while also looking ahead. There is no better showcase for these skills among his initial sessions than Screamin' the Blues, a rousing set of funky modernism interpreted by a sextet of players who shared Nelson's allegiance to both virtuosity and vision. The pairing of saxophonist Eric Dolphy with Nelson was particularly inspired as both men were adept on more than one instrument, and allowed this sextet to create an uncommon diversity of colors. Nelson and Dolphy would reunite a year later on both the classic Blues and the Abstract Truth and (with the band heard here minus trumpeter Richard Williams) on the looser yet intense Straight Ahead. With Richard Williams, Eric Dolphy, Richard Wyands, George Duvivier and Roy Haynes.
Analogue Productions (Prestige)
Part of the ultimate audiophile Prestige stereo reissues from Analogue Productions — 25 of the most collectible, rarest, most audiophile-sounding Rudy Van Gelder recordings ever made. All cut at 33 1/3 and also released on Hybrid SACD
All mastered from the original analog master tapes by mastering maestro Kevin Gray. 180-gram LPs pressed at Acoustic Sounds' state-of-the-art pressing plant, Quality Record Pressings, plated by Gary Salstrom
Tip-on jackets on thick cardboard stock
"Rudy Van Gelder captured this Prestige title in stereo, and it reflects his consistently fine work. Tonally it's a touch on the light side, but otherwise the band's energy is clearly and dynamically captured, with a decent sense of air and focus. Kevin Gray did the mastering of this excellent QRP platter, so the quality of this welcome reissue is as good as it gets." — Music = 4/5; Sonics = 3.5/5 - Wayne Garcia, The Absolute Sound, September 2016.
Booker Ervin's recordings with Charles Mingus and Randy Weston brought him good reviews and a bit of notoriety. But it was his series of Song Books for Prestige Records that broadcast the stentorian announcement that a jazz orator of gigantic stature had arrived. Ervin's tenor saxophone sound was haunted by the loneliness and spaciousness of the Texas plains where he was raised. The Southwest moan was an integral part of his playing. But his style went beyond the classic Texas tenor tradition to incorporate the intricacies of bebop and suggestions of the free jazz that was initiating one of the periods of self-renewal that keeps jazz fresh and interesting. The Freedom Book, recorded at the end of 1963, was one of Ervin's masterpieces. He is abetted by the power and drive of Jaki Byard, Richard Davis, and Alan Dawson.
