CANNONBALL ADDERLEY

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"He had a certain spirit. You couldn't put your finger on it, but it was there in his playing every night." --Miles Davis

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Julian Edwin "Cannonball" Adderley (September 15, 1928 – August 8, 1975), was a jazz alto saxophonist of the small combo era of the 1950s and 1960s. Originally from Tampa, Florida, he moved to New York in the mid 1950s.

He was the brother of jazz cornetist Nat Adderley.

Educator and saxophonist

His educational career was long established prior to teaching applied instrumental music classes at Dillard High School in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Cannonball was a local legend in Florida until he moved to New York City in 1955.

He joined the Miles Davis sextet in 1957, around the time that John Coltrane left the group to join Thelonious Monk's band. (Coltrane would return to Davis's group in 1958). Adderley played on the seminal Davis records Milestones and Kind of Blue. This period also overlapped with pianist Bill Evans's time with the sextet, an association that led to recording Portrait of Cannonball and Know What I Mean?.

His interest as an educator carried over to his recordings. In 1961, Cannonball narrated The Child's Introduction to Jazz, released on Riverside Records.

Band leader

The Cannonball Adderley Quintet featured Cannonball on alto sax and his brother Nat Adderley on cornet. Adderley's first quintet was not very successful. However, after leaving Davis' group, he reformed another, again with his brother, which enjoyed more success.

The new quintet (which later became the Cannonball Adderley Sextet), and Cannonball's other combos and groups, included such noted musicians as:
pianists Bobby Timmons, Victor Feldman, Joe Zawinul (later of Weather Report), Hal Galper, Michael Wolff and George Duke
bassists Sam Jones, Walter Booker and Victor Gaskin
drummers Louis Hayes and Roy McCurdy
saxophonists Charles Lloyd and Yusef Lateef.

The sextet was noteworthy towards the end of the 1960s for achieving crossover success with pop audiences, but doing it without making artistic concessions. 

Later life

By the end of 1960s, Adderley's playing began to reflect the influence of the electric jazz avant-garde, and Miles Davis' experiments on the album Bitches Brew. On his albums from this period, such as The Price You Got to Pay to Be Free (1970), he began doubling on soprano saxophone, showing the influence of John Coltrane and Wayne Shorter. In that same year, his quintet appeared at the Monterey Jazz Festival in California, and a brief scene of that performance was featured in the 1971 psychological thriller Play Misty for Me, starring Clint Eastwood. In 1975 he also appeared (in an acting role alongside Jose Feliciano and David Carradine) in the episode "Battle Hymn" in the third season of the TV series Kung Fu.

Adderley died of a stroke in 1975. He was buried in the Southside Cemetery, Tallahassee, Florida. Later that year he was inducted into the Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame.  

Joe Zawinul's composition "Cannon Ball" (recorded on Weather Report's album Black Market) is a tribute to his former leader.

Songs made famous by Adderley and his bands include "This Here" (written by Bobby Timmons), "The Jive Samba," "Work Song" (written by Nat Adderley), "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy" (written by Joe Zawinul) and "Walk Tall" (written by Zawinul, Marrow and Rein). A cover version of Pops Staples' "Why (Am I Treated So Bad)?" also entered the charts.

Adderley was a member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Fraternity of America Incorporated (Xi Omega, Frostburg State University, '70), the largest and oldest secret society in music and Alpha Phi Alpha, the oldest existing intercollegiate Greek-letter fraternity established for African Americans (made Beta Nu chapter, Florida A&M University).

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Biography by Scott Yanow

One of the great alto saxophonists, Cannonball Adderley had an exuberant and happy sound that communicated immediately to listeners. His intelligent presentation of his music (often explaining what he and his musicians were going to play) helped make him one of the most popular of all jazzmen. 

Adderley already had an established career as a high school band director in Florida when, during a 1955 visit to New York, he was persuaded to sit in with Oscar Pettiford's group at the Cafe Bohemia. His playing created such a sensation that he was soon signed to Savoy and persuaded to play jazz full-time in New York. With his younger brother, cornetist Nat, Cannonball formed a quintet that struggled until its breakup in 1957. Adderley then joined Miles Davis, forming part of his super sextet with John Coltrane and participating on such classic recordings as Milestones and Kind of Blue. Adderley's second attempt to form a quintet with his brother was much more successful for, in 1959, with pianist Bobby Timmons, he had a hit recording of "This Here." From then on, Cannonball always was able to work steadily with his band. 

During its Riverside years (1959-1963), the Adderley Quintet primarily played soulful renditions of hard bop and Cannonball really excelled in the straight-ahead settings. During 1962-1963, Yusef Lateef made the group a sextet and pianist Joe Zawinul was an important new member. The collapse of Riverside resulted in Adderley signing with Capitol and his recordings became gradually more commercial. Charles Lloyd was in Lateef's place for a year (with less success) and then with his departure the group went back to being a quintet. Zawinul's 1966 composition "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy" was a huge hit for the group, Adderley started doubling on soprano, and the quintet's later recordings emphasized long melody statements, funky rhythms, and electronics. However, during his last year, Cannonball Adderley was revisiting the past a bit and on Phenix he recorded new versions of many of his earlier numbers. But before he could evolve his music any further, Cannonball Adderley died suddenly from a stroke.

Source: http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=11:difixqr5ldte~T1

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Bio by Barry Kernfeld, The New Grove Dictionary Of Jazz

Julian Adderley. The nickname "Cannonball" was a childhood corruption of "cannibal," describing his large appetite. He played alto saxophone in Florida bands from around 1942 and directed a high-school band in Fort Lauderdale for more than two years from September 1948. After serving in army bands from 1950 to 1953 he resumed teaching until 1955. 

He then moved to New York, intending to play with his brother, Nat, and to begin graduate studies at New York University. Instead, a chance jam session led to his joining Oscar Pettiford's band and signing a recording contract. 

The Adderley brothers formed a promising quintet in january 1956, but in September the following year the group was forced to disband because of financial difficulties. Adderley then replaced Sonny Rollins in the Miles Davis Quintet in October 1957. He stayed in Davis's famous sextets, playing with John Coltrane, until September 1959, when he formed a second quintet with his brother. This group, which played soul jazz and bop, remained intact until 1975, achieving considerable success. 

A masterful, confident improviser, Adderley was called "the new Bird" because his debut in 1955 occurred shortly after Charlie Parker's death. This unfortunate label caused resentment among the press and public, and set him unattainable standards. 

Although he at times imitated Parker (as did all bop alto saxophonists), his first bop recordings reveal more chromatic and continuous lines and a more cutting tone than Parker's. On other recordings he played and composed in a simple blues- and gospel-oriented style. "Cherokee" [mp3] with Bud Powell & Don Byas from 1961. 

Source: http://hardbop.tripod.com/cannon.html

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Jazz: Cannonball Adderley

Those of you who have poked around Randy's Rodeo much have no doubt ascertained that my tastes can be a tad, um, mainstream. Certainly, I love a good, catchy single, and I am drawn to emotive, accessible records. My fondness, then, for the music of Cannonball Adderley should come as no surprise, for his was a joyful, soulful strain of jazz. Consequently, he has been, in the words of the Penguin Guide To Jazz, critically undervalued. "Cannonball always fell back on cliques," the book contends, "because he just liked the sound of them. But, there's a lean, hard-won quality about his best playing that says a lot about one man's dedication to his craft."

Julian "Cannonball" Adderley recorded prolifically for 21 years (1955-1975), playing with a who's who of jazz, including John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Art Blakey, Horace Silver, and Miles Davis. Cannonball earned his bones, in fact, as a member of the legendary Davis sextet that recorded Kind Of Blue, Milestones, and Porgy & Bess (1958-59), and Davis' contribution to Adderley's 1959 Blue Note LP, Somethin' Else, helped make it an indisputable jazz classic; grudgingly perhaps, the Penguin Guide gives it four stars - their highest rating.

But, Cannonball was very popular with the general public, thanks in part to his ingratiating personality; during concerts, he would launch into lengthy, humorous, spoken introductions that clearly pleased his audience. His success, however, was mostly due a series of catchy, rock-solid singles he recorded in the years following his high profile work with Miles Davis. These include "Work Song" (1960), "African Waltz" (1961), "Jive Samba" (1962), "Save Your Love For Me" (1962), and one of the all-time great jazz hits, "Mercy Mercy Mercy" (1966), which reached #11 Pop and #2 R&B.

Tragically, Cannonball's life and career were cut short by a stroke at age 46. But, his recorded legacy, I argue, makes him an important figure in both the hard bop school of the late 50's and the development of soul jazz in the 60's. Perhaps more importantly, he played an important role as an ambassador for jazz and was instrumental in advancing the careers of many young players - Charles Lloyd and Yusef Lateef among them. Truly, Cannonball Adderley was an expansive, engaging bandleader; together with his easygoing musical style, this made him one of the most popular (if not respected) jazzmen of his day.

An alto saxophone player, Cannonball Adderley was inevitably influenced influenced by post-war giants Charlie Parker and Benny Carter. By the mid-50's, he was a moonlighting from his job as a high school band director in a group with his brother, cornet virtuoso Nat Adderley, in their native Florida. While visiting New York, he and Nat sat in with Oscar Pettiford and were subsequently signed to Savoy Records. Before long, Miles Davis tapped Cannonball to play alongside John Coltrane in that immortal sextet. Following following his stint with Miles, Adderley picked up where he has left off, playing with his brother. Over the years, the Adderley siblings performed in a variety of settings, from small groups to big bands, but their best and most popular sides were recorded by quintets and sextets that, over the years, included Joe Zawinul (who wrote "Mercy"), Charles Lloyd, and Bobby Timmons. 

But, I'm getting ahead of myself. In 1955, Adderley and his brother participated in several hard bop sessions for Savoy that featured a rotating cast of soon-to-be-legends, including Kenny Clark, Horace Silver, Donald Byrd, and Hank Jones. The sessions yielded (at least) three different albums: most famously Bohemia After Dark, but also Cannonball's and Nat's respective debuts, Presenting Julian Cannonball Adderley and That's Nat. These sessions have been reissued many times - most expansively on Summer Of '55 (1999) and most concisely on Spontaneous Combustion (2006), or on any number of other Savoy reissues.

Beginning with 1955's Julian Cannonball Adderley (and throughout his celebrated stint with Miles Davis), Cannonball recorded for the EmArcy label, and these sides are often overlooked by fans and (especially) critics. And it's true, some of these sessions were overtly tailored to pop tastes. By the way, two of the best such albums - Adderley And Strings (1955) and Jump For Joy (1958) - are available as a 2-for-1 CD from Verve.

Most of Cannonball's EmArcy sessions, however, were bop-oriented, and these recordings are compiled in their entirety on Sophisticated Swing: The Emarcy Small Group Recordings - including sessions issued under brother Nat's imprimatur. When EmArcy was shuttered, Adderley switched to Mercury, which reissued his EmArcy sides in the early 60's under a variety of titles new and old including Cannonball EnRoute (1961) and The Lush Side of Cannonball (1962).

As an overview of this period, pick up Verve's The Ultimate Cannonball Adderley (1999) which brings together highlights from all the EmArcy and Mercury recordings, including the fabled quintet sessions with John Coltrane (see below) and a 1962 date with Ray Brown. In the alternative, look for Verve Jazz Masters (1994) or Cannonball Adderley's Finest Hour (2001).

Though Cannonball Adderley was quickly coming into his own as a bandleader, his two landmark recordings from the late 1950's are inextricably tied to his tenure with Miles Davis. Somethin' Else, of course, was an absolutely stellar session with Miles Davis, Hank Jones, and Art Blakey, and Sam Jones, and it has become Adderley's most highly regarded album. Then, Cannonball quickly followed up with Quintet In Chicago, a magnificent jam with Adderley's mates from the 1959 Davis sextet, including John Coltrane and Wynton Kelly. It is among the most challenging work Adderley ever did - and among Coltrane's most instantly likeable. (Quintet In Chicago was released on Mercury, and later reissued by Verve as Cannonball And Coltrane)

Around this time, Adderley began a productive sojourn at Riverside Records (from 1958 till it went bust in 1963) marked by popular singles like "This Here," "African Waltz," "The Jive Samba," "Work Song," and "Waltz For Debby" (with Bill Evans). Among the standout studio albums from these years are his Riverside debut, Portrait Of Cannonball (1958); Things Are Getting Better (a tremendous date with vibraphonist Milt Jackson, Art Blakey, and Wynnton Kelly, 1958); Quintet In San Francisco (1959); Them Dirty Blues (1960); Know What I Mean? (with Bill Evans, 1961); and the live sextet workout, In New York (1962). Fantasy's Greatest Hits: The Riverside Years collects (all too brief) highlights from this period - excellent as jumping-off point or as a taster for casual fan. During this period, Adderley also waxed Poll Winners with Ray Brown and Wes Montgomery (1960) and the popular Nancy Wilson & Cannonball Adderley (1962) for Capitol.

It was Capitol that snatched up Cannonball Adderley after Riverside folded, and they took control of several of his Riverside masters. During these years, Adderley settled into a pleasant, easy groove - though he inarguably continued to produce good music. The first Capitol releases, Jazz Workshop Revisited (an excellent 1962 live date), Cannonball Takes Charge (an authoritative 1959 studio session), and Cannonball's Bossa Nova (featuring Sergio Mendes) were originally recorded for and/or released by Riverside. But, his surprising Fiddler On The Roof (1964) was all new. The popular LP Mercy Mercy Mercy (1966, billed as "live at The Club," which it is not) is also very good, and it gave Adderley the biggest hit of his career.

Contrary to popular wisdom, Adderley pushed and stretched his music later in his career, experimenting with electric music, among other things. But the soulful sides are what he did best (and is best known for), and Capitol's Best Of Cannonball Adderley nicely sums up this aspect of his career. And, it is a good companion to Fantasy's Greatest Hits. Under their Blue Note imprint, Capitol also collaborated with Verve to produce The Definitive Cannonball Adderley; in a word, it's not definitive (it would take a boxed set to achieve that), but it cherry picks cuts from four labels and spans 15 years - something no other album has attempted.

Adderley continued to record for Capitol until 1973. He switched briefly to Motown and then to Fantasy before returning to Capitol shortly before his death. All told, the recordings of Cannonball Adderley are many and varied; as many as we've discussed here, there are dozens more. Collecting Cannonball, then, becomes a daunting task. Thankfully, some good compilations exist to expedite the process - though none are any more comprehensive than the all-too-brief Definitive Cannonball Adderley. 

Together, five discs - Spontaneous Combustion (Savoy), Ultimate (Verve), Somethin' Else (Blue Note), Greatest Hits (Fantasy), and Capitol's Best Of (which overlaps slightly with Fantasy's set) - provide a good start, comprising an ad hoc boxed set (sans box) that surveys most of Adderley's prolific catalog. Plus, a huge amount of Cannonball's repertoire is now available for download, making it easier to fill in the gaps. Beyond that, jazz buffs will find a cornucopia of albums to dig - most reissued on CD more than once. 

Source: http://www.randysrodeo.com/jazz/adderley.php

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Discography

As a leader

Julian Cannonball Adderley and Strings (1955)
Jump For Joy (1957)
Portrait of Cannonball (1958)
Somethin' Else (1958) - with Miles Davis, Hank Jones, Sam Jones, Art Blakey
Things Are Getting Better (1958)
Cannonball Adderley Quintet in Chicago (1959) - with John Coltrane
The Cannonball Adderley Quintet in San Francisco (1959)
Cannonball and Coltrane (1959)
Blue Spring (1959) - with Kenny Dorham
At the Lighthouse (1960)
Them Dirty Blues (1960)
What Is This Thing Called Soul? (1960)
Sweet and Lovely (1960/1961)
Know What I Mean? (1961) - with Bill Evans
African Waltz (1961)
The Quintet Plus (1961)
Nancy Wilson and Cannonball Adderley (1961)
In New York (1962)
Cannonball's Bossa Nova (1962)
Dizzy's Business (1962)
Jazz Workshop Revisited (1963)
Nippon Soul (1963)
Fiddler on the Roof (1964)
Domination (1965) - Orchestrated and arranged by Oliver Nelson
Mercy, Mercy, Mercy! Live at 'The Club' (1966)
Cannonball in Japan (1966)
Why Am I Treated So Bad! (1967)
74 Miles Away (1967)
Radio Nights (1967)
Accent On Africa (1968)
Country Preacher (1969)
The Price You Got to Pay to Be Free (1970)
The Black Messiah (Live) (1972)
Inside Straight (1973)
Pyramid (1974)
Love, Sex, and the Zodiac (1974)
Phenix (1975)
Big Man (1975) (Musical with Joe Williams and Randy Crawford)

As sideman

With Miles Davis
Milestones (1958)
Miles & Monk at Newport (1958)
Jazz at the Plaza (1958)
Porgy and Bess (1958)
Kind of Blue (1959)

As a producer

Wide Open Spaces (1960) - David Newman
A Portrait of Thelonious (1961) - Bud Powell
Don Byas & Bud Powell - Tribute To Cannonball (1961)

Awards

1967 Grammy Award, Best Instrumental Jazz Performance, Small Group or Soloist with Small Group for "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy! Live at 'The Club'" by Cannonball Adderley Quintet.

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ERIC DOLPHY

Eric Allan Dolphy (June 20, 1928 – June 29, 1964) was an American jazz alto saxophonist, flautist, and bass clarinetist.

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Dolphy was one of several groundbreaking jazz alto players to rise to prominence in the 1960s. He was also the first important bass clarinet soloist in jazz, and among the earliest significant flute soloists.

His improvisational style was characterized by the use of wide intervals based largely on the twelve tone scale, in addition to using an array of extended techniques to reproduce human- and animal-like effects which almost literally made his instruments speak. Although Dolphy's work is sometimes classified as free jazz, his compositions and solos had a logic uncharacteristic of many other free jazz musicians of the day; even as such, he was considered an avant-garde improviser. In the years after his death, his music was described as being "too out to be in and too in to be out."

Dolphy posthumously became an inductee of the Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame in 1964.

Biography

Early life

Dolphy was born in Los Angeles and was educated at Los Angeles City College. He performed locally for several years, most notably as a member of bebop big bands led by Gerald Wilson and Roy Porter. On early recordings, he occasionally played soprano clarinet and baritone saxophone, as well as his main instrument, the alto saxophone. Dolphy finally had his big break as a member of Chico Hamilton's quintet. With the group he became known to a wider audience and was able to tour extensively through 1959, when he parted ways with Hamilton and moved to New York City.

Early partnerships

Coltrane had gained an audience and critical notice with Miles Davis's quintet. Although Coltrane's quintets with Dolphy (including the Village Vanguard and Africa/Brass sessions) are now legendary, they provoked Down Beat magazine to brand Coltrane and Dolphy's music as 'anti-jazz'. Coltrane later said of this criticism: "they made it appear that we didn't even know the first thing about music (...) it hurt me to see [Dolphy] get hurt in this thing."

The initial release of Coltrane's stay at the Vanguard selected three tracks, only one of which featured Dolphy. After being issued haphazardly over the next 30 years, a comprehensive box set featuring all of the recorded music from the Vanguard was released by Impulse! in 1997. The Complete 1961 Village Vanguard Recordings carried over 15 tracks featuring Dolphy on alto saxophone and bass clarinet, adding a new dimension to these already classic recordings. A later Pablo box set from Coltrane's European tours of the early 1960s collected more recordings with Dolphy for the buying public.

During this period, Dolphy also played in a number of challenging settings, notably in key recordings by Ornette Coleman (Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation), arranger Oliver Nelson (The Blues and the Abstract Truth and Straight Ahead) and George Russell (Ezz-thetics), but also with Gunther Schuller, Max Roach and Abbey Lincoln, multi-instrumentalist Ken McIntyre, and bassist Ron Carter among others.

As a leader
 
Dolphy's recording career as a leader began with the Prestige label. His association with the label spanned across 13 albums recorded from April 1960 to September 1961, though he was not the leader for all of the sessions. Prestige eventually released a 9-CD box set containing all of Dolphy's recorded output for the label.

Dolphy's first two albums as leader were Outward Bound and Out There. The first, more accessible and rooted in the style of bop than some later releases, was recorded at Rudy Van Gelder's studio in New Jersey with hard-bop trumpeter Freddie Hubbard. However the album still offered up challenging performances, which at least partly accounts for the record label's choice to include "out" in the title. Out There is closer to the third stream music which would also form part of Dolphy's legacy, and reminiscent also of the instrumentation of the Hamilton group with Ron Carter on cello and Dolphy on bass clarinet, clarinet and flute as well as saxophones.

Far Cry was also recorded for Prestige in 1960 and represented his first pairing with another important partnership, trumpeter Booker Little, a like-minded spirit with whom he would go on to make a set of legendary live recordings at the Five Spot in New York before Little's tragic death at the age of 23.

Dolphy would record several unaccompanied cuts on saxophone, which at the time had been done only by Coleman Hawkins and Sonny Rollins before him. The album Far Cry contains one of his more memorable performances on the Gross-Lawrence standard "Tenderly" on alto saxophone, but it was his subsequent tour of Europe that quickly set high standards for solo performance with his exhilarating bass clarinet renditions of Billie Holiday's "God Bless The Child". Numerous recordings were made of live performances by Dolphy on this tour, in Copenhagen, Uppsala and other cities, and these have been issued by many sometimes dubious record labels, drifting in and out of print ever since.

20th century classical music also played a significant role in Dolphy's musical career. He performed Edgard Varèse's Density 21.5 for solo flute at the Ojai Music Festival in 1962 and participated in Gunther Schuller's Third Stream efforts of the 1960s.

In July 1963, Dolphy and producer Alan Douglas arranged recording sessions for which his sidemen were among the leading emerging musicians of the day. The results were his Iron Man and Conversations LPs. Around this time Dolphy's pianist was occasionally the young Herbie Hancock, this group was recorded at the Illinois Concert and others.

In 1964, Dolphy signed with Blue Note Records and recorded Out to Lunch! with Freddie Hubbard, Bobby Hutcherson, Richard Davis and Tony Williams. This album was deeply rooted in the avant garde, and Dolphy's solos are as dissonant and unpredictable as anything he ever recorded. Out to Lunch, his last major studio recording, is often regarded not only as Dolphy's finest album, but also as one of the greatest jazz recordings ever made.

His final months (1964)

After Out to Lunch! and an appearance as a sideman on Andrew Hill's Point of Departure, Dolphy left to tour Europe with Charles Mingus' sextet in early 1964. From there he intended to settle in Europe with his fiancée, who was working on the ballet scene in Paris. The Mingus band for this tour is recorded on the Cornell 1964 album and is one of Mingus' strongest line-ups, including Dolphy and pianist Jaki Byard. After leaving Mingus, he performed with and recorded a few sides with various European bands, including the mis-named Last Date with Misha Mengelberg and Han Bennink, and was preparing to join Albert Ayler for a recording.

The liner notes to the Complete Prestige Recordings say that on June 28, 1964 Dolphy "collapsed in his hotel room in Berlin and when brought to the hospital he was diagnosed as being in a diabetic coma. After being administered a shot of insulin (apparently a type stronger than what was then available in the US) he lapsed into insulin shock and died." A later video documentary disputes this, saying Dolphy collapsed on stage in Berlin and was brought to a hospital. The attending hospital physicians had no idea that Dolphy was a diabetic and thought that he, like so many other jazz musicians, had overdosed on drugs, so he was left in a hospital bed until the drugs had run their course.

Dolphy died on June 29, 1964 in a diabetic coma, leaving a short but tremendous legacy in the jazz world. He was quickly honored with his induction into the Down Beat magazine Hall of Fame in 1964. Coltrane paid tribute to Dolphy in an interview: "Whatever I'd say would be an understatement. I can only say my life was made much better by knowing him. He was one of the greatest people I've ever known, as a man, a friend, and a musician." Dolphy's mother, Sadie, who had fond memories of her son practicing in the studio by her house, gave instruments that Dolphy had bought in France but never played to Coltrane, who subsequently played the flute and bass clarinet on several albums before his own death in 1967. Dolphy was engaged to be married to Joyce Mordecai, a classically-trained dancer.

Influence

Dolphy's musical presence was hugely influential to a who's who of young jazz musicians who would become legends in their own right. Dolphy worked intermittently with Ron Carter and Freddie Hubbard throughout his career, and in later years he hired Herbie Hancock, Bobby Hutcherson and Woody Shaw at various times to work in his live and studio bands. Out to Lunch! featured yet another young lion who had just begun working with Dolphy in drummer Tony Williams, just as his participation on the Point of Departure session brought his influence into contact with up and coming tenor man Joe Henderson.

Carter, Hancock and Williams would go on to become one of the quintessential rhythm sections of the decade, both together on their own albums and as the backbone of the second great quintet of Miles Davis. This part of the second great quintet is an ironic footnote for Davis, who was not fond of Dolphy's music yet absorbed a rhythm section who had all worked under Dolphy and created a band whose brand of "out" was unsurprisingly very similar to Dolphy's.

In addition, his work with jazz and rock producer Alan Douglas allowed Dolphy's style to posthumously spread to musicians in the jazz fusion and Rock environments, most notably with artists John McLaughlin and Jimi Hendrix. Frank Zappa, an eclectic performer who drew some of his inspiration from jazz music, paid tribute to Dolphy's style in the instrumental "The Eric Dolphy Memorial Barbecue" (on the 1970 album Weasels Ripped My Flesh).

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Jazz needs Eric Dolphy more than ever. A virtuoso on saxophone, clarinet and flute, his work bridges the two sides of a debate that dogs jazz fans and performers today. To oversimplify, the neoconservatives argue that jazz must be profoundly grounded in tradition, that new developments are little more than a gloss, and that history stops with Miles Davis and modal jazz in the middle '60s, with bare whispers of Ornette Coleman and nothing from swingless radicals like Cecil Taylor. The rebels (most now older than the neocons) counter that jazz loses its essence by going backward, that the titans revered by the neocons were fearless innovators, and that the whole reactionary movement reduces jazz to a museum music with a self-righteous fence around it. Dolphy could have listened to both sides, picked up his horn, and showed the way out in a dozen choruses. But he died in 1964, barely 36, struck down by complications stemming from undiagnosed diabetes. 

Dolphy, who studied classical flute with Elise Moennig (and brought the instrument into jazz more forcefully than anyone before him) and founded the bass clarinet as an improvising horn, flourished in a jazz scene far more turbulent and riven than today's. A Los Angeles native who honed his chops for years on the local scene, he gained national attention as a member of the Chico Hamilton band, and went out on his own at the end of 1959. By then, Taylor and Coleman had already dropped the bombshells that ignited free jazz, and the response to their challenge would dominate the next 10 years of the music. Dolphy began with a blast of creativity: he would never record as much for the rest of his life as he did in 1960-61. Many key parts of those sessions are gathered together for the first time on the 9-CD box "Eric Dolphy: The Complete Prestige Recordings" (Milestone). 

No acquaintance ever had a bad word to say about Eric Dolphy the person. All describe him as calm, kind, witty, humble and introspective. The mercurial bassist and band leader Charles Mingus, a harsh judge of character, called Dolphy "a saint." He needed the internal fortitude to withstand the resistance his work met not only with the public but with more traditional jazz players. Financially strapped his whole career, Dolphy had to scramble for gigs. He never touched drugs or alcohol. His only addiction was constant practicing -- in the bathroom between sets, next to the record player at parties. 

The sound-blip version of Dolphy is that he was freer than John Coltrane but more traditional than Ornette Coleman. He met both men in the middle '50s and later played crucial dates with them, as well. But Dolphy's technique and soul stand apart.

Source: http://www.salon.com/05/reviews/dolphy.html

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Discography

As leader

Hot & Cool Latin (1959)
Wherever I Go (1959)
Status (1960)
Dash One (1960)
Outward Bound (1960)
Here and There (1960)
Looking Ahead (1960)
Fire Waltz (1960)
Other Aspects (1960)
Out There (1960)
The Caribe with the Latin Jazz Quintet (1960)
Candid Dolphy (1960)
Magic (1960)
Far Cry (1960)
Eric Dolphy (1960)
The Quest (1961)
The Great Concert of Eric Dolphy [live] (1961)
Live! at the Five Spot, Vol. 1 (1961) with Mal Waldron and Booker Little
Live! at the Five Spot, Vol. 2 (1961)
* Eric Dolphy and Booker Little Memorial Album (1961) (more from the Five Spot)
Latin Jazz Quintet (1961)
Berlin Concerts [live] (1962)
Eric Dolphy in Europe, Vol. 1 [live] (1961)
Eric Dolphy in Europe, Vol. 2 (1961)
Eric Dolphy in Europe, Vol. 3 (1961)
Copenhagen Concert [live] (1961)
Softly, As in a Morning Sunrise (1961)
Quartet 1961 (1961)
Vintage Dolphy (1962)
Eric Dolphy Quintet featuring Herbie Hancock: Complete Recordings (1962)
Conversations (1963) (also known as Jitterbug Waltz)
Iron Man (1963)
The Illinois Concert [live] (1963)
Out to Lunch! (1964)
Last Date (1964)
Naima (1964)
Unrealized Tapes (1964)

As sideman

Chico Hamilton
Chico Hamilton Quintet with Strings Attached (1958)
The Original Ellington Suite (1958)
Chico Hamilton - Gongs East! (1958)
That Hamilton Man (1959)(also released as Truth

Charles Mingus
Pre-Bird [aka Mingus Revisited] (1960)
Charles Mingus Presents Charles Mingus (1960)
Mingus at Antibes (1960)
Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus (1963)
Town Hall Concert (1964)
The Great Concert of Charles Mingus (1964)
Revenge! (1964)
Charles Mingus Sextet with Eric Dolphy: Cornell 1964 (1964)

Ornette Coleman
Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation (1960)

Oliver Nelson
Screamin' the Blues (1960)
The Blues and the Abstract Truth (1961)
Straight Ahead (1961)

John Coltrane
Olé Coltrane (1961)
Africa/Brass (1961)
Live! at the Village Vanguard (1961)
Impressions (One Track, "India") (1963)

Makanda Ken McIntyre
Looking Ahead (1960)

Booker Little
Out Front (1960)

George Russell
Ezz-thetics (1961)

Max Roach
Percussion Bitter Sweet (1961)

Andrew Hill
Point of Departure (1964)

John Lewis
The Sextet of Orchestra U.S.A. (1964)
John Lewis Presents Jazz Abstractions (1960)

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