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Indies Only 180G vinyl with OBI strip
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The Joe Harriot Quintet was one of the most forward-looking in Britain, but no jazz man works in isolation from the past and the great tradition of jazz is never absent from the work of the Joe Harriot Quintet.
Shepherds Serenade, composed for the Joe Harriott group by Dizzy Reece, one of Britain's many distinguished gifts to the jazz scene in New York. But Jazz enthusiasts not only like to know what they're hearing, they like to know who, or at any rate, whom. Joe Harriott's alto Saxophone leads the group partnered by the flugelhorn and occasionally the trumpet of Shake Keane. Incidentally, both they and bassist Coleridge Goode are West Indians who found the jazz world congenial here in London and the climate, well, bearable.
On piano is Pat Smythe and on drums, Bobby Orr. It's Bobby who lays down the basic beat behind Joe Harriott's composition Pictures.
Then there is another Dizzy Reece composition, this time dedicated to the then living legend Thelonious Monk. There is a hint of the old standard Blue Lou in the chord changes, but the solo's are free and forthright as the Harriott Group plays Variations on Monk. A monkish theme by Dizzy Reece, with a solo from Joe, which made the happy grin spread all over the face of session producer Terry Henebery.
"another lost treasure" - Peter Bevan, Northern Echo
"The combination of a top quality original master tape, expert valve re-mastering at 45rpm on premium 180 gram vinyl gives the illusion that the listener is back in 1962 listening to this music live. It couldn’t have sounded much better in the studio." - Derek Ansell, Jazz Journal
The first ever commercial release of a burning 1962 Maida Vale session, this is a lost treasure of a recording. It features Shake Keane on trumpet and flugelhorn, Pat Smythe on piano, Coleridge Goode on double bass, and the solid-as-ever Bobby Orr on drums.
Tracklist
1 Shepherd’s Serenade 3:07
2 Pictures 4:01
3 Variations On Monk 2:58
4 Tonal 3:11