Cashbox : 01/26/1957

The Ruby Braff trumpet has taken part in a healthy amount of disk sessions and this release from ABC-Paramount has Braff’s expressive jazz artistry in a clean, swinging form. Braff takes on most of the solo licks with some well thought out keyboard work from Dave McKenna. Excellent sound. Package is a dealer showpiece. Solid jazz work throughout.

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High Fidelity
John S. Wilson : February 1957

The unique status of Ruby Braff is, in itself, a caustic comment on the current state of jazz. Braff’s is not a vast, wide-ranging talent but his way with a trumpet is warm and direct. This is what should be expected of any good jazz trumpet man but, currently, is hardly ever heard. So Braff’s performances on discs, even though they come in a steady stream, are usually something to be treasured. In addition to the basic qualities noted above, he normally centers his attention on worthy melodies which fit in well with his relaxed, carefree manner. This disc is in the finest Braff tradition. Braff plays with artful simplicity (including some unexpected touches of Wild Bill Davison’s sotto voce rasp), and the group with him is precisely the unostentatious rhythm team that he needs. When Braff is resting, pianist Dave McKenna works out some pleasant complementary solos.

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Metronome
Jack Maher : March 1957

Teaming Ruby Braff with Al Lucas’ bass and drummer Buzzy Drootin and rhythm guitarist Sam Herman seems sensible enough, after all, they all have a feeling for the same jazz environment. But when the fifth member of the group is Dave McKenna you find yourself listening just a little more closely. Dave is the young Silver-type pianist who has spent his record dates prior to this, with the more modern groups.

This team-up however, doesn’t turn out badly at all. Dave backs up the neo-Dixie blowings with all the aplomb of a well-grounded swing pianist. He plays occasional four-four, rolling left-hand bass lines, comps in a deft way and gains the chunky sort of rhythmic feeling of the section. Occasionally, however, he plays more eighth-notes and a more extended line than any pianist of this order has a right to as on Dancing in the Dark and Lover Come Back. Ruby is his usual sharp-toned self, traveling well-worn paths but with dignity and spirit.

This album is a great deal like the wedding or dance band from which you expect little and yet receive much sound music.

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Miami Herald (Miami, FL)
Fred Sherman : 01/27/1957

Many muted shades of trumpet are offered in an ABC-Paramount album bearing the name of Ruby Braff (ABC 141). If you like the furred tones of the mute, then this is music for you. Braff is a fine young horn man, but I prefer him blowing clear. Featured with him on the 11 tunes that go back to the ’30s are Dave McKenna, piano; Al Lucas, bass; Buzzy Drootin, drums, and Sam Herman, rhythm guitar. McKenna’s piano work is excellent; wish there had been more of it. Good recording sound.

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Oakland Tribune (Oakland, CA)
Russ Wilson : 01/06/1957

Ruby Braff (ABC-Paramount) presents this youthful trumpeter leading a quintet through 11 numbers which were popular in the thirties. It’s happy, swinging music and illustrates Braff’s dictum that the melody is of great importance. The leader varies his sound by frequent use of mutes. Among his associates is Dave McKenna, a fine pianist. Included in the repertoire are Blue Prelude, I’m Crazy ‘Bout My Baby, and Dancing in the Dark.

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Reporter Dispatch (White Plains, NY)
Ted Riedeburg : 04/10/1957

Sometimes sound tracks come in wonderful bunches like those which can be found on ABC-Paramount’s recent release titled simply Ruby Braff, featuring Dave McKenna. Ruby, who hails from Boston, has surrounded himself with Dave McKenna on piano, Al Lucas on bass, and Buzzy Drootin on drums. This is about all the backing an artist of the stature of Mr. Braff needs to produce some great sounds. He does so on tunes such as If I Could Be With You, Blue Prelude, Dancing in The Dark and It’s Wonderful. This is pleasurable listening.

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Washington Post (Washington, DC)
Paul Sampson : 01/13/1957

Ruby Braff’s trumpet is as richly eloquent as ever on an excellent ABC-Paramount LP (141). His tone is almost juicy as he zestfully sails through several standards. Braff is accompanied by a hard swinging rhythm section of Dave McKenna, Sam Herman, Al Lucas and Buzzy Drootin. McKenna, who occasionally sounds like Jess Stacy, takes several good solos. Recommended.

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Down Beat : 01/23/1957
Ralph J. Gleason : 3 stars

This is not a complicated album; it is a simple one but nonetheless effective for being so. Braff plays trumpet solos with rhythm accompaniment on 11 ballads which are very well paced and make a good program. One of them, It’s Wonderful, is a great, forgotten tune of the mid-’30s (Maxine Sullivan introduced it and used to sing it at the Onyx), not to be confused with ‘S Wonderful.

On all the numbers, Braff displays his warm, relaxed, and moving approach to a melody. If occasionally there is an old-fashioned sound, it is not corny at all but directly evocative of the best feeling of the “good old days.”

There are some excellent bits of McKenna’s piano playing scattered here and there and also several good solo appearances by bassist Lucas. The tempos are excellent, and the directness of approach gives a joyous feeling that must come from the heart. Good, straightforward notes by Leonard Feather.

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Liner Notes by Leonard Feather

Sometimes you can judge a jazzman by the company he keeps. If he draws his paycheck at Eddie Condon’s bistro, you can reasonably assume he is not a bopper; if he is now, or ever has been, a member of the Kenton party, it can be deduced that he is not a violent partisan of New Orleans revivalism. On the other hand, you have occasional anachronisms such as Coleman Hawkins, who plays, thinks and works with the younger generation, and a certain group of relatively young men in San Francisco who insist on playing music that was dead before they were born.

Ruby Braff’s case is relatively simple: you can judge him by the excellence of his taste. From the selection of tunes in this LP, it can be discerned quite clearly that Ruby has a very special place in his heart for the middle and late 1930s. “I always thought,” he reflects, “that that group produced just about the most beautiful dance music you could ever want to hear. I couldn’t afford to buy those records, but I sure heard an awful lot of them.”

Reuben Braff (age: 29; weight: 130; height: five feet plus; shirt size: 14; shoe size: 8) is something of an anachronism, not simply because of his predilection for these wonderful old songs, but because of the completely informal nature of his musical personality, rarely found among gifted jazzmen in the “under 30” category nowadays. Reading music, organizing groups, creating new material—these ambitions are not for him. Give Ruby a horn, a rhythm section and the freedom to choose whatever songs come to mind on the spur of the moment, and you will wind up with a program of music more agreeable and less pretentious than any formalized session could produce.

Ruby was granted all these requisites for the present session. On piano he had Dave McKenna, the remarkable maverick from Woonsocket, R. I., a former Charlie Ventura and Woody Herman sideman currently ensconced in the Gene Krupa quartet (for solo evidence of Dave in finest fettle, study ABC-104). On guitar he used Sam Herman, about whom he had all the evidence he needed—simply that Freddie Greene was Sam’s favorite guitarist. Since Ruby naturally leans to rhythm guitar rather than modern amplified solos, Sam filled the bill perfectly. Al Lucas, the doughty bassist, is a veteran sideman who has seen service with Duke Ellington, Mary Lou Williams, Eddie Heywood and other leading jazz groups.

To complete the rhythm section, on drums there was Ruby’s old Boston buddy, Benjamin “Buzzy” Drootin, who worked around Beantown for years in most of the same combos from which Ruby graduated.

As the lone horn on the session, Ruby insured variety by making frequent use of mutes. The variation in tone colors thus obtainable has been a source of fascination to Ruby, as to every sensitive trumpet player. “Every mute, to me, is like another little horn,” he says. “When I’m at home practicing, at one time or another during every practice session, I like to use a mute.” On these sides you will hear Ruby equipped with cup mute, straight mute, Harmon mute, and when you hear something that sounds like a muffled open horn, or possibly recalls the effect of a felt hat played over the bell of the horn, this would be the bucket mute, which, Ruby recalls, has long been a favorite gadget with Bobby Hackett.

There is an interesting parallel involving Hackett and Braff. Bobby, who was popular around Boston in the late 1930s, just a decade before Ruby began to make a name for himself in the same city, bears approximately the same relationship to Bix Beiderbecke that Ruby bears to Buck Clayton. This means that while there is no tendency to imitate consciously, there is a sense of marked resemblance, though out of this resemblance has been fashioned a style that is new and attractive in itself.

Dancing in the Dark, which opens the first side, shows Ruby’s remarkable facility in the lower register. Here, as at other points in the session, he hits a low F concert, not for synthetic effect, but simply because it happened to fit into the improvisational thought of the moment. After a swinging McKenna chorus, Ruby comes back with Harmon mute in hand to take it out. The song is a Schwartz-Dietz hit of 1931.

Blue Prelude, Woody Herman’s old theme, written by Gordon Jenkins and Joe Bishop in 1933, features Ruby out of tempo, with cup mute, establishing an impressively somber mood.

Why Was I Born?, a hit of 1929, shows some particularly forceful and fleet work by McKenna.

Blue is a song Benny Goodman recorded as far back as 1928. Ruby and Dave keep this one simple and sincere: note particularly the groovy two-bar ending.

If I Could Be with You, a song older jazz fans associate with the great Louis Armstrong treatment, again shows some fine lower register Braff and some nice chording by McKenna.

I’m Crazy ‘Bout My Baby, one of the lesser-known Fats Waller songs, is introduced by Ruby with Harmon mute. Dave again shares the footage until the bridge of the last chorus, when Buzzy helps himself to eight bars.

Louisiana offers guitarist Herman a moment in the spotlight with a four-bar introduction. On this one, too, you will find one of Ruby’s rare attempts at organization, in the shape of a little unison gimmick he worked out with Dave.

It’s Wonderful is a too-long neglected tune published in 1938 and not to be confused with the Gershwin ‘S Wonderful. Introducing the melody, Ruby is in wonderfully lyrical form, both muted and open, on this slow but rhythmic performance.

Almost Like Being in Love starts with Dave McKenna, in a rather more boppish mood than usual; after Ruby has been heard from, there is a 16-bar solo by Al Lucas. Notice how Ruby takes this one out with repeated arpeggios on a descending chord pattern.

Lover, Come Back to Me, which surprises with a Salt Peanuts-type riff at the end of the first chorus, gives Al Lucas a 32-bar stretch in addition to showing Ruby and Dave in flowing improvisations at a bright tempo.

I Must Have That Man, the Jimmy McHugh melody from Lew Leslie’s Blackbirds of 1928, again shows some fine low-register Braff and some Teddy Wilson-like thoughts from Mr. McKenna.

When I reported to Ruby after having listened to the results of this session on a test pressing, he said that he was anxious to know how things had turned out, as he had not listened to the results since the day of the date. Having now listened to these sides several times, both subjectively and objectively, I hasten to assure Ruby that he hasn’t a thing to worry about; in fact, I recommend that he run out to his neighborhood store right now.