Billboard : 06/29/1957
Score of 76

A superior bit of alto, framed by Red Garland, piano; Paul Chambers, bass, and Philly Joe Jones on drums, with Pepper cooking up sparkling improvisations thruout. Group has a sweet, clean sound, best shown on You’d Be So Nice to Come Home To and a funky attack of Jazz Me Blues. Well worth stocking.

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Cashbox : 06/01/1957

Pepper is one of the most fluent alto sax men around. His disk union with such distinguished artists as Paul Chambers (piano), Red Garland (bass), and Philly Joe Jones (drums) offers 8 sessions bursting with enthusiasm, and provocative swinging arrangements. The clean-cut, happy outlook performances carry their weight in pure jazz gold. Beautiful sound. Major jazz pressing.

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Army Times
Tom Scanlan : 06/01/1957

Alto man Art Pepper, one of the best of the Bird followers, can reach greater heights than is indicated on his newest LP. Other records by Pepper have knocked me out in the past, but not this one. For one thing, that tone, man, it’s too piercing.

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Audio : October, 1957
Charles A. Robertson

West coast altoist Art Pepper was introduced to the rhythm section of the now disbanded Miles Davis group in the Contemporary studios last January. Pianist Red Garland, bassist Paul Chambers and drummer Philly Joe Jones have the benefit of having played together nearly a year and a half and are well equipped to inspire the former Kenton star. For this is a spontaneous session and Pepper did not know it was arranged until the morning of the date. At thirty-two, he bridges the swing-era with more than seventeen years of playing and is appreciative of dixieland. Few musicians of his age have as many resources to draw on, and it is a substantial bag of goodies which he strews throughout the nine numbers, following a relaxed Jazz Me Blues with the intricacies of Chano Pozo‘s Tin Tin Deo.

Garland collaborates with him in Red Pepper Blues; Chambers in Waltz Me Blues. His own Straight Life is an unmitigated shout. In the standards Imagination, Star Eyes, and You’d Be So Nice To Come Home To, he shows a talent for playing upon a phrase, dropping a reflective touch into an emotionally positive statement. The concluding Birks’ Works is another proof that West Coast men should meet this sort of rhythm section more often.

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Kansas City Star
R.K.S. : 06/02/1957

Art Pepper Meets the Rhythm Section is a Contemporary album which presents Pepper on alto sax, Red Garland on piano, Paul Chambers on bass and Philly Joe Jones on drums. Pepper is a tremendous saxophonist and those other cats are hip, but just alto and rhythm tend to make a weak sound that doesn’t wear well, especially in a large dose like an LP album.

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Memphis Commercial Appeal
Unknown : 05/26/1957

If you like Art Pepper, this is the sort of a record you will like. Any resemblance to jazz is purely a mistake or an aural error. But possibly the reviewer is prejudiced against progressive.

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Pasadena Independent
George Laine : 06/15/1957

Pepper, having now settled once and for all on the alto sax, has himself a blowing session with the Miles Davis rhythm section in this new Contemporary album. Art’s tone has gained on a readily-noticeable scale. In this setting, he’s immaculate. There is no cuteness – just tonal mastery – in the version of Tin Tin Deo (which is launched inspiringly by Jones). And I’ll bet Dizzy never heard his Birks’ Works enunciated so well. Fine liner by Les Koenig, too.

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Saturday Review
Nat Hentoff : 06/29/1957

Art Pepper, a plunging, emotional modern altoist who is also conceptually astute has been a prolific visitor to California recording studios since his return to the jazz scene a few months ago after a therapeutic time away. Never before, however, has Pepper had such a boiling foundation on which to improvise as in Art Pepper Meets the Rhythm Section. The pulsating steam behind him is fired by bassist Paul Chambers, pianist Red Garland, and drummer Philly Joe Jones. At the time of recording, the three were members of the Miles Davis Quintet, and had annealed themselves in a year and a half into the strongest rhythm section in modern jazz. It is a pity that they have been torn asunder by the dissolution of the Davis combo. Pepper, incidentally, as a boy used to practice along with Muggsy Spanier records, and there is a Jazz Me Blues in this set that is honestly appreciative in intent if not essential style of Dixieland antecedents in jazz, but might nonetheless traumatize Eddie Condon.

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San Francisco Chronicle
Ralph J. Gleason : 05/19/1957
Album of the Week

This is one of the best jazz albums of the month, a great free-swinging session with altoist Pepper and the rhythm section of the Miles Davis group. Everybody had a good day when this was made and the cover is an exceptionally attractive one.

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Venice Vanguard
C.M. Weisenberg : 06/05/1957

Sometime ago I expressed a disbelief in West Coast Jazz as a distinct style of music and shortly after that was able to review a fine album from Pacific Jazz which featured three jazzmen from the west and two from the east.

Contemporary Records has just released an album featuring the alto sax of Art Pepper with a rhythm section composed of easterners which reveals a great unity between all four musicians. Accompanying Pepper is Red Garland on piano, Paul Chambers on bass, and Philly Joe Jones on drums.

Pepper, a Kenton alumnus, plays the nine numbers in the album in a lively up beat tempo. One of the most interesting things is his modern rendition of the old jazz tune Jazz Me Blues. The feeling and spirit of this traditional jazz songs have been maintained by Pepper who has transposed it into the Modern idiom.

Although this is the first time these four musicians have played together their music is tightly knit and well presented. For the most part Pepper manages to keep his solos smoothly flowing through the up tempo music. The rhythm section provides a fine background for the saxophonist and each one of them is given an opportunity to show his individual talent.

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White Plains Reporter-Dispatch
Ted Riedeburg / Don Smith : 06/12/1957

Art Pepper Meets the Rhythm Section is too much of altoist Pepper‘s horn to take with only Red Garland‘s piano to relieve what seems to be an interminable series of repetitious chord progressions. Lester Koenig’s liner notes mention the adverse conditions under which this set was taped, not the least of which was the fact that the boys were beat when they arrived for the date.

Maybe another try at it after everyone had a good night’s rest and with the addition of a solid guitar man would give Art a chance to show his true capabilities.

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Down Beat : 06/12/1958
John A. Tynan : 5 stars

At time of writing, this album is exactly one year in release. Why it has not been reviewed until now is quite unfathomable, for it certainly was one of the best jazz albums of last year and probably Pepper’s most mature recording to date. The session was held Jan 19, 1957, when Lester Koenig availed himself of the Miles Davis rhythm section, then in Hollywood with the trumpeter to play a local night club.

The altoist and rhythm section are indeed well met in this balanced set of eight tunes ranging from a purely played Imagination to some intriguing three-quarter jazz in Waltz Me. The solos of all concerned are of consistent interest, with Pepper at times reaching heights he’s seldom attained even under most congenial conditions in a club. In Red Pepper, a down-homey blues, Art’s Lester Young-like phrasing in his opening chorus clearly shows where the roots lie.

As soloist and comper, Garland is authoritative and original. He can be alternatively strong and delicate, sparely laconic, and rippingly virtuosic. The bass-drums team here is peerless, with Chambers getting off some well-conceived pizzicato and arco solos. Jones‘ brush chorus in Waltz Me bears endless replaying for its taste and humor.

This memorable meeting deserves a favored place in anybody’s collection.

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Liner Notes by Lester Koenig
April 2, 1957

One of the great advantages of the disc or tape recording is the special performance by jazzmen who ordinarily could not be heard together. And as one of the most absorbing aspects of jazz itself is individual expression, it can be fascinating to hear the impact of personality upon personality, and to capture permanently, by recording, the result of the impact. That happened Saturday afternoon, January 19, 1957, when altoist Art Pepper met pianist Red Garland, bassist Paul Chambers and drummer Philly Joe Jones, hereinafter (as the lawyers say) referred to as The Rhythm Section.

Pepper, one of the most exciting jazzmen of the 1950s, was known only in what might, for want of a better term, be called a “West Coast context.” And The Rhythm Section, Easterners all, had been playing together for the past year and a half with the Miles Davis group. It seemed a provocative and challenging project to bring the two elements together. After the first chorus of the first rehearsal of You’d Be So Nice To Come Home To, there was no doubt in anyone’s mind the interaction was going to result in some unusually exciting jazz. Things happened fast after that, with everyone coming up with ideas, two new tunes (Waltz Me Blues and Red Pepper Blues) composed and worked out on the spot, and just five hours later this album had been recorded. It is a one shot, unique jazz experience, giving the jazz fan and critic a ringside seat at a completely spontaneous and uninhibited blowing session.

Art Pepper was born in Gardena, California, September 1, 1925, moved to nearby Los Angeles when he was three, and moved again to the Los Angeles harbor at San Pedro when he was six. His father, who was a machinist when Art was born, became a longshoreman at San Pedro, and still lives and works there. From his earliest days, Art was interested in music. His mother’s family, the Bartolds, were all musicians, and his mother’s cousin Gabriel Bartold was a child prodigy on trumpet, appearing professionally. Art was very impressed by Gabriel, and anything that had to do with music. “I used to stop in front of music stores and stare at the instruments. I didn’t want to leave. They’d have to drag me away, crying.”

His father hoped Art would go to college and become an engineer, not a musician. However when Art was 9, he yielded to the boy’s passionate desire to study music, and sent him to a teacher, Leroy Parry. Art wanted to learn trumpet like his cousin Gabriel, but because several front teeth had been broken accidentally the year before, Parry suggested Art take up a reed instrument. Art was very unhappy about it, but began clarinet lessons, with the promise he’d be taught the alto saxophone as soon as he passed his clarinet “test” (The Flight Of The Bumble Bee). He did, and his father gave him an alto for Christmas the year he was 12.

During this period he became very interested in jazz via records and radio. His idols were Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw. He also liked Jimmie Lunceford‘s band, particularly the lead alto, Willie Smith. Another favorite was Muggsy Spanier. “I had Muggsy’s records,” Art recalls, “and I used to practice by playing along with them: Livery Stable Blues, Relaxin at the Touro, and all the others. A lot of people think I’m putting them on when I say I like Dixieland. It’s all the same thing. Dixieland is just jazz in an earlier period.” One happy result of this attitude is Art’s version of the Dixieland classic Jazz Me Blues in this album.

When he was 14 he played alto in his high school band and at local dance. By the time he was 15, he was committed to jazz, and started spending most of his time on Central Avenue, the main street of Los Angeles’ Negro community. “From 1940 to 1943, instead of formal schooling, I used to stay out all night and blow. I attribute whatever ability I have to play jazz to those times on the Avenue. I didn’t know what a chord was, but I was in an atmosphere of great jazz feeling, and I think it stayed with me ever since.”

He played in after-hours spots like The Ritz Club at Central and Vernon, and the upstairs club known as the Brothers’. Among his musical companions were Dexter Gordon, Charlie Mingus, Gerald Wiggins, Zoot Sims and Joe Mondragon, all now well-known in modern jazz. Late in ’42 he joined Gus Arnheim for his first big band job, but left after two months because “it was too commercial,” returning to the jazz of the after-hours spots. Dexter Gordon got him set with Lee Young‘s band at the Club Alabam, and for part of 1943 he played with Young until 2 a.m. moving over to The Ritz to play a second job until 7.

Later in 1943, Lee Young recommended Art to Benny Carter, and Art worked with the Carter band in Hollywood and Salt Lake City. After that the Carter band was heading into the South and on Benny’s suggestion, his manager brought Art to audition for the Kenton band. He was hired, and spent the next seven or eight months with Kenton.

While with Kenton he had his first record date (November 19, 1943) and first recorded solo on Harlem Folk Dance. The bridge was difficult, and Art found out how much he didn’t know when he saw a B flat chord on the music. Up to that time he’d played everything by ear. Now he realized he would have to learn the fundamentals of music. “I was a little afraid that I might lose some of the jazz feeling if I studied, but I was wrong. If you’ve got the jazz feeling to begin with, knowledge of music and technique on your instrument will be a great help.”

In February 1944, when he was 18 1/2, his musical career was interrupted by the draft. He spent the next two and a half years in uniform: basic training for six months, and then a band, just before it went overseas. After several months in England, the band returned to the United States, and Art was transferred to the MPs, as acting sergeant of the guard in charge of the Marlborough Street Jail in London. “You should have seen me. I was on 24 and off 24 and carried a sawed off shotgun.” While stationed in London, Art played some jazz concerts at the Adelphi Theater, and met many of the top British jazzmen including George Shearing and Victor Feldman, then a child prodigy on drums. He also played a concert with Ted Heath‘s band.

He left England in 1946, returned home to be discharged in June. In September, when the Kenton band was reorganized in Balboa, Art rejoined for a five year stay. During the years with Kenton, and the five years on his own, Art developed into one of the outstanding alto stars with an international reputation. His services have been in great demand; he has played and recorded with most of the best jazzmen on the West Coast. Since 1956 he has led his own group in Los Angeles.

Although The Rhythm Section is composed of three individualists, each of whom has established a reputation on his own, the year and a half together behind Miles Davis has fused them into a unit. Philly Joe Jones, born of course in Philadelphia, in 1923, is rapidly becoming recognized as one of the great jazz drummers. “Tough” is the word they use for him. He generates tremendous excitement, swings like mad, and withal can play delicate patterns with brushes on the snare or cymbals when a soft and delicate sound is appropriate. Paul Chambers, one of the rising young bass stars of the East, is also a hard swinger, as well as a gifted soloist, is noted particularly for his bowed solos. He was born in Pittsburgh April 22, 1935, first came to prominence in Detroit in the early ’50s, and has been with Miles Davis since 1955. Red Garland was born in Dallas, May 13, 1923, and has been an active pianist with many leading groups since 1945.

The session itself started off in the worst possible way. Art didn’t know about it until the morning of the date. Arrangements were made by Art’s wife, Diane, who didn’t want him to become tense worrying about it. He hadn’t been playing for a couple of weeks; his horn was dried out and the cork in the neck was broken; and he had no idea of what he’d record. To top it all, everyone had been up late the night before and were late in getting started. but after the first rehearsal of You’d Be So Nice To Come Home To, everything jelled. As Art says, “I was so inspired by the rhythm section, I forgot the ‘adverse’ conditions. I’d never played most of the tunes before, and I fell back on the time I spent before the war on the Avenue playing by ear. Otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to make it.”

About his own playing, Art feels, “In some spots I may sound rough, like I’m squawking, but I finally realized that in playing I’ve got to play exactly as I feel it. I want the emotion to come out rather than try to make everything perfect. You can’t express your emotions in that way. I believe I’m coming closer to that kind of honest emotion in this album. It’s hard to drop all the inhibitions built up over the years, but I’m gradually beginning to free myself.”