Billboard : 07/08/1957
Score of 76

One of the last packages cut by Tatum before his death, and a set worthy of one of the true giants in jazz. Tho Red Callender and Jo Jones ably support the sprightly 88’er, there’s little doubt that Tatum leads all the way. Blue Lou and Isn’t It Romantic are must listening, and excellent demo tracks for dealers and DJs alike.

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Cashbox : 06/29/1957

Verve, which under the Clef label produced an 11 volume Genius Of Art Tatum series, has a single LP issue featuring the late keyboard artist in 10 sides as he is backed by Jo Jones (drummer) and Red Callender (bass). The Tatum brilliance is heard delightfully on a mostly evergreen bill (Isn’t It Romanic, Just One Of Those Things) playing with unhurried ease, or flashy attacks. Excellent examples of the jazz keyboard master.

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Jazz Monthly (UK)
Paul Rossiter : 12/1957

The reduction of several recent Verve LPs from twelve inch to ten inch form for local issue could be applauded on musical grounds, but in this instance it is unforgivable. One hopes that E.M.I. will release the remaining titles on an EP.

In many ways this is one of the greatest records that Tatum ever made. He did not need the addition of drums or bass from a rhythmic viewpoint, but it does help to show the listener the nature of the inherent swing in Tatum’s playing. Callender and Jones provide an effective background as it happens and were good choices for the date, even though one is both surprised and relieved that Ray Brown and Buddy Rich were not used. Tatum himself is superlative on every track, his fund of ideas seemingly inexhaustible, his technique staggering yet never an end in itself, and his touch something at which to marvel. There is no “best” track in the normal sense, for all tracks are the best when one is playing them. Genius is a word bandied about a great deal on sleeve notes these days, but in the case of Tatum it is an accurate description. This LP is an impressive memorial to a wonderful musician, and anyone who really cares for jazz should get it.

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Metronome
Jack Maher : October, 1957

Following up their Genius of Art Tatum series, Verve presents a trio album; not what was Art’s usual trio but a specially picked group (sometime previous to his death) of Jo Jones and Red Callender. The music is intrinsically Tatum, full of his peculiar little trills and frills and with that same underlying competence on his instrument that has earned him the fabulous reputation he enjoys.

The music is extremely enjoyable with Art limited only by his own resources and the rhythm section, which plays well, but seems to keep him from all the changes of direction that earmark his unaccompanied playing.

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Miami Herald (Miami, FL)
Fred Sherman : 09/15/1957

The small son around the house wanted to know why I as being so enthusiastic about the LP spinning on the turntable. What’s so much better about this piano player, he asked. He couldn’t understand how it could be different. Didn’t everybody hit the same keys when playing the same song?

It came close to a case of disownment. The piano player was Art Tatum and the album was called Presenting the Art Tatum Trio, one of the final recording sessions by the man who died last year at 46. Jo Jones on drums and bassist Red Callender make it a trio, but it’s not like the old trio work when Slam Stewart worked with Tatum. On many of the 10 numbers you will have to make an effort to hear bass and drums. Jones offers a beautiful brush beat on More Than You Know. Callender shines on a Tatum piece he calls Trio Blues.

Callender sums it up in the album notes when he writes: “This man was the greatest jazz instrumentalist of all time. I mean the greatest.”

This is a wonderful album. If you don’t know Tatum, you’re going to be struck by the mass of music he gets out of the piano. At the record stores you will find an important series of albums called The Genius of Art Tatum. I think there are 10 now.

It was in 1954 that Norman Granz started Tatum recording 150 songs for what he hoped would be the definitive library. I’m sure you’ll find your “our song” on one of the albums. Hear Tatum play it and you’ll buy the album.

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New Yorker
Whitney Balliett : 07/13/1957

When Art Tatum, the miraculous, almost totally blind pianist, died last fall, at the age of forty-six, he was widely considered the greatest of all jazz pianists. This universal regard, however, has been at least partly created by the ballooning powers of a legend that confused his massive technique with his somewhat average abilities as a jazz improviser, and that got its start when Tatum appeared in the early thirties as the first full-fledged virtuoso performer that jazz had produced. In any case, the astonishment at his style—smooth, whipping arpeggios that seemed to be blown up and down the keyboard; impossibly agile bass figures; and furious tempos played with perfect touch—was deep and apparently permanent. For the rest of his life, Tatum continued to receive more attention than the average jazz musician, perhaps because he worked largely as a bravura solo pianist, whose surging, orchestral approach never fitted into the collaborative confines of a jazz band. When he played with other musicians, When he played with other musicians, an embarrassing thing happened: no matter how resolute his cohorts, he inevitably overran them; even while supplying accompaniment, he never seemed able to keep himself from swelling up, like an enormous djinni, alongside the soloist. Thus, Tatum was practically forced to establish his own medium of expression. His technique, which may have been equal to that of any pianist who ever lived, was, of course, based in jazz, but it was so superior to the standard popular songs he invariably used—peculiarly, Tatum never wrote a single tune—that it often took on a palpable life of its own, in the manner of the flawless execution of, say, a Salvador Dali. A fantastic embellisher, Tatum used the melody at hand not as a basis for improvisation but as an outline, which he would clothe with unique, rococo rhapsodies of runs, breaks, and chords that at times seemed because of their essential similarity—as if they could be transplanted intact from number to number with identical results.

Some of Tatum’s brilliant cavorting is evident in a new recording—The Art Tatum Trio (Verve MGV-8118), made not long before his death, with Red Callender, bass, and Jo Jones, drums—which is, compared to some of his other late work, a fairly docile effort. (A few years ago, in a set of a dozen or so Clef records, called “The Genius of Art Tatum,” the pianist, unaccompanied, set down his ruminations on more than a hundred standard selections, in which he developed, again and again, wild and rather formless arabesques that departed completely from an explicit beat and lasted for minutes at a time.) Tatum’s overweening attack can, however, be heard here in Just One of Those Things and Trio Blues, the latter of which he converts into a sly, though always gracious, parody of the blues. While Callender plays with aplomb throughout (there are ten selections in all), Jones fearlessly provides—in addition to a couple of stunning solos with the wire brushes that override Tatum’s creeping, vinelike background figures—an almost governing support, which suggests that if Tatum had played with more musicians of Jones’ strength and inventiveness, he might in time have pocketed some of his insuperable fireworks and got down to business.

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San Francisco Chronicle (San Francisco, CA)
Ralph J. Gleason : 06/16/1957

Red Callender and Jo Jones accompany the master of jazz piano on this, one of his last LPs. It is a gem well worth a place in anyone’s collection, not only because it is superbly recorded Tatum, but because it is superb Tatum. As far as I am concerned, Trio Blues, which has echoes of Lewis and Yancey and the boogie woogie boys, oddly enough, is one of Tatum’s greatest performances and his work on the ballads here, such as Isn’t It Romantic and Some Other Spring is inspired.

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St. Louis Post-Dispatch (St. Louis, MO)
Charles Menees : 06/16/1957

Ten sides cut by pianist Art Tatum shortly before his death last year are contained in Presenting the Art Tatum Trio. With Tatum are two other jazz stalwarts, drummer Jo Jones and bassist Red Callender. Tatum plays with his customary firm yet feathery touch, runs arpeggios at lightning speed, at times overpowers with technique. But one has to stand firm in admiration of his great feeling for jazz. One of the selections, Trio Blues, was improvised on the spot at the recording session. Other titles include Just One of Those Things, If, and I Guess I’ll Have to Change My Plans.

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Down Beat : 08/08/1957
Don Gold : 5 stars

There is little to be said here, concerning Tatum’s remarkable ability. It’s been said many times before. As Callender notes, “There’s been a lot of fine pianists, but only Tatum could make the piano say quite as much, and seemingly with so little effort.”

This LP was the product of one of Tatum’s last recording sessions and becomes another volume in the Tatum literature Norman Granz thoughtfully has provided. All the Tatum mastery is indicated here: the technical command, the astute sense of time, the melodic concepts, the communicative approach to the instrument, and the rare ability to play powerfully without turning the piano into another instrument.

Among the tunes included are a technically exhilarating Things, a driving Lou, and a directly stated, grasped-by-the roots Blues. The backing by Callender and Jones is inspired, to say the least. This is a historically significant LP and a part of the musical life of one of jazz’ most illustrious figures.

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Liner Notes by Unknown

On this album, one of the last cut by Art Tatum, his incomparable piano was abetted by George “Red” Callender, the bassist, and Jo Jones, the drummer. How did it feel for a musician to play in the same trio with the virtuoso Tatum? The question was put squarely to Red Callender, himself one of the more highly regarded jazzmen on the West Coast, one accustomed, moreover, to playing with other topflight musicians of all schools and persuasions of jazz.

“To play with Art Tatum? Well, it was a ball, of course,” Callender began. “I suppose I felt as any musician did about playing with Art – the mere fact that he asked for me, expressly, to be a part of his trio for the date was a great honor, a fine compliment. Let me tell you about Art Tatum. This man was the greatest jazz instrumentalist of all time. I mean that greatest, bar none. I mean simply that Art Tatum played more piano than anyone else played any other instrument. There’s been a lot of fine pianists, but only Tatum could make the piano say quite as much, and seemingly with so little effort.

“Art was a meticulous, unbending perfectionist. He liked playing alone and he also liked playing with other people – but the others had to keep up with him. With Art there was very little margin for error. Nothing annoyed him more than a note or a change that wasn’t just right. You might say that as a jazz artist he was overpowering to anyone playing with him. You never thought of taking a solo, for instance, because – let’s face it, would could you play? Not that Art would deliberately cut you, but what he played was just so naturally brilliant there was nothing left to say…”

How did the trio prepare for this recording date? “Art was a meticulous artist, as I said,” Callender went on. “We would have a conference just before starting to play and that’s when the decisions would be made regarding what notes and changes we’d play. It was like a guide, though, and not an absolute blueprint. So what followed once we started to play was that you might call planned improvisation.” Callender also had a comment to pass along concerning the drummer in the trio. “Jo Jones,” he said, “plays drums as though he invented the instrument.”

About the album itself, there are a number of standards, including two by Cole Porter – Just One of Those Things from “Jubilee” (1935) and Love for Sale from “The New Yorkers” (1929) – a Rodgers-Hart evergreen entitled Isn’t It Romantic from “Love Me Tonight” (1932) and Vincent Youmans’ More Than You Know from “Great Day” (1929), to list a few of them. The Trio Blues by Art Tatum was improvised on the spot at the recording session.

Throughout, of course, the spectacular wizardry of Art Tatum is paramount, at once subtle and commanding, with the firm yet feathery touch which gave his sound such an identifiable quality. The backing he receives from bassist Callender and drummer Jones is tasteful and complete, giving the trio a strong sense of unity.

Art Tatum was born in Toledo, Ohio, in 1910, beginning his musical studies at 13 as a violinist. Soon he switched to the piano and it wasn’t long before he was playing in clubs and on the air, earning a widespread reputation which lasted, expanding even into legend until his death in 1956.

Jo Jones, born in Chicago in 1910, first made his mark with the Count Basie band in the late 30s and late 40s – the mid-40s being occupied by Army service. It was Jones, master of the subtle cymbal, who started the notion of mainstreaming the four beats on his cymbal, leaving his bass drum foot free for special accents.

Red Callender, born in Richmond, VA, in 1918, started his musical studies on the trumpet, touring through a number of other instruments deciding on the bass. By 1937 he was with Lous Armstrong and later joined the Nat “King” Cole trio, followed by stints with Lester Young and Erroll Garner. For the last six years Callender has been recording in Los Angeles, earning a reputation as a topflight addition to any unit.