Down Beat : 03/21/1956
Nat Hentoff : 4 stars

This is the first 12″ LP for pianist Hope (he’s had two previous Blue Note 10″ sets). He is well accompanied here by bassist John Ore (who has worked with Lester Young, George Wallington, and is currently with Bud Powell) and drummer Willie Jones (who has been with Thelonious Monk, Randy Weston, J.J. Johnson, and most recently, with Charlie Mingus‘ Jazz Workshop.) Ore has a good solo on Mood for Love. Hope, who was obscured for several years in r&b bands, is the same age as Powell and they were friends during their early years as musicians. There is much in common with their style, but Hope has musical identify of his own as well.

Elmo, though a swinger and emotionally direct, has several liabilities at this point. One is an insufficiently developed left hand. A second is a tendency to forget to adapt his conception with sufficient sensitivity to the particular needs and contours of each song. As a result, his interpretations of all the standards (except for the beautifully realized Ghost of a Chance and I’m in the Mood for Love) are too similar in basic approach and therefore are largely ineffective as wholes. On his three up-tempo originals, Hope wails, but neither the themes nor their structuring are memorable. But his brooding, slow-tempoed Quit It and Blue Mo sustain their moods with depth and freshness, and are the highlights of the recording. Hope’s conception is powerful but thus far is limited. He needs more range. Yet he gets four because when he’s good he’s very good. Artistically, this would have been more effective as a 10″ LP.

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Liner Notes by Ira Gitler

This is the case of a musician whose talent was buried tor a long time. While things were happening in New York in the mid and late Forties, Elmo Hope was traveling around the country with rhythm and blues bands. Although he was one of the first and best to play in the particular style which so many modern pianists work in today, he was never around for his playing to be appraised, much less praised. Last year he was discovered, unearthed might be a better term, and is at last starting to receive the recognition due him.

Elmo has a drive which is extremely reminiscent of Bud Powell. This is as it should be, for he and Bud grew up together and evolved along the same lines by exchanging ideas. On numbers like Lucky Strike and Elmo’s Fire this is best demonstrated, the left hand insistently building plateaus tor the right hand to take off from. Elmo gets to the heart of the matter on the beautifully sad Blue Mo. There is no pounding, the piano counterpart of a honking tenor, or over-syncopation, the device which is used by some as an impoverished excuse for swinging. Elmo swings naturally.

For his rhythm accompanists, Elmo has chosen two of the new talents who have been impressing musicians and serious listeners in New York during the past few years.

John Ore, heard most often with Lester Young, is another in the line of illustrious Philadelphia (born there in 1933) bassists (Percy Heath, Nelson Boyd). He started on cello at 9, switched to alto later on and took up bass in 1951.

Brooklyn born (1929) Willie Jones started playing in 1947. He studied at Parkway Institute in his native borough and has played with Randy Weston, Jay Jay Johnson and Thelonious Monk. Art Blakey and Max Roach are considered tops by Willie who is consciously working towards a melodic style where the accents simulate the rhythmic figures of melody phrases and are shaded accordingly.

This LP represents something new for Elmo. In previous recordings he had concentrated on his own originals. This set has, in addition to four new originals, six standards which range from Kern to Rodgers with a stop at Berlin on the way.