Billboard : 07/14/1956
Score of 79

Jon Eardley‘s “Seven” frame the trumpeter in familiar company: Zoot Sims, his present colleague in the Gerry Mulligan Quartet, and his old New Jazz Quintet buddy, Phil Woods (on alto), Milt Gold is on trombone and the rhythm section is made up of Teddy Kotick, George Syran and Nick Stabulas. The ensemble has an unusually cohesive sound and yet gives the horns ample freedom for individual flight. Eardsley gets more impressive with each new album: paradoxically, his tone is muscular and yet engagingly lyric. Both his brilliant playing and the originality of his writing in this set will attract modern aficionados.

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San Francisco Examiner
C.H. Garrigues : 08/26/1956

During the first few months after the death of Charlie Parker it seemed almost impossible to pick up a new set of liner notes without reading that here was the great Bird’s true successor; here (in this altoist, or tenorman, trumpeter or even organist, no matter how cool, no matter how wispy) was to be found the reincarnation of the genius of the Bird; his inventiveness, his tone, his drive, his “spatial” quality, his genius for improvisation.

By this time, the spate has ceased; writers of liner notes are perceptive people and it had already become clear that, even before Parker’s death, the main line of development had shifted into other directions. Parker’s introduction of “spatial form” into jazz had shown the way to cool music but Parker had never played cool and the wispy boys, though owning much to him, were not following in his footsteps. In the last few months we have heard little of Bird-like reincarnations.

That being true, it is now possible to say that of all the albums issued since Parker’s death, a recent one by the Jon Eardley Seven seems to me to come closest to carrying on the tradition – the main jazz line – which Parker set during the latter years of the 1940s. To say this is not to say that any member of the Eardley outfit sounds at all like his opposite number on (for example) the old Parker sextet. Earl’s trumpet is much warmer, richer, less strident than Miles Davis and nobody has ever said that Phil Woods sounded like Parker himself or that Milt Gold played like J.J. Johnson. Yet what you get from this rather extraordinary album, as a whole, is a sense of the drive, the excitement and yet the detachment, the “spatial” quality, which was the essence of Parker at his best. Much of the credit, I think, is due to Eard’s own driving horn, with perhaps as much to Zoot Sims on tenor. But perhaps much more is due to the fact that here are seven musicians who really had something to say and who sat down to say it. In this day of more or less desultory musical doodling, an album with his warmth, this drive, which yet avoids the pitfalls of hootin’ jazz, is more than welcome.

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Liner Notes by Ira Gitler

When Jon Eardley first joined Gerry Mulligan’s Quartet many people immediately closeted him with Chet Baker for the simple reason that he was playing with Gerry Mulligan. It is true that Jon was exercising a certain restraint in lifting his personality to the quartet but he never sounded like Baker. However, it took his own recordings and those with Phil Woods to establish clearly that his was a harmonically richer and more virile style.

Now Jon is with Mulligan again. This time it is the sextet, a group much freer and less demanding on the personality than the quartet. It still follows that an LP featuring Jon and four of his original compositions is naturally going to be a more personal expression. Previously Jon had used a quartet and a quintet for his Prestige LPs. Here it is a septet for which he has penned some arresting lines which never lack an inner swing and are well developed by the integration of trumpet-alto against trombone-tenor.

For the personnel of the septet, Jon has drawn on past and present associates and chosen wisely and well. The very sound that they gel points up the kindred spirit that existed on the date. For conclusive proof listen to the exchange between Zoot and Phil in On The Minute or the four way conversation on Ladders.

Zoot Sims is with Jon in Gerry Mulligan’s present sextet. His playing here is not what would be judged typical Zoot stylistically and soundwise, as some new elements seemed to have entered his playing, but is typically Zoot in its tremendous warmth, swing and soul.

Jon’s old New Jazz Quintet buddy, Phil Woods, is reunited with him here. Phil’s rise in recognition in the past year has been as steady and sure as his consistent playing is each time out.

A fellow native Pennsylvanian to Jon is Milt Gold. Milt is a young jazz veteran who has played with Claude Thornhill and Stan Kenton among others. This is one of his rare recording appearances and the valve-like facility of his slide work will make you wonder why.

The rhythm section is the empathetic trio of George Syran, Teddy Kotick and Nick Stabulas which made things cook on both New Jazz Quintet dates (Prestige 191, 204) and also Hey There, Jon Eardley! (Prestige 207). They are all strong swingers and George’s solos and comping are especially noteworthy.

As I said before this is really Jon’s personal expression. Aside from the ballad There’s No You and George Syran’s For Leap Year, the rest of the compositions are by him. And there is his muscular and melodic horn which shows further maturity and added lustre. This is Eard’s word and you can take him at it, for he knows whereof he speaks… straight from the shoulder.