Billboard : 05/27/1957
Score of 77

For modernists who go for “thinking” jazz musicianship, this is a prize package. Front-line players Waldron on piano, Gigi Gryce on alto and Idrees Sulieman on trumpet, are all writers exploring new patterns and there’s an absorbing “workshop” quality to the set along with more than usual quota of taste and charm. Dee’s Dilemma has jazz in both 4/4 and 3/4, and Shome shows what the men can do with an item based on the blues. Sulieman’s rich-toned trumpet is a gas on the latter.

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Cash Box : 6/1/1957

Mal Waldron is a fresh arrival on the jazz disk scene, heading the quintet here in a variety of approaches. The big man in the combo is alto saxist Gigi Gryce, who is afforded lots of room for eventful work. The soft and smooth ivory inventions of arranger-artists-composer Waldron are a joy. Numbers are originals with the exception of a beautifully performed Yesterdays. What jazzist Waldron has to say is worth hearing.

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Down Beat : 07/11/1957
Dom Cerulli : 4 stars

This is an interesting session, highlighted by the debut on record of bassist Euell, who glistens in his solo spots and is a strong spark in the rhythm section.

The tunes range from the rather glib Stablemates to the moving and still-evolving Bud Study. In between, and very close to the top, is Yesterdays, with Sulieman blowing soft-edged, moody but still forceful open horn against the heartbeat of Euell’s bass. The setting for the ballad is indeed handsome, with Euell spotted at the opener, joined shortly by Sulieman; then with Gryce blowing with taste and depth. Mal‘s solo is quietly and insistently built. Along the way, the drums lay out to bring the bass pulse into sharper focus. A very effective rendition.

In Dilemma, strongly structured like Yesterdays, Mal takes one of his best solos and manages to work in a pun with a few phrases from It’s Delovely. Transfiguration is Gone with the Wind rather thinly disguised. The piece swings effectively, with good solo contributions all around, but is marred a bit by some sloppy fours before the end.

Waldron is emerging as one of the important writing talents on the scene today and bids well to be an exciting pianist, as well. Gryce plays throughout here with bite and a flow of ideas. Sulieman is generally lyrical and forceful. Edgehill‘s rhythm is good. And bassist Euell impresses very strongly.

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Lines Notes by Ira Gitler

Mal-1 is not Mal minus one because this would equal nothing and this LP is far from nothing. It’s actually something – something else.

Mal-1 is Mal dash one and signifies the first in what will be a series of recordings by a new personality on the jazz front who is going to have a lot to say about the future of his chosen idiom.

Mal is Malcolm Earl Waldron, pianist and composer-arranger, a studios looking young man (born in New York, 8-16-1926) who gives the impression of being a college graduate and is. Queens College is his alma mater and it was there where he received his B.A. after studying composition under Karol Rathaus.

Originally an alto saxophonist, he later switched to piano and began working around New York with various groups including those of tenormen “Big Nick” Nicholas, Ike Quebec and many less musical aggregations. This was in the years 1949 through 1953. In 1954 he began an association with Charlie Mingus which continued intermittently until the formation, in late 1956, of the group you hear on this record. There was one period of a year in 1955-56 when he was with the bassist’s Jazz Workshop on a regular basis, appearing with him at the Newport Jazz Festival in both years. Mal gives Mingus a lot of credit for his development. He says, “With Charlie’s Workshop I had a chance to concentrate on playing music. Before that I was fighting rock and roll bands.”

As a pianist, Waldron lists his personal influences as Bud Powell and Thelonious Monk, the two deans of the school of modern piano in the Fifties. Bud captured his imagination first and later he found the intricacies of the Monk message to suit his mind and spirit.

As a composer, he has written modern ballet scores for the Henry Street Playhouse dance group and others. He still plays for these groups and one of his ambitions is to write once again for the dance. Right now he is fulfilling other ambitions by creating new compositions and arrangements in the jazz idiom, ones which have already made an imprint on the imagination of many serious musicians on the East Coast and will do the same to thinking musicians all over the world as they are heard. Even before they are turned into arrangements, the lines of the Waldron compositions are far removed from the ordinary originals which are whipped together for many a record date.

One of the problems confronting him is, Mal says, “keeping the balance between writing and playing. The more I work on writing, the less chance my technique at the keyboard has to develop.”

There aren’t many musicians who do both things and do them well but Mal is doing it and constantly improving as a pianist despite his dual role.

Gigi Gryce, the alto saxophonist on this recording, is another who essays writing and playing and achieves the rare combination of success in each. Born in Florida but raised in Connecticut, Gigi settled in New York after a European tour with Lionel Hampton in 1953. Well known for his collaboration with trumpeter Art Farmer in the years 1954-56, Gigi here teams with Idrees Sulieman in the front line of the quintet and also contributes his passionate solo voice.

Trumpeter Sulieman is a Florida native like Gryce (Idrees was born in St. Petersburg, Gigi in Pensacola) who made New York his base of operations in the early Forties. He appeared with Sid Catlett‘s band at the Famous Door on 52nd Street in 1946 and at Minton’s in various sessions thereafter, making his first recordings with Thelonious Monk. Idrees has had much big band experience with such names as Calloway, Hines, Basie, Hampton and Gillespie. His brash, biting, exciting horn, influenced by Gillespie, Navarro and Clifford Brown was heard during 1956 at the Newport Jazz Festival and at Birdland with Friedrich Gulda.

This album is a first for bassman Julian Euell. Although he has worked with Benny Harris, Joe Roland and Freddie Redd in the Fifties, Julian had never recorded before. Born in New York on May 23, 1929, he took up the bass in high school at DeWitt Clinton and worked with Elmo Hope before going into the Army in 1945. On his discharge in 1947 he resumed playing but gave it up for financial reasons in 1949. Julian studied sociology at New York University from 1951-54 and started playing again in 1952. Since 1953 he has studied his instrument with Charlie Mingus, Fred Zimmermann and his present teacher, Stuart Sankey. He is also presently attending Columbia University in order to receive his B.S. in sociology and go into youth work.

Drummer Arthur Edgehill has been active on the New York scene since 1954 with Horace Silver‘s quartet at Minton’s in that year, Kenny Dorham‘s Jazz Prophets in 1956 and the co-operative unit known as the Jazz Lab Quintet which was made up of the five musicians in this album when originally formed.

Planned to be a variety of material and moods, this LP succeed admirably on both interrelating counts. Two of the compositions are by Mal and there are one each by Idrees, Lee Sears and Benny Golson. In addition, this is a Waldron treatment of Yesterdays.

Yesterdays is a perfect example of Mal’s concern with mood and his sensitivity to the ways of achieving it. Because he was reminded of the bass, he left the drums out in certain places in order to draw more attention to the bass. This controlled the mood through the rhythm even though the soloists had their freedom. Euell carries off his role with aplomb.

The two Waldron originals are Dee’s Dilemma and Bud Study.

Dee’s Dilemma, dedicated to a young and beautiful dancer, was originally written all in 4/4 but as musicians played it they would find it natural to go into 3/4 at times. In the version by Jackie Mclean and Bill Hardman in Jackie’s Pal (Prestige LP 7068) the tempo is faster than the lament that you hear here and there is no 3/4 as it was an early arrangement. Later, Mal wrote it for Art Blakey and there were sections of 3/4 in the melody line but these were dropped in the blowing choruses. In this arrangement, the waltz moods alternate with the 4/4 even in the solos and give rise to some sensitive, moving moments.

Another piece which has gone through an evolution is Bud Study. First written as a piano solo and used as such by Mal in the Mingus group, it was enlarged for a group when Mal was not satisfied with it. This had not been the first change in it and Mal claims it has not yet come to a resting point. He says, “It is an attempt to combine a classical flavor with jazz, something I heard in Bud Powell in Glass Enclosure.

Benny Golson’s Stablemates has been recorded before by Miles Davis in Prestige LP 7014. You will find this interpretation of the piece different. The arrangement was done by Benny himself. Now playing tenor sax with Dizzy Gillespie’s orchestra, he is another young writer who is turning out originals of more than passing interest.

Sulieman’s written contribution is Shome, a simple blues figure which adds another dimension to the many present in the album.

Transfiguration is by Lee Sears and is a bright, buoyant line that moves happily as it swing along. The exchanges between Gigi and Idrees are especially warming here.

This is Mal-1 or Mal to the first power. As I look forward to Mal-2, all I can say is more power to him.