Kansas City Call
Bob Greene : 12/01/1961

The blues have been isolated and declared as the basic origin of jazz. Here seven of the top jazzmen unite to play their progressive figures over, around and through a steady stream of blues, whether 12, 16, 32 or 44 bars in length.

Alto and tenor saxophonist Oliver Nelson wrote all six tunes presented here by Eric Dolphy, alto and flute; Freddie Hubbard, trumpet; George Barrow, baritone sax; Bill Evans, piano; Paul Chambers, bass and Roy Haynes, drums.

Although the album notes, which were, incidentally, written by Nelson, and directed toward those with a more than casual touch of musical knowledge, the music is there for everyone to enjoy.

Dolphy and Hubbard are outstanding on their solos, creating figures that are digested but consisting of ideas that are totally new.

Dolphy starts out on the initial song Stolen Moments – with one of his best solos, taking flight on his flute after Freddie Hubbard runs through what must be a tiring finger exercise on the trumpet. Other melodies here that are bound to delight are Hoe-Down, Cascades and Yearnin’.

A very good buy.

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Montreal Gazette
Charles J. Schreiber : 11/11/1961

Bill Evans, Roy Haynes, Oliver Nelson, Paul Chambers and Freddie Hubbard share equal billing in this work, which is touted as 20th Century classical. (See, someone agrees with us). The collection is enterprising and insists that the artists work in classical forms and restrictions. We found the effort an interesting and enjoyable study but hardly one that will command attention except as a curio.

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Down Beat : 12/21/1961
Don DeMichael : 4 stars

A glance at the personnel of this album might lead one to believe this is another blowing session. It is not. Although there are good, sometimes excellent, solos on every track, Nelson’s writing lifts this record out of the ordinary.

Using 12-bar blues and I Got Rhythm as points of departure, Nelson has put together six compositions that show him to be one of the important new writers. He uses various devices, depending on the mood he wishes to create.

In Stolen Moments, he uses close parallel voicing, to achieve a soothing, floating feeling, somewhat in the manner of Gil Evans. In Hoedown, he contrasts a rustic effect, similar to that used by country fiddlers, in the first part of the composition with undulating modern lines in the second.

Cascades is built on a minor-key exercise Nelson composed when he was in school. The theme, 56-bars long, puts me in mind of Lester Young‘s Tickletoe. Instead of returning to the original theme after the solos, Nelson introduces a 12-bar theme that is related to Stolen Moments. Yearning, made up of two sessions, on of 12 bars, the other of 16, is in a Basie mode and played behind the beat, so far behind, in fact, that it sets up an uncomfortable tension in the rhythm section. Nelson has written a boppish line, played by alto and trumpet, in Butch, with tenor and baritone together acting as foil and counterbalance. Teenie’s is written for two altos; blues serve as the base, but Nelson adds spice by employing dissonance and half-step transpositions.

Nelson’s playing is like his writing; thoughtful, unhackneyed, and well constructed. Though their styles of playing and writing are dissimilar, there is a parallel between Nelson and Benny Golson. Both play compositionally; each writes with an over-all effect in mind, neither restricts himself to standard meter constructions.

Hubbard steals the solo honors with some of his best playing on records. The young trumpeter seems to be giving more thought to the shape of his solos than was his wont previously. In several of his solos here he alternates to advantage a series of short, punching phrases with long, flowing ones. Hubbard still has the wonderful fire of youth in his playing but there are now moments of soberness also.

Dolphy gets off some good solos, too, his most interesting one on Yearnin’. If we can visualize most solos as being a given area that is gradually filled in by the soloist, as, say a circle is blacked in, Dolphy, on Yearnin’, seems to outline the solo area, blacking in, as it were, the space around the edge of the circle. Anyway you want to look at it, it’s a hell of a solo.

Evans is a little disappointing. Except for short solos on Butch and Teenie’s, his piano spots are no more than pleasant and there’s nothing more frustrating than an excellent musician being merely pleasant.

Special commendation must go to Barrow, Haynes, and Chambers for their ensemble playing. Haynes again shows that he is one of the most adaptable and understanding of drummers; his support is excellent throughout.

Now, how about a big-band date for Nelson?

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Liner Notes by Oliver Nelson

Classical music of the 19th Century, and contemporary music of our own 20th Century brought about the need for adopting a different perspective in order to create music that was meaningful and vital. This was done in many ways too numerous and complicated to mention here. but one device which has always been successful in both classical music and in present-day jazz is to let the musical ideas determine the form and shape of a musical composition. In effect, that is what I have tried to do here. The blues, which is a twelve-bar form and the form and chord structure I’ve Got Rhythm, being 32 measures in length, was my material for all of the compositions on this album. The augmentation of the forms themselves comes from thematic motifs and melodic ideas.

Stolen Moments, written in 1960, is a 16-bar composition derived from blues in C minor. The tune consists of three melodic ideas which extend the basic blues form. The divisions within the piece would then be 8 bars, 6 bars and 2 bars. In order to add contrast, the harmonic progressions for the solos are minor blues 12 measures in length. Freddie Hubbard begins with a very sensitive and soulful trumpet solo, followed by Eric Dolphy on flute and a tenor solo by myself. Bill Evans completes the series with a beautiful piano solo. After the final statement of melody. the piece ends quietly.

Hoe-Down lengthens the form of rhythm from 32 to 44 bars. The two notes at the very beginning of the tune are responsible for the melody itself, and it turns into a statement and response kind of thing which lasts for 44 measures. For the solos, I chose to use the 32-bar mold for the sake of variety, and, needless to say, Freddie Hubbard makes the most of it with a rousing but serious-minded trumpet solo. Eric Dolphy follows with a beautifully projected and controlled interesting alto saxophone solo. I play next and Roy Haynes follows with an 8-bar drum solo which leads back to the written part of the composition. This time we begin on the melody proper, and put the first 4 measures of the tune at the end. This serves as a kind of arc to unify and tie the whole piece together.

Cascades started out as a saxophone exercise I composed while in school. As it turned out, 32 bars were molded into 56 bars to accommodate all the things that seemed to lend themselves naturally for further musical expansion.

After the complete statement of melody, Cascades becomes a vehicle for Freddie Hubbard and pianist Bill Evans. Freddie begins his solo with long melodic lines that weave in and out of the harmonic progressions. He sounds to me like John Coltrane playing a trumpet. Bill begins his piano solo quietly and gradually builds his lines in intensity and structure. At the conclusion of his last chorus, Bill leads the four horns into the ensemble out-chorus. The out-chorus is different from the melodic line present in the beginning of the piece. It is twelve bars in length and is borrowed harmonically from Stolen Moments. Again the melodic ideas have determined the size and shape of this composition.

Yearnin’ opens the B side of this LP and is a blues in C major with only superficial modifications. Pianist Bill Evans begins with two choruses of blues which set the mood of the piece. The first ensemble is 16 measures long. The second ensemble, 12 measures in length, employs a kind of “amen” cadence that is different from the liturgical one in that it is stationary and does not move when the harmonic progression is resolved. The second ensemble leads directly into Eric Dolphy‘s alto solo, a trumpet solo by Freddie Hubbard, and some sensitive playing by Bill Evans.

Butch and Butch is dedicated to my oldest sister and her husband. It remains a blues throughout with no structural changes. I decided to couple the ideas used in this tune and orchestrate them first as statement of melody, then as statement of melody plus background. After a brief introduction by the wonderful Roy Haynes, Eric and Freddie play the bop-like line and are joined by George Barrow on baritone saxophone and myself on tenor for the second statement of melody. This leads to the blowing choruses by myself, followed by Freddie. Eric and pianist Bill Evans.

Teenie’s Blues is dedicated to my baby sister, who is a fine singer and pianist now living in St. Louis, Missouri. The purpose of this tune was to write a blues using traditional harmony employing no more than 3 harmonic progressions. Since the dominant 7th is considered by theorists to be one of the so-called “blue” notes, I limited the underlying harmony to consist of these 3 tonal centers: F7, B flat 7 and C7. The melodic line Eric Dolphy and I play on alto saxophones is made up of displaced intervals which have points of tension and rest. They are transposed up a half step for the sake of tension and down a half step for resolution of this tension.

Eric has the first solo and gives me the motif that enables me to begin my solo. Bill Evans takes the motif that I conclude with to begin his solo which leads into a pizzicato bass solo by Paul Chambers. After the bass solo, the melody is restarted on the forte dynamic level for twelve bars and at mezzo forte the second time until the 11th and 12th measures. At this point, Eric and I drive the theme home and, instead of a complete cutoff, allow the melody to dissipate naturally.

The compositions on this recording present a phase of my development up to the present time as a jazz writer (as distinguished from my contemporary or so-called “classical” music) and might shed some light on the subject of where I would like to go as a composer and arranger in the jazz idiom.

As a player, I became aware of some things that I knew existed, but I was afraid to see them as they really were. There is no need to elaborate; but, when I arrived on the New York scene in March 1959, I believed I had my own musical identity; but before long, everything got turned around and I began a period of self-searching. One big influence for tenor players was John Coltrane and it was an influence that I could not deny. Sonny Rollins was the other. It was not until this LP was recorded on Thursday, the 23rd of February, 1961, that I finally had broken through and realized that I would have to be true to myself, to play and write what I think is vital and, most of all, to find my own personality and identity. This does not mean that a musician should reject and shut things out. It means that he should learn, listen, absorb and grow but retain all the things that comprise the identity of the individual himself.

I take off my cap to Paul Chambers, Eric Dolphy, Roy Haynes, Freddie Hubbard and Bill Evans for the fine talent they displayed, and especially to George Barrow, who played only a supporting role. His baritone parts were executed with such precision and devotion that I find it necessary to make special mention of his fine work.