Billboard : 05/05/1956
Score of 76

Get Happy, one of the more impressive bands in this set, could very well have served as the title of this LP, for that seems the natural aim for this group. With marvelous command of the alto, Woods breezes along amiably, light in touch and spirit. Not that he doesn’t have a soulful enough horn for a beautiful ballad like Falling in Love All Over Again. However, his forte is witty, up-tempo improvisations on tunes like Slow Boat to China and Be My Love. This ex-Juilliard man swings hard and can get into the groove of a funky foot tappin’ blues like Strollin’ With Pam (Teddy Kotick‘s bass solo is fabulous), too. John Williams is at the piano; Nick Stabulas is on drums.

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High Fidelity
John S. Wilson : December 1956

Phil Woods may stand as the example of the ultimate dead end of the cool school of jazz. Woods is an alto saxophonist who has almost everything on his side – polished technical skill, a strong swinging attack, and a great carousing drive. Yet, because he has no suggestion of warmth or shading, the final impression is of a shrill and tiresome series of exercises. For a chorus or two, any of these selections engages the attention, but then, as aural attrition sets in, one sits back to await the entrance of John Williams, a pianist who is both modern and human.

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Miami Herald
Fred Sherman : 06/24/1956

Step over to the Prestige label and you find Williams playing piano in the Phil Woods Quartet, an alto sax showcase called Woodlore. The Julliard-trained saxophonist really can swing and he gets this quartet to throbbing. Part of the credit goes to the programming. There are only seven tracks on the 12-inch LP, giving the group a chance to spread out on a couple of the tunes. Maybe pianist Williams will learn from this session. In his EmArcy album he crowds 12 tunes on the vinyl. But this is Woods’ paragraph so let’s move him down stage. He is completely uninhibited with his horn, ripping loose with sweeping tones that set my 12-inch speaker to quivering. Teddy Kotick is on bass and Nick Stabulas does the drumming. Ira Gitler goes down swinging on the album notes, a real screwball.

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Saturday Review
Wilder Hobson : 05/12/1956

Phil Woods, like Bud Shank, is another non-Parker imitator and is, all in all, probably the most impressive altoist to arrive since Bird. He has a hot, flowing style – jammed with ideas – that has much of the plaintiveness of Bird in it, and Get Happy as heard here is, as Ira Gitler points out in the notes, something. Johnny Williams, Teddy Kotick, and Nick Stabulas are unruffled.

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Down Beat : 05/30/1956
Nat Hentoff : 4 stars

Woodlore is the first 12″ LP of his own by the most consistently impressive of the younger altoists. It is also the first set on which Phil is the only horn present. The rhythm section, which in temperament and intensity of pulsation is just right for this context, consists of John Williams, Nick Stabulas, and Teddy Kotick. Bassist Kotick in particular is superb. Woods plays with slashing emotional power, swings deeply, has individuality of conception and style and, above all, can shout when the occasion demands. His roaring Get Happy, for example, taken way up at a tempo not many hornmen can sustain imaginatively, is an experience of unusual undiluted force that is close to ferocity.

Unfortunately, Woods plays only one slow tempo track, Neal Hefti’s Falling, on which he is relaxed but no less intense than he usually is. China and Be My Love would have benefited from a slower tempo, as would thereby the whole LP in terms of program balance. Another horn would have also helped over a 12″ expanse, although Woods certainly can handle this much solo space better than most jazzmen his age. The two completely casual swing-inducing originals are by Phil. Strollin’ especially comes off with joyful conviction. Good notes by Ira Gitler. Recommended.

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Liner Notes by Ira Gitler

In recent years, baseball has seen many instances of rookies being rushed up to the major leagues too soon. The minor leagues have diminished and the era of the “bonus baby” is on us. Some of them make it. They have the talent to survive a couple of years in the majors while getting their experience the hard way. Others fall by the wayside where they might have made it if given a chance to blossom in the minors.

This situation has its parallel in jazz. The big bands, once in abundance, that served as farm clubs, have disappeared steadily in the last ten years. Previously they were great spawning grounds of new talent. Musicians would gain the necessary seasoning and build their reputations according to their work in the ranks. Before they became recording leaders themselves, they were featured with a name band for a while.

Now there are only a few bands left, the “double A” and “triple A” so to speak. Like the major league teams, these bands and the recording companies are looking to the colleges for some of their talent. In the past two years there have been Jack Montrose from Los Angeles State, Jerry Coker from Indiana, Jimmy Cleveland from Tennessee State, Ernie Wilkins from Wilberforce and Phil Woods from Juilliard.

Phil Woods came off the “campus” to play and record with Jimmy Raney and as a result signed with Prestige to record with his own group. It wasn’t until after recording with his New Jazz Quintet that Phil worked with the big bands of Charlie Barnet and Neal Hefti (both temporary bands) and by this time he already had built somewhat of a reputation.

The things that a scout looks for in a young ballplayer are speed, power, and throwing arm. We might equate these with soul, swing, ideas and technical skills (dexterity and sound). A scouting report on Phil Woods might have looked like this when he broke in.

Woods, Philip Wells, alto sax;
Soul: very soulful; no doubt that his roots are deeply in jazz
Swing: swings very hard and can get funky too
Ideas: always thinking and searching, especially rhythmically. Fine melodic sense.
Technical skills: marvelous command of his instrument and beautiful, singing sound
Potential: unlimited

Phil has been realizing this potential in all his in person and recording performances during the past two years. Perhaps it is because this is the first time he has been the only horn on a date, and it is his first 12 inch recording but this opportunity to blow at length has produced the finest collection of Phil Woods performances to date. He swings through Slow Boat to China and Be My Love at up tempo, presents the natural facts on his own medium Woodlore and shows he can go to his left on Neil Hefti’s plaintive Falling In Love All Over Again. The throw from deep short is a gunshot with Get Happy as Phil minors it at top speed in one of the classic performances of this or any other year. Strollin’ With Pam is for one of his daughters. Strollin’ is a device where the piano lays out and the soloist wails against the background of drums and bass. This is a vigorous blues in a funky finger snappin’ foot tappin’ groove. Phil and Teddy Kotick, who is a rock throughout the session, will lift you out of your seat and march you around the room on this one.

The supporting cast besides Teddy includes John Williams and Nick Stabulas. Teddy and John, like Phil, are New Englanders by birth. Teddy learned his craft well with Charlie Parker and Stan Getz while John also played with Stan’s quintet. His solo spots here are short, sweet and swinging here and his tremendous percussive “comping” is one of the main reasons for the tremendous enthusiasm of these tracks. Nick is off the “sandlots” of New York. He appeared in sessions at the Open Door and played with Phil at the Nut Club where they got a chance to blow before the strippers came on. Nick is another swinger who takes an intelligent solo too.

The present scouting report on Phil hasn’t changed. The potential is still unlimited. Like Al Kaline of the Detroit Tigers, he is a rookie who has stepped in and done the job like a veteran.

You may be wondering why I have linked Phil Woods and baseball so often in this liner. Is Phil a good ballplayer or does he like baseball? I don’t know; I never talked baseball with him. All I know is that I like baseball and I like Phil Woods.