Billboard : 10/07/1957
Score of 76

An unusually rewarding jam session package that lives up to its title. Functional, pithy lines written by H. McKusick, M. Waldron and K. Burrell prove most appropriate for blowing, and A. Farmer, McKusick, Burrell, Waldron, and a particularly “wailing” Al Cohn, blow with vigor, feeling, and oftimes with heat. Try M. Waldron’s What’s Not or McKusick’s I Wouldn’t as demo bands.

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San Francisco Examiner
C.H. Garrigues : 11/17/1957

An excellent example of what East coast jazz has come to in these modern days: delicately hard-swinging, funky, with rhythm section laying down a fine intricate but solid pattern against which the horns develop a lyrical but space-oriented line.

Al Cohn again demonstrates here that, when he is with the right men he is very near the top tenormen of the day; Hal McKusick, who usually plays tenor, switches to alto on this date with excellent results; Waldron, Kotick and Thigpen do just right in the rhythm section. I do not, however, appreciate Burrell on guitar as fully as do the Prestige people. Or, rather, when a combo includes both piano and guitar, something special is required in the way of a relationship between them. In the present case, this doesn’t occur.

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Saturday Review
Nat Hentoff : 11/30/1957

Waldron is also distinctively consistent in Earthy, an “all-star” seminar involving Al Cohn, tenor; Art Farmer, trumpet; H. McKusick, bass; Ed Thigpen, drums; and Waldron. The title selection is in rather self-conscious (I mean the title, not the music) acknowledgement of that quality of deep-rootedness in the jazz loam (“funk” is the more common synonym) to which an increasing number of young modernists aspire. An essential membership requirement is the ability to feel and play the blues. All those present are aptly of the earth; and unlike many another “all-star” hopscotch game, there is a cohesiveness of line and spirit in this album. In addition, most of the various originals, while slight, are more arresting and thoughtfully drawn than is usually the case. The final fourteen-minute Dayee, however, might have benefited as often happens at Prestige, by an extra take or three and by more writing the frame the monologues.

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Down Beat : 11/28/1957
Don Gold : 4 stars

These are extremely professional, disciplined performances.

Cohn, Farmer, and Burrell, working in front of an excellent rhythm section, have a free-blowing time. The charts, with the exception of Waldron‘s appealing What’s Not, are more excuses for soloing than all-encompassing entities, but accepting this as the premise, the sides are worth hearing.

There is a high level of solo invention here, with Farmer, Burrell, and Waldron particularly impressive. Cohn and McKusick are strong ones, too, and play with consistent warmth.

Farmer plays several striking passages here, highlighted by a projecting tone and fascinating conception. Burrell, one of the finest guitarists in contemporary jazz, creates deft patterns and single lines. Waldron’s piano would be an asset to most of the current record sessions.

McKusick’s alto often is a fascinating instrument. He communicates with a good deal of conception strength. Cohn continues to be one of the most inventive tenor men.

There is a good deal of extended soloing here, highlighted by Dayee, a 14-minute-plus series of solos based on a riff by Burrell. Sustaining freshness under such circumstances is often difficult, but these men manage to do just that.

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Liner Notes by Ira Gitler

Besides the relaxed and inspired jazz they often create, jam sessions also provide the opportunity for musicians who never ordinarily play together, to gather and exchange musical thoughts. Very often this fresh experience makes a jam session live up to the best aspects of this tradition.

In Earthy (and all of the players here have deep roots) many of the musicians are recording and/or playing together for the first time and certainly this combination has never played on a unit before.

Al Cohn, composer, arranger and reedman, is a “musicians’ musician” who is finally getting the recognition he deserves from the critics and lay public. From the time he joined Georgie Auld‘s band in the early Forties, Al has been recognized and revered by his cohorts for his lyricism, harmonic awareness and singular brand of swing.

Art Farmer is another lyric sensitive soloist who never neglects swinging. Through his natural talent and serious application of himself to the trumpet and other facets of his music, Art has emerged as one of the best in modern jazz today.

Hal McKusick, who is also a fine tenor sax and clarinet player, is heard here exclusively on alto sax. In addition to doing his very first arrangements, Hal was made extremely happy by this session because it gave him a chance to stretch out and blow.

Kenny Burrell is the new star guitarist in the random, unofficial poll conducted by word of mouth among musicians. His bright and plastic lines are a delightful translation of the best of the modern idiom to the guitar.

The rhythm section is composed of pianist Mal Waldron, the talented composer-arranger who has been accompanying Billie Holiday in recent months; bassist Teddy Kotick, who has been dividing his time between the Horace Silver group and the Zoot Sims – Al Cohn combo; and drummer Ed Thigpen, a vital third of the Billy Taylor trio.

Two lines apiece were contributed by Hal McKusick and Mal Waldron while credit for the riff Dayee goes to Kenny Burrell.

McKusick’s objective of unison sound is well carried out in his haunting I Wouldn’t and minor lament The Front Line.

Waldron’s title piece, Earthy, is a minor tune, too; a dirge-like blues in which funk abounds. What’s Not, more recently recorded by Teo Macero with the Prestige Jazz Quartet also has elements of the minor and a particular kind of beauty all its own.

The compositions serve their purpose as blowing vehicles but are not merely that. Dayee is an unabashed riff which sends the soloists off on a fourteen minutes plus workout wherein there is much room for building.