Bobby Hutcherson on Blue Note pt. 1

I have had very little time for this blog over the last few months and I confess that I have not really found a satisfying way to combine it with my Live365 site.  This was a lot more fun when I was posting links directly to sample cuts, but that was more risk that I was willing to continue taking. 

The original purpose of the blog was to share my love of jazz collecting, so I am going to try to return to that purpose.  Who knows?  Perhaps I can draw some audience back.  

I have been rounding out my collection of vibe man Bobby Hutcherson recordings.  In the mid '60's, Hutcherson did a series of recordings for Blue Note that ought to be in anyone's jazz library.  Here is a list of these recordings with some notes.  

1. The Kicker (63)  Joe Henderson (ts); Duke Pearson (p); Grant Green (g); Bob Cranshaw (b); Al Harewood (d).  This might as well have been marketed as a Henderson album.  Maybe then Blue Note wouldn't have kept it in the vaults for more than thirty years (1999)!  It is a rock solid hard bop date, with fine displays by Henderson and Hutcherson and Pearson.  Kicker* may be heard on my Live365 site.  
2. Dialogue (65) Freddie Hubbard (t); Sam Rivers (ss, ts, f); Andrew Hill (p); Richard Davis (b); Joe Chambers (d).  Likewise, this might have been marketed as an Andrew Hill recording, as the pianist composed three of the cuts and it has a very topography.  This is Hutcherson's most interesting and inventive recording.  It invites obvious comparison with two very great recordings.  Hill's Andrew!!! has the same Hill-Davis-Chambers rhythm section.  Hutcherson, Hubbard, and Davis appeared on Eric Dolphy's earth shaking recording, Out To Lunch.  Hill's 'Les Noirs Marchant' could easily have fit on that album.

Don't misinterpret my remarks about marketing.  These are both Hutcherson recordings.  If his subsequent Blue Note recordings were less adventurous than Dialogue, they are nonetheless squarely on the path of the new thing.   In pt. 2, I'll cover Happenings, Stick Up, and Oblique. 

ps.  I have relied heavily on A Bobby Hutcherson Web Site.  What a resource!  Would that every jazz artist had this kind of attention paid to him or her.