The Incredible Jimmy Smith Home Cookin' (1959) [remastered 1996]

The Hammond organ mastery of Jimmy Smith is arguably nowhere as profound as on 1959's Home Cookin'. Support is provided by the formidable trio of drummer Donald Bailey, guitarist Kenny Burrell, and tenor Percy France. Here they couple a few understated cool R&B classics with their own originals. The almost dirge-like cadence of "See See Rider" is given a bluesy and low-key workout, featuring tasty interaction between Smith and Burrell. The languid pace churns steadily as they trade off impressive solos with almost palpable empathy. Burrell's "Sugar Hill" swings with a refined post-bop attack…

Jimmy Smith - Home Cookin' (1959) {2004 Blue Note RVG Edition}
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Jazz / Hard Bop / Soul Jazz / Hammond

Smith's superb keyboard technique is only half of his musical magic. The other is his astonishing ability to paint atmospheres and create exquisite moods. The feeling of this album is perfectly evinced, relaxed and cool, spacious yet textured and sophisticated enough to keep the ear consistently intrigued. The album's title and cover photo are an homage to a soul food diner in Harlem called Kate's Home Cooking, and the tunes parallel a range of subtle, carefully prepared flavors.

I'm not one of those people who believes that Christmas CDs are only for the holiday season. At any given point during the year I might pull out my Christmas CDs and enjoy them, though the experience is lacking something in, say, July or August, because the music is inextricably tied to Christmas. The tunes on Jimmy Smith's Christmas Cookin' are holiday standards, yes, but this CD stands out. ~ Amazon

Compared to his earlier Blue Note recordings, organist Jimmy Smith's outings for Verve are not as strong from a jazz standpoint. Certainly his renditions of the "Theme from Joy House," "The Cat," and the "Main Title from The Carpetbaggers" are not all that significant…

Jimmy Smith single-handedly reinvented the Hammond organ in a modern jazz setting, and given the many Hammond players who have followed in his wake, most of them working off of the same template that Smith established way back in the early 1950s, it is easy to forget how amazingly brilliant he was on his chosen instrument, as innovative in his own way as Charlie Parker was on sax or Thelonious Monk on piano. Although he is chiefly known for his soul-jazz blues trios, Smith had a wider musical palette than that, as this fine reissue (with four bonus tracks), originally released by Blue Note in 1956, makes clear…