Barry Harris

You Can't Lose with the Blues is a refreshing treasure of a jazz recording - a pinao trio session with 12 tracks and varied enough to sustain interest for the long haul. Lafayette Harris Jr. is just the pianist to accomplish this feat. He has an energetic sense of rhytmic vitality, a tasty, full bodied, approach to the keyboard, and a sensibility drenched in the blues.

Legendary alto saxophonist Charles McPherson makes his Smoke Sessions debut with an inspired album, Reverence, dedicated to Barry Harris, captured in front of a live audience at Smoke Jazz Club and featuring his quintet of Terell Stafford, Jeb Patton, David Wong, and Billy Drummond.

True Blue is led in title under the auspices of Dexter Gordon as a welcome home party conducted by Don Schlitten for the expatriate tenor saxophonist in 1976. Essentially a jam session, this very talented septet features a two tenor-two trumpet front line, utilized to emphasize the soloing strength of the horns, not necessarily in joyous shouts or big-band like unison outbursts. The real star here is Barry Harris, and if you listen closely to his comping behind the soloist or his many colorful chords and single-line runs, you realize how brilliant he continued to be in his prime during this beyond-bebop time frame. The distinctly different, legato flavored sound of Al Cohn contrasts nicely to the broader range and richer tones of Gordon, while Blue Mitchell's warm West Coast trumpet phrasings also run aside but a little behind the animated and clipped brassy sounds of Sam Noto, a player deserving much wider recognition, and playing to the hilt on this recording. The session kicks off with the classic superimposed melodies of "Lady Bird" and "Half Nelson," with melodies split between the trumpet and tenor tandems.

Emmylou Harris - Singin' With Emmylou, Vol. 1 & Vol. 2 (2003) {Raven Records RVCD-93/RVCD-164}
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© 2000, 2003 Raven Records | RVCD-93 / RVCD-164
Country / Progressive Country / Alternative Country / Country Rock / Contemporary Country

Although it is no secret that Emmylou Harris is one of the modern era's most prolific guest vocalists, it's only when you see her appearances laid out one after the other that you realize just how many other performers have called upon her over the years – a gamut that runs from Linda Ronstadt to Little Feat, from Bob Dylan to Bonnie Raitt.

Lee Morgan Quintet - Take Twelve (1962) {Jazzland OJCCD-310-2 rel 1989}
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© 1962, 1989 Jazzland Records / Fantasy | OJCCD-310-2
Jazz / Hard Bop / Post Bop / Trumpet

Take Twelve was trumpeter Lee Morgan's only recording during an off-period that lasted from mid-1961 to late 1963. Morgan (who sounds in fine form) leads a quintet with tenor saxophonist Clifford Jordan, pianist Barry Harris, bassist Bob Cranshaw and drummer Louis Hayes through four of his originals, Jordan's "Little Spain," and the title cut, an Elmo Hope composition. The superior material uplifts the set from being a mere "blowing" date but it generally has the spontaneity of a jam session. It's one of Lee Morgan's lesser-known dates.