James Moody The Teachers

The Teachers couples the two funk-tinged albums this legendary tenor saxophonist recorded for Perception: the politically-inspired LP The Teachers from 1970 and Heritage Hum (1971), featuring Eddie Jefferson.

The Teachers couples the two funk-tinged albums this legendary tenor saxophonist recorded for Perception: the politically-inspired LP The Teachers from 1970 and Heritage Hum (1971), featuring Eddie Jefferson.

Perception Productions, a New York based label that ran from the late 60s through until 1974, was a strangely eclectic affair. Its roster stretched from a radical Afro-American poet through to the pop band King Harvest whose hit ‘Dancing In The Moonlight’ became a massive hit for the UK band Toploader a couple of decades later. The inbetween points covered jazz, funk, vocal harmony soul and proto-disco. In fact distilled down into this compilation the label provides us a view of Manhattan’s black music scene of the period, from the established greats to the fresh young things who would make their mark in the coming years. The two men who ran the label, President Terry Phillips and Boo Frazier burned brightly for that half a decade before almost entirely disappearing from the music scene.

Rob Mullins (jazz piano) has built his musical reputation around the world with a solid string of releases in the contemporary jazz field over the past twenty years. His rise to international acclaim as a composer and performer began with his "Soulscape" project, which earned him a Grammy Nomination for composition. Since that time, Rob has gone on to record 20 CD's of his music, three of which went Billboard Top Ten. Starting out on drums at age 11, Rob became a touring professional with a California Big Band by age 12, doing his 6th grade homework on a tour bus.