Sonny Stitt

Deftly handling the alto, tenor, and baritone saxophone, bebop giant Sonny Stitt is heard to perfection here on a variety of early-'50s dates. Stitt not only shows off his patented speed throughout, but he goes a long way in dispelling criticisms of him being all fire and no grace. The 16-track disc kicks off with four tight, Latin-tinged swingers featuring an octet that includes trumpeter Joe Newman and timbales player Humberto Morales. Switching to piano quartet mode for the bulk of the disc, Stitt ranges effortlessly from frenetic blasts ("Cherokee") to golden-hued ballads ("Imagination"). Capping off the set with four bonus cuts featuring the likes of Gene Ammons and Junior Mance, Stitt delivers one of the top sets of performances from the late bebop era.

Sonny Stitt and Paul Gonsalves - Salt And Pepper +8 (1963) {Impulse! IMPD-210 rel 1997}
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© 1963, 1997 Impulse! / MCA Records / GRP Records | IMPD-210
Jazz / Bebop / Straight-Ahead Jazz / Saxophone

Head to head blowing from Sonny Sitt and Paul Gonsalves – just the kind of twin-horn performance that Stitt was famous for in his live battle days, and one that also reminds us that Gonsalves can be a very loose swinger when he wants to be! The tracks are all long, and played with the sort of feel you'd hear if you caught these guys live at some small southside club – and the solos also show the kind of inventiveness and imagination you'd catch in that sort of setting – backed by a swinging rhythm combo that features Hank Jones on piano, Milt Hinton on bass, and Osie Johnson on drums.

Gene Ammons & Sonny Stitt - Left Bank Encores (1973) {Prestige PRCD-11022-2 rel 2002}
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© 1973, 2002 Prestige / Fantasy | PRCD-11022-2
Jazz / Bop / Hard Bop / Saxophone

On June 24, 1973, Baltimore's Left Bank Jazz Society reunited one of the most legendary tenor teams of the bebop era: Gene "Jug" Ammons and Sonny Stitt. Like Dexter Gordon and Wardell Gray, Jug and Stitt were on the same team – the bop team – but loved to compete with one another and see who had the mightiest chops. That was in the late '40s and early '50s – when the saxmen were reunited at that Baltimore concert in 1973, they weren't as competitive and battle-minded as they had been in their younger days. But their chops were still in top shape, and they could still swing unapologetically hard.

Sonny Stitt - Stitt Goes Latin (1963) {2011 Roost Japan Jazz Masterpiece Best & More 999 Series TOCJ-50190}
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© 1963, 2011 Roost / EMI Music Japan | TOCJ-50190 | Jazz Masterpiece Best & More 999 Series
Jazz / Bop / Soul Jazz / Saxophone

Sonny Stitt goes Latin – and the results are tremendous! The set's still got all the soulful feel of the best Stitt sessions for Roost, but it brings in some nice Latin rhythms too – inflecting things with that blend of soul jazz and congas you might find over at Prestige or Blue Note, yet also taking things further, too – given the Roost/Roulette connection to the New York Latin scene! Sonny plays both alto and tenor, and gets jazzy accompaniment from Thad Jones on trumpet – but the rhythm section is the real charmer here – and features a young Chick Corea on piano, Larry Gales on bass, and the trio of Willie Bobo, Patato Valdes, and Chihuaua Martinez on percussion! Most tunes are originals – a great change from the usual Latinized standards you might find on a set like this – and Stitt's got this nicely exotic tone in his reeds which is a further highlight of the record – almost a Yusef Lateef inflection at points.

Sonny Stitt - Stitt Plays Bird (1963) {Atlantic Japan WPCR-25116 Mini LP 24bit remastered rel 2006}
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© 1963, 2006 Atlantic / Warner Music Japan | WPCR-25116
Jazz / Bebop / Bop / Saxophone

Special Feature / Bonus Track: 2 bonus tracks. After years of staying free of comparisons with Charlie Parker, Sonny Stitt steps confidently into a set of compositions by the late, great one – sounding really wonderful in his own interpretations of these classics! The album's got the same simple and focused still as Stitt's best work on Roost – and although the compositions are all by Bird, the overall sound is still very much Sonny's own – especially given the wonderful sense of space and timing brought to some of the performances! The group's an unusual one, especially for Stitt – and features John Lewis on piano, Jim Hall on guitar, Richard Davis on bass, and Connie Kay on drums – all offering a slightly more modern take on Bird than might be expected – especially through the angular lines on Hall's guitar.

In another of those two-fers that are going to tangle discographies for some time to come, this bears the title of a Don Patterson album, The Boss Men, and includes all of the material from that LP. However, this CD, though it's also called The Boss Men, is billed to both Sonny Stitt and Don Patterson, and combines the original Patterson The Boss Men LP with another album cut in 1965, Night Crawler, that was billed to Sonny Stitt, although it featured the exact same lineup (Stitt on alto sax, Patterson on organ, Billy James on drums) as The Boss Men. Not only that, the CD adds two cuts from a Patterson 1964 LP, Patterson's People, also featuring the Stitt-Patterson-James trio. As for the original The Boss Men, it's a respectable straight-ahead jazz-with-organ session…