Artist:Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers
Song:On the Ginza
Album:Les Incontournables
Most jazz fans are familiar with the Blue Note recordings of Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers. Blakey left Blue Note in the early 60s and he bounced around a few labels including Riverside. The band also went through several personnel changes. This wore Blakey down and though the band continued to tour especially in Europe and Japan, Blakey did not record any studio albums from 1966-72. On the Ginza is from the 1963 album Ugetsu. This was recorded live at Birdland in New York and was the first of three albums that Blakey recorded for Riverside. The band was still fairly stable at the time. The main thing was Wayne Shorter was still on tenor sax and was musical director. He wrote four of the six songs on Ugetsu including On the Ginza. The rest of the band was Freddie Hubbard on trumpet, Curtis Fuller on trombone, Cedar Walton on piano and Reggie Workman on bass. Ugetsu was recorded at Birdland June 16, 1963. This album was reissued in 2011 with four bonus tracks and it is available as a digital download. The CD I am recommending was released by WEA in France and is a comp of the Riverside recordings and Prestige recordings from the 70s. Shorter left Blakey for Miles Davis in 1964. By that time trumpeter Lee Morgan had returned and he brought in tenor saxophonist John Gilmore from the Sun Ra Arkestra and he brought with him pianist John Hicks and bassist Victor Sproles. Thar's the band in this 1965 video clip. They also appeared on two albums that Blakey recorded for Mercury's Limelight label. But Gilmore and the others went back to Sun Ra. And the 1966 album Buttercorn Lady had an all new band with Chuck Mangione and Keith Jarrett. It was at this point that Blakey stopped recording until he signed with Prestige in 1972 though the band continued to tour. Here's Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers performing On the Ginza on the British TV show jazz sixtwofive 1965.
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