Customer Reviews

Domino

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
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I love "Domino", Rahsaan Roland Kirk's great 1962 album. Recorded duriung his early period with Mercury Records, Rah extends his voice even further than his previous album "We Free Kings" and starts to exhibit more humor through his playing and interpretations of originals and standards. And the man cooks! His multi-reed playing is astonishing! Yet, what could be taken as showy or novel, is some of the most melodic, lyrical and swinging music around. And the company! Herbie Hancock, Andrew Hill, Wynton Kelly, Roy Haynes, etcetera, is very fluid and challenging.

Of course, there's the classic first versions of loved Kirk staples like the title track, "Meeting On Termini's Corner", "A Stritch In Time", "Three In One Without the Oil" and great takes on "J.J. Johnson's "Lament", "I Didn't Know What Time It Was", "Someone To Watch Over Me" and so much more. At over 77 minutes long, this is well-worth the bucks!

Be glad that this album is now easily available (with PLENTY of extra tracks, too!!). Rah was one of the best musicians and the most most natural to grace jazz and 20th Century music. Grab it without two thoughts! Go....

Awesome CD,some earlier works that were missing from my collection. Excellent reissue.

This is the first album on which Kirk started to really push the boundaries of jazz in ways other than the multiple-horn trick. While the saxophone was always his base, Kirk plays plenty of flute, manzello, stritch and nose flute on this one, and what is more impressive is that he didn't just try to force each instrument to fit some preconceived traditional bop phrasing. He alternated between instruments because sometimes one horn is better suited to the specific phrasing he wanted to use than another. This album, then, is the beginning of Roland Kirk's truly eclectic approach to jazz, drawing openly on multiple traditions, breaking them down and putting them back together again in interesting, and what were then new ways. He could play swing, bop, cool, avant-guarde, or whatever he wanted, but what makes this album so interesting is that he didn't just play a hard bop piece, then a "cool" piece, and so on. He would mix and match elements within the context of the same piece in unexpected ways, which would later become his trademark. This album shows how he got started with that approach. It is probably not a stretch to suggest that the experience of playing on this album would help Herbie Hancock and Andrew Hill clarify their own ideas, which were still forming at the time (1962), and it is difficult to see how this would have remained as cohesive without a drummer like Roy Haynes on board.

The thing to look out for is the release date on this CD. There are earlier releases without the same track listings or sequence. Nonetheless, earlier releases still have 21 tracks of "fine" R Kirk compositions and covers. This release of at least two sessions, showcase 6+ Kirk originals and some great covers, along with his virtuosity and humour on various reeds and horns, including stritch. Both quartets on these dates in 1962, the first Wynton Kelly, Vernon Martin and Roy Haynes, the second Andrew Hill, Martin and Henry Duncan more than ably keep the pace with the man - an absolute giant of the jazz idiom.

I loved this record 30 years ago when I got it, and am so happy to get it on CD with the extras ( which I could do without, in truth ).
The first 10 tracks are the original and the next 15 are out takes and tracks from other sessions.
However, I have never heard Kirk in better form - even on "We Free Kings" which is also great. His movement from flute, to tenor, manzello and stritch is absolutely genius. And one doesn't have to have seeen him live - although it does help - to appreciate his musicality and swing. GREAT DISC. Every tune is a winner.