Customer Reviews

In Person Friday & Saturday Blackhawk

5 star:		(29)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is the first time I've pre-ordered a CD, but the announcement last January that this session would be reissued in a definitive, complete, authoritative edition was enough for me. Moreover, after the "Ellington at Newport" and "The Complete Lady Day" reissues, I've come to trust the Columbia/Sony people in doing these things right.

If you're considering purchase, you probably know about the circumstances of the music already. For me, this "transitional" group between Miles' first great quintet with Coltrane and second with Shorter is the equal of the first ensemble and more satisfying than the second. Miles' chops were never better, and as if too make up for the absence of Coltrane, he plays with uncharacteristic fire and pyrotechnical flare. Jimmy Cobb has by now erased the memory of Philly Joe and fits in perfectly with Chambers and Kelly. No rhythm section ever achieved a greater sense of vitality and vibrancy within the conventional 4/4 walking-bass pattern of mainstream modern jazz. (Many drummers would do well to listen just to Cobb's ride cymbal, noting how little else is required to keep the music fresh and flowing.)

But for me the most compelling reason for owning the set is Hank Mobley, whose innate lyricism blossoms to a degree not possible on his Blue Note/Van Gelder recordings. His sound is present but never "boosted"; it's close and personal but at the same time totally natural, in keeping with the spacious acoustics favored by the Columbia engineers. And his playing in this musical context is so heartfelt and inspired, not to mention melodically inventive, that I can't help but rethink Miles' later published criticisms of him: perhaps Miles considered him less a drag on the group than a personal threat.

His solo on "Blackbird" is simply astonishing, a rare example of a musician willing to take every risk and hold nothing back in an unguarded, naked pursuit of all the beauty the moment is capable of yielding. Following two choruses by Miles, Mobley goes to work, through four inspired choruses, each phrase exceeding the previous in imagination and intensity until reaching a climax that is not so much arbitrary as the natural outcome of the musical journey itself. For me, it ranks with Coltrane's "I Want To Talk About You" and Dexter's "Body and Soul." Nothing seems the least bit contrived, formulaic, or played for effect (though I'm emotionally spent after each listening). On Saturday night Miles did not call tune.

The audio overall is superior, though not perfect. The separation of piano (left speaker) and bass (right) seems overdone. I found myself rolling back the bass a bit and boosting the treble. But the balance and sound are still more natural and believable than countless current studio recordings where the primary requirement for every musician is to wear headphones. And the previously unreleased material is of such a high order as to make you question some of the choices on the earlier editions. But best of all, at the end of Mobley's "Blackbird" solo you can hear someone in the audience shout "Bravo" three times. I'd like to meet that person, if only to express my thanks.

It says something about the state of jazz today that this stuff sounds about a thousand percent better than recent live releases by the likes of Joe Lovano etc. You can speculate as to why it is that a gig by Miles Davis in 1961 sounds fantastic and a gig by Joe at the Village Vanguard in 2003 sounds appalling. Maybe record companies cannot be bothered trying to get decent sound set ups for jazz anymore.
Now to the music itself. This was one of the first live jazz albums I ever owned and to have it now complete on CD with terrific remastered sound is a revelation. It grooves like mad and the playing is exemplary. I suppose that Hank Mobley was not having his greatest night in a technical sense- reed squeaks all over the place, a couple of missed starts and so on. Perhaps that is why Miles was unhappy with him. But his playing is still very effective in this context and it provides a good contrast to the fire and brimstone of the leader.
If you love jazz buy this CD, it's that good. If you want to love jazz but you haven't been able to up to this date then buy this CD. It will win you to the music just by itself. So much of what gets put out these days is either unlistenable (e.g. virtually any thing by critics' darling Greg Osby) or just tired sounding retro (e.g. the recent effort by the usually excellent Branford Marsalis). Is jazz really a lost art? I hope not. But any jazz musician listening to this could learn that you CAN make thrilling and daring music without sending the audience rushing out of the theatre! Music spoken here.

In 1961, Miles Davis had two full nights of sessions at the Blackhawk in San Francisco recorded for a live LP, and now finally the entire two nights, uncut, are remastered on four CDs in a boxed set.

The sound is terrific -- the Blackhawk was apparently a small, intimate club along the lines of the Village Vanguard, but the crowd is so hushed that if it wasn't for the applause at the end of a given set, you'd never know they were there. What I wouldn't give to have tapes this good of the nights in 1957 when Thelonious Monk played at the Five Spot in Greenwich Village with John Coltrane!

About the performances all you need to know is that it's Miles Davis at the top of his game. For those who are familiar with other Davis performances of these tracks, you will be surprised at the differences. He indulges his alchemic musical taste for making gold out of the most unlikely material (such as "Someday My Prince Will Come" from the 1937 Disney cartoon "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs"), and he's backed up by a group that, although not as famous as the sidemen he had before and after this recording, definitely hold their own.

There's not much else to say. If you're a Miles Davis fan, you need to buy these CDs pronto. If you're not a fan, and you buy these CDs, you will be. From the first few bars of the opening track of the first CD, you feel as if you're instantly transported to a ringside seat at a legendary nightclub, where one of the greatest of all jazz artists is playing just for you. It doesn't get much better than that.

Eddie Henderson, in his rather disjointed but informative liner notes for the reissue of Miles' "Someday My Prince Will Come" (which features basically this same band), calls this Miles' "groove band." Firmly in the hardbop tradition, this group sported one of the GREAT rhythm sections in Wynton Kelly (p), Paul Chambers (b), and Jimmy Cobb (d). Cobb's beat was "second to none," as Bob Blumenthal put it. Combined with Kelly's three-way synthesis of Bill Evans, Red Garland, and himself and PC's expert walking line, this rhythm section gave Miles a swingin' backdrop unlike any other he had. What made them even more swingin' than normal was tenor saxophonist Hank Mobley.

Hank was a cool-toned, relaxed exponent of the Lester Young school. Always putting his long, looping phrases into a smooth behind-the-beat time conception, you couldn't get much more the opposite of John Coltrane than Hank. Yet it was exactly that unhurried, Lesterian sense of improvising that gave this band the hardbop swagger it displays here. Miles responded to this by making his playing more aggressive than ever before, but it also had a sort of heightened vulnerability as well, and he never lost that gorgeous tone.

I feel like the reviewer below sells this band a little short. These guys were the ultimate professionals. They were not a bunch of innovative wunderkinds like Miles' Shorter-Hancock-Carter-Williams quintet, but then again, they didn't want to be. They found their niche playing polished hardbop, and nowhere else can you find a Miles Davis band so happy doing what they do best. No need to push the envelope here, just sit back and swing happy.

This box is this band's definitive statement. Pristine sound, loads of unreleased takes, and more disjointed, informative new liners from Eddie Henderson. If you're a Miles lover, or dig your jazz a little more from the Silver-Blakey school, this is for you.

During a long-ago April weekend in 1961, at San Francisco's Blackhawk Nightclub, The Miles Davis Quintet recorded live, four complete sets, (previously available only edited on separate discs), when Hank Mobley was on tenor and improvising like crazy, and the sound was happening. This fabulous, 4 CD collection features thirteen previously unreleased selections. The performance may be flawed at times, and Sony may have done better remastering with other reissues, but so what? This is Miles and crew making history!

Davis is at his best with "Walkin,'" "Bye Bye Blackbird," and "No Blues." Other offerings include "Autumn Leaves," On Green Dolphin Street," "I Thought About You," "Someday My Prince Will Come," and the formerly bluesy, now upbeat "So What."

This is some of the best sound from post-war jazz, which warped in a multitude of interesting ways after this period. And much extraordinary music was warped under Miles Davis' watch. But this was then. And then was great! Wynton Kelly, on piano, is the brightest and funkiest of the group. And Mr. Miles' rhythmic sense - so important to his trumpet style - never got better then it was with this group!

This 4 CD, boxed-set also features original liner notes by Ralph Gleason, along with updated notes by trumpeter Eddie Henderson & rare photos of all the musicians. "Miles Davis: In Person Friday and Saturday Nights at the Blackhawk, Complete" is one of 2003's most exciting releases.

It's a moment to cherish for many Miles Davis fans. The historic and monumental 1961 live recording in San Francisco's Blackhawk club has been expanded from its original 2 LP version to a comprehensive 4 CD box set. When I heard Sony was going to re-release this album, it wasn't a question of whether I'd get it--rather, it was a question of how quickly. Captured in a handsome package with extensive liner notes, the album has the original recording with 12 previously unreleased tracks. While the quintet's performance isn't always flawless, it's still makes for a great display for their talents. For me, the set's main attraction is an uptempo version of "So What," which will raise the eyebrows of many who are already familiar with the slower version that appears on the "Kind of Blue" release. Davis also holds his own impressively on the 12 minute breezy "Walkin'," and his trumpet compliments the impressive saxophone of Hank Mobley on "Neo" and "Two Bass Hit." And to be honest, Hank is so good a saxophonist, that he not only sometimes threatens to steal the show, I also found myself re-reading the credits to make sure I wasn't listening to John Coltrane. For example, listen to his playing on "Bye Bye Blackbird" (as well as the 14-minute version of "Walkin'") and you'll see what I mean. Still, it's Davis who wears the pants onstage, and he leads the pack with his ever-emotional trumpet which he uses not as an instrument but as a voice to scream, speak, or to long for romance ("Someday My Prince Will Come"). And the remastering? It's good, but it's not the best Sony has done for a Miles Davis re-issue. The bass is often separated and projected mostly on one speaker which makes it a slightly weird listening experience on the headphones. Other than that, the sound quality is clear and crisp for a live concert performance of this age. I understand that the original 2-CD version is also available, but don't be cheap and get that version. Go for the gusto and get this, the entire box set which has the full recording as well as essential unreleased cuts. It provides an even more intimate and detailed look at this performance, which is a must-have for fans of Miles Davis. One listen and you'll wish you were there.

Man, I just love box sets. They're such treasure-troves. And as documents of multi-set engagements by particular jazz bands, it's just lovely to own something like Miles' "Friday & Saturday Night at the Blackhawk."

This particular quintet of Miles' is certainly worth taking an extended soak in: after the classic 50's group with Coltrane, Garland, Chambers, and Jones, but before the arresting, mind-bending twistiness of the mid-to-late-sixties one featuring Shorter, Hancock, Carter, and Williams, this is a group that's deceptively important historically as well as easy to overlook between those two other groups. This is fairly traditional standards jazz but more breezy and forward-looking than the previous quintet with Coltrane, but still hardly hinting at what was to come. The music is warm, foot-tapping, and delectable. The Wynton Kelly/Paul Chambers/Jimmy Cobb contingent is a force in and of itself, on piano, bass, and drums, respectively. They are the legs and feet that move this band where it goes, covering untold stretches of rhythmic and harmonic territory without blinking or looking back. And then there's the Hank Mobley/Wynton Kelly axis; Hank the "middleweight champion" of the tenor sax, and Wynton groovy and misty and playful all over. Those guys are just plain fun to listen to. And then there's Miles, who needs no introduction. He certainly seemed to be the glue in whatever band he led, and set the tone for the renditions of whatever tunes were being read, by suspending clouds/networks of decision/indecision over them, transcending time by playing in front of it, behind it, all at once.

Nice to have such an affordable box set available, all complete and giving a unified picture of a full performance spanning 7 sets and two nights. Each evening's worth of performances is packaged in its own jewel case as if manufactured also for individual retail, although you can hardly imagine how or why one would choose just one disc out of the four available here. You need to get this whole set. Do it now.

I'm going to make this short: buy this album--you won't regret it! Instead of studio re-takes, overdubs and an altered order of songs like you get with most live recordings, this is the way it went down that evening in 1961. And you are THERE, at a table near the stage, at the Blackhawk club as the players stroll out, set up the first song, count it in and blass off. Each of the four sets unfolds exactly as it happened that night---completely unedited. Miles in charge, as always, expecting the very best tonight from pianist Wynton Kelly, bassist Paul Chambers, tenor saxophonist Hank Mobley, and drummer Jimmy Cobb. And they repond, launching themselves higher and higher, through the stratosphere, up into the ether where Miles hangs out, circling him, trading punches with him, diving ducking and weaving with him. No one knows what's going to happen next-this is live jazz--live without a net. You can almost feel the chemistry between the players. Close your eyes and put on the headphones if you really want to get there. And hang on!

This set, a hugely expanded & refurbished edition of the old pair of Friday & Saturday Blackhawk concerts (turning two LPs into four lengthy CDs), was released last year to considerable acclaim. These albums have traditionally been considered lesser albums in the Miles Davis canon, not least by Miles himself, who had nasty things to say about Hank Mobley's playing in his ghosted autobiography (though it's as well to treat Miles's compulsive dissing with caution). My impression is that many critics & jazz fans have revised their opinion of the sessions upwards in the wake of this expanded reissue.

I don't know--I picked this up last summer & have tried my darndest with it, but the more I listen to it the more I feel: (1) 4 CDs of this is just too much, & (2) Mobley's playing is not right here, despite what the revisionists say. I really can't figure out what happened--after all, just 5 months prior to the Blackhawk sessions Mobley waxed _Roll Call_, one of his best albums, with Kelly & Chambers in tow to boot. There he's got a great tone, a relaxed sense of time, & the good sense not to douse you in his favourite licks ad nauseam, or at least of how to place them & how to make them resolve in unexpected ways. Here, Mobley's tone isn't terribly well-served by the live recording--his tone has lost its butter, & has an annoying kind of importunity (that's the only word I can think of). There's also a hectoring obviousness to his solo construction--there are nice passages, to be sure, but for very long stretches he relies heavily on the same limited stock of devices (a mere dozen or so), which all have the same annoying habit of spelling out the underlying chord or chordal movement as explicitly as possible. I wondered if the largely "up" tempos were making him uncomfortable, but the tempos are really no faster than on _Roll Call_. So I'm at a loss as to why his playing here is so cliche-bound. Perhaps Mobley was a tad self-conscious about his presence in the band--note that on "So What" he actually quotes Coltrane's blues line "Mr P.C."

Miles tended, like Monk, to throw sidemen on their own resources for extended periods of time--witness his willingness to let Coltrane solo at length undisturbed--but here the practice is pushed to extremes: it's very rare that he & Mobley play together at all. As with many live albums, there's less variety than on a more self-conscious studio album: the tempos are largely medium-up to _really_ up (the very fast "Walkin'")--the only exceptions are "I Thought About You" (two versions) & a (badly bungled, I must say) "Round Midnight". The tracks run more or less the same way: Miles states the tune (much of the time as sole horn, though on a few pieces Mobley also states the head), plays a pithy solo, then disappears till it's time to end the piece; Mobley gets a rather longer solo feature, there's a spot for Wynton Kelly, then the head (no bass or drum solo or trading eights). It must be said that Miles plays very well, even though his appearances (as I've said) tend to come at long intervals & be rather compact; & the Kelly/Chambers/Cobb rhythm section (almost at the end of their tenure in Miles' band) plays impeccably, as you'd expect. But this still seems to me like a second-tier Miles Davis album. If this were still two well-chosen, edited-down LPs' worth of music, it'd be four stars; as it stands, diluted/expanded (depending on your viewpoint) by an influx of extra tracks, I put it at three.

One nice thing about the reissue: they've got rid of the silly substitute cover from the previous CD issue & restored the moody, indeed downright creepy original cover: mostly black, with Miles on the right, half-obliterated in shadow, while his wife (soon to be ex-wife) is barely more than a ghostly face on left, looking tense & unhappy.

Considering all the talk about Kind of Blue, Bitches Brew (which I can't stand) and Miles at Carnegie Hall, this is the album I find most enjoyable and keep going back to. His group back then for some reason was very underrated. After the all-star cast of Kind of Blue in 1959, I guess everyone was kind of blase about this one. Well, this album to me captures Miles innovative best on the horn. Recorded live at San Francisco's Black Hawk, it's more bluesy than some of his latter stuff. The group features great sax from Hank Mobley and I always thought Wynton Kelly was a cool jazz pianist, Jimmy Cobb on Drums and Paul Chambers on bass, are all big-league jazz players. My favorites are If I Were a Bell, Someday My Prince Will Come and On Green Dolphin Street. If you really want to know what made Miles Davis, a creative genius on trumpet, this is the best example. If you're into collecting Miles or new to Miles, I recommend this one, without a doubt one of his finest performances.