Looking back, we can say now that Horace Silver was way ahead of his time. The pianist not only invented hard bop piano but also funk. All in 1952, two years after being discovered by tenor saxophonist Stan Getz in Hartford, Ct.
Silver's first album was a 10-inch LP recorded for Blue Note in October 1952. The recording—New Faces New Sounds (Introducing the Horace Silver Trio)—is astonishing in that Silver unleashed an entirely new approach on the piano that fused multiple styles, including bop, funk and Latin. The result was all his own and sounded shockingly modern for 1952. What's more, all of the Silver originals on the LP are lyrical gems.
The tracks
- A1. Safari (Silver)
- A2. Ecaroh (Silver)
- A3. Prelude to a Kiss (Duke Ellington, Irving Gordon, Irving Mills)
- A4. Thou Swell (Lorenz Hart, Richard Rodgers)
- B1. Quicksilver (Silver)
- B2. Horoscope (Silver)
- B3. Yeah (Silver)
- B4. Knowledge Box (Silver)
The personnel
- Horace Silver (piano)
- Art Blakey (drums)
- Gene Ramey (bass) (tracks: A1, A4, B2)
- Curley Russell (bass) (tracks: A2, A3, B1, B3, B4)
Here's the complete New Faces New Sounds (Introducing the Horace Silver Trio) without ad interruptions...
Other ad-free Backgrounders in my series:
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