In the mid-1950s, drummer Kenny Clarke was the house drummer for Savoy records. Ozzie Cadena, Savoy's A&R chief, was aware that Clarke was plugged in to networks of musicians, so he paid him extra to assemble interesting combinations of talent for recordings. As a reader pointed out a few days ago, the Kenny Burrell and Pepper Adams album I posted about last week was one of those Clarke dream sessions.
Today, I'm continuing with records for Savoy that Clarke not only played on but also masterminded is Julian "Cannonball" Adderley's Presenting Cannonball, the alto saxophonist's first leadership LP. Recorded in July 1955 at Rudy Van Gelder's home recording studio in Hackensack, N.J., the album featured Nat Adderley (cnt), Cannonball Adderley (as), Hank Jones (p), Paul Chambers (b) and Kenny Clarke (d).
Cannonball—or Cannonball and his brother, Nat, composed four of the five tracks, with the fifth being a standard. The first two tracks of the album are bluesy affairs, with Cannonball's Charlie Parker-influenced attack on the alto saxophone. Clarke and bassist Chambers were on the Burrell-Adams album, but this time around, Hank Jones, another superb and prolific accompanist, was on piano.
The tracks:
- Spontaneous Combustion (Julian and Nat Adderley)
- Still Talkin' to Ya (Julian and Nat Adderley)
- A Little Taste (Julian Adderley)
- Caribbean Cutie (Julian Adderley)
- Flamingo (Edmund Anderson, Theodor Grouya)
What's most interesting about the album is how advanced Cannonball was artistically at the time. The surging, fluid style that would stand out on recordings by the Miles Davis Sextet between 1957 and '59 was already in place, along with his sophisticated, improvisational ideas. The highlights for me are A Little Taste and Caribbean Cutie. The former has a nifty and tight melodic personality while the latter provides a full Cannonball workout.
Nat is musically advanced as well, and the rhythm section is bespoke—perfectly tailored for the session.
Cannonball Adderley died in 1975.
Here's the entire album...
