NEA Jazz
Master Bobby Hutcherson makes his triumphant return to Blue Note Records, where
the virtuoso vibraphonist started his career in the early ‘60s, with the superb
album, Enjoy the View. The vibrant session is produced by Blue Note president
Don Was and will be released on June 24 as a significant event in the label’s
75th anniversary yearlong celebration. Recorded by an all-star collective of
saxophonist David Sanborn and organist Joey DeFrancesco, and featuring drummer
Billy Hart, the Hutcherson-sparked group plays seven original compositions that
range from cool, gentle grooves to fiery outbursts of exuberance. At heart, the
album soars thanks to the divine musical alchemy among the performers—an
assemblage of veteran artists who play at the top of their game.
“I’m
happy to have a recording come out on Blue Note,” says the 73-year-old
Hutcherson. “I’ve had a long-term association with the label. I’m thrilled to
be back here.”
Was
concurs: “Bobby not only has an incredible history with Blue Note as the
preeminent voice of the vibes, but he still remains the giant of the instrument.”
Coming
on the heels of last year’s signing of saxophone legend and one-time Blue Note
artist Wayne Shorter, which resulted in his stellar live quartet album Without
a Net—one of 2013’s top jazz albums—Enjoy the View stands as a valuable addition
to the classic catalog of the most-respected and longest-running jazz label in
the world. “Our goal has been to maintain the underlying aesthetic that has
governed Blue Note throughout its 75 years,” says Was. “It’s very poetic to be
doing it with the original guys who helped to define the label. For Bobby, it’s
more than coming full circle. It’s also about guiding the course for the
future.”
In the
tradition of the Blue Note label, founded by Alfred Lion in 1938, a day of
rehearsal was scheduled preceding the recording of Enjoy the View at Ocean Way
Studios in Hollywood. Even though it was the first time Sanborn had played with
Hutcherson and Hart, the chemistry was immediate. “Don decided to have the
rehearsal session recorded,” says DeFrancesco. “It’s a good thing because we
decided that three of the tunes—Dave’s ‘Delia’ and two of my new songs written
for the date, ‘Don Is’ and ‘You’—were the best takes for the album.”
DeFrancesco
proved to be the common denominator of the session, having played with Hutcherson
for some ten years, with Sanborn and Hart, with whom he has enjoyed a long
history, including his second album as a leader (1990’s Where Were You?). In
New York when Was first came on board at Blue Note Records, after dinner he
serendipitously dropped into the Blue Note club where DeFrancesco and Sanborn
were performing. “I’d known Dave for some 25 years and I knew Joey as one of
the best Hammond B3 organ players in the world,” Was says. “I just sat there
and the set was so relaxed and grooving. I loved what I heard. So after the two
sets, I met Joey upstairs and asked him what he thought about doing an album
with Bobby and Dave. That’s how it started.”
DeFrancesco
says that after that initial meeting,Was continued the conversation a year
later when he was playing at Birdland in New York. A year after that the
recording date took place in 2013, with DeFrancesco writing new songs that
reminded him of Hutcherson.
“No
matter how brilliant he is, Joey has that great enthusiasm which fueled the
recording,” says Hart who has appeared on over 700 albums as a sideman and who
recently released a new album on ECM. “As for Hutch, he’s a magician and a
musician. When he hits the mallets on the vibes, something special happens.
Recording with him is so inspiring that it’s like taking a master class. When I
walked into the session, I had no idea what to do, but everything meshed so
well. I had never played with Dave before even though I knew his work. He’s
really a star and his tune ‘Delia’ is to me the song of the album that unites
the concept of the band.”
“It was
so great to discover the collective spirit of the session,” says Sanborn, whose
alto saxophone has graced the recordings by a range of artists, from pop to
r&b to jazz, and has recorded several albums as a leader in his 50+-year
career. “I had never played with Bobby before, so it was a thrill to play with
him. It was like going to graduate school. And even though I’ve known Billy for
30 years, I had never played with him either. It was so much fun recording with
these guys. It was loose and flexible and it was like we were having a four-way
conversation. When that happens with no egos, everyone talks. We were all just
learning the tunes, yet the sessions went so fast. It was, blink your eyes and
we’re done. That experience was worth everything to me.” Sanborn’s two-song
contribution (the buoyant “Delia” and the tender “Little Flower”) comes from
his 2003 Timeagain CD. “I brought those to the session because I could hear
Bobby playing them,” he says. “They end up feeling looser and freer than the
first time I recorded them.”
While
Hutcherson is the marquee player on this album who swings hard and romps on the
uptempo tunes and soothes on the slower pieces, he modestly says, “I’ve always
tried to be the person who is able to fit in with the music and add what I
think it needs to top it off. What I play on the vibes always seems to be the
cherry on top of the sundae. You can’t play over the organ or the saxophone,
which have more power, so I play softer and add to what Joey and Dave deliver.
And Billy, he understands that you don’t continually play one tempo. There will
be the driving force and the automatic cruise where the ideas fall into place
and the funky feel to playing behind the tune and the whip like the back of a
hurricane and then the sprint to the finish line. Billy knows that.”
~ Blue Note Records
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