Mal Waldron
A Touch Of The Blues
Nuremberg, East-West Jazz Festival, 6 May 1972. Mal Waldron's trio with Jimmy Woode, the former Ellington bassist, and Allen Blairman on drums. Three long pieces, all by Waldron, taped live and issued by Enja only in 1975.
Waldron had settled in Europe in 1965 and rebuilt his playing from scratch after a breakdown. By 1972 the new style was fully formed: dark, insistent, built from a few repeated cells that tighten over long stretches. The Enja records from these years (Black Glory, Plays the Bl…
Hard Talk
Nuremberg, East-West Festival, 4 May 1974. Mal Waldron's quintet with Steve Lacy on soprano, Manfred Schoof on cornet, Isla Eckinger and Allen Blairman. Four Waldron compositions, live; AllMusic gives it four and a half stars and calls it a strong set where Schoof often steals the solo honours.
What It Is
Vanguard Studios, New York, 15 November 1981. Mal Waldron with Clifford Jordan on tenor, Cecil McBee on bass and Dannie Richmond on drums, two weeks after the same quartet had played a Columbia University concert. Produced by Horst Weber for Enja, released in 1982.
Three pieces. Jordan's Charlie Parker's Last Supper; Waldron's Hymn from the Inferno, twelve minutes; and the title track, eighteen minutes, which takes the whole second side. Ron Wynn at AllMusic gives it three stars and two words: d…
Black Glory
One of the first Enja records, the fourth in the catalogue according to AllMusic, recorded live at the Domicile club in Munich in June 1971. Mal Waldron in trio with Jimmy Woode, the former Ellington bassist, and the Swiss drummer Pierre Favre. The same trio made Mal Waldron Plays the Blues for the label the same year.
Four Waldron originals (Sieg Haile, La gloire du noir, The Call, Rock My Soul) and Woode's brief M.C.. AllMusic's note describes a master of repetition and brooding chords in exce…
Sweet Love, Bitter
On Sweet Love, Bitter, Mal Waldron turns a fictional portrait of Charlie Parker’s final years into a darkly luminous suite of cinematic jazz. His lyricism, tension and blues‑stained restraint guide a formidable 1967 ensemble through music that moves beyond soundtrack function, making New York feel bruised, nocturnal and fiercely alive.
Free At Last (LP)
Promotional copy of the 1970 album on ECM (the label's first release!). With insert.
Mingus Lives (LP)
1981 priginal Japanese edition on Enja Records of the 1979 live album. With insert and obi.
At The Five Spot (2LP)
1970's Japan-only 2LP compilation on Prestige with live recordings from 1961 featuring Mal Waldron. With obi.
At The Five Spot (2LP)
1970's Japan-only 2LP compilation on Prestige with live recordings from 1961 featuring Mal Waldron.
At The Five Spot Volume 1 (LP)
1978 Japanese re-issue on Prestige's "Jazztime Now!!" series of the 1961 live album featuring Mal Waldron and Booker Little. With insert.
At The Five Spot Volume 1 (LP)
1991 Japanese re-issue on New Jazz's "Gold Of G.D. 100" series of the 1961 live album featuring Mal Waldron and Booker Little. With insert.
Where? (LP)
1972 US re-issue with different cover on Prestige's "Jazz Classics Series" of the 1962 album featuring Ron Carter and Mal Waldron.
Dash One (LP)
Original Japanese edition on Prestige's "Collection of Unreleased Music by Jazz Giants" series of the 1983 album with previously unreleased recordings from 1960/61 featuring Jaki Byard, Mal Waldron, Ron Carter, Booker Little and Freddie Hubbard. With insert and obi.
Dash One (LP)
Original Japanese edition on Prestige's "Collection of Unreleased Music by Jazz Giants" series of the 1983 album with previously unreleased recordings from 1960/61 featuring Jaki Byard, Mal Waldron, Ron Carter, Booker Little and Freddie Hubbard. With insert and obi.
Eric Dolphy & Booker Little Remembered Live At Sweet Basil (LP)
Original Japanese edition on King Records / Paddle Wheel of the 1986 live album. With insert and obi.
Live at Yoshi's 1994
On Live at Yoshi’s 1994, Mal Waldron and Steve Lacy turn a decades‑deep partnership into a single, extended act of listening, folding Monk, Ellington, Strayhorn and their own themes into a stark, tensile dialogue where every note feels earned.
Candy Girl
An electrified meeting of minds, Candy Girl is a lost 1975 session by jazz pianist Mal Waldron, recorded in Paris with core members of the mighty Lafayette Afro Rock Band, the American funk unit who had made France their home and whose deep grooves would later be mined by generations of hip-hop producers. By 1975, Waldron was a decade into his self-imposed exile from the United States—a transformed musician who had reassembled his sound in Europe and Japan after a devastating breakdown in the ea…
The Quest
2025 stock Probably due to the fact that Eric Dolphy died untimely in 1964, making every one of his recorded contributions more widely sought after, pianist Mal Waldron’s album, The Quest, was reissued soon after its release under the reedman’s name. Tenor saxophonist Booker Ervin is also featured on The Quest. Ervin and Dolphy had both been members of the Charles Mingus group and the two reedmen recorded various LPs together with Mingus between 1960 and 1963.
Rat Now…Paris 70
A never-before released Mal Waldron Trio 1970 live recordings. First official release with the full permission and cooperation of the Mal Waldron Estate & INA (Institut National de l’Audiovisuel).
Free At Last - Extended Edition
Revisited and remastered, with additional takes, texts and photos, here is the very first ECM session, recorded in Ludwigsburg in November 1969, featuring the great American pianist Mal Waldron, whose resume included work with Coltrane, Mingus, Dolphy and Billie Holiday. In his original liner notes, Mal wrote: “This album represents my meeting with free jazz. Free jazz for me does not mean complete anarchy… You will hear me playing rhythmically instead of soloing on chord changes.” As Jazz Journ…