Michael Cochrane

Elements is the first album Michael Cochrane made as a leader, a quintet date for Soul Note on which the pianist wrote all seven pieces and put Tom Harrell on trumpet and flugelhorn at the front of the band. It was recorded over two days in September 1985 and released in 1986. The tunes cover a wide span of forms within a post-bop frame: a piece built on a tone row, a bossa, a samba and a waltz, all between three and seven and a half minutes.

The session took place at Titanic Sound Studios on September 23 and 24, 1985, recorded by Guillermo Mager and produced by Giovanni Bonandrini. Harrell shares the front line with Bob Malach on tenor saxophone and flute, and the rhythm section is Cochrane with bassist Dennis Irwin and drummer Jimmy Madison. Reunion opens the album, followed by Tone Row Piece No. 2, named for the serial device it starts from, and Bossa For Quintet, at over seven minutes the longest track. The title piece sits at the centre, ahead of Song From Within. Proof Of The Pudding is the short one, a samba that the publisher of Cochrane's lead sheets describes as starting in A minor and ending each chorus in A major, a form built for blowing on. Waltz No. 1 closes the record at six and a half minutes. Cochrane also drew the cover art.

Soul Note CD 121151-2, which Discogs lists as a reissue of the album first released in 1986 on LP and CD as SN 1151, with the same seven pieces.