condition (record/cover): NM / NM

Obi included.

Sixty years of tenor saxophone, essentially invented by one man. Before Coleman Hawkins the instrument was a novelty; after him it was the centre of the music, and every player who came afterwards was either following him or reacting against him. This memorial collection gathers earlier material and functions as a reminder of how completely formed his conception already was: the enormous tone, the vertical harmonic thinking that made "Body And Soul" a landmark, the willingness to run the changes rather than the melody. Mono, historical, and much livelier than the packaging suggests.

Japanese Jazz Society pressing. Compilation rather than an original album, and a good survey of the foundations.