Stanley Turrentine

Rough 'N Tumble is a 1966 soul jazz album by Stanley Turrentine that settles into a deep, bluesy groove from the first bar and keeps it to the end. Built around his big tenor sound and a full horn section, it mixes pop and rhythm and blues hits of the day with jazz writing. The album reached number 20 on Billboard's soul albums chart. Born in Pittsburgh in 1934, Turrentine had been recording soul jazz for Blue Note since 1960.

The session took place on 1 July 1966 at Van Gelder Studio in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, produced by Alfred Lion, with arrangements by Duke Pearson. The horns around Turrentine are Blue Mitchell on trumpet, James Spaulding on alto saxophone and Pepper Adams on baritone. McCoy Tyner plays piano.

Grant Green adds guitar, while Bob Cranshaw on bass and Mickey Roker on drums hold the beat steady. The covers carry much of the record. Sam Cooke's Shake becomes a strutting groove for the full band, and Walk On By, by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, turns into a slow-burning feature for the tenor. Feeling Good, which Nina Simone had recorded the year before, gets a broad, soulful reading. A Ray Charles song completes the covers, and two jazz pieces, And Satisfy and Baptismal, round out the programme.

Pearson's charts give the horns punch without crowding the soloist, and Turrentine stays at the centre throughout. Writing for AllMusic, Jason Elias called him the star of the show, and the saxophonist's warmth, in his view, makes the album a necessity. The original liner notes were by Ira Gitler.

This stereo Tone Poet edition was produced by Joe Harley and mastered by Kevin Gray at Cohearent Audio from the original analogue master tapes. It is pressed on 180g vinyl at RTI and comes in a deluxe gatefold jacket.