McCoy Tyner

LP version. Time For Tyner is McCoy Tyner's third album for Blue Note, recorded on 17 May 1968 and released in 1969. His debut there, The Real McCoy, came soon after he left John Coltrane's quartet, and Tender Moments added a six-piece horn section. This time the pianist chose a quartet with no horns at all, built around piano and vibraphone.

The session took place at Van Gelder Studio in Englewood Cliffs, with Duke Pearson producing and Rudy Van Gelder recording. Tyner is joined by Bobby Hutcherson on vibraphone, Herbie Lewis on bass and Freddie Waits on drums. Tyner and Hutcherson had first recorded together on the vibraphonist's 1966 album Stick-Up!. They returned to the quartet format on Quartets 4 X 4 in 1980 and Land of Giants in 2003.

The record moves in two halves. First come three expansive Tyner originals, the twelve-minute African Village, Little Madimba and May Street. The vibraphone gives these modal pieces an airy, shimmering surface, while the performances stay forceful. Then the group thins out. The quartet plays Rodgers and Hart's I Didn't Know What Time It Was, and the trio takes The Surrey with the Fringe on Top. Tyner closes alone with a rhapsodic I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face.

Reviewing it in DownBeat, Harvey Pekar found Tyner's playing inspired and vigorous, and praised his discipline and taste. The Penguin Guide to Jazz later placed the album in its Core Collection, and AllMusic's Scott Yanow called it a fine all-round portrait of the pianist in the late 1960s.

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 packaged in a deluxe gatefold tip-on jacket, with the original liner notes by Ed Williams.