Mal Waldron

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: dauntless piano. A collector on London Jazz Collector calls it pure gold and says he is always amazed at how Waldron can play with that much intensity and precision in any setting.

This is the New York side of Waldron's Enja years, a straighter band than the Lacy-Schoof quintets, with Richmond bringing the Mingus pulse and Jordan, who had played with Mingus and Dolphy in 1964, on the front line. Waldron's method is unchanged: a figure repeated until it turns into something else.

Japanese CD edition from Solid's Enja Real Jazz Classics series.