| In the 1950s, the Curtis Counce Group was the West Coast answer to the East Coast hard bop, epitomized by groups such as Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers and the Horace Silver Quintet. The brilliant pianist Carl Perkins, an early casualty of the jazz life, and who Miles Davis once identified as his favorite pianist, was at the core of this exceptional band. Harold Land, who was fresh from the Clifford Brown/ Max Roach band, and who has gone on in the nearly forty years since this album was recorded to international acclaim, and the vastly underrated trumpeter Jack Sheldon round out the front line. The fiery Frank Butler (who the legendary Count Basie drummer Jo Jones once called the greatest living jazz drummer) and Kansas City native, Curtis Counce, who had had recent stints with Stan Kenton, Maynard Ferguson, Art Pepper and Gerald Wilson formed the rock-solid rhythmic underpinnings that propelled the band. Characterized by the solid musical concept and sound quality normally associated with Contemporary, this album is sonically, musically, and historically outstanding. |
