Search - Cannonball Adderley :: Quintet in Chicago (Shm)

Another Kind of Blue

Eric V. Jung | Bear Valley, CA United States | 05/14/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Trane and Cannonball took the Kind of Blue band sans Miles Davis into the studio right after that album was cut. It's tempting to guess that the atmosphere was looser without Miles, and the album sounds like it. Over the unbeatable bedrock of Wynton Kelly, Paul Chambers, and Jimmy Cobb, Trane and Cannonball trade state of the art solos for the time. It's a matter of taste, but I think Cannonball comes off better with his crystal clear articulation and inexhaustible flow of ideas at high speed. Trane shows signs of the modalism to come while occasionally sounding like he's groping in mid-solo. Of course, his groping was better than most people's sure-footed playing. Limehouse Blues is rocket bop; they can hardly wait to get through the statement of the melody to take off. Cannonball's Stars Fell on Alabama has to be the model for sweet swinging ballads; I can't imagine a better version, and it belongs in any good jazz collection.

This album is a very cool footnote in jazz history which answers the question: what did the two greatest saxmen of their time have on their mind after cutting an alltime classic album with Miles."