Search - Sonny Clark :: Leapin & Lopin

Clark Makes Magic Here

Blake Lucas | los angeles, CA USA | 05/01/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I bought this several months ago and have listened to it over and over. A wonderful group under Clark's leadership. Turrentine is a pleasing trumpet player I only know from a Jackie McLean album (A FICKLE SONANCE) with same great rhythm section and he's outstanding here too. Apart from his session with Clifford Brown, this is the only album I have with Charlie Rouse apart from all of his ones with Monk. He's a great player and it's nice to hear him in another setting. It was an inspiration on Clark's part to have Ike Quebec play on the ballad "Deep in a Dream"- a very moving rendition. But the piece de resistance of this album is the wonderful "Melody in C"--especially the master though it's nice to have both takes. On the master, Clark's solo so enthralls me that it reminds me of why I fell in love with jazz in the first place, almost 50 years ago (and Billy Higgins was on that too--it was MONK AT THE BLACKHAWK). People who have heard this know it's a modal piece--a very fresh line and it just seems to inspire everyone but especially Clark. I will buy more Clark albums, but they won't even need to be as good as this to make me care about him and sad about his early death. But his wonderful playing lives on and that's what counts.



I'm sending LEAPIN' AND LOPIN' to a jazz friend today, ordering on Amazon after writing this review. This is my first review here. I've enjoyed many of the reviews I've read and feel a lot of solidarity with the other jazz fans here."

The Disinterested Magic of Sonny Clark!

Wayne Dawson | New Zealand | 09/21/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Thanks to the remastering we really get inside the tenor tones of Charlie Rouse and the singing quality of Tommy Turrentine's much neglected trumpet. With Butch Warren on bass, Sonny Clark on piano and our man Higgins on drums, this was the in house rhythm section for Blue Note that provided so much outstanding back up to so many other legendary sessions as well as this one.



Sonny Clark's style of piano playing is audacious in the most unlikely way. For much of the time he hovers over the middle section of the keyboard as if inviting criticisms of blandness but his weaving, alternating line soon becomes irresistible. A first rate composer, he had a direct and lyrical simplicity that reminds me of Tina Brooks. 'Voodoo', a Clark original, I could quiet easily let run all night long. What a perfect composition to show off the singing, sky writing quality of Turrentine. During the fade out, as the horns maintain the head, Clark lets himself off the leash and starts meandering with those magical alternations that unwind like a ribbon. It's at that point, caught in the melodic web, you wish there was no end!



There's a certain inherent contradiction to his playing; a disinterested involvement. It all sounds deceptively easy but when Clark passed away and the in house rhythm section took on the wonderful Barry Harris, inevitably the placement of notes weren't quite the same and the unconscious flow became self conscious.



Ike Quebec's tenor sax guest appearance on `Deep in a Dream' adds to the lustre of this disk that finds Sonny Clark off loading a carnival of dance patterns for anybody with a foot tapping itch.

"

Seriously great record

L. Topper | 03/18/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is a seriously great record. Charlie Rouse and Tommy Turentine are both great. This record has really snappy, clever songs that have wonderful rhythm. The songs are just fun--the best of late 1950's hard bop. Tommy Turentine is kind of a forgotten player. He plays some great slurs on trumpet. There is one ballad where Ike Quebec does a guest shot on tenor. Billy Higgins may be one of the most fun drummers of the late bebop period. This record was out of print for a while. Don't let it get away. You will not regret it.



I think that this may be the best Sonny Clark record in print."