The shades of blue are not there for the trad lads, but there is a strong blues influence for those who like their jazz served in every other form, tinged with a Latin beat, straight from the shoulder à la mainstream, or in the modern vein.
The quintet stimulates a remarkably fresh feeling, and reveals little in the way of adherence to any particular jazz form. The leader’s constant shifts from tenor to soprano keep the front line alive and variable in tone contrast, and there is a constancy in the rhythmic response which is quite rare and always animated.
Ian Carr, who has been working with Don since the beginning of 1963, provides some splendid moments in solo work, notably in Sailin’, which was written by his brother. Colin Purbrook, who at present is occupying the piano chair with Bruce Turner, makes it all sound very free and easy in this session, and is becoming something of a young veteran in the jazz world. Garrison ’64 is quite an ambitious approach to the new patterns set by Coltrane, Davis, and the other leaders of style today. It would be wrong to describe it as free form, but it conveys the same loose feeling.
I commend this album as a fine example of British jazz, matching and surpassing much of the stuff which is fobbed off on us from America, and revealing the creative ability of a handful of young men who will go much further if their creative talents are not restricted by apathy and disinterest.
Discography
Blue Mosque; Layin’ Blue; Just Blue; Sailin’ (18½ min) – Garrison ’64; Blue Doom; Shades Of Blue; Big City Strut (19½ min)
Don Rendell (ten/sop); Ian Carr (tpt/flugelhorn); Colin Purbrook (p); Dave Green (bs); Trevor Tomkin (d). London, 1965.
(Columbia 33SX 1733 12inLP 32s.)
