If you’re a Charles Mingus fan (and if you aren’t, please explain yourself), you know that trumpeter Gene Shaw (1926-73) is probably his most obscure sideman. He did essentially a one-off with him, but that one session was the classic “Tijuana Moods” when he gives a sui generis workout on “Dizzy Moods” where he uses his cleaning of his mouthpiece as part of the solo. After that, what happened?Well, Fresh Sound records brings back Shaw’s other sessions, while the album liner notes fill in the gaps. He lead a quintet in 1962 with Sherman Morrison/ts, James Taylor/p, Sidney Robinson/b and Bernard Martin, and the next hear had a sextet with Taylor, Robinson, Gerald Donovan/dr, Herb Wise/tb and Jay Peters/ts. Both sessions are wonderfully hip hard bop, with Shaw’s horn from the Kenny Dorham-Blue Mitchell School of gentle warmth. The quintet develops a hip strut with Shaw’s sweet tone on “AD’s Blues” and Morrison has a bluesy mid-career Coltrane tone as he blows smoke rings on the nimble Six Bits” with the rhythm team doing the mambo on “Marj.” Shaw’s horn cries on the Mingus-inspired “The Thing” and squeezes out notes on “It’s A Long Way.”
The sextet has Donovan laying down an exotic groove on “Karachi” and the team gets into a gospel soul thing as Shaw preaches on “Thieves’ Carnival.” Pieces like ‘When Sunny Gets Blue” and the bluesy “Not Too Cool” make you wonder why some label didn’t snatch Shaw up and put some promotion behind him. He may have slipped through the cracks back then, but Fresh Sound fills them up with grout so you don’t miss him this time around. Check it out!
Fresh Sound Records