Eric Dolphy - Complete Memorial Album Sessions

Collective personnel: Woody Shaw (trumpet), Clifford Jordan (soprano sax), Sonny Simmons (alto sax), Eric Dolphy (alto sax, bass clarinet, flute), Prince Lasha (flute), Bobby Hutcherson (vibraphone), Richard Davis, Eddie Kahn (bass), J.C. Moses (drums)

Recorded in the summer of 1963 for producer Alan Douglas (look under the bongwater stains and you'll find his his name all over those sleazy old posthumous Hendrix releases) these sessions were only released after Eric Dolphy's death the following year and for decades were found scattered among various albums such as Iron Man, The Eric Dolphy Memorial Album, Conversations and Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. This is par for the course in Dolphy's piecemeal discography; perhaps because of his endless session work and touring he never developed a close relationship with a protective producer and label the way Coltrane did with Bob Thiele at Impulse. In any case, and despite the brilliance displayed in his own work and numerous supporting roles, Dolphy didn't find his true voice as a leader - one that would mark him as an 'auteur' equal to Coltrane or Miles - until the last year or so of his short life. Fate's a motherfucker, as Miles might say.

Burning Spear, for nonet, leads the album and illustrates what an original thinker Dolphy really was. With twin basses and a frontline dominated by high pitched instruments (trumpet, soprano, alto, flute, vibes plus bass clarinet) Dolphy scores floating harmonies that sound inspired by Ravel or Stravinsky rather than Basie or Ellington but uses them to create a free counterpoint to the wild solos; a fresh way out of the tired head-solos-head format of post-bop while skirting the radicalisms of free jazz and the moribund politeness of the Third-Stream. Other than his role as arranger for Coltrane's Africa/Brass I know of no other instance where a larger band was put at his disposal and it's a shame it wasn't to happen more often. Music Matador, a calypso by Prince Lasha and Sonny Simmons, is something of a shock after Burning Spear, the sextet romping through a kitschy theme with Dolphy's wild bass clarinet hurumphing like an elephant and screaming like a cockatoo.

The three quintet numbers, though exciting in their own right, sound like dry runs for the Out to Lunch album. The instrumentation is the same but the ensemble work very different; the bassist and drummer's roles here are those of a traditional rhythm section and the band never develops the intense five-way conversation that makes Out to Lunch a milestone. The scorching, headlong Ironman is a highlight and the lilting take on Fats Waller's Jitterbug Waltz displays Dolphy's reverence for the past and alliegance to the present. It's something of a cliche to describe the musical relationship between Dolphy and bassist Richard Davis as 'telepathic' but their three duets could hardly be described more accurately, each player perfectly attuned to the other's every inflection on a gorgeous Come Sunday. A characteristic Dolphy alto solo on Alone Together closes out the album and, as everywhere else on these sessions, his playing is astounding. Everyone plays well but it's Dolphy's lines that demand to be heard.

The Complete Memorial Album Sessions isn't a cohesive statement - the contrast between the band half of the record and the duet half is a bit jarring - but it is Dolphy just entering his prime. Who knows what would have come next? Though no one would mistake them, Dolphy resembles Ornette Coleman in musical temper; confident, wild, inventive and above all joyous, with little of the bristling anger or tortured mysticism of so many progressive players of the time. Coleman inspired the fire breathers to come but always followed his own tune. It's left for us to wonder how Dolphy's spirit would have fared in the combative, often bleak years to come.