Album: The Sidewinder


The Sidewinder is a 1964 album by the jazz trumpeter Lee Morgan. It was released on the Blue Note label as BLP 4157 (mono) and BST 84157 (stereo). The title track is perhaps Morgan's all-around best-known composition; it would go on to become a jazz standard, and was additionally released as a single, reaching number 81 on the Billboard Hot 100 in January 1965.

The album became Blue Note's best-selling record to that date, and saved the label from at the time being on the brink of bankruptcy. By January 1965, the album had reached No. 25 on the Billboard chart. At the insistence of Blue Note executives, several of Morgan's intended follow-up albums either had their release postponed or were shelved entirely so that Blue Note could "[score] another 'Sidewinder.'" Morgan's subsequent albums in that vein were The Rumproller, The Gigolo and Cornbread.

Musians on the album were Morgan, Joe Henderson (tenor saxophone), Barry Harris (piano), Bob Cranshaw (double bass) and Billy Higgins (drums).

The Sidewinder Track List is The Sidewinder, Totem Pole, Gary's Notebook, Boy, What a Night, Hocus Pocus, and Totem Pole.

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Lee Morgan - The Sidewinder

This content was excerpted from the Wikipedia article, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sidewinder, which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike License 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/).