Artist: Eric Dolphy
Charles Mingus's "Eclipse" from this album is one of the rare instances where Dolphy solos on soprano clarinet (others being "Warm Canto" from Mal Waldron's The Quest, "Densities" from the compilation Vintage Dolphy,and "Song For The Ram's Horn" from an unreleased recording from a 1962 Town Hall concert).
Around 1962–63, one of Dolphy's working bands included the pianist Herbie Hancock, who can be heard on The Illinois Concert, Gaslight 1962, and the unissued Town Hall concert with poet Ree Dragonette.
In July 1963, producer Alan Douglas arranged recording sessions for which Dolphy's sidemen were emerging musicians of the day, and the results produced the albums Iron Man and Conversations, as well as the Muses album released in Japan in late 2013. These sessions marked the first time Dolphy played with Bobby Hutcherson, whom he knew from Los Angeles, and whose sister he dated at one point.
In 1964, Dolphy signed with Blue Note Records and recorded Out to Lunch! with Freddie Hubbard, Bobby Hutcherson, Richard Davis and Tony Williams. This album features Dolphy's fully developed avant-garde yet structured compositional style rooted in tradition. It is often considered his magnum opus.
Before a concert in Oslo, he informed Mingus that he planned to stay in Europe after their tour was finished, partly because he had become disillusioned with the United States' reception to musicians who were trying something new. Mingus then named the blues they had been performing "So Long Eric". Dolphy intended to settle in Europe with his fiancée Joyce Mordecai, who was working in the ballet scene in Paris.
After leaving Mingus, he performed and recorded a few sides with various European bands, and American musicians living in Paris, such as Tony Williams and Nathan Davis. Last Date, originally a radio broadcast of a concert in Hilversum in the Netherlands, features Misha Mengelberg and Han Bennink, although it was not Dolphy's last public performance.
Further information about Eric Dolphy is found here and here.
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Eric Dolphy was an American jazz alto saxophonist, bass clarinetist and flautist. His use of the bass clarinet helped to establish the instrument within jazz. Dolphy extended the vocabulary and boundaries of the alto saxophone, and was among the earliest significant jazz flute soloists.
His improvisational style was characterized by the use of wide intervals, in addition to employing an array of extended techniques to emulate the sounds of human voices and animals. He used melodic lines that were "angular, zigzagging from interval to interval, taking hairpin turns at unexpected junctures, making dramatic leaps from the lower to the upper register." Although Dolphy's work is sometimes classified as free jazz, his compositions and solos were often rooted in conventional (if highly abstracted) tonal bebop harmony.
Dolphy gained his big break when he was invited to join Chico Hamilton's quintet in 1958. With the group he became known to a wider audience and was able to tour extensively through 1958–59, when he left Hamilton's group and moved to New York City.
Charles Mingus had known Dolphy from growing up in Los Angeles, and Dolphy joined Mingus' Jazz Workshop in 1960, shortly after arriving in New York. He took part in Mingus' big band recording Pre-Bird (sometimes re-released as Mingus Revisited), and is featured on "Bemoanable Lady".
Dolphy and John Coltrane knew each other long before they formally played together, having met when Coltrane was in Los Angeles with Johnny Hodges in 1954. They would often exchange ideas and learn from each other, and eventually, after many nights sitting in with Coltrane's band, Dolphy was asked to become a full member in early 1961.
Dolphy's recording career as a leader began with Prestige. His association with the label spanned 13 albums recorded from April 1960 to September 1961. Fantasy released a 9-CD box set in 1995 containing all of Dolphy's recorded output for Prestige. Dolphy's first two albums as leader were Outward Bound and Out There; both featured cover artwork by Richard "Prophet" Jennings. The first, sounding closer to hard bop than some later releases, was recorded at Rudy Van Gelder's studio in New Jersey with trumpeter Freddie Hubbard, who shared rooms with Dolphy for a time when the two men first arrived in New York. Out There is closer to third stream music, which would also form part of Dolphy's work, and features Ron Carter on cello.
Charles Mingus Sextet - Feat. Eric Dolphy - Take The A Train
Eric Dolphy: Videos
Charles Mingus Sextet - Feat. Eric Dolphy - Take The A Train
Charles Mingus Sextet - Feat. Eric Dolphy - Take The A Train