Dexter Gordon: The Complete Columbia Albums Collection (7 CDs)

 

Available at PopMarket.com

6 Original Albums (7 CDs) Included:

1. Homecoming: Live At The Village Vanguard [2 CDs] (1976)
2. Sophisticated Giant (1977)
3. Manhattan Symphonie (1978)
4. Live At Carnegie Hall (1978)
5. Gotham City (plus bonus tracks) (1980)
6. Bonus Tracks (a new compilation disc of bonus material)

 

Dexter Gordon – The Complete Columbia Albums Collection by Legacy Recordings

Interview with Maxine Gordon and Woody Shaw III | WBAI Radio Tribute (2hrs)

Source: Joyce Jones of “Suga’ In My Bowl” on WBAI-FM/Pacifica Radio in New York.
November 20, 2011

The Complete Columbia Albums Collection – Summary

Dexter would be very happy to know that his Columbia recordings have been reissued by Sony Legacy / PopMarket. This box set represents a very important period in Dexter Gordon’s career, and an important stage in jazz history. Dexter’s return from Europe after 14 years residing there helped rekindle a new level of enthusiasm in the jazz world, a wave of excitement that many other musicians benefited from. Dexter also won a number of Downbeat Critics and Readers Poll Awards during this period, and two Grammy nominations for Homecoming and Sophisticated Giant, respectively. These recordings on Columbia, signed off on by then-President Bruce Lundvall, also facilitated a reunion of sorts between many musicians who might not have otherwise ever recorded together or been featured collectively within the same release, the likes of which included: Tony Williams, Slide Hampton, Frank Wess, Stan Getz, Hubert Laws, Jimmy Heath, Eddie Gladden, Billy Brooks, Ronnie Matthews, Stafford James, Louis Hayes, Art Blakey, and others. All of these musicians appear on The Complete Columbia Albums Collection in various settings from the original studio dates to live performances in NYC and at the Havana Jam in Cuba in 1979.

During the 1970s, the jazz world entered a period of transformation. Many musicians began moving out of the acoustic modern jazz tradition into popular and often more commercial genres of music. There were fewer and fewer bands building upon the legacy of jazz in its most authentic formats in terms of instrumentation, repertoire, and style, and given the absence of popular demand, fewer and fewer musicians were signing major record deals. There were also less bands (and bandleaders) than there had been in previous decades.

In 1972, Dexter Gordon was living in Europe. He had relocated there in the 1960s and, although he frequently returned to perform in the States, he had gradually become somewhat disassociated with the contemporary jazz scene in the U.S. It was that year that a young rising trumpet star known as Woody Shaw would hear Dexter on a collaborative big band engagement lead by European pianist and arranger George Gruntz. The two (Shaw and Gordon) had never crossed paths before professionally yet they immediately established a meaningful camaraderie through the recognition of each other’s talent, individuality, and artistic integrity.

Gordon, being a contemporary of such legendary Bebop icons as Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk, and Bud Powell, represented the essence of the innovative tradition out of which Shaw had grown. Woody Shaw, having been born in 1944, never got to hear Charlie Parker and many of his contemporaries live, so Dexter represented, to Shaw, the many legendary figures that he had never met, seen or heard perform. Gordon was the ideal elder statesman for Shaw at that point in his life. Meanwhile, in Woody, Dexter saw the continuum of modern trumpet playing stemming from Louis Armstrong, Roy Eldridge, and Dizzy Gillespie.

Upon returning to the states, Woody Shaw began to spread the word about Dexter Gordon, telling members of the contemporary scene that “Dexter is still playing and he sounds great!” In 1976, Shaw, along with his manager at the time, Maxine Gordon (formerly Maxine Gregg), arranged to bring Dexter Gordon back to the United States for what would become his official “homecoming,” a reentry into the American jazz scene, solidified by a new deal with Columbia Records. At the time, Woody Shaw had been performing with Ronnie Mathews on piano, Stafford James on bass, and Louis Hayes on drums (all featured on the Sony boxset, Homecoming: Live at the Village Vanguard). As a gesture of respect and as a solution to facilitate collaboration, Woody Shaw handed his rhythm section over to Gordon and re-positioned himself as a “featured guest” in his own group, which was now lead by Gordon.

Maxine, through her company Ms. Management, booked Dexter Gordon and Woody Shaw for a week at the Village Vanguard. The result was a huge success, causing a new wave of excitement in the jazz world. One of the legendary icons of the bebop tradition, Dexter Gordon, paired with one of the foremost modern innovators of the trumpet at the time, Woody Shaw. An unlikely, and yet compatible and historically significant union.

Signed by then President of Columbia Records, Bruce Lundvall, in 1976, Dexter Gordon’s resurgent career would help reignite popularity for jazz around the world, garnering an unpredicted wave of publicity and mass appeal for himself and for the jazz world as a whole. Shortly thereafter, as a result of the success of this newfound collaboration, and with an endorsement from Miles Davis, Lundvall would soon sign Woody Shaw to Columbia Records in what would be Shaw’s first record deal with a major label.

In addition to his debut double-LP album Homecoming: Live at the Village Vaguard (1976), Dexter Gordon would go on to record four additional albums for Columbia: Sophisticated Giant (1977), Gotham City (1980), Manhattan Symphonie (1978), and Live at Carnegie Hall (1978) featuring fellow tenorman Johnnie Griffin. During this period, Gordon also received Jazz Artist of the Year in the 1978 Downbeat Readers Poll as well as Jazz Album of the Year (for Homecoming: Live at the Village Vanguard and Sophisticated Giant) in the 1978 Downbeat Critics Poll.

Columbia Bonus Tracks & Featured Guests

The Complete Columbia Albums Collection of Dexter Gordon includes rare and classic material of Dexter and fellow collaborators Stan Getz, Woody Shaw, Art Blakey, Cedar Walton, George Duke, Hubert Laws, Maynard Ferguson, Tony Williams, and others. The bonus CD contains various single recordings, features, and outtakes made by Dexter during his Columbia tenure, such as Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, originals like Fried Bananas, an alternate version of Woody Shaw’s The Moontrane, Red Top by Lionel Hampton, the famed standard Polka Dots and Moon Beams, Project S by Jimmy Heath, Isn’t She Lovely by Stevie Wonder, and additional studio material from Gordon’s album Gotham City.

Reflections from Producer Michael Cuscuna

In the ’70s, there were at least a dozen major labels in the United States, but the biggest, best and classiest was Columbia Records. When Bruce Lundvall ascended to the presidency in 1975, he had a personal agenda to sign great artists in the jazz tradition. At the time, jazz fusion ruled the industry and avant garde artists dominated the press, leaving the mainstream out in the cold. Lundvall decided to open Columbia’s imposing marketing and distribution machine to mainstream artists. Stan Getz was his first signing and Dexter Gordon was his second.

In the ’70s, there were at least a dozen major labels in the United States, but the biggest, best and classiest was Columbia Records. When Bruce Lundvall ascended to the presidency in 1975, he had a personal agenda to sign great artists in the jazz tradition. At the time, jazz fusion ruled the industry and avant garde artists dominated the press, leaving the mainstream out in the cold. Lundvall decided to open Columbia’s imposing marketing and distribution machine to mainstream artists. Stan Getz was his first signing and Dexter Gordon was his second.

This meant all the more to Dexter than to most because he’d spent the last 14 years as an expatriate who felt that he couldn’t get the respect and the work he deserved in his own country.

Suddenly his place as the innovative pioneer of bebop tenor saxophone was rightfully reinstated into the history of the music and there were literally lines around the block every time he played the Village Vanguard. And soon he had the stature and the work opportunities to move back to the United States in style. Signing with THE major label was a major step toward that new stage of his life.

During the 5 years, Dexter was signed to Columbia, we had the budget to do anything we wanted within reason. The fist album (actually a double album) was fittingly recorded live at Max Gordon’s Village Vanguard, everyone’s home away from home. But from there, we tried projects that Dexter had never had the ability to do before, like the stellar Slide Hampton-arranged orchestra on “Sophisticated Giant,” a Carnegie Hall concert with guest artist Johnny Griffin and an all-star album with giants like George Benson, Woody Shaw and Art Blakey.

But I think the album that meant the most to Dexter was Manhattan Symphonie which featured his working group (George Cables, Rufus Reid and Eddie Gladden). It was recorded under very relaxed circumstances at Columbia’s magnificent 30th Street Studio. But what was most remarkable was that this was the first regular band that this venerated 54-year-old jazz giant had ever had.

This collection is filled with a plethora of bonus material and organizes the Manhattan Symphonie sessions and the Carnegie Hall in complete form. It also adds all of Dexter’s performances from all-star Columbia expeditions in Montreux and Havana.

One-of-a-kind is a phrase that it is tossed around a lot lately. Dexter Gordon definitely was a one-of-a-kind in his artistry, his literary taste, his style and his unique, worldly personality. What survives is his music; his creative improvisations flow like lava from a volcano. They are the source from which the diverse style of Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane sprang. And they remain incandescent and timeless.

Order The Complete Columbia Albums Collection at PopMarket.com

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