Art Blakey Quintet A Night At Birdland With The Art Blakey Quintet Vol. 1 on 10" Vinyl

Blue Note Reissue of the Album's Original 10" Configuration!

"Wow! First time I enjoyed a recording session!" With these significant words...Art Blakey offers an eloquent tribute to the motive that produced this unique series of recordings. Because Art had organized this constellation of jazz names a while before taking it into Birdland, and had worked up a library of both old and new material, he was able to produce results that transcended the capabilities of a disorganized jam session.

"Because this material was by now familiar enough to the musicians, they were able to express themselves fully and freely. While they could avail themselves of the lack of any time limitation on the performances, they still took no undue advantage, never distorted liberty into license; as a result, there are no 20-minute voyages into tautophony...Thus Birdland combines the three elements essential to an enjoyable evening of modern jazz: preparation, improvisation and inspiration. And the greatest of these three is inspiration.

"...Art's teammates on A Night At Birdland are all members of what might be called the Blue Note family. Lou Donaldson's place in the scene was firmly etched with his great work on three BN LPs; Horace Silver's two sets of solos won wide acclaim; Clifford Borwn, after co-starring with Lou and Jay Jay Johnson, made his first LP as a Leader for Blue Note; and Curly Russell has been such a frequent visitor that we won't even attempt to list all of his performances." - Leonard Feather, liner notes

Musicians:
Art Blakey (drums)
Horace Silver (piano)
Clifford Brown (trumpet)
Lou Donaldson (alto saxophone)
Curley Russel (bass)