A
Long Time CTI Music Fan
This CD, along with all the other CTI music ever produced, is some of the
best jazz you will ever hear. Red Clay was the first CTI music I ever bought
back in 1973. After that, I got almost the entire CTI music collection.
It is all good music. I originally bought it all on LP, before the days
of CDs. I have since bought all the CD reproductions as they’ve been
reissued through the years. You can’t go wrong with Red Clay or any
of the CTI music.
–
a music fan
One of His Best
This 1970 recording was one of the last great releases of Hubbard’s
uneven recording career (and given that he has spent the last few years
recovering from a serious lip injury, he may never record another great
album again). Coming on the heels of the excellent Straight Life, Hubbard
reassembled some of the cast from that success for Red Clay, and the results
were even more impressive.
The title cut sets the no-nonsense
tone for the date. Hubbard once told an interviewer that Red Clay sprung
from his memories of his childhood in Indianapolis, noting that many of
the neighborhood’s residents had come from the deep South, and he
wanted the tune to evoke images of that Southern red clay.** On that score,
the composition succeeds brilliantly. Hubbard opens it with a trumpet
testimonial that summons up musical connections to field shouts while
saxophonist Joe Henderson and pianist Herbie Hancock (both holdovers from
Straight Life) hum beneath him. Drummer Lenny White kicks off the tune’s
darting theme, and the band takes off on an immensely satisfying improvisational
performance. It deserves a place among modern jazz classics.
None of the other tunes score
quite as successfully as “Red Clay,” but they are all excellent
in their own right, especially “Suite Sioux” and “The Intrepid
Fox,” both hard-driving performances that give Hubbard a chance to
show off his considerable chops. As on Straight Life, Joe Henderson’s
playing is a major plus, but then that’s no surprise. Throughout
his career, Henderson has shown he can bring fire and intelligent playing
to almost any setting.
Hubbard’s recording career
has featured some tremendous high points (it’s easy to forget that
he made major contributions in his 20s to recordings by Ornette Coleman,
John Coltrane, Eric Dolphy, Sonny Rollins and Oliver Nelson)... Happily,
Red Clay falls into the major success category. It’s a terrific reissue
that should be enjoyed by those who missed it the first time around, or
by those who have heard it but forgotten how good it really was.
–
Tyler Smith
** – Actually, Freddie had been talking to me about the yet-to-be-titled
song. He suggested Mississippi Mud. I proposed Red Clay as the title.
CTI had a rather dramatic red sunset image. And, at the time I thought
it would be a fitting tribute to Medgar Evans, who was assassinated by
the Ku Klux Klan (1963). Thus, the “Red Clay” of Mississippi.
– Creed Taylor
|
Creed with Freddie
Freddie & Joe Henderson
Herbie Hancock
Photos by Chuck Stewart
|
to hear sound samples.