This 1958 “live” album is classified as one of the best Jazz albums ever. The Jazz Con Class listeners will be able to hear it in its entirety and will realize why it is so highly regarded. Many of the listeners here know this already but there are many also, who have not heard it before and they will get the opportunity. This was a tiny club in New York City (More Below) and was very famous from the mid 50’s to the mid 60’s. There were 7 live recording there and this one was the first. I will definitely feature more live recordings from this historic Jazz club in the future. The album cover even has additional pictures from inside the club and where the musicians stood. I will be featuring “10 To 4 At The 5 Spot” for a week or so and then place it into the “G4” playlist. Check the schedule link for play times, enjoy!
About the album:
In 1958, Pepper Adams and Donald Byrd were pivotal members of a sextet led by Chicago tenor saxophonist Johnny Griffin. They also formed their own quintet with fellow Detroiters Doug Watkins and Elvin Jones, and the then-rising star Bobby Timmons as the fifth wheel. This album, one of the first club dates recorded for the Riverside label, may have presented logistic problems with the acoustics, mic placements, and reel to reel tape technology, but there were no such issues with the extraordinary music contained on this effort. A tight, in tune and exciting ensemble, Adams and Byrd laid it all out for this single 39-minute set of modern jazz at the Five Spot Café in New York City. The symmetry between the witty and raw baritone sax of Adams and Byrd’s stirring and sometimes strained trumpet is the stuff of legends, and the hallmark of the bop to hard bop era. Contained on this album are two definitive all-time great selections — “The Long Two/Four” and especially “Hastings Street Bounce” — the former with a march intro from Jones setting up a sharp staccato hard line melody with trumpet fills and the precise comping of Timmons, the latter a definitive groovy soul strut shuffle with one of the more hummable and memorable melodies ever, both pieces featuring rousing solos, and both tracks over ten minutes of jam power……Read More
More on The Five Spot Cafe’ Jazz club (Wikipedia):
The Five Spot Café was a jazz club located at 5 Cooper Square in the Bowery neighborhood of New York City.
In 1937, Salvatore Termini (b. 1884) purchased what was then known as the Bowery Café, a working-class bar located under the Third Avenue El. In 1946, two of Termini’s sons, Joe and Ignatze (Iggy) returned from the war and helped run the bar. In 1951, the sons purchased the business from their father and renamed it the No. 5 Bar.
In late in 1955 the Third Avenue El was demolished and the city embarked on a revitalization of the Bowery. During this time many artists were drawn to the area due to the cheaper rent prices compared to Greenwich Village. Pianist Don Shoemaker was among the influx of artists who moved re-located to the Bowery. Occupying a studio at 1 Cooper Square above the No. 5 Bar, Shoemaker hosted jam sessions during which he would purchase beer from the Terminis. Shoemaker eventually told Joe that if the bar would purchase a piano, he and his band would play. Joe bought a used upright piano, received a cabaret licence on 30 August 1956, and opened a week later under the name the Five Spot Café……Learn More
About the Five Spot Cafe’ from son of owners (Joe and Iggy Termini) (Picture above is located here):
If you are an aficionado of Jazz, especially the Jazz that reigned in the 50’s and 60’s in New York City you have undoubtedly heard of, or visited The Five Spot Café on 3rd Avenue and St. Marks Place in Manhattan’s East Village. My father, Joe Termini and his brother, Iggy, owned and operated The Five Spot during those heydays and created a haven for such musical giants as Theonious Monk, Sonny Rollins, Charlie Parker, Ornette Coleman, and Charles Mingus.
What you may not know is that The Five Spot Café was also the gathering place for many of the most important artists of the Abstract Expressionist Era…… Learn More
A great link about the closing of The Five Spot Cafe’ (1976)
