Monday, August 5, 2013

Nat Adderley Quintet: 1992 Cologne concert remastered

Nat Adderley Quintet: Workin' 
Timeless Jazz Legacy series.
Hans Koert

Nat was the younger brother of Julian Cannonball Adderley  ……. A position which had its pros and cons. After the decease of Charlie Parker, Julian Cannonball Adderley was labeled as his successor, and Nat was not able to hold a candle in him; he was overshadowed by his brother … in both senses of the words.

Nat Adderley (Source: Timeless Records)

As a young adult he joined the band of his brother's, but actually he started his professional career in the Lionel Hampton band, which took him to the other side of the ocean, sailing at the Nieuw Amsterdam ………… Nat’s first recorded concert was at the Amsterdam Apollohall ( October 28th, 1954), where he was part of the Lionel Hampton trumpet section with musicians like Wallace Davenport, Billy Brooks and Eddie Mullin. In an interview with Dutch Jazz journalist Eddy Determeyer (Jazz Nu maart 1995) Nat explains how popular Lionel Hampton’s band was in Europe. In 1956 Lionel Hampton would join one of the most talked-about concerts of The Netherlands of the 1950s, which even postponed the night concerts at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw for a few months …… Nat had left the band at that time …. In May 1955 his son Nat (Nat Adderley jr. is nowadays a sought-after arranger and piano player) was born and Nat (sr) couldn’t return in time for a series of concerts at the New York Apollo Theater. Lionel Hampton was unrelentingly and fired him.
Nat Adderley ( photo courtesy: Jan Persson)

After he joined commercial R & B bandsf or some times, he definitely joined his brother's bands, in which he would participate, with a break in the early 1960s, until his brothers death in 1975.

Nat Adderley (source: Timeless Records)

One of the albums from this period I love very much is Kenny Clarke’s Savoy record Bohemia After Dark ( June 1955). Due to problems with the US Internal Revenue Service’s their ways part for a few years ….. Cannonball joined  Miles Davis ( remember Cannonball’s great Blue Note album, Something Else) and Nat became a member of the J. J. Johnson and Woody Herman bands.

Vincent Herring (2010) ( photo courtesy: Hans Koert)

Since the 1960s the two brothers worked together again up to the death of  Julian Cannonball Adderley in 1975. When Cannonball had passed away, Nat continued the quintet as before, and tried to find alto saxophone players that could play in the style of his deceased brother … like Sonny Fortune, Vincent Herring and Antonio Hart.
Sonny Fortune  (2005) (photo courtesy: Hans Koert)
 
In Workin’, recorded by the German radio station ( WDR),  in Cologne (Germany), March 26th, 1992, Nat can be heard with his quintet in half a dozen tracks, most own compositions, Plum Street, the Big J, The Scene ( Recorded for the very first time by the Cannonball Adderley Quintet in 1967) and of course his  1960 “hit” Work Song! … The profit is high enough for a living, he told Eddy in 1995:  Dat is een heel aardig inkomen …. Eerlijk gezegd zou ik ervan kunnen leven …….
 Nat Adderley Quintet - Workin' ( TJL 74511 (previous released as CD SJP 387))
 The album Workin’  with the Nat Adderley Quintet, features Nat on cornet, Vincent Herring at the alto saxophone, Rob Bargad piano, Walter Booker on bass and Jimmy Cobb  drums.  It was recently remasters by Peter Brussee and re-released by Timeless in its great Timeless Jazz Legacy series.  A jazz trumpet player with a great reputation, although in the latter days of his career, but accompanied with some famed musicians like a young Vincent Herring, who, like Nat, started his career in Hampton’s band and  in the rhythm section the legendary percussionist Jimmy Cobb. Nat suffered from diabetes, and he couldn’t perform anymore half way the 1990s. He passed away in 2000.
In its series Timeless Jazz Legacy  a dozen historical recordings were remastered and re-released.

MY JAZZ LINKS: Nat Adderley
Hans Koert
keepswinging@live.nl
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Nat Adderley: Julian Cannonball Adderley younger brother; A position which had its pros and cons. After the decease of Charlie Parker, Julian Cannonball Adderley was labeled as his successor, and Nat was not able to hold a candle in him; he was overshadowed by his brother … in both senses of the words. They played together for years, but when Canonball passed away Nat continued the quintet ...... and tried to find alto saxophonists that could play like his brother. Timeless remastered the 1992 Cologne concert by the Nat Adderley Quintet with Vincent Herring on alto sax ... in its series Timeless Jazz Legacy.


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