Julian Edwin "Cannonball" Adderley got the New York jazz world talking the second he took the stage in 1955. Originally from Florida, this gregarious man had originally intended to pursue graduate studies and came to Manhattan to do so. He had been the high school band director at the Dillard High School in Ft. Lauderdale and had a local following as a musician there as well. He and his brother Nat had played with Ray Charles in the 1940s. But, he didn’t come to New York to play the clubs specifically. He wanted a higher education. By chance, he was asked to sit in with Oscar Pettiford one night at the Café Bohemia and that changed everything. Talk of a new Charlie Parker on the scene began immediately.
Soon Adderley had formed a group with his brother and they worked the club circuit and recorded a number of albums for the likes of Savoy and EmArcy Records. Eventually, Cannonball was brought in to join the Miles Davis Sextet, which he played with for two years. After his split from Davis’ group, Cannonball went on to help pioneer soul jazz, post-bop and a number of other subgenres.
Adderley was a fun-loving guy who liked the audience to have a good time, but he was also a thought-provoking artist and he addressed that with every genre that he played in. Oh, about that nickname? During Adderley’s youth, a guy in one of his early groups tried to make fun of his weight by calling him a “cannibal” but mispronounced it as can-i-bol. The other bandmates used “can-i-bol” to lightly make fun of the would-be mocker and the name eventually morphed into Cannonball. Or so the story goes. Anyway, here are the 10 best Cannonball Adderley albums to own on vinyl in chronological order.
Adderleys Debütalbum von 1955 setzte den Ton für das, was kommen sollte. Während es voller tanzbarer Nummern steckt, sind Cannonballs Solos hier abenteuerlich und selbstbewusst. Der Eröffnungstrack, Spontaneous Combustion, beginnt mit einer spinnförmigen Klaviermelodie, bevor die Band in ein bluesiges Groove eintaucht, das perfekt für einen Tanzabend im Club ist. Während das Stück voranschreitet, ändert es den Gang und wir werden mit Bass- und Schlagzeugsolos überrascht. Das ist klassischer Cannonball; immer bereit für eine gute Zeit, aber nie vergessend, dass Jazz auch Kunst ist. Oder vielleicht umgekehrt. Diese Stimmung zieht sich durch das gesamte Album bis zum Ende. Definitiv ein großartiges Frühlingshörvergnügen.
\nPräsentation war auch das Debüt von Cannonballs Bruder und lebenslangem Mitwirkenden, Nat Adderley. Nat, der ein ernsthaft talentierter Trompeter war, hatte nur zwei Wochen nach Veröffentlichung von Präsentation von Cannonball Adderley sein eigenes Soloalbum. Auch an der Seite der Adderley-Brüder standen Donald Byrd, Horace Silver, Hank Jones, Paul Chambers, Kenny Clarke und Jerome Richardson. Alle sind Legenden der klassischen Bebop-Ära des Jazz.
CJ Hurtt is a record nerd and writer who lives in a remote fishing village in the Pacific Northwest. His work has appeared in Word Riot, various games for Aegis Studios, and Brain Scan Comics.
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