The 1956 Trio
Artist: Red Garland
Label: Essential Jazz Classics 
Time:  13 Tracks / 78 mins
 
Another in the Essential Jazz Classics series, re-issued as a 50-year celebration, this disc is filled with a flowing and well-matched selection of tracks, which comprises the complete Garland of Red album, plus four tracks that were split into pairs for the Red Garland’s Piano and Groovy albums. His support players on all these were his fellow Miles Davis Quintet bassist Paul Chambers and drummer Art Taylor. Between them, this rhythm section played with virtually all the greats of the time: Davis, John Coltrane, Coleman Hawkins, Dexter Gordon, Sonny Rollins, Donald Byrd, Freddie Hubbard and Cannonball Adderley. 
 
Until he was eighteen, Garland played clarinet and alto sax. For the ten years before this disc was made, he worked with such luminaries as Coleman Hawkins, Charlie Parker and Lester Young, but it was when he joined the Miles Davis Quintet that he moved forward from the shadows. The final track on this collection, “Ahmad’s Blues” was recorded in Davis’s final sessions for the Prestige label, and had Philly Joe Jones on drums. (This piece was written by Ahmad Jamal, whose subtle way with space apparently influenced Davis’ own approach to economy).
 
Where Garland made a difference in the ‘fifties was in eschewing the fast runs of notes of the previous decade, developing his own style of playing block chords with his left hand – which was to influence the piano players of the ‘60s – and being more economical with his right hand, consciously playing fewer notes, but more phrases. 
 
Garland of Red, Garland’s first disc as a bandleader, contains six standards (including work by Gershwin, Cole Porter and Richard Rogers) as well as his own eight-minute “Blue Red,” and the distinctive, frantic bop of Charlie Parker’s “Constellation.” He allows his rhythm section ample solo space, but on several pieces, bassist Chambers’ solos are sometimes scratchily bowed. While that is fine for variety, it can sound out of place among the crispness of Garland’s playing and Taylor’s brush strokes.
 
There is a richer piano tone as he moves on to the December 14th session that fed two discs, and it is particularly noticeable on the longest track, another coolly paced piece, "Willow Weep for Me," which helped to justify the Groovy album’s title.
 
The two tracks from that session, which that ended up on Red Garland’s Piano – the distinctive “If I Were a Bell” and the touching “I Don’t Know” – are both full of character and definite highlights of this compilation. 
 
Otherwise, apart from the lovely, classic style of “My Romance;” the chilled blues of “Blue Red” and “Willow Weep for Me;” and the piece with Jones’ snappy drumming, “Ahmad’s Blues,” there are few other standout tracks, but importantly the deftly-played disc swings well as a whole as it breezes through bebop, blues and ballads. It’s well-worth celebrating its half-century.

Derek Walker