A while back, B-3 and Blue Note fan Andy suggested I look up George Braith, in response to a post of mine about "Kirk's Work," a CD featuring multi-reedist, sometimes more than one instrument at a time, Roland Kirk and B-3 legend, as well as Champaign native, Jack McDuff. While it's out of print, I was lucky enough to find a surplus copy of the two CD-set "George Braith: The Complete Blue Note Sessions" at Amoeba Records in Hollywood on my trip to LA last month.
Braith is not Kirk. He has a lighter sound overall, more like Coltrane on soprano, and his use of multiple instruments isn't as blatant. The organist for the date, Billy Gardner, reminds me of Larry Young and you also get Grant Green, one of the best jazz guitarists ever, although he's not overly prominent on many of these sides.
"Mary Ann" makes me feel the same kind of joy Sonny Rollins' calypsos do, or some of the reggae music I like, and you gotta love "Mary Had a Little Lamb" turned into a jazz tune, one with avant-garde touches at that. The way Braith and Gardner recast "The Man I Love" is unusual to say the least. The former sounds like he's playing a train whistle or a car horn in places. "Billy Told" includes some clever quoting of "The William Tell Overture," which also is quite skillful because it's done completely in context. Glad I found this CD set, the sum total of Braith's Blue Note recordings.
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