Home (David Murray album)

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Home
Home (David Murray album).jpg
Studio album by
Released1982
RecordedOctober 31 & November 1, 1981
Genre Jazz
Length38:35
Label Black Saint
Producer Giovanni Bonandrini, David Murray
David Murray Octet chronology
Ming
(1980)
Home
(1982)
Murray's Steps
(1982)

Home is an album by David Murray, released in 1982 on the Italian Black Saint label and the second to feature his Octet. It features performances by Murray, Henry Threadgill, Olu Dara, Lawrence "Butch" Morris, George E. Lewis, Anthony Davis, Wilbur Morris and Steve McCall. [1]

Contents

Reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar half.svg [2]
The Penguin Guide to Jazz Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar half.svg [3]
The Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svg [4]

Robert Palmer reviewed the album for The New York Times , writing that Ming "was an arresting record when it first appeared in 1980, but it seems to have been a dress rehearsal for the new album, Home...an apt title, for on this record David Murray stakes out a territory he can call his own, but a territory that nevertheless offers considerable room for growth. His writing and arranging for the five horns, piano, bass and drums he works with here is as idiomatic as his saxophone playing. There are references to Duke Ellington and Charles Mingus and Eric Dolphy, and two ensemble styles from Dixieland to rhythm-and-blues. Whiplash horn unisons and brassy shouts give way to dense but buoyant welters of independent melody lines, collective improvisations, and barreling solos." [5]

The Penguin Guide to Jazz selected this album, along with its predecessor Ming, as part of its suggested Core Collection, writing that "Home is very nearly the better album. The slow opening title-piece is a delicately layered ballad with gorgeous horn voicing. 'Last of the Hipmen' is one of his best pieces, and the Anthony Davis vamp that leads out of Steve McCall's intelligent and exuberant solo is a reminder of how close to Ellington's bandleading philosophy Murray has come by instinct rather than design." [3]

The Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide said, "both Ming and Home display an excellent balance between written material and solos by a distinguished group of sidemen". [4] The AllMusic review by Scott Yanow stated: "All of the brilliant players have their opportunities to make strong contributions to Murray's five originals (best known of which is '3-D Family'), and the leader's writing is consistently colorful and unpredictable. Recommended." [2]

Track listing

  1. "Home" – 5:58
  2. "Santa Barbara and Crenshaw Follies" – 7:30
  3. "Choctaw Blues" – 7:20
  4. "Last of the Hipmen" – 9:12
  5. "3-D Family" – 8:35

All compositions by David Murray

Personnel

References

  1. Black Saint catalogue
  2. 1 2 Yanow, S. AllMusic Review accessed July 6, 2011
  3. 1 2 Cook, Richard; Brian Morton (2008) [1992]. "David Murray". The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings. The Penguin Guide to Jazz (9th ed.). New York: Penguin. p. 1059. ISBN   978-0-14-103401-0.
  4. 1 2 Swenson, J., ed. (1985). The Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide . USA: Random House/Rolling Stone. pp.  150. ISBN   0-394-72643-X.
  5. Palmer, Robert (October 27, 1982). "The Pop Life; David Murray Comes Into His Own". The New York Times . New York. Retrieved May 27, 2024.