Illinois Concert
Eric Dolphy was a musician's musician, and over the course of his brief but incandescent career, he played and recorded with some of the finest pianists of his generation, includingJaki ByardandMal Waldron. Still, as much as one might cherish their contributions to such Dolphy classics asFar CryandLive at the Five Spot, nothing can prepare you for the concert experience of Dolphy's 1963 working band featuring a startling young pianist from the next generation, 23-year-oldHerbie Hancock. Hancock reacts to the shamanistic energy of Dolphy's improvisations with the kind of exploratory open voicings and emotional urgency that characterizedBobby Hutcherson's vibraphone work onOut to Lunch!, save that no two-mallet vibist could hope to approximate the rich chordal canvas Hancock portrays on "Softly as a Morning Sunrise." Hancock abstracts and deconstructs the song form with imaginative polytonal overlays, allowing Dolphy to transcend the harmonic backgrounds and superimpose his own exploratory brand of calculated dissonance and speaking-in-tongues hosannas over the top. The virtuoso reedman engages the pianist and drummer J.C. Moses in ever more impassioned rhythmic exchanges.--Chip Stern