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| 4.511 Ft
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| 1. | Annette's Blues
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| 2. | All the Things You Are
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| 3. | Mr. Lucky
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| 4. | Are You Real
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| 5. | Medley: My Funny Valentine / Peace / What's New
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| 6. | High Fly
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| 7. | Once I Loved
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| 8. | Ceora
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| 9. | Strollin'
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| 10. | Stella by Starlight
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| 11. | The Way You Look Tonight
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Jazz / Neo-Bop; Bop
Recorded: Mar 9-11, 2002
No, the Al Green who plays on Mister Lucky isn't the famous soul icon turned gospel-singing Protestant minister who gave listeners '70s classics like "Take Me to the River," "Let's Stay Together," "Love and Happiness," and "I'm Still in Love With You." This Al Green isn't from Memphis, and he doesn't sing soul or gospel; he's a Chicago-based drummer who started out playing blues before making instrumental hard bop his main focus. And bop is exactly what he plays on Mister Lucky, a 2002 session that he co-leads with alto saxophonist and fellow Chicago resident Othello Anderson (who has an attractive tone in the Charlie Parker/Jackie McLean/Sonny Stitt/Phil Woods vein). Neither Green nor Anderson are well known, but they've both been around the Windy City jazz scene for decades -- which means that they're exactly the sort of players who would typically record for Delmark (a Chicago-based indie that has been great about giving lesser-known local talent a chance to record). On Mister Lucky, Green and Anderson co-lead an acoustic quintet that employs Dr. Odies Williams III on trumpet and flugelhorn, Leandro Lopez Varady or Jodie Christian on piano, and John Whitfield on bass. The performances are pleasant, although very few surprises occur. For the most part, Green and Anderson are content to pick overdone warhorses and play them the same old way. Green and Anderson make a few interesting choices, including Henry Mancini's "Mr. Lucky" and Benny Golson's "Are You Real." But all too often, they offer conventional readings of beaten-to-death songs like "The Way You Look Tonight," "All the Things You Are," and "Stella by Starlight." No one is asking Green and Anderson to reinvent the jazz wheel, but it would have been nice to hear more surprises and fewer warhorses on this decent, if conventional, outing.
---Alex Henderson, AMG
Al Green
Active Decades: '80s, '90s and '00s
Genre: Jazz
Styles: Bop, Neo-Bop
When R&B lovers hear the name Al Green, they immediately think of the Memphis soul singer who gave us ‘70s hits like "I'm Still in Love with You," "Take Me to the River," "Love and Happiness," "Full of Fire" and "Let's Stay Together"--that is, before he became a gospel-singing Protestant minister and gave up his career in secular music. But the Al Green who is profiled in this bio is a different Al Green; he's a veteran jazz drummer who has been around the Chicago music scene since the ‘50s. Green, who was born in Houston, TX on March 20, 1936 but raised on the Windy City's Near North Side, started out as a blues drummer; one of the bluesmen he accompanied on stage was Willie Dixon. But Green ended up shifting his focus to instrumental jazz, and the drummers who influenced his hard bop playing included Art Blakey, Max Roach, Art Taylor and Philly Joe Jones. Although Green never became well known nationally, he remained active on the Chicago jazz scene in the ‘60s, ‘70s and ‘80s. In the late ‘90s--when the hard bopper had a regular gig at the Marriott Hotel in Downtown Chicago--he ran into someone he had known since the ‘50s: alto saxophonist Othello Anderson. Along the way, Anderson had grown disillusioned with the music business and become an art teacher--in the late ‘90s, the alto man was paying his bills by teaching art at the University of Illinois at Chicago but still played his alto on the side. So Green invited Anderson to sit in with him on his Marriott gigs, and Anderson ended up playing with Green on a regular basis. In the early 2000s, they co-led a working group that was billed as the $Al GreenOthello Anderson Quintet; the group's three other members were Dr. Odies Williams III (trumpet), Leandro Lopez Varady (piano) and John Whitfield (bass). Neither Green nor Anderson had ever recorded an album under his own name, but in March 2002, they finally co-led a hard bop-oriented studio session. That session resulted in their CD Mr. Lucky, which came out on Bob Koester's Chicago-based Delmark label in August 2002.
---Alex Henderson, All Music Guide |
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