Track Listing

1. Blues to Elvin
2. Blues to Bechet
3. Blues to You
4. Mr. Day
5. Mr. Syms
6. Mr. Knight

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #54761 in Music
• Released on: 1990-10-25
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Extra tracks
• Dimensions: .21 pounds

Album Description
Limited Edition Japanese pressing of this album comes house in a miniature LP sleeve. 2006.

Amazon.com
The recordings here come from the same October 1960 sessions that produced My Favorite Things, and while the all-blues album is far less famous, it's an equivalent document of John Coltrane's work in his earliest recordings of the quartet with drummer Elvin Jones and pianist McCoy Tyner. The all-blues format emphasizes Coltrane's personal relationship to the form, both his emotional depth and his capacity for harmonic extension on essentially modal materials. His soprano on "Blues to Bechet" is a summoning up of the blues form's original power, also apparent in the slow and moving "Blues to Elvin." "Blues to You," played with just Jones and bassist Steve Davis, is a hot coil of sound, Coltrane's convoluted lines twisting into new shapes while he and Jones catch every possible nuance of the beat. "Mr. Knight" would later turn into "India," but it's already a floating modal figure for his tenor. This edition includes the alternate takes previously available only in the box set The Heavyweight Champion. --Stuart Broomer

Customer Reviews

Blues elevated to the sublime
This session was hastily put together, recorded on the same day as another album, but in retrospect it turned out to be a visionary idea. How would one of the leading experimenters of the time tackle the very roots of the music, its most fundamental form? After listening to Coltrane Plays the Blues, no one could credibly accuse the form of being monotonous, infertile or banal.

In a tribute to Sidney Bechet, "Blues to Bechet", Coltrane plays the soprano saxophone alone with bass and drums, fusing blues and Middle Eastern idioms together in passionate, incantatory figures that dance like eddies in a mountain stream. "Mr. Syms" also features Coltrane on soprano, but here he merely states the theme, opening up the central solo space to McCoy Tyner, who delivers an exquisite blues, swinging with all the majesty of a great and profound tradition.

In a time when both jazz and Coltrane himself were undergoing a period of turbulent self-analysis, this record serves as a refreshing reminder of the illuminating simplicity of the central architecture of jazz: the blues. Ironically, but perhaps fittingly, the critic Ralph J. Gleason wrote in the original liner notes to Coltrane's Sound that "this music is an extraordinary example of the complex beauty of this most complex age".

That Coltrane was able to record two albums in the same day that masterfully captured the polar opposites of simplicity and complexity without contradiction is testament to his genius.

October 1960...
October 1960 was one of those prolific times during Trane's career where in a short period he was able to turn out album after album of classic music in an extremely brief span. My Favorite Things, Coltrane's Sound, and Coltrane Plays the Blues, all cornerstones of jazz's period of transition of the early 60's were recorded in one month.
This unbelievable actuality brings me to the review of perhaps my favorite out of all of the 3. In the liner notes of Plays the Blues, Joe Goldberg describes a typical club date for Trane during this time. He states that when appearing at a club, the last set of the evening typically is devoted to the blues. Today it is hard for the majority of jazz listeners to imagine or even fathom seeing Trane at the Vanguard, the Half Note, or Birdland, but by putting Plays the Blues and closing your eyes, this album may be closest we can get to imagining a smoky club in the 60's at midnight, when the real fans come out to see Trane play the blues. The album itself is separated into two somewhat-relating halves. Blues for Elvin kicks the first half with a slow blues featuring the full quartet of the time (the classic quartet, save for Steve Davis instead of Jimmy Garrison), Trane builds a lovely, soulful solo with gorgeous accompaniment from McCoy. The next two tracks feature the trio of Elvin and Steve Davis, Blues for Bechet has Trane on soprano and Blues to You, my favorite track on the album has one of the finest solos on the blues I have ever heard.
The second half is tracks evoking other feelings of the blues. Mr. Day and Mr. Knight are much more modal examples of the blues and the best writing on the album as well as McCoy's best playing. These tunes should be considered a stepping point as to the direction of his music from then on. Compare these tracks to Chris Potter's tribute "The Source" on the fantastic Gratitude. Mr. Syms is a fascinating minor blues with jaw-dropping soprano work. Artist's ranging from Billy Bang to Mark Whitfield has covered this track.
Coltrane Plays the Blues is the most underrated masterpiece of Coltrane's early 60's transition period and has yet to take its deserved place with My Favorite Things or Africa/Brass as early classic. That withstanding, those who own Coltrane Plays the Blues, may see it as a treasure that comes as close as some can get to seeing the late set back at the Half Note in 1960

Top-notch coltrane
This album is right up there amongst Coltrane's best. All six original tunes are fantastic, and like most coltrane albums, this one has varying levels of complexity so that it provides just as much pleasure after months of listening as it does the first time. Recorded around the same time as, and in a class with "My favorite things".