Track Listing

1. Passion Dance
2. Contemplation
3. Four by Five
4. Search for Peace
5. Blues on the Corner

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #18422 in Music
• Released on: 1999-03-09
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Original recording reissued, Original recording remastered
• Dimensions: .21 pounds

Album Description
McCoy Tyner forged his sound as a leader on the amazing session with Joe Henderson, Ron Carter and Coltrane bandmate Elvin Jones. All five distinctive compositions have become jazz standards. A perfect record and an essential one too.

Amazon.com
This 1967 quartet was McCoy Tyner's first for Blue Note as a leader, although he had frequently recorded as a sideman for the label--with Wayne Shorter, Joe Henderson, and Grant Green, among others. One of the last recordings produced by Blue Note founder Alfred Lion, and Tyner's first as a leader since leaving the legendary John Coltrane Quartet two years before, the session has a special quality. There's something of the Blue Note sound to the group's concentrated intensity, perhaps Lion's contribution as well as engineer Rudy Van Gelder's, while Tyner, a more conservative musician than Coltrane, was integrating the modal and expressionist forms of the Coltrane quartet into more tightly defined compositional patterns. In tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson, Tyner found a true peer, another musician with a strong identity whose style represented a similar amalgam of conventional and innovative elements. Together with drummer Elvin Jones, and bassist Ron Carter, they both reassert the hard-bop mainstream with "Four by Five" and the deep blues of "Blues on the Corner" and extend it with the heightened solemnity of "Search for Peace" and the brilliant rhythmic interplay of "Passion Dance." --Stuart Broomer

Customer Reviews

Advanced 60s jazz
This was the first of 6 albums McCoy Tyner recorded for Blue Note records in the late 60s and early 70s. His earlier records for Impulse (Inception, A Night of Ballads and Blues, etc.) were generally more conservative recordings in the piano trio format. But on Real McCoy he went for the explosive, wide open modal sound of the 60s Coltrane quartet.

Tyner had played with Elvin Jones for over five years in Coltrane's group and by this point they were joined at the musical hip; as usual, Jones is a polyrhythmic monster on "Passion Dance" and "Four by Five". Joe Henderson had played in front of Tyner and Jones several times, including the classic quartet date Inner Urge (also on Blue Note); this is among his best playing of the 60s, along with Larry Young's Unity. His mixture of mainstream playing and wild avant-gardisms is on perfect display. Ron Carter provides a strong, flexible anchor. McCoy's playing would get denser and heavier over the next few years, but his powerful sound (dark, left hand chords and fast, unpredictable right hand lines) is well featured here.

All five original compositions are classics. Coltrane didn't record many of Tyner's pieces, so the pianist's style as a writer give this album a distinctly different flavor from the Coltrane group despite the Tyner-Jones pairing. "Passion Dance" and "Four by Five" are intense modal workouts, "Contemplation" and "Search for Peace" are haunting ballads, and "Blues on the Corner" sounds just like the title.

The Real McCoy isn't as intense as some of his early 70s recordings for Milestone records (Sahara, Enlightenment) but it sets the tone for them. With the possible exception of Extensions with Wayne Shorter and Gary Bartz, it is the best of his Blue Note albums. If you like the more intense, wild moments of the '63-'64 Coltrane quartet, the Real McCoy is essential.

This is a real beauty
Having been a big fan of Tyner's amazing piano work with Coltrane in the 60s, I bought "The Real McCoy" with high hopes. I was not disappointed, and since then, this record has seen many hours in my CD players. Tyner proves here that his genius is not limited to playing sideman. The tunes here are beautifully composed, fully developed, and expertly performed. Tyner's left hand is scary; it demands your attention. The other players are in top form as well. It's great listening to Ron Carter and Elvin Jones together after hearing so many hours of Ron Carter playing with Tony Williams and Elvin Jones playing with Jimmy Garrison. I can't see any fan of jazz, casual or otherwise, being disappointed by this masterpiece.

Great Music
Here's a great album by McCoy Tyner. And it's another great album recorded with this rhythm section of McCoy, Elvin Jones, and Ron Carter. There are too many great ones to list... Extensions, Trident,

Joe Henderson roughs out the mix with his gruff, but pleasant tenor sax. And it's an all around nice deal. I really like this music, sometimes more than some of the work that McCoy and Elvin did with Trane (hope I don't get shot for saying that though!) There's just some great music here. Five songs, lots of action, some nice fireworks, and good restraint. Everyone plays pretty passionate. Elvin is Elvin and always will be. I like McCoy here, but don't like much of his recent work. But he's still got that thing that I like. But, that doesn't necessarily mean that you will or will not. Joe Henderson always makes a nice foil for these guys, just like Wayne Shorter does on his albums. And Ron Carter is just cool to listen to.

I'd say, get this album. Especially if you've sampled a lot of Coltrane with these guys and maybe some Wayne Shorter or Bobby Hutcherson where these guys play together. It's nice to hear Elvin and McCoy with someone Else besides Trane. And it's just a damn good cd. Good sound. Good playing. Get it!