Grant Green

LP version. The Latin Bit is the record on which Grant Green took his guitar into a Latin rhythm section. Recorded for Blue Note in April 1962 and issued in 1963, it is a loose concept album of mambo, bolero and Brazilian standards. By then Green had already cut some ten sessions of hard bop and soul jazz for the label in two years, and this was a clear change of scene.

The date took place on 26 April 1962 at Van Gelder Studio in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, with Rudy Van Gelder at the controls. Johnny Acea plays piano and Wendell Marshall bass. The rhythm is carried by three percussionists: Willie Bobo on drums, Carlos "Patato" Valdes on conga and Garvin Masseaux on chekere, the beaded gourd rattle.

All six pieces come from outside Green's own book. Mambo Inn, the Cuban dance tune by Mario Bauzá, opens the set at a buoyant tempo, the guitar's single-note lines running over conga and shaker. Besame Mucho is turned into a lyrical ballad. The second side moves from Ary Barroso's Brazil and Zequinha de Abreu's Tico Tico to Charlie Parker's My Little Suede Shoes, a bebop tune with a calypso lilt. Throughout, Green phrases as he would on a blues.

In the original liner notes Nat Hentoff heard "a seamless blending of Latin idioms and blues-laced, modern mainstream swinging". Reviewing the album for AllMusic, Michael G. Nastos admitted that it had divided Green's fans, but called it "a credible effort, even if slightly flawed in part". He singled out Acea's piano as the core of the band and praised the seasoned Latin feel of Bobo and Valdes. He also heard the record as a bridge to the boogaloo sessions Green would make later in the decade.

This stereo Tone Poet edition was produced by Joe Harley and mastered by Kevin Gray from the original analogue master tapes. It is pressed on 180g vinyl at RTI and housed in a gatefold jacket with Hentoff's notes.