condition (record/cover): NM / VG (6" spine damage)

No obi.

Second copy of the Prestige memorial's second volume - Wardell Gray remains a musician's musician whose records quietly disappear from the racks whenever tenor players pass through the shop, usually with a knowing look and no haggling. The Lester Young lineage runs straight through him into modern jazz: the buoyant time, the storytelling logic, the melodic generosity that made even his fastest bebop sides sound like singing rather than sprinting. The early-fifties small group material collected here catches bebop's second wave at its most relaxed and self-assured, the revolution settling into a language, before the hard bop muscle arrived to change the accent. History has been slowly correcting its neglect of Gray for decades now - reissues, biographies, the steady advocacy of saxophonists - but the records always made the case themselves, needing only ears.

Same essential contents as its twin in this sale, fresh copy, warmly recommended to anyone who loves the tenor saxophone as a singing instrument. Which is everyone, deep down.