Andrew Hill

Four albums Andrew Hill made in Milan for Soul Note, from two pairs of sessions six years apart. In June 1980 he recorded a solo record and a trio record on consecutive days; in July 1986 he came back for a quartet date and, the day after, another solo album. Half of the box is therefore Hill alone at the piano, mostly on his own long compositions. The other half places him with two different rhythm sections, the second joined on part of the record by a tenor saxophonist.

Faces Of Hope and Strange Serenade were both cut at Barigozzi Studio on June 13 and 14, 1980, engineered by Giancarlo Barigozzi and produced by Giovanni Bonandrini, and both appeared that year. The solo album opens with the fifteen-minute Rob It Mohe and includes Lee Morgan's Ceora next to the two parts of Bayside. On Strange Serenade Hill plays with bassist Alan Silva and percussionist Freddie Waits, starting from another long piece, Mist Flower, and ending with Andrew, written by Laverne Hill. Shades, recorded at Barigozzi on July 3 and 4, 1986 and released in 1987, sets him with bassist Rufus Reid and drummer Ben Riley, and on part of the album tenor saxophonist Clifford Jordan; it runs from Monk's Glimpse to the thirteen-minute La Verne. Verona Rag was taped solo at Jingle Machine Studios on July 5, 1986, with engineer Paolo Lovat. Its sixteen-minute title piece and Retrospect stand beside two standards, Darn That Dream and John Lewis's Afternoon In Paris. The original liner notes were by Lee Jeske, Gary G. Vercelli and Nat Hentoff.

The Complete Remastered Recordings on Black Saint & Soul Note, CAM Jazz box BXS 1039 from 2015: four CDs remastered from the original master tapes, reissuing albums first released between 1980 and 1988.