LP/CD Review: John Coltrane With Eric Dolphy - Evenings at the Village Gate

John Coltrane With Eric Dolphy

Evenings At the Village Gate

(Impulse!) impulserecords.com

As these words are being typed, this album has been out for a little more than a week. I picked mine up on the day of its release and of course I had to get it on vinyl because it's good to get up every 15 minutes or so to turn over the record. If I didn't, I'd nod off during "My Favorite Things" and potentially wake up during "Greensleeves" and not know what was happening. (That's not a value judgement of the music; it's an assessment of what happens when I slouch down in a chair and relax while listening to music.) 

All joking aside, one of the many thrills of checking out Evenings At the Village Gate on vinyl is seeing how well the folks at Impulse! stay loyal to the original design of the label. Vinyl reissues in the '90s acknowledged it a bit, but outer circle was too narrow, the text was laid out differently and I believe the whole thing had a shiny gloss to it, unlike the early labels that really looked like thin paper. As you can see below, the label of Side One would make Bob Thiele proud. Those little "Impulse!s" look like they're dancing as they spin around your turntable. It gives me the same feeling of excitement that came when I found a used original copy of Live at Birdland and saw that layout for the first time. 

Of course, no one is buying a brand new, recently unearthed John Coltrane album for the look of the label. Or for the cover, which sports a grainy (or is it smoky) shot of Trane and Dolphy in action. (The picture in the gatefold is beautiful too; Dolphy is glaring at Trane with a look of awe on his face, as if he's saying either "Damn!" or "Woah!") The album's merit lies in the grooves. What's also important is when this particular bit of music was recorded too. 

No specific date is attributed to the five tracks, but "August 1961" is offered as a definitive time. The group had a residency at the Village Gate from August 8 through September 3, sharing a bill with Horace Silver and Art Blakey, a trifecta which in retrospect must have been like a bit of heaven, even if it was a bit of a standard at that time. (A month earlier, Coltrane had split the bill with 19-year old Aretha Franklin.) 

Elvin Jones (drums) and McCoy Tyner (piano) had secured their roles with Coltrane by this time, and Reggie Workman filled the bass chair. (Jimmy Garrison would take his spot by year end.) Eric Dolphy was a semi-regular member of the band, playing alto saxophone, flute and bass clarinet. Art Davis occasionally dropped in and played second bass with the group, helping Workman create a sound that built on the use of drones that interested their leader at that time.

Rich Alderson, the Village Gate's soundman, admits in the liner notes that he hadn't intended to record the Coltrane Quintet for posterity. He was merely trying to test out an RCA 77-A ribbon microphone, which he suspended from the ceiling, pointing it down at the band. Since the group didn't know the recording was happening - or if they did, they didn't let it affect their playing since it wasn't a professionally-recorded document - we get a sense of what the band was like on any given night when their only concern was getting the chance to do their thing. As with the recordings that everyone has digested over the years, the group is playing at a high caliber level.

One of the big surprises about the set  doesn't become clear until Side Four. "Africa," which takes up that whole side, is the only track where Coltrane plays tenor saxophone. He plays soprano saxophone on the other tracks. It might be nit-picking, but hearing so little tenor comes as a slight disappointment. At the same time, hearing the group play "Africa" in a club setting helps to make up for it. 

With Davis along to anchor the groove, everyone in the now septet gets to solo during the 22-minute track. Coltrane goes first, saying his piece is a rather concise manner before letting Dolphy jump in on alto. And jump he does, with his usual spikey enthusiasm. The biggest solo space comes after Tyner finishes and Davis and Workman take over. The duo moves fluidly around each other and the low volume at this point of the performance makes something very clear: There is no noise from the audience. No casual conversation in the back, not even the clink of glasses. Perhaps, as the accompanying booklet infers, this was one of the nights that the Village Gate was half empty, but nevertheless, it sounds like everyone in the room was lost in the music.

The album opens with "My Favorite Things" already in progress, with Dolphy in the midst of a flute solo. (I was hoping Tyner's dramatic intro would usher in the album.) When Coltrane comes in for a final soprano solo, he seems to be exploring the limits of what could work in this vamp, and gets a bit spiky himself in the process. Without giving too much credence to John Tynan, who would call Coltrane's music "anti-jazz" just a few months later, one can imagine a casual jazz fan getting baffled a bit by Coltrane's ideas that night. But the contrast between the tranquil groove of the song and Trane's forward vision is exciting to hear.

"Greensleeves" gets much more room (16 minutes) than the quartet's made-to-be-a-single studio recording offered. After a brief but soaring soprano lead, Tyner plays tension and release, toying with listeners as to when he'll go into the chord changes of the chorus. All the while, Jones drives the music along, never excessively but always with choice combination of fills, cymbal crashes and press rolls. The blend of Coltrane and Dolphy (here on bass clarinet) feels like two strands of the same vine working together. Dolphy can even be confused for Coltrane when he begins his solo. 

Even though his name was on the marquee, Coltrane still gave plenty of room to his bandmates. In addition of solo space, he let Dolphy have a showcase in "When Lights Are Low," a song the multi-reedist would be playing regularly in Europe in less than a month, as documented on the third volume of the In  Europe series on Prestige. This inclusion might be one of the most intriguing parts of the set, as it presents the most straight ahead composition of the album, which the group respects even as they adapt it to their futuristic vision. It makes the drive in the version of "Impressions" that follows it all the more contagious.

For a recording made with a single microphone, Evenings At the Village Gate has some pretty solid fidelity. Like A Love Supreme: Live In Seattle, it's a great Elvin Jones showcase since his performance stands out most prominently. But considering how often Jimmy Garrison gets covered up on numerous Coltrane albums, both studio and live, Alderson's RCA 77-A did a good job of capturing Workman and Davis. Perhaps the real hat tip should go to Kevin Reeves, who mastered the album.

By November of 1961, with Dolphy back from Europe, Coltrane and his associates would land an extended gig at the Village Vanguard. Workman stepped down to take care of his family and Garrison would take the bass chair, thus solidifying the group that is known as the Classic Quartet. At the Vanguard, Bob Thiele would have professional machines set up to record everything and release it on Impulse! (It would all eventually come out on a box set in the '90s.) Now we have a chance to hear what happened in the preceding months that came into full bloom during to that residency. In a way, this document is just as vital as what would follow.