| All of the music recorded by Tommy Flanagan during
his first session as a leader, fronting an all-star trio
with Wilbur Little and Elvin Jones.
The session, recorded in Sweden in 1957, was first
issued on the local label Metronome and later appeared
on Prestige as Overseas (Prestige LP7134).
These seminal recordings were made while Flanagan,
Little, and Jones were touring Europe as part of the
J.J. Johnson Quartet.
All existing alternate takes have been added to the
nine masters from the session. As a bonus, we have
added the only trio tracks from two quartet albums
with Flanagan, one of which presents the same trio
featured on Overseas.
All previous editions of this session presented three
apparent alternate takes, which were actually exact
copies of the master takes. All of the six alternate
takes included here have been carefully examined and
are clearly different from the masters. Includes 16-page booklet.
This 1957 trio session taped in Sweden marked Flanagan’s first album as a leader. Albums prior to his first trio recordings include
collaborations with Kenny Burrell, Thad Jones, Miles Davis, Kenny Clarke, Sahib Shihab, Oscar Pettiford, Phil Woods, Sonny Rollins, Bobby
Jaspar, Donald Byrd, J.J. Johnson (with whom he was touring –along with Wilbur Little and Elvin Jones – when these recordings were
made), Cecil Payne, Herbie Mann and, last but not least, John Coltrane. These collaborations produced essential jazz albums like Rollins’
Saxophone Colossus and Miles’ Collector’s Items. The quantity of important works for such a young and still relatively-unknown pianist
gives testimony to Flanagan’s enormous talents as well as his reliability as a musician. His initial trio LP gives proof of Flanagan’s musical
depth, showing that he wasn’t just a pianist but also a solid composer. Overseas was also Flanagan’s first recording in Europe, and the
only one made “overseas” for a considerable amount of time. |