Happy Birthday to ‘Bitches Brew’ and ‘Sextant!’
Say happy birthday to two great jazz fusion albums today. Bitches Brew, the font of all things fusion, was released March 30, 1970. The Miles Davis masterpiece included a veritable who’s who of jazz players who embraced the new direction music was taking. Look at this stunning array of talent on the Bitches Brew sessions:
Wayne Shorter, Benny Maupin, Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock, Keith Jarrett, Joe Zawinul, Dave Holland, Harvey Brooks, John McLaughlin, Jack DeJohnette, Lenny White, Don Alias, Summa Santos, Larry Young, Billy Cobham, Steve Grossman, Ron Carter, Bihari Sharma, Khalil Balakrishna, and Airto Moreira
From this grew Return to Forever, the Mahavishnu Orchestra, the Headhunters, the Cobham-Duke Band and the entire fusion movement, still vibrantly alive today.
Three years later, Herbie Hancock released Sextant, the album directly preceding Headhunters (with “Chameleon”). This was Hancock’s first album for Columbia after years with Blue Note and three albums on Warners. The album featured Eddie Henderson, Billy Hart. Julian Priester, Buster Williams and Buck Clark, and it also included ARP synthesizer pioneer Dr. Patrick Gleeson. A highlight was the nearly 20-minute “Hornets.”
Happy birthday to fusion! Happy birthday to you!
And thanks to the one and only Skerik for sharing this (and he credited somebody else)!