Max Roach: The Complete Max Roach

NINE ORIGINAL MAX ROACH ALBUMS OVER FOUR DISCS. MORE THAN FIVE HOURS OF PIONEERING JAZZ ALL AT A SINGLE DISC PRICE! In 1958, Max Roach was a busy man. His first album of the year, Deeds Not Words, released on the Riverside label, has since been recognised as one of his finest, with the All Music website awarding it 4.5 stars and stating; This is fine music from a group that was trying to stretch themselves beyond hard bop. The group in question was made up of Max with Booker Little on trumpet, Ray Draper on tuba, George Coleman on tenor saxophone and Art Davis on bass. The follow up, Award-Winning Drummer, was recorded at a November 1958 session and featured the same line-up as Deeds, an ensemble who by then were being touted as among the finest hard bop units around. Roach also found time to contribute to Booker Little 4 with Max Roach, helping out his by now regular trumpet player. A further three albums came out in 1959, most notably Rich versus Roach, a 1959 studio record by Max, with fellow drummer Buddy Rich, and with the pairs respective bands of the time. Also released in 59 were Quiet as its Kept and Moon Faced & Starry Eyed, both on Mercury. 1960 saw the release of Parisian Sketches, recorded in Paris in March, but additionally the remarkable avant-garde jazz album We Insist! came out in August. Subtitled, Max Roach's Freedom Now Suite and released on Candid Records it contains a suite which Max and lyricist Oscar Brown had begun to develop in 1959, with a view to its performance in 1963 on the centennial of Abraham Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation. The cover references the sit-in movement of the Civil Rights Movement. The Penguin Guide to Jazz awarded the album one of its rare crown accolades, in addition to featuring it as part of its Core Collection. The music consists of five selections concerning the Emancipation Proclamation and the growing African independence movements of the 1950s. Only Roach and vocalist Abbey Lincoln perform on all five tracks, and one track features a guest appearance by saxophonist Coleman Hawkins. In 1961 Roach released Percussion Bitter Sweet, and in 1962, It's Time. Both these albums featured the piano skills of Max Waldron, the man who had been house pianist for Prestige Records in the 1950s and had thus played on scores of classic jazz recordings. Max Roach continued to perform and record throughout the rest of the 1960s and in the 1970s formed a musical organization -"M'Boom" - a percussion orchestra. In the early 1980s, Roach began presenting entire concerts solo, proving that this multi-percussion instrument could fulfil the demands of solo performance and be entirely satisfying to an audience. Roach surprised his fans in 1983 by performing at a hip hop concert, featuring the artist-rapper Fab Five Freddy and the New York Break Dancers. He expressed the insight that there was a strong kinship between the outpouring of expression of these young black artists and the art he had pursued all his life. -amazon.com

Disc: 1 1. You Stepped Out of a Dream 7:49 2. Filide 7:09 3. It's You or No One 4:15 4. Jodie's Cha-Cha 4:59 5. Deeds, Not Words 4:37 6. Larry-Larue 5:15 7. Conversation 3:51 8. Tuba De Nod 4:00 9. Milano 5:13 10. Variations on the Scene 5:41 11. Pies of Quincy 3:29 12. Old Folks 4:20 13. Sadiga 6:35 14. Gandolfo's Bounce 5:43 Disc: 2 1. Quiet as It's Kept 6:10 2. To Lady 6:07 3. Lotus Blossom 5:33 4. As Long As You're Living 5:55 5. The More I See You 4:03 6. Juliano 5:40 7. You're Mine You 2:45 8. Come Rain Or Come Shine 3:18 9. Wild Is The Wind 3:17 10. Speak Low 2:50 11. I Concentrate On You 4:45 12. Moon-faced and Starry-eyed 2:53 13. Never Let Me Go 3:04 14. Namely You 2:47 15. Never Leave Me 6:42 16. Sing, Sing, Sing (With A Swing) 4:08 17. Figure Eights 4:31 18. Big Foot 5:00 Disc: 3 1. Parisian Sketches 17:13 2. Nica 4:48 3. Petit Dejeuner 4:06 4. Un Nouveau Complet 3:25 5. Liberte 6:25 6. Driva' Man 5:15 7. Freedom Day 6:06 8. Triptych 8:05 9. All Africa 8:03 10. Tears for Johannesburg 9:42 Disc: 4 1. Garvey's Ghost 6:40 2. Mama 4:49 3. Tender Warriors 6:52 4. Praise For A Martyr 7:09 5. Mendacity 8:51 6. Man From South Africa 5:08 7. It's Time 6:33 8. Another Valley 8:38 9. Sunday Afternoon 6:09 10. Living Room 7:27 11. The Profit 7:28 12. Lonesome Lover 7:00 -amazon.com

Price: $29.98