Beautiful, suggestive and rhythmic jazz created with some lovely compositional skills by Prince Lasha (flute) and Sonny Simmons (alto). Both cats are making their debut here. The influence of Ornette shines through and Lasha was a boyhood companion of his. They learned music together and played together for a period of eight to nine years. Simmons was first influenced by Bird and then along came Ornette and changed his perspective on how to express music - free, flowing naturally through you.
Gary Peacock is on this as well which is a huge plus cause he was one of the absolute best bassists in jazz. He had a big, fat and natural sound and lovely technique. I have far too little stuff on which he his present in the collection. But he is not the only bassist here. Introducing Mark Proctor, who is the second bassist and a cat I haven’t heard of before. There are plenty of great bass lines on this record to enjoy for sure. Gene Stone rounds out the line-up on drums and I really like him. He seems to have a great sense of what the tunes need. Playing very rhythmically and natural. Not sure if I’ve listened to him before either. Great drummer, playing for the tune but standing out at the same time with tasteful rhythmic patterns.
I can highly recommend this 1962 recording, which stands out for me as one of the absolute highlights of the entire Contemporary catalogue.