Austin Lindy Hop
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Austin Lindy Hop
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Sonny Clark: Standards (Blue Note 1958)
On this album, Clark plays several jazz standards that were originally intended to be released as individual 45s. As a result or the time limits of 45 records, Clark needed to be and was more efficient in his solo work, which some jazz critics have bemoaned but which provides a boon to Lindy Hoppers. Almost every song on this uncharacteristic album is danceable: either as a slow Blues number or a soft-rolling, Mainstream Jazz tune or an up-tempo, but light-hearted ditty.
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Sonny Clark was a hard bop pianist in the late 50s and early 60s, influenced
mostly by Bud Powell. Despite his eventual reputation as a hard bop
archetype, Clark nonetheless developed an intricate and hard-swinging harmonic
sensibility that was full of nuance and detail. He never got his due
before he passed away in 1963 at the age of 31 from his heroin addiction,
despite the fact that it can be argued that he never played a bad recording date
either as a sideman or as a leader. He developed a post-humus following in
Japan through the 1960s, which ultimately spread world-wide.