Liberty Records • Jazz in Hollywood Series (VII)

Jack Millman Sextet

Shades Of Things To Come

✤Liberty LJH 6007✤

A great lost treasure from the LA scene of the 50s — one of the few albums recorded by trumpeter Jack Millman as a leader, working here with a well-named set of "all stars" that includes Jimmy Giuffre on baritone and clarinet, Buddy Colette on flue and alto, Bob Harrington on piano, Harry Babasin on bass, and Larry Bunker on drums! The set's got a similar feel to other west coast work of the time, but the tracks are tighter, more composed, and a bit more swinging — sort of halfway between swing and the chamber jazz of some of the headier groups. Titles include "The Great Lie", "Along About F", "Butterfingers", "Thinking Of Russ", and "Da Bloosiest Blues". 

*Dusty Groove, Inc.*

Shades of Things To Come, as this is titled, is a consistently attractive, immediately assimilable album by flugelhornist Millman. It's considerably more relaxed and generally imaginative than his recent Decca Jazz Studio 4 set. Everyone blows warmly and with a fine collective, cohesive swing. The musicians include Buddy Collette, flute, alto, and tenor; Jimmy Giuffre, baritone sax and clarinet; Bob Harrington, piano; Harry Babasin, bass and producer of the date; Larry Bunker and Fred Capp, alternating on drums.

The writing throughout is unpretentious, tinged with wit, and quite fresh in places. The notes provide composition and arranging details. The writers involved are Millmann, Carson Smith and Jimmy Hall, Don Peterson, Bunker, Harrington, Charles Deremo, and Collette.

It’s too bad that 12 tracks ar jammed swiftly into this one LP.

When will a&r men realize that the chief virtue of the 12'' LP (aside from added sales) is the breathing space it's capable of providing writers and blowers? Anyway, the set is certainly recommended as an unusually friendly one, a word that really fits this particular context.

Millman on flugelhorn is, by the way, one of the hotter, unabashedly emotional hornmen on the coast. As a writer, Harrington has a commendably easeful touch. This is another good engineering job by John Neal. *Nat Hentoff (Down Beat, May 16, 1956)*

When this session was originally planned, Jack intended to use the late Bob Gordon on bass clarinet and the arrangements were written with Bob specifically in mind.

Bob's untimely passing created a problema — mainly, where to find another swinging bass clarinetist. The answer proved to be a simple one, for Jimmy Giuffre was available and readily stepped in. Although he could play the bass clarinet, he didn't own one! So all arrangements were finally rewritten for regular clarinet. Jimmy’s playing in the low register produced a particularly fine sound.

⁂

This is not Jack Millman's first album, but it is most definitely his "swingin'est". In listening to the crop of upcoming West Coast jazz men, it is increasingly apparent to what degree these young musicians are constantly progressing. With each successive record, it is possible to hear the advancement in ideas, technique and tonal quality. Jack's work on both trumpet and flugelhorn, as with so many of our young jazz men on the West Coast, shows this continuous advancement. 

"SHADES OF THINGS TO COME" offers an intriguing speculation on future jazz.

*Sleepy Stein (liner notes)*

Side 1

1 - Thinking Of Russ

(Millman)

2 - Along About F

(Harrington)

3 - Butterfingers

(Millman)

4 - Polka Dots And Moonbeams

(Van Heusen, Burke)

5 - There Will Never Be Another You

(Warren, Gordon)

6 - The Great Lie

(Hefti)

Side 2

7 - Da Bloosiest Blues

(Millman)

8 - Mother's Whistler

(Harrington)

9 - Gone With The Wind

(Wrubel, Magidson)

10 - Skylark

(Carmichael, Mercer)

11 - It Could Happen To You

(Van Heusen, Burke)

12 - That Old Feeling

(Fain, Brown)

Jack Millman (flugelhorn); Buddy Collette (flute, alto sax, tenor sax);

Jimmy Giuffre (baritone sax, clarinet); Bob Harrington (piano); Harry Babasin (bass);

Frank Capp [#1 to #4, #8, #10, #12], Larry Bunker [#5 to #7, #9, #11] (drums).

Recorded in Hollywood, California, September 1955