Stanley Turrentine: The Blue Notes of Mr. T – 1975-81

Tenor sax great Stanley Turrentine (1934-2000) recorded a remarkable 15 albums for the Blue Note label between 1960’s Look Out! and 1970’s lesser-known Another Story. But Turrentine waxed a substantial number of sessions for the label during that period that were never issued until well into his better-known and far more popular albums on the CTI (1971-75) and Fantasy (1974-80) labels.

These aren’t “leftovers,” “alternative tracks” or songs that were never intended for release. They are fully fleshed-out, incredibly wonderful performances, well worth hearing in their own right. These tracks deserve a special scrutiny that I want to delve in to right here – especially as none are as well known as they ought to be.

Stanley Turrentine (1975): The resuscitation of Stanley Turrentine’s Blue Note archives began in 1975 – while the tenor player was recording completely different crossover material for the Fantasy label – with this double-disc set curated by the late, great Duke Pearson (1932-80), simply titled Stanley Turrentine.

While the oddly eponymous set is often classified as a compilation, it is a bit more than that. Like the posthumous Oliver Nelson set A Dream Deferred (1976), the disc titled Stanley Turrentine is an intriguing mix of several formerly released tracks with a number of previously unissued titles.

As for the previously-released tracks, there is “Cherry Point” and “One O’clock Jump” from A Chip Off the Old Block (1964) and “Trouble #2” from Hustlin’ (1965) as well as the Thad Jones-arranged tracks “Little Green Apples,” “Those Were The Days,” and “Song for Bonnie” from Always Something There (1968) and “Smile” from The Look of Love (1968).

The remaining tracks had not previously been issued, making their very first appearance here exceptionally notable – if anyone noticed. At the time, Turrentine was coming off the popularity of “Pieces of Dreams” – the title track of a 1974 album, the first of Turrentine’s to crack the Billboard Top 100 – and riding on the success of In The Pocket (1975), which hit number 65 on the charts.

The music heard here is Stanley Turrentine in pure pre-crossover mode.

“She’s a Carioca,” “Samba Do Aviao” and “Night Song,” are from a February 1967 session arranged by Pearson himself. As this record’s curator, Pearson likely sought to rescue these gorgeously-arranged pieces as he had – at the time of recording – become beguiled by the Brazilian bossa nova – at least as far as the first two of these tunes prove.

Pearson had previously arranged Turrentine’s Rough ‘n Tumble (1966) and The Spoiler (1967), but this lovely session was likely quashed in favor of more commercial material. (Alfred Lion retired in July of 1967 and the label’s new owners, Liberty, were looking to push all the Blue Note artists toward more crossover fare.)

The deftly-employed musicians backing Turrentine here are Donald Byrd, Julian Priester, Jerry Dodgion, Joe Farrell, Pepper Adams, Kenny Barron, Bucky Pizzarelli, Ron Carter and Mickey Roker. Pearson’s masterful touch here is never brash or fussy and does no more than make the leader sound positively sumptuous.

Additional unissued tracks include the Pearson-arranged tracks from a June 1967 session with Marvin Stamm, Joe Shepley, Julian Priester, Garnett Brown, Al Gibbons, Joe Farrell, Mario Rivera, McCoy Tyner, Bob Cranshaw and Ray Lucas. These tracks have a somewhat different feel than the three prviously-discussed tracks.

Irving Berlin’s little-known “Better Luck Next Time” (from Easter Parade) is taken as a low-key after-hours ballad while Antonio Carlos Jobim’s downbeat “Bonita” gets an appropriately melancholic reading that only sort of complements the two previous bossa novas.

Then comes the hard swinging “Flying Jumbo,” an absolute barn burner that seems to have swung in from an earlier era or another session altogether. Credited here to Duke Pearson, “Flying Jumbo” was later discovered to be a Turrentine original called “Pres Delight” – in honor, no doubt, of Lester Young – which is how it has been subsequently credited on later releases.

The three tracks from the February 1967 session – plus four tracks from that session on New Time Shuffle (below) – later appeared on the 2007 Turrentine CD A Bluish Bag while the three tracks from the June 1967 session – plus the three tracks from that session also on New Time Shuffle – would later appear on the 2008 Turrentine CD Return of the Prodigal Son.

Jubilee Shouts (1978): This double disc – called “Jubilee Shouts” on the cover and “Jubilee Shout” on the labels – contains two early Turrentine sessions, one recorded in January 1961 and the other in October 1962. While these early sessions share the same drummer, the two were likely paired in this set due to the presence on both of brother and fellow veteran of Max Roach’s group, trumpeter Tommy Turrentine (1928-1997).

Aside from from Tommy Turrentine’s superbly underrated and totally overlooked solo album on Time in 1960, these two sessions are the brothers’ only recordings together under either name until Stanley Turrentine’s The Man With the Sad Face (1976), where Tommy is, sadly, just part of the section.

Jubilee Shouts (shall we say) was released in 1978, the same year that brought out Turrentine’s terrific West Side Highway, the second of two superb collaborations with arranger Claus Ogerman. There are no arrangers, large groups or strings here, though. This is pure Turrentine…to a T.

The first two sides – recorded between Blue Hour (1961) and Up at Minton’s (1961/1962) – were intended to be Turrentine’s third album for the Blue Note label. It had a title, a catalog number and a cover but no release. Producer Alfred Lion chose instead to put out the live Up at Minton’s sets – which featured this record’s rhythm section with guitarist Grant Green (1961).

Joining the Turrentines here are fellow Pittsburgher and Stanley’s high-school friend Horace Parlan on piano, George Tucker on bass and Al Harewood on drums, essentially the rhythm section for Lou Donaldson’s group at the time. This quintet had previously recorded Parlan’s Speaking My Piece (1960) and two months after this session would wax the pianist’s On the Spur of the Moment (1961).

If this wonderfully entertaining set was held back for any reason, it may be that the session lacks some of the heat this group was perfectly capable of generating. While the players are all in top form – particularly the leader – the program is rather ho-hum. The well-known “Someone to Watch Over Me” and “Stolen Sweets” mingle tepidly with the little-known “My Girl is Just Enough Woman for Me” (which was previously covered on Stan “The Man” Turrentine and later on Mr. Natural, below) and “Then I’ll Be Tired of You.” While none of these stand out particularly, they make for some fine listening even so.

Sadly. the leader provides none of his own originals. But “Fine L’il Lass,” a contribution from Philadelphia composer Leon Mitchell, who also provided tunes to the Max Roach group and the previously-cited Parlan records, makes a strong case for kicking off this set, instead of being buried as the third track. Perhaps programming was the problem here.

Brother Tommy, who was always an interesting composer, contributes the bop-ish R&B of “Thomasville,” which spurs Stanley to some of his finest playing on the record. Stanley would record the song again, commandingly, for More Than a Mood (1992), with such jazz all-stars as Freddie Hubbard, Cedar Walton, Ron Carter and Billy Higgins.

These sides would later be issued as Comin’ Your Way (the album’s original title) in 1987, with an alternate take of “Fine L’il Lass” and the previously unissued standard “Just in Time,” a real high point for the leader and – finally! – pianist Parlan. All of these tracks later appeared on the 2002 Mosaic box set The Blue Note Stanley Turrentine Quintet/Sextet Studio Sessions.

The set’s third and fourth sides were recorded in October 1962 between the albums That’s Where It’s At (1962) and Never Let Me Go (1963). It’s an especially attractive session that finds its players plying their signature trades and playing at the very top of their game.

Stanley Turrentine provides three originals (the especially notable “Jubilee Shout,” the bebop of “Brother Tom” and the slow blues of “Cotton Walk”) while brother Tommy contributes the swinger “You Said It.” The group also tackles the Kurt Weill/Ira Gershwin classic “My Ship,” which was – and remains – best known in jazz by the Miles Davis-Gil Evans version on Miles Ahead (1957).

Bob Porter’s notes don’t reveal why this one wasn’t released at the time, but one suspects that, despite the ace performances to be heard, the music itself is more derivative than original or memorable. “You Said It” and the title track crack out of their molds a bit but the remaining tracks seem to be riffing along somewhat familiar lines.

Turrentine is joined here by brother Tommy and Al Harewood from the previous session. Shouting along with the two horns are pianist Sonny Clark – who, himself, came from the north of Pittsburgh and was on the tenor great’s recording debut, Stan “The Man” Turrentine (recorded in 1960 but not issued until 1963) – bassist Butch Warren (part of Clark’s group at the time) and the great Kenny Burrell on guitar.

Burrell, who factored on many Blue Note albums of the period, had previously recorded with Turrentine on the Jimmy Smith classics Midnight Special (1961) and Back at the Chicken Shack (1963). His characteristically melodic swing, mixed with that warm-bordering-on-hot signature sound are enough to welcome any listener in to the proceedings.

The guitarist and the saxophonist have always sounded good together and Jubilee Shout(s) is no exception. They would, of course, go on to reconvene a mere three months later for Burrell’s very own Blue Note classic, Midnight Blue (1963).

Curiously, the five tracks on these two sides were issued as a single album in Japan in 1978, also called Jubilee Shouts. The disc was also issued as Jubilee Shout!!! on American LP in 1986, but not on CD until 1988, with a previously unissued track from the session, the lovely “You Better Go Now” (a.k.a. “Little Girl Blue”). All of these tracks would later appear on the aforementioned Mosaic box The Blue Note Stanley Turrentine Quintet/Sextet Studio Sessions.

New Time Shuffle (1979): One of the previously-unissued 10 titles released in October 1979 as part of the “Back to Blue Note” series, New Time Shuffle contains seven selections heard here from two sessions recorded in 1967, both recorded between Stanley Turrentine’s otherwise released The Spoiler (1967) and The Look of Love (1968).

This disc appeared in the same year as Turrentine’s well-forgotten Elektra debut, the Gene Page-arranged (and West Coast-recorded) debut, Betcha, which was released at around the same time of fellow former CTI All Star Grover Washington, Jr.’s own Elektra debut, Paradise (recorded at CTI’s longtime home base, Rudy Van Gelder’s Englewood Cliffs studio).

Again, New Time Shuffle is very different from what Stanley Turrentine was cranking out at the time.

The record’s first-side tracks are from a June 1967 session arranged by Duke Pearson, featuring Stanley Turrentine backed by Marvin Stamm, Joe Shepley, (returning) Julian Priester, Garnett Brown, Al Gibbons, (returning) Joe Farrell, Mario Rivera, the great McCoy Tyner, Bob Cranshaw and Ray Lucas.

Kicking off with Harold Ousley’s soulful “Return of the Prodigal Son,” Turrentine is absolutely in his element, forcefully injecting R&B in his jazz. Tyner and Lucas firmly plant the song, which riffs off “Wade in the Water” (and is made explicit in Pearson’s arrangement), in gospel territory and Turrentine raises the rafters with some fiery soulful tones.

If “Prodigal Son” sounds familiar, it’s likely because it was previously recorded by Ray Bryant and future fellow CTI All Stars George Benson and Freddie Hubbard – all in releases that came out in 1967 (Ousley himself would record the song as “The Prodigal Son” in 1972).

The Motown classic “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough,” a 1967 hit for Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell, is the sort of thing that was popping up on many jazz albums of the period. But if anybody can make good jazz out of AM radio fare of the day, it’s Stanley Turrentine and Duke Pearson. Makes you wonder what the Turrentine-Pearson team would have done with a full-on Motown tribute (it would be two decades before Turrentine would wax his Stevie Wonder tribute album).

At first hearing, the Jazz Crusaders’ 1965 hit “New Time Shuffle” sounds as though it was written just for Turrentine (it’s the sort of thing Turrentine played with Shirley Scott). Here, even in a big-band setting, Turrentine makes the tune his own. But it was likely Pearson who made the choice here: Pearson would add the song to his own repertoire and record the song six months later for Introducing Duke Pearson’s Big Band (1968).

The side-one tracks heard here – along with three additional tracks from this session that first appeared on Stanley Turrentine (above) – would also appear on the Turrentine CD Return of the Prodigal Son (2008), which features previously-unissued tracks from a July 1967 session, also arranged by Duke Pearson,

The four tracks from New Time Shuffle‘s second side are from a February 1967 session, also arranged by Pearson, with the deft support of Donald Byrd, Julian Priester, Jerry Dodgion, Joe Farrell, Pepper Adams, Kenny Barron, Bucky Pizzarelli, Ron Carter and Mickey Roker.

The set kicks of with Turrentine’s positively electrifying “Blues for Del,” no doubt written for New York disc jockey Del Shields (1929-2017), who had also written liner notes for Jimmy Smith’s Midnight Special (1961), on which Turrentine appears, and Turrentine’s own The Look of Love (1968). Surprisingly, “Blues for Del” didn’t get more coverage or notice than it did. Maybe since its first appearance a dozen years after it was recorded, when jazz was very different, is why it never caught on. It’s a riveting piece nevertheless, expertly arranged in Pearson’s signature understated style.

This is followed by Turrentine delivering the festive goods on the Brazilian standard “Manha de Carnaval” (with a masterful solo) and his “tender but muscular” approach to the standard “Here’s That Rainy Day” and the popular favorite “What Now, My Love,” which is brilliantly reconstructed to eek out all the sap of that too-often sappy number.

It’s easy to imagine that one possible reason these sessions languished in the vaults for so long is that it wasn’t clear what they were going for: a Turrentine bossa nova record (muscling in on Stan Getz’s territory); a big-band burner like Turrentine’s previous Pearson-arranged albums like Rough ‘n Tumble (1966) and The Spoiler (1967); the big-band pop of the Thad Jones-arranged sets The Look of Love and Always Something There (both 1968); or something else altogether. It’s as though the employees weren’t sure what the new bosses were going to want.

The side-two tracks from February 1967 – along with three additional tracks from this session that first appeared on Stanley Turrentine (above) – would also appear on the Turrentine CD A Bluish Bag (2007), which features previously-unissued tracks from another June 1967 session, also arranged by Duke Pearson,

Producer Michael Cuscuna – who oversaw the releases of New Time Shuffle, Return of the Prodigal Son and A Bluish Bag (as well as most of the discs heard here) – notably supervised a Japanese CD reissue of New Time Shuffle in 2012 that included all seven of the issued tracks from the February 1967 session as well as all six of the issued tracks from the session four months later.

What makes this particularly remarkable is that Japanese CDs rarely, if ever, change original LP configurations or add “bonus tracks.” But, in this case, it makes for a perfectly sensible curated collection very much worth hearing and experiencing. Stanley Turrentine would have been pleased.

In Memory Of (1980): This positively stellar Stanley Turrentine septet session was recorded in June 1964, between Hustlin’ (1965) and Mr. Natural (below – Joyride [1965] was Turrentine’s next official release at the time). The record wasn’t issued until 16 years after its recording, the same year that the contemporaneous Use the Stairs and Inflation – both arranged by Wade Marcus – came out.

The tenor sax great leads an amazing group here, featuring such Blue Note stalwarts of the day as Curtis Fuller (who solos on “Fried Pies” only [!], but adds a real Blue Train levity here even so) on trombone; Turrentine’s fellow Earl Bostic veteran Blue Mitchell (who solos on “Fried Pies” and “Jodie’s Cha Cha”) on trumpet; and Herbie Hancock (who solos on “Fried Pies,” “In Memory Of,” Jodie’s Cha Cha” and “Sunday in New York”) on piano.

Bassist Bob Cranshaw and drummer Otis “Candy” Finch were regulars in the Stanley Turrentine-Shirley Scott group at the time and appeared on the duo’s discs – under Scott’s name – that bookend this record, Blue Flames (1964) and the still-not-on-CD Everybody Loves a Lover (1965).

Also on board here is drummer Mickey Roker in his first appearance with Turrentine – on congas and maracas,..for some reason. Guess Blue Note regular Ray Barretto was not available. Still, Roker would, of course, factor on many of the Turrentine Blue Note sessions of the late sixties, in his usual role as a drummer.

Not surprisingly, In Memory Of is more of a pleasurable listen than a provocative or progressive one. But those latter tropes were never part of Stanley Turrentine’s program or agenda anyway. There are, disappointingly, no originals to be heard here. But the program on tap is made up of some especially interesting and unusual choices nonetheless.

Suffice to say. Turrentine is superb throughout and a line-up like this could hardly go wrong. The set opens with Wes Montgomery’s spirited “Fried Pies,” originally from the guitarist’s 1963 album Boss Guitar, a song which only became known well after this particular performance was eventually released.

Both “In Memory Of” and “Niger Mambo” originally appeared on Turrentine’s future CTI-labelmate Randy Weston’s then-recent Music From The New African Nations Featuring The Highlife (1963), This “In Memory Of” contains an especially worthwhile Herbie Hancock solo.

The little-known “Make Someone Happy” was from the 1960 Broadway musical Do Re Mi and was recorded a mere two weeks after Turrentine’s wife at the time, the organist Shirley Scott, waxed her own version with Cranshaw and Finch for Great Scott!!! (1964). It’s not clear who provides the nice arrangement here or elsewhere on the session, but Turrentine is magnificent here..

Bill Lee’s “Jodie’s Cha Cha” was written for Max Roach’s Deeds, Not Words (1958) and was still in the drummer’s repertoire at the time Turrentine was in the group (check out the Roach CD Lausanne 1960 Part 1 [2013]). Blue Mitchell and Herbie Hancock solo beautifully here.

While In Memory Of has been issued on CD twice in Japan – once in 2012 and again in 2021 – the only time this music has appeared on domestic CD is as part of the aforementioned The Blue Note Stanley Turrentine Quintet/Sextet Studio Sessions.

Mr. Natural (1980): This is, perhaps, the best and most notable record of the Mr. T Blue Note rediscoveries covered here. It is not only a superb Stanley Turrentine session, it ranks among the very best of the tenor great’s many remarkable sessions for the label, making its lack of release at the time absolutely inexplicable.

The superbly-titled and perfectly realized Mr. Natural was recorded in September 1964, between In Memory Of (above – Hustlin’ [1965] was Turrentine’s previous release at the time) and Joyride (1965). The incredible line-up here includes Lee Morgan – in his only known recording with Turrentine – on trumpet, Bob Cranshaw on bass and Ray Barretto on congas with pianist McCoy Tyner and drummer Elvin Jones, a mere three months before their participation on John Coltrane’s landmark A Love Supreme (1965).

Weirdly, the original 1980 issue of Mr. Natural listed Duke Pearson’s catchy 5/4 album opener as “Stanley’s Blues” – even though anyone familiar with the Blue Note catalog would immediately recognize this scorcher as the title track to Pearson’s own Blue Note album, the terrific Wahoo (1965), recorded two months later with a completely different group – with the exception of bassist Cranshaw.

Turrentine’s lovely Latinate, “Shirley,” named for his wife at the time, organ great Shirley Scott (1934-2002), was also recorded by the Hammond B-3 great – with Turrentine and Cranshaw in tow – a few weeks later for Scott’s album Everybody Loves a Lover (1965) – an album, unlike Mr. Natural, which was issued at the time, but one that, coincidentally was never issued on CD.

Lee Morgan contributed the funky “Tacos,” – not to be confused with the Hubert Laws tune of the same name – which, surprisingly, factors nowhere else but here. Turrentine covers “My Girl is Just Enough Woman for Me” – from the 1959 Broadway musical Redhead, director and choreographer Bob Fosse’s debut – for the third and final time here (see Jubilee Shouts above).

The tenor great also delivers The Beatles’ “Can’t Buy Me Love” in a clever blues shuffle that surely would have made Turrentine’s earliest foray in to popular music palatable for his jazz listeners (credit the rhythm section for this bravura tact). Turrentine would again – and memorably – wax “Can’t Buy Me Love” three months later with wife Shirley Scott (and bassist Cranshaw) in a live setting for the organist’s Queen of the Organ (1965).

While Mr. Natural has been issued on CD twice in Japan – once in 2012 and again in 2021 – the only time this music has appeared on CD domestically is as part of the 2002 box set The Blue Note Stanley Turrentine Quintet/Sextet Studio Sessions. This truly “standout” album was also issued in 2023 as a 180g vinyl release in the Blue Note Tone Poet series with a deluxe gatefold package and truly lovely cover art.

Ain’t No Way (1981): Along with Don’t Mess With Mister T. (1973), Ain’t No Way was among this listener’s earliest forays in to the genuine joys of Stanley Turrentine’s music. Even if it is something of a compilation, the record remains among my favorites in the tenor saxophonist’s vast discography – much of which I have since acquired and treasure to this day.

The disc is made up of five tracks recorded over two sessions that come late in Turrentine’s Blue Note sessionography. The album’s first four tracks are from a quartet (!) session recorded in June 1969. Indeed, this is the final Blue Note session Turrentine recorded – until Straight Ahead, fifteen years later. For whatever reason, a second session to complete enough tracks for an LP was never scheduled (an additional track “Three Quarters” remains unissued).

The quartet could hardly be bettered, with McCoy Tyner on piano, Gene Taylor (Horace Silver, Blue Mitchell, Duke Pearson) on bass and Billy Cobham (who was with Horace Silver at the time) on drums. Turrentine and Tyner shared a positively alchemical kinship to one another – consider Mr. Natural, above, or Easy Walker, another quartet session – that seemed to complement and contrast nicely with both the saxophonist’s partnership with Shirley Scott and the pianist’s with John Coltrane. Sadly, this occasion marks the last time Turrentine and Tyner ever recorded together.

The program, too, is first-rate: from Turrentine’s roaring “Stan’s Shuffle” (which recalls “Can’t Buy Me Love,” above) and brother Tommy’s “Intermission Walk” (another shuffle) to the beautiful take on Michel Legrand’s well-covered “Watch What Happens” and the exceptionally breezy take on Antonio Carlos Jobim’s “Wave.”

The Jobim piece is surely the album’s standout moment and makes one wish that Blue Note would have given Turrentine his own bossa nova album, one Tyner would have to have been part of (the pianist recorded “Wave” again in 1977 with bassist Ron Carter, who was on Jobim’s original recording of the song, and drummer Tony Williams).

Carolyn Franklin’s fascinating “Ain’t No Way” was a Top 20 hit for sister Aretha in 1968. Turrentine – with then-wife Shirley Scott on organ, fellow Pittsburgh native Jimmy Ponder on guitar, Bob Cranshaw on bass and Ray Lucas on drums – gives the plaintive ballad a slow blues treatment that seems, somehow, to comment effectively on the Turrentines’ own relationship at the time.

The song comes from a May 1968 session Turrentine recorded that yielded two other as-yet unissued songs (“I Got the Feelin” and “She’s Looking Good”) and was likely to be included on the Common Touch album, recorded three months later with Idris Muhammad sitting in for Ray Lucas,but never was.

The four June 1969 tracks were sensibly added as bonus tracks to the 1997 CD issue of Easy Walker (1968, but recorded in 1966), another Turrentine quartet session with Tyner, while “Ain’t No Way” was naturally added to the 1997 CD issue of Common Touch (1968). Like In Memory Of and Mr. Natural, Ain’t No Way was issued twice on Japanese CD, once in 2012 and again in 2021.

In 1970, Stanley Turrentine parted ways with Blue Note for Flipped – Flipped Out, a brief and unremarkable foray on the little-known independent Canyon Records label – and, subsequently, released in a variety of releases. This was about the same time he and Ms. Scott separated. The mighty tenor player roared back to prominence, though, on the CTI label with his landmark record – and signature song – Sugar (1971).

He’d go on to record a string of popular records for the Fantasy label (1974-80) and several sessions for Elektra (1979-82) before coming back to the then-recently revived Blue Note label in 1985 for the aptly-named Straight Ahead – which also features such Turrentine partners of the past as Jimmy Smith, George Benson, Les McCann, Ron Carter and the aforementioned Jimmy Ponder.

Turrentine followed this up with two more crossover albums for the label, the Stevie Wonder tribute Wonderland (1987) and La Place (1989) – both worthy efforts, but neither of which made much of a dent.

The Blue Notes of Mr. T, especially those released between 1975 and 1981, put so much of this crossover fare to shame. This is Stanley Turrentine at the very top of his game – in a variety of formats. He’s neither phoning in his part nor laying down his sound overtop a commercial concept. Here, he’s fully engaged, always engaging and all-in – on his own terms – for whatever the music calls for.

Credit Alfred Lion and subsequent producers at Blue Note for recognizing Turrentine’s vast potential, at least before Creed Taylor came along.

But thanks to the late, great and indefatigable researcher, archivist, activist, producer and all-around great and gracious guy Michael Cuscuna (1948-2024) – who was responsible for ensuring so much of the music chronicled here (and elsewhere) could be heard in the first place. Because of Mr. Cuscuna, we know so much more about great artists like Stanley Turrentine.

Bless you, Michael Cuscuna. And, thank you, Stanley Turrentine.