Blues Bag

AMG Review of Blues Bag

Scott Yanow
All Music Guide

For this unusual set, reissued on CD in 2000, clarinetist Buddy DeFranco is exclusively heard on bass clarinet while joined by drummer Art Blakey and an interesting group of players, some of who were with Blakey's Jazz Messengers at the time. DeFranco, Blakey, pianist Victor Feldman, and bassist Victor Sproles are featured as a quartet on four numbers while the other three songs add trombonist Curtis Fuller and either Lee Morgan or Freddie Hill on trumpet. The seven selections are all bluish with many of them actually being lues. Highlights include "Straight No Chaser," John Coltrane's "Cousin Mary," Ornette Coleman's "Blues Connotation," and Leonard Feather's "Twleve Tone Blues." This is intriguing music which makes one wish that Buddy DeFranco still played bass clarinet now and then.