For one reason or another, there are many talented musicians who never became famous. Elmo Hope is one of those musicians. His brilliance on the piano can be heard on Sonny Rollins’ album, Moving Out. Hope was a musician’s musician, in the sense that his colleagues and contemporaries knew how good he was, but he never achieved wider acknowledgment from the public.
An example of how far Hope had fallen from the public’s consciousness, was what became of his album Informal Jazz. It was released on the Prestige label in 1956. Hope’s sidemen at the time were John Coltrane, Hank Mobley, Donald Byrd, Philly Joe Jones, and a 21 year old Paul Chambers. It was a brilliant album, but far from a top seller. When Prestige reissued the album in the late 60s, they decided to credit the album to John Coltrane and Hank Mobley, despite the fact that Hope was the leader, and they were his sidemen. They also renamed the album “Two Tenors“.
Hope died of heart failure in 1967 at the age of 43. When I think of Elmo Hope, I envision Herbie Nichols. Another talented pianist, who like Hope never got famous, despite the respect and critical acclaim he garnered.
If you can find the now out of print Mosaic boxset of Herbie Nichols' Blue Note recordings, your ears will thank you.
Listen to the cuts below from Elmo Hope’s Informal Jazz. Get familiar with his work, both as a leader and a sideman. It’s well worth the effort.
Elmo Hope LP Photo Credit – The Cover Project
Filed under: bebop, Hard bop, Jazz, Video, bebop, Donald Byrd, Elmo Hope, Hank Mobley, Hardbop, Herbie Nichols, John Coltrane, Paul Chambers, Philly Joe Jones, Prestige, Prestige Records, Sonny Rollins
A bit slow in catching up on your excellent blog. Enjoy reading it and the inclusion of samples is excellent. I have the Esquire UK release of Informal Jazz, and I confess I haven’t played it as much as I should. I will put this right.
On Mosaic box sets, what’s your view of their audiophile quality? So expensive its a risk just buying one to “find out”
The Mosaic sets are uniformly excellent. The one exception is The Complete Benedetti Recordings of Charlie Parker set, but that was recorded poorly in the first place.
Cheers,
Atane
Instead of the Herbie Nichols Mosaic, you should look for the same music released by Blue Note/EMI some years later. It doesn’t have the same booklet, but the music is all there, albeit in CD instead of vinyl form.
Wow
I just traded for some work for a small stack of jazz albums. One of them is the prestige LP 7043 Tremendous condition.The other albums are all 1960s early. Thanks for the info.
Thank you for this blog. I was lamenting that this classic recording keeps missing the periodic re-issues. My ears were longing to hear “Avalon” and low and behold, I came up on your blog with full versions of each tune! I had to post ‘em on my FB page. Thanks so much!
You’re welcome!