Landmark Jazz Album 21: Jelly Roll Morton Volume 1 (JSP)

Morton (p, comp, arr), George Mitchell (c), Edward Kid Ory (tb), Omer Simeon, Barney Bigard, Darnell Howard, Johnny Dodds (cl), Stump Evans (as), Johnny St Cyr (bj), John Lindsay (b), Andrew Hilaire, Baby Dodds (d) and others. Rec. 1926-28

As with Sidney Bechet, it’s devilishly hard to find a single compilation of Morton that covers all the essentials. This one doesn’t quite, but does it better than most, and also does it under the auspices of remastering from original 78s by John R.T. Davies, whose expertise in this area is legendary. Morton’s miraculous flowering in this period has to be heard to be believed, with his arrangements of his own and others’ tunes so multi-faceted, so imaginative and full of incredible creative drive as to be a collective body of genius to place alongside that of Ellington and – much later – Mingus or Gil Evans. Except he did it first.

CREDITS: KS