Introducing Kenny Burrell [Blue Note Tone Poet Series]

Contains tracks from the sessions that resulted in INTRODUCING KENNY BURRELL (1956) and KENNY BURRELL VOL. 2 (1957), as well as tracks recorded in a 1958 session that had limited release.
Personnel: Kenny Burrell (guitar); Frank Foster, Hank Mobley (tenor saxophone); Tommy Flanagan, Horace Silver (piano); Paul Chambers, Oscar Pettiford, Doug Watkins (bass); Kenny Clarke, Shadow Wilson, Louis Hayes (drums); Candido Camero (congas).
Producer: Alfred Lion.
Compilation producer: Michael Cuscuna.
Recorded at the Van Gelder Studio, Hackensack, New Jersey on February 10 and May 29 & 30, 1956 and Audio-Video Studios, New York, New York on March 12, 1956. Includes liner notes by Leonard Feather and Nat Hentoff.
Digitally remastered using 24-bit technology by Ron McMaster.
This is part of Blue Note's Connoisseur Series.
Detroit guitarist Kenny Burrell made his recording debut as a leader on Blue Note Records in 1956 at age 24, and forever changed the state of jazz guitar. This epic two-disc collection gathers that first session and two others from the same year. Burrell displays all the full-bodied, soulful swing for which he would become legendary, and a skillful hand at both standards and his own original tunes. These early sessions show a fully formed stylist who would soon take the jazz world by storm with his smooth, clear sound and unlimited creative virtuosity.
No one session stands out above the rest, although Burrell's debut, covering all of Disc One, has a special energy. Disc Two, however, is stimulating in its pairing of Burrell in two sessions with either Frank Foster or Hank Mobley. Kenny Burrell's first recorded chapter is a stellar beginning.