Listening to Prestige 370: Lem Winchester

Bob Weinstock's philosophy of the best jazz being from a spontaneous jam session hasn't found many adherents in recent years, with perfection being the goal. perfection achieved by multi-tracks and multi-takes, and laying in patches. But it made for some great jazz.

Part of that spontaneity came from Weinstock's commitment to fooling around with combinations of musicians. You'll recall that he deliberately did not set Miles Davis up with a regular group. That happened when Miles moved to Columbia.

It was a marketing move that brought him wealth and glory, and resulted in some great music, but he made some great music with Prestige too, and we have a legacy of Miles in different settings which is priceless.

Weinstock wouldn't mess around with an artist like Yusef Lateef, who had his familiar group that he brought in with him from Detroit. But Lem Winchester had already outgrown his Wilimington bandmates, and Weinstock set him up with a series of different partners: Benny Golson on his debut album, then Oliver Nelson and Johnny "Hammond" Smith, then Nelson again with Curtis Peagler. And for this, his third album as leader, Frank Wess came aboard, and this was another solid choice. Golson and Nelson were sax players; Wess is a tenorman, too, but here he concentrates on the flute, and to good advantage.

This album cover is a striking piece of art, and it's offered for 

sale as a print at a number of sites (including Walmart!), but

nowhere is the artist credited. There's a signature running

along the lower left, and it's Esmond Edwards'. He did a lot

of photography for Prestige album covers even before he 

began producing, so it's quite likely the art work is his. 

Talented guy.

Winchester has a new rhythm section, too. Hank Jones had lent his piano mastery to a variety of different Prestige settings: with Jerome Richardson, Curtis Fuller and vocalist Earl Coleman. And this, of course, barely scratched the surface of the catalog of this jazz master. Eddie Jones was not one of his brothers, but a heckuva bassist anyway. He worked with Count Basie for years, and was frequently on call for sessions with Countsmen like Frank Wess. He would go on, like so many jazzmen before him, to become vice president of an insurance agency. Gus Johnson also played briefly with Basie; his previous Prestige work had been a swing session and a blues session (with Willie Dixon).

The menu on this album features three tunes by Winchester, one by Oliver Nelson, and one standard. My two favorites on the set are Winchester tunes. "Another Opus" opens with a bass vamp by Eddie Jones turns into a moody Jones-Wess duet, a mood that's picked up and carried by Winchester, who never loses it even
as his playing gets more intricate. It's easy to kid around with the title of my other favorite--Lem and Frank let you have it with both barrels--but given that Winchester was to die far too soon from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, maybe not. This one is much more experimental, and much faster. Eddie Jones, whose bass is very much on display throughout this set, whips into steeplechase speed for this one, and Wess and Winchester both step outside the comfort zone. Listening from the perspective of 1960, you'd come away wanting to hear a lot more from Lem Winchester. Listening from the perspective of the new millenium, one can only grieve that there was to be precious little more.

Another Opus came out on New Jazz, Esmond Edwards producing.