Of Love and Peace cover

Of Love and Peace

Released

Can you play free jazz on an organ? Absolutely, and Larry Young does it on this 1966 release, the follow-up to the brilliant Unity and his third Blue Note album overall. The band features Eddie Gale on trumpet, James Spaulding on alto sax and flute, Herbert Morgan on tenor sax, and two drummers, Wilson Moorman III and Jerry Thomas. They play composer Morton Gould’s “Pavanne,” the second movement of a classical work called the American Symphonette No. 2, turning it into a 14-minute blowout; they also take the hammer and tongs to Miles Davis’s “Seven Steps To Heaven.” The title track and “Falaq” are Young originals, but they’re mostly platforms for free improvisation, the horns wailing like a half-drunk choir or taking screaming, high-flying solos as Young leans on the keys and the drummers do battle. If you’ve come in search of groove, seek elsewhere, but as an abstract exploration of musical possibility, Of Love & Peace is very much worth your time.

Phil Freeman

Recommended by

Suggestions
My Conception cover

My Conception

Sonny Clark
Shine Ball cover

Shine Ball

Bill Carrothers, Gordon Johnson, David King
Contact cover

Contact

Pharmakon
I Love Paris cover

I Love Paris

Nicolas Thys, Bill Carrothers, Dré Pallemaerts
The Way Up cover

The Way Up

Pat Metheny Group
West 42nd Street cover

West 42nd Street

Gary Bartz Quintet
Superposition cover

Superposition

Superposition
At Carnegie Hall cover

At Carnegie Hall

Thelonious Monk Quartet, John Coltrane
Hope Scope cover

Hope Scope

David Murray Octet