The Chicago Sound (Remastered 2023) Wilbur Ware

• 1 Mamma-Daddy (Remastered 2023) 03:54
• 2 Body And Soul (Remastered 2023) 03:16
• 3 Desert Sands (Remastered 2023) 05:29
• 4 31st And State (Remastered 2023) 06:28
• 5 Lullaby Of The Leaves (Remastered 2023) 02:56
• 6 Latin Quarters (Remastered 2023) 04:39
• 7 Be-Ware (Remastered 2023) 04:29
• 8 The Man I Love (Remastered 2023) 07:22
• Total Runtime 38:33

Info for The Chicago Sound (Remastered 2023)

Ware is best known for his work with the Thelonious Monk quartet in 1957-58 and for his live recordings with the Sonny Rollins Trio at the Village Vanguard. Ware’s exceptional timing, economic placement of notes combined with an adroit use of space and time in ensemble playing with Monk was perfectly suited to the pianist’s music. Perhaps the best illustration of this is Ware’s inter-play with Monk on “Off Minor” (Take 5) as Monk and Ware create a piano-bass dialog that increasingly builds a tension that is at last resolved with Ware’s highly creative and angular extended bass solo that remains one of the finest ever recorded in modern jazz. Ware’s unique ability to interpret Monk compositions, combined with his impeccable, and swinging sense of time and his percussive attack, perhaps made Ware the most perfectly suited bassist ever to work with Monk. Ware and fellow bassist Israel Crosby were leading examples of the more laid-back “Chicago Sound” approach to the bass during the 1950s.

"Bassist Wilbur Ware's only recording as a leader (which has been reissued on CD) mostly features Chicago musicians. Although Ware heads the set and contributed two originals, he does not dominate the music and delegated plenty of solo space to altoist John Jenkins (who also brought in two tunes), tenor saxophonist Johnny Griffin, and pianist Junior Mance; Wilbur Campbell or Frank Dunlop on drums complete the group. This fine hard bop date (which also has versions of "Body and Soul," Stuff Smith's "Desert Sands," "Lullaby of the Leaves," and "The Man I Love") was a fine debut by Ware. It seems strange that in his remaining 20-plus years the bassist never led another album." (Scott Yanow, AMG)

Wilbur Ware, bass
Johnny Griffin, tenor saxophone
John Jenkins, alto saxophone
Junior Mance, piano
Wilbur Campbell, drums (tracks 1 & 3-7)
Frankie Dunlop, drums (tracks 2 & 8)

Digitally remastered

Wilbur Bernard Ware
(September 8, 1923 – September 9, 1979) was an American jazz double-bassist known for his creative use of time and space, his angular, unorthodox solo technique and a distinctive percussive sound. He was a staff bassist at Riverside Records in the 1950s, playing on many of the label's sessions, including LPs with such widely diverse stylists as J.R. Monterose, Toots Thielemans, Tina Brooks, Zoot Sims, and Grant Green.

Born in Chicago, Ware taught himself to play banjo and bass and he approached the double bass not only as a melodic and rhythmic instrument but also as a percussive instrument. In the 1940s, he worked with Stuff Smith, Sonny Stitt and Roy Eldridge. He recorded with Sun Ra in the early 1950s. Later in the 1950s, settling in New York City, Ware played with Eddie Vinson, Art Blakey, and Buddy DeFranco. His only album recorded under his own name during his lifetime was The Chicago Sound, from 1957, while Ware was signed to Riverside. Ware was also active in studio recordings of several Music Minus One (MMO) jazz instructional LPs made in a New Jersey studio in the late 1950s, several of which have now been re-released on compact disc. In 1958, Ware was one of 57 jazz musicians to appear in the photograph A Great Day in Harlem.

In 2012, Ware's widow Gloria produced and released a collection of previously unreleased studio tracks made with trumpeter Don Cherry, under the title Wilbur Ware: Super Bass. The CD also contains a 5-minute track in which Ware describes his early years in music and his life in jazz.

Ware is best known for his work with the Thelonious Monk quartet in 1957-58 and for his live recordings with the Sonny Rollins Trio at the Village Vanguard. Ware's exceptional timing, economic placement of notes combined with an adroit use of space and time in ensemble playing with Monk was perfectly suited to the pianist's music. Perhaps the best illustration of this is Ware's inter-play with Monk on "Off Minor" (Take 5) as Monk and Ware create a piano-bass dialog that increasingly builds a tension that is at last resolved with Ware's highly creative and angular extended bass solo that remains one of the finest ever recorded in modern jazz. Ware's unique ability to interpret Monk compositions, combined with his impeccable, and swinging sense of time and his percussive attack, perhaps made Ware the most perfectly suited bassist ever to work with Monk. Ware and fellow bassist Israel Crosby were leading examples of the more laid-back "Chicago Sound" approach to the bass during the 1950s.

Ware struggled with narcotics addiction that resulted in his return to Chicago in 1963 and a period of incarceration, and was largely inactive musically for about six years. In 1969, Ware played with Clifford Jordan, Elvin Jones and Sonny Rollins. He later moved to Philadelphia, where he died from emphysema in 1979.

Although Ware has often been critiqued by modern-day schooled double bassists for his use of an unorthodox fingerings and left-hand shifts, he nevertheless had a mastery of all the fingerboard positions and his remarkable speed of execution enabled him not only to execute the correct chord tones but to craft uniquely structured solo movements on some of most difficult music in the genre. In his last years Ware was enthusiastically involved with the avant garde school.

This album contains no booklet.