Happy Girl (Remastered) Nathan Davis

• 1 The Flute in the Blues 04:55
• 2 Spring Can Really Hang You up the Most 07:04
• 3 Happy Girl 07:20
• 4 Evolution 07:15
• 5 Theme from Zoltan 05:09
• 6 Along Came Byrd 02:19
• 7 Mister E 03:19
• Total Runtime 37:21

Info for Happy Girl (Remastered)

One of the very early records in the MPS catalogue and long collector’s item. Recorded in 1965, a time when the Afro-American Davis lived in Europe, working with such legends as Kenny Clarke, Eric Dolphy Elvin Jones and Art Blakey.

“The Flute in the Blues” composed by Davis himself showcases his light-hearted flute playing is a must hear. On Happy Girl he is accompanied by Woody Shaw on the trumpet, Larry Young on piano, bassist Jimmy Woode and drummer Billy Brooks. Probably the MPS album with the cutest cover.

A hell of a hard-bop classic – one of a handful of 60s European sessions recorded by the amazing Nathan Davis – an American player, but one whose work really took off when he headed overseas! The set's done in a top-shelf style, put together by the MPS/Saba label – with a lineup that features a young Woody Shaw on trumpet, Jimmy Woode on bass, Billy Brooks on drums, and the great Larry Young on piano – making a rare European appearance here, and playing in an acoustic mode that's very different than his famous Hammond jazz records for Blue Note! All players groove together in a soulful approach to hardbop that shows traces of modalism, and of the "new thing" exploration that Jackie McLean was bringing to some of his work around 1963 and 1964 – but with more of a swing, too – a soulful groove that really hangs right on the cusp. Davis' tone is fantastic – and he plays soprano, flute, and tenor on the set – but his real talent is for leading a group that's incredibly cohesive, through a set of tracks that bristle with as much excitement today as they did when recorded in 1965! A treasure you'll never part with – and including the tracks "The Flute In The Blues", "Mister E", "Evolution", "Theme From Zoltan", and "Happy Girl".

Nathan Davis, tenor and soprano saxophones, flute
Woody Shaw, trompete
Larry Young, piano
Jimmy Woode, double bass
Billy Brooks, drums

Recorded January 31, 1965 at Saba Tonstudio, Villingen, Schwarzwald

Digitally remastered from the original Master Tape

Nathan Davis
was born in 1937 in Kansas City. His mother is a gospel singer, his father an amateur musician, and he plays tenor and soprano saxophone, bass clarinet and flute. He became a professional musician at the age of 16 in Jay McShann's orchestra.

His career took off when he moved to Paris in the 1960s after doing his military service in Berlin. He played several years in Kenny Clarke's band and made his first recordings with Woody Shaw and Eric Dolphy. He then took the lead in various bands and played alongside Bud Powell, Dexter Gordon, Art Blakey, Ray Charles... He was quickly placed in the post-bebop and post-Coltranian generation, although he rejected this categorization. Throughout his career, Nathan Davis showed an openness to modal, funk, North African and Indian music.

A graduate in ethnomusicology, Nathan Davis returned to the United States in 1969 to become a teacher at the University of Pittsburgh. There he founded the jazz department, for which he organized seminars and concerts. At the same time, he directed the Paris Reunion Band at the end of the 1980s (with Johnny Griffin, Joe Henderson and Woody Shaw among others) and formed his own group, Roots, in 1991.

From 2013, he spent a large part of his retirement in Florida, where he died in 2018 at the age of 81.

This album contains no booklet.