Tina, Teena, Tinah Has Done It Again Posted by independent j

The Way You Look Tonight - Tina Brooks from the album Minor Move on Blue Note (1978). Miss Hazel - Tina Brooks from the album True Blue on Blue Note (1960). Back To The Tracks - Tina Brooks from the album Back To The Tracks on Blue Note (1978). David The King - Tina Brooks from the album The Waiting Game on Blue Note (1999). Hello, dear readers. I've been absent for a long time and first and foremost extensive adulation to Junior for holding the site down solo for May. It is good to see us all popping up now. The reasons behind the long dry spell on my part has lots of factors, but the only one interesting enough to the community at large is that I had a real dearth of music and thoughts I considered inspired enough to share. I was caught in a morass of digging through lots of music (new and old) in an organizational project without finding anything that was really grabbing me. Two things pulled me out: 1) old Tribe Called Quest singles and 2) a deep study of the work of Tina Brooks. Harold Floyd Brooks garnered the sobriquet "Tina" as a variation on his childhood nickname "Teeny," which announced both something about his stature and his younger brother (to David Brooks) status. The North Carolina native hit the New York hard bop scene after some solid learning experience in a variety of R & B bands, and caught the attention of Alfred Lion early on and thus ended up recording exclusively for Blue Note. He was a sideman on records by Kenny Burrell, Freddie Hubbard, and Jackie McLean (I smell another post on these sessions), but I am most impressed with his compositional work and his four albums as a leader. All four albums are in a quartet or quintet setting and were recorded in the span of 4 years beginning in 1958. Brooks health failed him in the early 60s due to his drug addiction (sadly so common of jazz musicians at the time). Although he lived until 1974, he did not record further and at the time of his death only one of the four albums featured here was released (1960's True Blue). Minor Move and Back To The Tracks had been sequenced, mastered, and even had cover art prepared, but for unknown reasons were vaulted by Blue Note until being released in a box set in the late 70s. The Waiting Game was further unearthed for a Japanese release in 1999. Some more information here. The reason the delay in releasing these albums is so hard to fathom is because of their extremely consistent and high quality. Brooks didn't break new ground in the way his fellow saxophonist Coltrane was around that time, but he exemplified the hard bop style beautifully and provided a classic open style for his session mates to explore freely with their solos. Brooks is not the most impressive player himself...he lacks the power and dynamics of Rollins or the limitless expression of Coltrane (who can match these two really), but he has a distinctive style that puts each note out there clearly. This may be an artifact of spending so much formative time in R&B bands, but I quickly developed a taste for this "well enunciated" style. In my own opinion he is often outshone by the solos of Freddie Hubbard (on True Blue in particular) and his other brass players, but he leads a wonderful band. While I mentioned Brooks's compositional quality, I did pick one standard "The Way You Look Tonight" to include as well. I've waxed long on this post already, and am sure I'll be coming back to Tina Brooks soon...so I'll get out of your way and let you enjoy the tunes. For hard bop fans, I definitely recommend these albums (although Minor Move is the weakest). I'm glad to be back, hopefully you'll enoy what is comign, and many thanks to the dearly departed Tina for helping to reignite some missing audio passion.