Leo Parker’s seminal Rollin’ With Leo album, recorded in 1961 but released in 1980, is set to be reissued as part of Blue Note’s Tone Poet series.
Parker was the first bebop baritone saxophone player and an integral member of Billy Eckstine’s Unholy Four saxophone section with Dexter Gordon in the mid-40s.
Sidelined in the 50s due to personal troubles, Parker made an all-too-brief brief comeback in 1961. He recorded two Blue Note records—Rollin’ With Leo and Let Me Tell You ‘Bout It—just months before he died of a heart attack at the age of 36.
Rollin’ With Leo had been prepared for release, including an album cover design by Reid Miles, but wound up being shelved and not released until 1980 as part of the LT Series. The eight-song set includes swinging Parker originals like “The Lion’s Roar” and “Jumpin’ Leo” performed by a band including Dave Burns on trumpet, Bill Swindell on tenor saxophone, Johnny Acea on piano, Stan Conover and Al Lucas on bass, and Wilbert Hogan and Purnell Rice on drums.
This stereo Tone Poet Vinyl Edition was produced by Joe Harley, mastered by Kevin Gray from the original analog master tapes, pressed on 180g vinyl at RTI, and packaged in a deluxe gatefold tip-on jacket. It is set to be released on May 2.
In a laudatory AllMusic review of the album, writer Steve Leggett said that Rollin’ With Leo “…is a wonderful portrait of this unsung but brilliant player, whose huge, sad, but almost impossibly strong tone always felt like it carried the world on its shoulders. The centerpiece of Rollin’ with Leo is the fascinating ‘Talkin’ the Blues,’ which unfolds, nearly themeless, like a late-night conversation, ebbing and flowing exactly the way a conversation does, with Parker’s baritone swinging back to gather notes, but always moving and stretching forward, expanding the conversation until it seems like everything that could be said HAS been said.”
Order Leo Parker’s Rollin’ With Leo on vinyl now.
Leo Parker’s Rollin’ With Leo Tracklist:
A1 The Lion’s Roar
A2 Bad Girl
A3 Rollin’ With Leo
A4 Music Hall Beat
B1 Jumpin’ Leo
B2 Talkin’ The Blues
B3 Stuffy
B4 Mad Lad Returns
