The Complete Lee Morgan Lighthouse Sessions

courtesy of Blue Note Records

It was after my return from Singapore in August of 1995 that I began extending my collection of recorded music to include more jazz. This led to my getting on the Blue Note mailing list, leading to an extensive number of acquisitions from both Blue Note and the Mosaic anthologies. As a result, I was one of the “early adopters” when Blue Note released its three-CD Lee Morgan collection Live at the Lighthouse in May of 1996. Each CD had four tracks (with an introductory track on the first CD), all taken from performances in Hermosa Beach at The Lighthouse on July 10, 11, and 12, 1970. Only one of the tunes on those tracks, Morgan’s “The Sidewinder,” was familiar to me.

Alternating between trumpet and flugelhorn, Morgan led a quintet that featured Bennie Maupin playing flute, bass clarinet, and tenor saxophone. Rhythm was provided by Harold Maybern at the piano, Jymie Merritt on bass, and Mickey Roker on drums with a “guest appearance” of drummer Jack DeJohnette on Morgan’s “Speedball.” That piece and “The Sidewinder” were the only offerings composed by Morgan.

Maybern contributed “The Beehive,” “I Remember Britt,” and “Aon.” Merritt’s compositions were “Absolutions” and “Nommo.” Maupin was the most prolific contributor with “Peyote,” “Neophilia,” “Something Like This,” “Yunjanna,” and “416 East 10th Street.” These were the only pieces to be performed over the course of the three evenings at The Lighthouse, each of which offered four sets.

All twelve of those sets were recorded; and, one week from today, Blue Note will release a new Morgan album, Complete Live At The Lighthouse, which will account for all of those sets. The Amazon.com Web page for this album is currently processing pre-orders, and I suspect that there are a generous number of history-minded jazz fans that will be placing their pre-orders even as I write! The release comes with a booklet offering a wide variety of perspectives on Morgan and his quintet work, including an extended essay by Jeffery S. McMillan, whose book Delightfulee: The Life and Music of Lee Morgan was published in 2008.

The performances themselves are generous in length. Two of the three performances of Merritt’s “Absolutions” are over twenty minutes in duration. These are clearly sessions in which in-the-moment invention was allowed to play out to accommodate the imaginations of the individual performers. The “Speedball” tracks are, for the most part, briefer, since Morgan used them to wrap up individual sets. Only the performance with DeJohnette is an extended one, clocking in at a little under twelve minutes, making it one of the shorter offerings in the collection.

While many listeners will probably be content with a single performance of each of the selections, the Complete collection allows the more curious to develop an appreciation for diversity across the performances of any given tune. This is very much in-the-moment music-making. My guess is that, back in 1970, the greater Los Angeles area probably had more than a few passionate listeners who showed up at The Lighthouse for all four sets on all three nights. The new Blue Note release allows one to share that enthusiasm through a “virtual” experience. Such listeners are likely to experience some joyous lessons in how listening to jazz is more about the “making” than about “what is made.”