Cantaloupe Island

Hello! Tonight let's check out one of the greatest "all-star" groups you'll ever hear. This YouTube video is from the "One Night with Blue Note" recording. Blue Note is one of the most famous jazz record companies; back in the 50s and 60s, Blue Note was the hard bop record company. Many of the greatest players of the genre recorded for Blue Note - check out this web site and see the Table of Contents for a list of these artists.

The all-star group for this recording: Freddie Hubbard (trumpet), Joe Henderson (tenor), Herbie Hancock (piano), Ron Carter (bass), and Tony Wiulliams (drums). The tune is Hancock's "Cantaloupe Island," a straight-8ths tune, and a standard tune today.

All the soloists mix bursts of notes with bluesy motifs on this tune; that mixture is central to playing in a basic hard bop style, and of course there are an infinite number of variations on that mix. Hancock gets the most "outside" during his solo (between about 6:50 and 7:35 or so), in contrast to the more straight ahead work from Hubbard and Henderson. Can you tell the difference? Can you hear the points where Hancock starts to move away from the basic harmony of the tune? The ability to do that is important as a way to build tension during a solo, which is an important skill to master as you learn to play this music. The way you create tension in your lines and the way you relieve that tension is a major part of your musical personality.

We'll talk more about tension-and-release in future posts. For now...just dig this group!