Frank Strozier is one of those artists whose great talent never broke though to a wider audience. One of a number of Memphis-born musicians who came to maturity in the late 1950s early 1960s, he recorded extensively on alto as a sideman and led a few (too few) sessions, and finally left the music business out of frustration. There’s can’t something wrong with a system in which a Frank Strozier is unable to thrive.
A good example of what we’ve lost is Strozier’s 1977 What’s
Goin’ On, his second album for Steeplechase Records (after a 15-year(!) lapse
in recording as a leader. With fellow Memphian Harold Mabern on piano, Danny
Moore (tp) Louis Hayes (dr) and Stafford James (bs), it’s a consistently excellent
date. High points include Ollie, a tribute to Strozier’s friend Oliver
Nelson, Chelsea Drugs, with Strozier on flute, and Psalm for John
Coltrane, an intense, Trane-like ballad.
And then there’s the title track, which is why I acquired
this recording. On What’s Goin’ On, Strozier gives it everything he’s
got—a brilliant extended interpretation of Marvin Gaye’s original that burns
with passionate intensity. Harold Mabern follows with an almost equally extraordinary
solo, both performances supported to the max by James and Hayes. It’s the kind
of music that inspires and uplifts—qualities we all need in times like these.
Here are What's Goin' On and Ollie.
