Freddie Hubbard - At The Club (Live) Vol. 1 (2020)

A magnificent recording to be released on December 21st is Ernie Garside Presents: At The Club Volume 1. The album/CD release is a taped live recording of the Freddie Hubbard Quintet at the Roundhouse in London in March 1983. The recording captured an amazing energetic Freddie Hubbard and his quintet performing five tunes. The five tunes consist of recordings from CTI and straight-ahead standards.

The quintet pulled together on this date included Freddie Hubbard on trumpet and flugelhorn, Hilton Ruiz on piano, Bob Sheppard on sax and flute, Herbie Lewis on bass, and Carl Allen on drums. A fantastic fiery line up that the recording displays in all its burning musicality. The five tunes recorded are shown here on the backside of the forthcoming CD:

The performance of First Light is glorious. In retrospective, jazz history accounts for Hubbard’s CTI work as some of his greatest. The Grammy-winning First Light is performed by this quintet stripped of the electric fusion elements that characterized the original. While fusion, in general, was heavily criticized at the time by critics, First Light in this recording puts on display an unquestionable greatness the tune respectfully deserves. Hubbard is simply magnificent. Hilton Ruiz, perhaps in a moment of improvisation, hits the piano solo with Latin Jazz syncopations that surprises.