Trumpeter
Kenny Dorham is captured in his hard-swinging prime on 2025's archival recording
Blue Bossa in the Bronx: Live from the Blue Morocco. Transferred from tape reels recorded in 1967, the album features the legendary trumpeter leading a quartet with alto saxophonist
Sonny Red, pianist
Cedar Walton, bassist
Paul Chambers, and drummer
Denis Charles. While
Dorham never officially recorded this particular group on album, he was close with each musician; having featured
Chambers on his 1959 album
Quiet Kenny and worked with
Walton on several occasions, including appearing on the pianist's own 1967 session
Cedar!. This recording exists thanks to fellow engineer
Bernard Drayton having produced a short-lived series of jazz nights at the Bronx nightclub and recorded the proceedings. The result is a delightfully raw-sounding, fly-on-the-wall experience that finds
Dorham leading his group through a set of standards and originals, including his own classic Latin composition, "Blue Bossa," introduced several years prior on
Joe Henderson's
Page One. Here,
Dorham stretches out on the tune, bobbing and weaving with a boxer's dexterity, before landing a bold harmonic punch, his tone a clenched fist of intensity. It's a vibe he sustains the whole night, moving deftly between warm lyricism and angular harmonic exploration. The Detroit-bred altoist
Red is equally impressive throughout, evoking at turns the propulsive swagger of
Jackie McLean but also pushing towards the gruff edginess of
Sonny Rollins, especially on his showcase rendition of the ballad "Memories of You." It's also cool to hear drummer
Charles (who fell into obscurity in the '70s, before remerging in the '80s) dig into the bossa nova and hard bop grooves here.
Walton is perhaps the most impressive here, conjuring a warm, bluesy sophistication on
Dorham's "Blue Friday" and their urbane take on "My One and Only Love." Elsewhere, the group display their bop bona fides on "The Theme" and "Confirmation," the latter of which also features an ear-popping bowed bass solo from
Chambers. Though
Dorham continued to perform until two days before his 1972 death, his later life was marred by health issues, and his recordings had already become sporadic by the late '60s. Consequently,
Blue Bossa in the Bronx: Live from the Blue Morocco and the few other live recordings that exist are treasured documents of his daring, artful style. ~ Matt Collar
