Blue Note + Hammond Organ = 100% Funky Grooves

here’s more:

9 months after Patton’s “The Way I Feel”, he released an album called “Oh Baby!” with the exact lineup of the Harold Vick lineup from the above album. essentially, it’s the same as “the way i feel”, with Blue Mitchell replacing the obscure Richard Williams…

the coolest is this: Big John Patton’s debut solo album for Blue Note featured both Harold Vick AND Fred Jackson (who i mentioned earlier)! of course, Grant Green & Ben Dixon are on that one, too! : )
Dixon, the musical drummer, penned half of the half-dozen pieces on that record.

guys like jackson & vick, were relatively unknown and not well represented on the blue note label. they mostly came from the R&B scene, like a Leo Parker. these guys had great jazz chops though, and a big, fun sound!

Vick, was a quiet southern guy who studied psychology and came to the “organ” scene, via Brother Jack McDuff. Jackson, had even less of a jazz connection, though he did appear on the first of 2 Baby Face Willette Blue Note organ cd’s. Of course, both of Willette’s cool albums featured – yup, you guessed it… – Grant Green & Ben Dixon.

Green has a cool album called Iron City, with Patton & Dixon, that was somehow recorded for a label other than Blue Note…

big john patton is prolly my fave organist. i’ve got every one of his blue note solo albums, except ‘that certain feeling’, which was never released on cd (save for the mosaic box set). i think i have every blue note recording he did as a sideman.

‘the way i feel’ album cover, hangs at my drum studio, along with a coupla others of his… this album features Fred Jackson on sax. if you dig this and the super cool Harold Vick disc, you need to check out Jackson’s one solo record for Blue Note – Hootin’ ‘N ‘Tootin from 1962. the name power isn’t there, but the music is! 14 original tracks, connoisseur series.

patton w/ grant green & ben dixon, were such a cool organ trio!!! in 1963, on blue note, there’s a hard-to-find (but worth it!) record called Blues For Lou, under grant green’s name. ben dixon, was the perfect drummer for this type of organ trio and he was also a fine composer, with a penchant for a memorable memory!

that harold vick album is a lot of fun and another typically great Reid Miles cover! that was also 1963.