Wailing with Lou

Lou Donaldson was no stranger to Blue Note by 1957. Ira Gitler, in the original notes, reminds readers that the alto player made his debut as a leader on the label, played on Clifford Brown's first session, and was on the front line of Art Blakey's A Night at Birdland records. His quartet, quintet and sextet sides were on BLP 1537. For this one he brought his own piano player.

Herman Foster was born blind in Philadelphia in 1928. He took up the piano in grammar school, and he told Gitler how it started:

"A girl taught me a hymn," he relates, "and I went on from there."

Ira Gitler, original liner notes

Foster moved to New York in 1944, played his first paying jobs in Asbury Park, left music for factory work for a time, and worked with the tenor player Eric Dixon. Then Donaldson hired him, for a week in Buffalo and a dance at North Carolina A&T among other jobs. Gitler hears in his chords the locked-hands style that goes back to Milt Buckner.

The date was Sunday, January 27, 1957, at Van Gelder's in Hackensack, with Alfred Lion producing. Donald Byrd played trumpet. Peck Morrison, born in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, played bass, and Art Taylor, a New Yorker who had worked with Donaldson and Bud Powell, played drums. Nine takes were made. Six tunes made the record; two tries at "Stella by Starlight" and a fast "L.D. Blues" were left over.

Side one opens with Juan Tizol's "Caravan." Taylor plays an Afro-Cuban figure under the first 16 bars and the last eight and swings in four between, and Byrd takes the bridge. Then comes "Old Folks."

Charlie Parker was the only modern jazzman to record this piece and Lou sort of pays a little tribute here.

Ira Gitler, original liner notes

"That Good Old Feeling," a Donaldson tune, closes the side. Side two has two more of his, "Move It" and "L.D. Blues," either side of "There Is No Greater Love," a song Gitler connects with Billie Holiday.

The sleeve was designed by Reid Miles, with photography by Francis Wolff. Four of the tunes also went out on two 45s.

The record came out in June 1957. Reviewers that summer, in Billboard and the San Bernardino County Sun, gave Byrd the solo honors. Two weeks after this date, Donaldson and Byrd were both at Van Gelder's on a Jimmy Smith session, and that June Foster and Morrison were back with Donaldson for another quintet date.