Jazz has no shortage of musicians who were taken from us way too young. Trumpet player Roy Hargrove’s passing at the age of just 49 seems especially cruel. He was a searingly hot player, a brilliant composer and an awesome band leader. By the time of his death in 2018 he’d already amassed an impressive catalogue in his own name as well as being an acclaimed sideman for artists as diverse as Steve Coleman, Oscar Peterson, Jimmy Smith and D’Angelo. The New York Times called him ” … the most impactful trumpeter of his generation.” But yet as he passed we couldn’t help feeling he had so much more to give.
Hargrove’s 1997 album Habana with his band Crisol was a triumph. A glorious celebration of his love for Afro-Cuban music it won him a Grammy for Best Latin Jazz Performance. And so it’s a delight that seemingly from nowhere comes a new, never-before heard set from Crisol.
In early 1998, fresh off that Grammy win Roy and and his group of musicians from Cuba, Guadeloupe and the USA headed back into the studio to capture more magic. Until now that recording, Grande-Terre, has never been heard.
It’s a crackling album that excites from the off with a series of Afro-Cuban standards and Hargrove originals and reminds us, just as Roy would have turned 55, what a talent he was. It’s an album not to be missed.
This is our Album Of The Week on One Jazz w/c Monday 18th November