Blue Mitchell's "Soul Village"

Blue Mitchell is often over looked when it comes to Jazz artists.

He got his start in the 50s playing trumpet with R&B bands but in 1958, Cannonball Adderly noticed him. He played with Adderly for awhile and then moved on to play with Horace Silver until the mid 60s.

When he left Silver, he formed his own band which included a young Chick Corea on piano. That band recorded a string of albums for Blue Note.

In 1971 he released a self-titled album, Blue Mitchell. It started off with the song "Soul Village" so the album is often mistakenly called Soul Village. This album was released on the Mainstream Records label. He released four albums on that label and they are considered to be not as good as his Blue Note releases, but that's just a matter of taste. If you are a hard core Bop fan you will enjoy the Blue Note releases. If you you enjoy a little funk in your jazz, you will probably prefer the Mainstream releases.

He later went on to tour with Ray Charles and John Mayall. And later became to principal soloist for Tony Bennett and Lena Horne.

I recently ran across "Soul Village" and I love it.



The album, Blue Mitchell, is available for download through Amazon. And seems to run for about $13-$35 for the original LP. I'm not sure if it has been re-released on vinyl.

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