In February 1954 Art Blakey was 34. Born in Pittsburgh, he had drummed for Fletcher Henderson in 1939, spent the middle of the 1940s in Billy Eckstine's big band, and worked a year with Buddy DeFranco. The wider public was only starting to catch up. Leonard Feather, in the original notes, puts it plainly:
Art Blakey's extraordinary talent antedated his recent public recognition by far too many years.
Leonard Feather, original liner notes
The night was Sunday, February 21, 1954, the eve of Washington's Birthday, at Birdland on Broadway, a room below street level. Rudy Van Gelder recorded it, and Pee Wee Marquette did the announcing. Clifford Brown played trumpet and Lou Donaldson alto, with Horace Silver on piano and Curly Russell on bass. Feather credits the crowd: people who came to listen, so the band knew it was being heard. The quintet played five sets, and about 20 performances were taped. Ten were used, five on each 12-inch volume. Most of them had already come out in 1954 on three 10-inch LPs.
Side one opens with "Wee-Dot," a 12-bar blues by J.J. Johnson, and Feather singles out Brown's solo on it. "If I Had You," an old British standard, is Donaldson's ballad. The side ends with Silver's "Quicksilver." Volume 1 has a different take of it; this one had not been issued before.
Side two is two Charlie Parker themes. Feather notes that "Now's the Time," a 12-bar blues, was written some time before the hit "The Hucklebuck." "Confirmation" closes the record.
Later critics were not all sure of this half of the night. Scott Yanow, as quoted by Wikipedia, heard "extraordinary high points" on it, next to stretches where the band sounded tired or underprepared.
The sleeve credits Reid Miles and John Hermansader for the design and Francis Wolff for photography.
Two more tunes from the night, "The Way You Look Tonight" and "Lou's Blues," stayed in the vault and turned up decades later, first on LP and then on the CD. Feather added a line to his notes after Clifford Brown was killed in a car accident in June 1956. He gave the date as June 27, though his own notes for the Memorial Album (BLP 1526) say June 26. Thirteen days after Birdland, Blakey and Silver were back on a Blue Note date together, playing for Miles Davis.
