Hank Mobley with Donald Byrd and Lee Morgan

Hank Mobley was born in 1930 and grew up mostly in Elizabeth, New Jersey, in a family of piano players. An uncle who admired Lester Young steered him to the tenor. Leonard Feather, in the original notes, names Sonny Stitt as his first big influence, and later Sonny Rollins. Mobley told Feather what he was after:

Not a big sound, not a small sound, just a round sound.

Hank Mobley, in Leonard Feather's original liner notes

He toured with Paul Gayten's rhythm and blues band until Max Roach heard him at a jam session in Newark and called him the next day. After Roach came J.J. Johnson, Miles Davis and a spell in Dizzy Gillespie's small group, and then Horace Silver, and the Jazz Messengers. When that band broke up in 1956, Mobley stayed with Silver's new quintet.

The date was Sunday, November 25, 1956, at Van Gelder's in Hackensack, with Alfred Lion producing. Silver was on piano, Paul Chambers on bass and Charlie Persip on drums. The front line was unusual: tenor and two trumpets, Donald Byrd and an 18-year-old Lee Morgan. Mobley explained the choice to Feather:

It gave us a limited range, and it was a challenge to make the writing interesting.

Hank Mobley, in Leonard Feather's original liner notes

Feather says Byrd's tone is a little more biting than Morgan's, though they come from the same school. Mobley wrote all four tunes. The day's tape list has five takes, and four made the record.

Side one opens with "Touch and Go," which starts with a fanfare. Silver, Morgan, Mobley and Byrd solo in turn, Chambers takes one with the bow, Persip takes one on drums, and the trumpets trade fours. "Double Whammy" is brisker and ends with an eight-bar chase, Byrd first.

Side two has the long "Barrel of Funk," a medium tempo tune that sits mostly on one chord; Feather hears Howard McGhee in Byrd here, and Chambers plucks his solo. "Mobleymania," also known as "B for B.B.," has Morgan going first.

Wikipedia credits the sleeve to Reid Miles, with photography by Francis Wolff.

Another take of "Barrel of Funk" waited decades for a Mosaic box. One week later, on December 2, Mobley, Morgan, Silver, Chambers and Persip were back in the same room, with Kenny Rodgers on alto in place of Byrd, for Lee Morgan Sextet (Vol. 2) (BLP 1541).