Woody Shaw Quintet - At Onkel PO's Carnegie Hall Hamburg 1982

180-gram double LP

Includes bonus track "Diane"

Recorded January 13, 1982 at Onkel Pö's Carnegie Hall, Hamburg, Germany; Recorded by NDR Hamburg. Personnel: Woody Shaw - trumpet. flugelhorn; Steve Turre - trombone; Mulgrew Miller - piano; Stafford James - bass; Tony Reedus - drums.

Woody Shaw disappeared from the personal jazz-universe of way too many people after his early and tragic death in May 1989. Shaw represents a position in the recent history of the jazz trumpet, which hardly ever before nor after was painted so clearly, so precisely and with so much energy: as the quivering and delicate virtuosity of a coeval, who has absorbed virtually all earlier traditions — modernity and awareness for history as the spirit of jazz.

Shaw was at the zenith of his personal development as an artist at the time of the performance at Onkel Pö's Carnegie Hall on January 13, 1982; just imagine what he might have achieved had he lived longer than for just seven more years.

At Hamburg he was accompanied by a sensational group of musicians. All of them subsequently made news as artists in their own right: the drummer Tony Reedus as well as the bassist Stafford James, the pianist Mulgrew Miller and especially the young trombonist Steve Turre, who alongside Lester Bowie became the new young voice of the jazz-trombone shortly afterwards and who gave orientation to a whole generation.

The music — as documented here in this recording of a very intensive concert, as they could be experienced at Onkel Pö, besides the passion-driven, delirious performances by entertainers such as Dizzy Gillespie or blues-fireworks by the likes of Albert Collins — is a huge and important heritage of contemporary jazz. This heritage is now enriched by another sparkling facet. Those who listen, will learn to inherit.