Kenny Burrell & John Coltrane - Kenny Burrell & John Coltrane

From 1955, the year he came to prominence with Miles Davis’s first “great quintet,” the legendary tenor saxophonist John Coltrane (1926-1967) recorded with only one guitar player: the superbly versatile Kenny Burrell (b. 1931). In March 1958—the pair joined by the crack rhythm section of pianist (and Burrell’s fellow Detroiter) Tommy Flanagan, bassist Paul Chambers, and drummer Jimmy Cobb (the latter two Coltrane’s colleagues at the time with the Miles Davis sextet)—got together to cut the five tunes herein for New Jazz. The result is part hard-bop, part blowing session, and part tuneful bebop, with one very special intimate dialogue between tenor and guitar on “Why Was I Born?” the only duo recording Coltrane ever essayed with a chordal instrument. Throughout Kenny Burrell & John Coltrane, the parts add up to a thoroughly absorbing whole.