The Adams Effect

                           Park "Pepper" Adams III
                                                                October 8, 1930 - September 10, 1986

"We called him 'The Knife' because when he'd get up to blow, his playing had almost a slashing effect on the rest of us. He'd slash, chop, and before he was through, cut everybody down to size."

--Mel Lewis

Pepper Adams, a scholarly looking, strong-toned baritone saxophonist, who placed first in the "New Start--1957 Down Beat Critic's Poll" makes his initial Blue Note appearance on this record. Born in Highland Park (a suburb of Detroit), Michigan in 1930, Pepper moved to Rochester, New York when he was five and began listeneing to people like Fats Waller over the radio when he was in the first or second grade.

He lived in Rochester until he was sixteen, picking up the tenor when he was twelve, and digging in particular the big bands of Jimmy Lunceford, Lucky Millinder, Cab Calloway and Duke Ellington. He played with his high school band and local groups and collected records by Ellington, Coleman Hawkins, Art Tatum, Benny Goodman, Don Byas, Charlie Christian, et al.
He moved back to Detroit in 1946 and switched to baritone, then worked his first big-time gig with Lucky Thompson. After that he played with just about all the young Detroiters who were eventually to make a success in the east (most on this label); Barry Harris, Billy Mitchell, Kenny Burrell, Tommy Flanagan, Paul Chambers, Don Byrd, Doug Watkins, Curtis Fuller, the Jones Brothers and Yusef Lateef. Sonny Stitt, Milt Jackson and Wardell Gray were others with whom he worked.

Pepper remained in Detroit until early 1956 when Oscar Pettiford got him a gig with the Stan Kenton orchestra. That band broke up six months later in Los Angeles, but Pepper stayed on the coast to work with Dave Pell, Shorty Rogers, etc. He came back east with the Maynard Ferguson big band--quit it in New York and then returned to the west with Chet Baker.
Once again in L.A. Pepper left Baker and came back to New York where he has since remained. He says that Hawk, Harry Carney, and Wardell Gray have been his biggest influences and names Carney and Cecil Payne as his favorite baritonists.

--ROBERT LEVIN, from the liner notes,
The Cooker, 1957, Blue Note.

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Biography from Wikipedia

Pepper Adams was born in Highland Park, Michigan. His family moved to Rochester, New York when he was young. and in that city he began his musical efforts. Then when he was sixteen he moved back to Detroit, Michigan, near where he had been born, and where he met several musicians who would later be important to his career, including trumpeter Donald Byrd. Adams now became interested in Wardell Gray's approach to the saxophone, later naming Gray and Harry Carney as his influences. He also spent time in a United States Army band, and briefly had a tour of duty in Korea.^[1]

He later moved to New York City, where he played on the album Dakar by John Coltrane, played with Lee Morgan on The Cooker, and briefly worked with Benny Goodman's band in 1958. During this time, Adams also began working with Charles Mingus, performing on one of Mingus's finest albums from this period, Blues & Roots. Thereafter he recorded with Mingus sporadically until the latter's death in 1979. He later became a significant member of the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Big Band from 1965 to 1978, and continued to record Jones's compositions on many of his own albums.^[2] Adams also co-led a quintet with trumpeter Donald Byrd, with whom he recorded a live date, 10 to 4 at the 5 Spot, featuring Elvin Jones.^[3]

He died of lung cancer in Brooklyn, New York on September 10, 1986.^[4]

As can be heard on his recordings with Morgan and Mingus, Adams's sound on the baritone was very big and intense – almost completely contrasting that of Gerry Mulligan – and so lent itself very well to up the up-tempo hard bop style that was prevalent during the 1950s and '60s. The styles of Adams and Mulligan are considered to be the foundation for contemporary playing of the baritone saxophone, and Adams's influence can be heard in the work of such notable jazz baritone saxophone players as Scott Robinson, Ronnie Cuber and Vanguard Jazz Orchestra "bari chair" Gary Smulyan, among many others.

Discography

As leader

• Pepper Adams Quintet (1957)
• Critic's Choice (1957)
• 10 to 4 at the 5 Spot (1958), with Donald Byrd and Elvin Jones
• Motor City Scene (1960), with Donald Byrd
• Donald Byrd and Pepper Adams, Out of This World: The Complete Warwick Sessions (1961), with pianist Herbie Hancock
• Encounter (1968)
• Ephemera (1973)
• Julian (1975)
• Twelfth and Pingree (1975)
• Live in Europe (1977)
• Live Jazz By the Sea (1977), live in California
• Reflectory (1978)
• Be-Bop (1979) Musica Records
• The Master (1980)
• Urban Dreams (1981), quartet with pianist Jimmy Rowles
• Conjuration: Fat Tuesday's Session (1983), live with trumpeter Kenny Wheeler
• The Adams Effect (1989, posthumously)

As sideman

With John Coltrane

• Dakar (1957)

With Ben Webster

• See You at the Fair (1964)

With Charles Mingus

• Blues & Roots (1959)

With The Thad Jones/ Mel Lewis Orchestra

• Consummation (1970)

With Lee Morgan

• The Cooker
• Standards (1967)

With Donald Byrd

• Byrd in Hand (1959)
• At the Half Note Cafe (1960)
• Chant (1961)
• The Cat Walk (1961)
• The Creeper (1967)

With Duke Pearson

• Honeybuns (1965)
• Introducing Duke Pearson's Big Band (1967)
• Now Hear This (1968)