Body & Soul

Tadd Dameron wrote the arrangements for a 1947 band that includes trumpeter Fats Navarro, trombonist J.J. Johnson, pianist Hank Jones, and drummer Max Roach. While the horns all solo fluently on Dameron's "Half Step Down, Please," it's the three ballad features for the leader that stand out, Hawkins drawing inspiration from Dameron's moodily dense harmonies. The settings are pedestrian at best for a series of 1956 recordings, with Billy Byers and Manny Albam writing arrangements. Hawkins bristles with individuality, whether soaring over a substantial big band on "The Bean Stalks Again," cutting a new path through a cluttered "Body and Soul," or counterposing his ruggedly magisterial horn to still fussier arrangements of "I Love Paris" and "Under Paris Skies." --Stuart Broomer