The recording is a meaningful one for Don Was, who’s served as president of Blue Note since 2011. “James Spaulding! Man, I don’t know if he was ever captured playing better than those nights,” he said in a video interview. “And the rhythm section, they’re swinging relentlessly. People sometimes complain about the recording quality of that album. I happen to love it because it is the 1965 equivalent of immersive audio. It puts you in that room, man. And it’s such a glamorous, romantic image. I don’t know what that club was like but I can picture it — subterranean, smoky and filled with groovy people.”
The trumpeter and producer David Weiss, who leads the Cookers, said, “With studio recordings you hear the polished versions of the tunes and that is why those records become classics. But with live, you’re hoping for that special moment where the band gels, and you reach that peak. For me, that’s Freddie Hubbard on ‘Jodo’ and Lee Morgan on ‘Walkin’’ from ‘The Night of the Cookers’.”
“Breaking Point” featured both trumpeters, but they really challenged each other on the Clare Fischer bossa nova tune “Pensativa.” Morgan, using a Harmon mute, was first to solo, followed by Hubbard on open horn. The two then exchanged 8-bar, 4-bar and 2-bar statements culminating in an overlapping interplay — or perhaps melee — until the ecstatic La Marchal audience just couldn’t take it anymore. It’s 22 minutes of fierce music.
“Compositionally, ‘Pensativa’ is one of the hardest songs for anyone to play,” the trumpeter Keyon Harrold said by phone, “but these guys make it sound so easy and so beautiful.” The trumpeter, educator and podcaster Nabaté Isles concurred: “That tune is so difficult. It goes through a lot of keys as it flows and you have to nail each change.”
The way the two trumpeters inspired and elevated each other during the extended battle remains an inspiration for Harrold. “That session was one of the reasons why I moved to New York City,” he said. “I wanted to feel what that energy could possibly be like. The best jazz musicians, you know, late night and just going at it.”
“The Night of the Cookers” was one of the last Blue Note albums with artwork designed by Reid Miles, who was responsible for the label’s memorable early visual aesthetic. The following year, Blue Note’s founder Alfred Lion sold the company and retired. The famous Brooklyn cutting session with Hubbard and Morgan marks the end of an era.
“The music is really burning, the artwork is great, and it’s on Blue Note,” the producer Zev Feldman said. “What can I say? It’s folklore!”