Inner Urge (Joe Henderson album)


Inner Urge is an album by jazz saxophonist Joe Henderson released in 1966, the fourth recorded as a leader for Blue Note Records. It was recorded at the Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey on November 30, 1964. It features Henderson playing tenor sax, along with pianist McCoy Tyner and drummer Elvin Jones. The album's bass player, Bob Cranshaw, was a regular member of Sonny Rollins' band at the time of the recording, and was also a frequent session musician for record labels including Blue Note, Prestige and Atlantic.

The compositions

Jazz critic Nat Hentoff interviewed Henderson for the album's original liner notes essay, and Henderson described the creative impulses behind several of the songs to Hentoff. The title track, "Inner Urge,", was a reflection of a time in his life when Henderson was "coping with the anger and frustration that can come of trying to find your way in the maze of New York, and of trying to adjust the pace you have to set in hacking your way in that city in order to just exist." Henderson also told Hentoff that "Isotope" is a tribute to Thelonious Monk and Monk's use of musical humor. Hentoff writes elsewhere in the liner notes that "El Barrio" represents Henderson's attachment to the "Spanish musical ethos", and that the piece was inspired by Henderson reflecting on his childhood in Lima, Ohio. Henderson is quoted as saying that he gave the other musicians "two simple chords, B minor and C major 7 ", and asked them "to play something with a Spanish feeling" while he improvised a melody for the piece.

Reception

The Penguin Guide to Jazz gave the album a four-star rating, describing the music as "dark and intense".

Track listing

All compositions by Joe Henderson, except where noted.
  1. "Inner Urge" – 11:58
  2. "Isotope" – 9:15
  3. "El Barrio" – 7:15
  4. "You Know I Care" – 7:22
  5. "Night and Day" – 7:24

    Personnel

Musicians