In Love With Night – 1978

One of the greatest baritone-saxophonists in jazz history, Pepper Adams spent much of his career overshadowed by the popular Gerry Mulligan.

While Mulligan had a light tone and a floating style, Adams had a more guttural sound and a style that tended to explore the lower register of the baritone, in time he became quite influential on the baritonists who followed.

On this Nov. 5, 1978 version of his “In Love With Night,” an Adams composition that he never got around to recording in the studio, the baritonist is accompanied in Montreal, Canada by Maury Kaye on Fender Rhodes, bassist Paul Dyne and drummer Andre White.

The picture might be dark but the music comes across loud and clear with Pepper Adams heard in top form.

-Scott Yanow