Seldon Powell - Go First Class - The Complete Roost Sessions (2011)

Seldon Powell (1928-1997) was not an adventurer in either conception or sound. He was a solid, consolidated modern tenorist with a big, full tone, a superb beat, and largely interesting logically structured ideas. Powell plays with invigorating straight forwardness. He has the ability to take you with him all the way, in all tempos, and on all registers of his horn. On ballads, he combines lyricism with guts, and on the up tempos, he really digs in. Barry Ulanov mentioned in his excellent notes, that Powell had a ceaseless flow of melodic inspiration, a very precise description of what is so attractive, both in his playing and in these recordings.