Combo project - "Horace Silver Complete" fakebooks

Over the last several years, my Saturday adult combo class has taken on some ambitious projects. The first was playing repeatedly through a list of 100 jazz standards, trying to play by ear and from memory, rather than reading (we are not done with this project). Next was playing through all the tunes in the Thelonious Monk Fake Book, one or two tunes every Saturday for more than a year. After that was the Just Gershwin Real Book, then Charles Mingus - More Than a Fake Book. Following that was an effort to go through all the Tadd Dameron tunes that we could find charts for.

Our newest project is to play through the two volumes of the "Horace Silver Complete" fakebooks - Horace Silver Complete Vol. 1: The 50s (58 tunes), and Horace Silver Complete Vol. 2: The 60s (49 tunes).

We had hoped at first to check out at least one or two tunes each session, but it hasn't worked out that way. One reason is that many of these tunes involve arrangements that are more detailed than the usual head/solos/head format of a run-of-the-mill combo rendition. Another reason we've been working more slowly is that Horace's compositions are enjoyable and challenging, and some need several weeks, just to come anywhere close to getting it right.

We felt the same way about the Monk and Mingus repertoire, though we got through the list of Dameron tunes somewhat faster. As for the Gershwin fakebook, I think we all agreed that George and Ira in fact wrote a large number of pretty unmemorable tunes, along with the wonderful ones that made it into the jazz standards canon.

Jay Glacy, the editor of the two Silver books, has made a fine contribution to jazz education. I do have to say, after going through the first dozen tunes with the class, that some charts could have benefited from one more round of proofreading. It has been helpful for the class to listen to Horace's original recordings, both to check for typos and to understand the intended form of the tunes. Of course, checking the recordings is something that we should do anyway, since a lot of musical elements can't really be put into lead sheet form. The charts do include many shout choruses, bass lines, and harmony parts.

I'm hoping the editor will eventually publish one or two more volumes in this series. Horace recorded through the 1990s. He was with Blue Note records from 1952 to 1979 (27 albums). According to Wikipedia,

His final Blue Note album was Silver 'n Strings, recorded in 1978 and 1979. His stay was the longest in the label's history. By Silver's account, he left Blue Note after its parent company was sold and the new owners were not interested in promoting jazz. In 1980, he formed the record label Silveto, "dedicated to the spiritual, holistic, self-help elements in music"...Silver also formed Emerald at the same time, a label for straight-ahead jazz, but it was short-lived. 

From 1993 to 1999, Horace recorded five more albums for Columbia, Impulse, and Verve.

Here is Horace's Wikipedia bio, and here is his discography. 

Here are the Amazon links for the two volumes:

Horace Silver Complete Vol. 1: The 50s 
Horace Silver Complete Vol. 2: The 60s 

The books, as well as pdf versions, are also available from reallygoodmusic.com.