The The Groove Masters Series: The Opening Round in Bloomington, MN

A fun and personable mix of
jazz
and
soul
classics plus a couple of originals by guitarist
Rodney Jones
,
Houston Person
's
The Opening Round: Groove Masters Series, Vol. 1
isn't a
album for the ages, but it's start-to-finish entertaining. It's a straight-up groove album, with
Person
in front of a four-piece organ combo anchored by the legendary
Bernard "Pretty" Purdie
on drums next to ex-
Waitresses
-bassist-turned-session-star
Tracy Wormworth
.
Joey DeFrancesco
, a disciple of the late
Jimmy McGriff
, adds funky Hammond B-3 throughout, and the song selection seems to have been chosen specifically to highlight his interplay with
. Heavy on the '70s
classics, it features effective though hardly groundbreaking takes on classics like
"What's Going On,"
"Let's Stay Together,"
"When a Man Loves a Woman,"
staying close to the original melody lines but thankfully not replicating the original vocal parts on sax the way that so many
smooth jazz
lamers do. Moving back a bit,
essays both the
Showboat
standard
"Can't Help Lovin' That Man"
and, surprisingly, the old
folk
tune
"Shenandoah,"
which he and the group transform into a bittersweet, elegiac theme. ~ Stewart Mason