ProJazz.net

You, Baby is an album by jazz cornetist Nat Adderley released on the CTI label featuring performances by Adderley with Jerome Richardson, Joe Zawinul, Ron Carter, and Grady Tate and an orchestra arranged and conducted by Bill Fischer.

“As Cannonball Adderley moved with the times in the late ’60s, so did brother Nat on his own. While Adderley generally buys into Creed Taylor’s A&M mixture of top-flight jazz talent, pop tunes and originals, and orchestrations packaged in bite-sized tracks, this album has its own pleasingly veiled yet soulful sound quite apart from its neighbors in the A&M/CTI series. Give credit to Adderley’s successful use of a Varitone electronic attachment on his cornet, giving the horn an “electric blue” sound which he handles with marvelous rhythmic dexterity. Add Joe Zawinul’s lively, funky electric piano from Cannonball’s quintet, as well as the brooding, genuinely classically-inspired orchestrations of Bill Fischer that only use violas, cellos and flutes. While not always technically perfect, Adderley’s solos have soul and substance; his brief, catchy bop licks on “Halftime” are some of the best he ever played and on Zawinul’s “Early Minor,” he evokes a sense of loneliness that Miles would have admired. A lovely, intensely musical album, well worth seeking out.” – Richard S. Ginell/AllMusic.

Track listing:
“You Baby” (Ivy Hunter, Jack Goga, Jeffrey Bowen) – 2:46
“By the Time I Get to Phoenix” (Jim Webb) – 3:20
“Electric Eel” (Nat Adderley) – 4:58
“Early Chanson” [aka “Joe’s Blues #1”] (Joe Zawinul) – 2:25
“Denise” (Wilson J. Turbinton, Earl J. Turbinton) – 3:59
“Early Minor” [aka “Joe’s Untitled #2”] (Zawinul) – 3:45
“My Son” (Caiphus Semenya) – 4:28
“New Orleans” (Nat Adderley) – 4:20
“Hang On In” (Eric Knight) – 3:31
“Halftime” (Nat Adderley, Julian “Cannonball” Adderley) – 2:39

Recorded at Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey on March 26, 1968 (tracks 4 & 7), March 27, 1968 (tracks 3, 6 & 9), March 28, 1968 (tracks 2, 5, 8 & 10) and April 4, 1968 (track 1)

Personnel:
Nat Adderley – cornet
Jerome Richardson – soprano saxophone, flute
Harvey Estrin, Romeo Penque, Joe Soldo – flute
George Marge – flute, oboe
Joe Zawinul – electric piano
Ron Carter – bass
Grady Tate – drums
Al Brown, Selwart Clarke, Bernard Zaslav – viola
Charles McCracken, George Ricci, Alan Shulman – cello
Bill Fischer – arranger, conductor

_______________________

Released: 1968
Recorded: March 26–28 & April 4, 1968
Studio: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ
Length: 36:09
Label: CTI
Producer: Creed Taylor