Frame For The Blues – Slide Hampton

It's easy to see why Maynard Ferguson performed and recorded this piece so many times: what he plays here is nothing short of jaw-dropping! We've formatted our lead sheets to follow the original Maynard big band recording, beginning with the melody and including the repeating shout chorus that sets up the out melody.

Many artists choose to start Frame For The Blues with the shout chorus first, and then play the melody. Our audio clip for this album starts at the melody.

This album was the first time Maynard Ferguson and Slide Hampton recorded together, but it certainly wasn't the last: Slide played trombone in Maynard's orchestra on 13 albums over the course of two decades. Frame For The Blues was a staple in Maynard's repertoire; it was first introduced on this recording in 1958 and was featured on Maynard's final album just one year before his death. In all, Maynard recorded Frame For The Blues four times and included it on his "Maynard Ferguson Hit Medley" on a 1988 recording. Since day one, it's been an important piece in his repertory, performed countless times. Clearly, this composition was a special one for Maynard.

This arrangement features soulful alto sax player Hank Crawford and guitarist Calvin Newborn. The lush arrangement is reminiscent of the original Maynard Ferguson recording, but Calvin's bluesy guitar certainly brings a different vibe to the composition. As you can hear, this arrangement begins with the shout chorus; indeed, this shout chorus is what many think of as the melody of Frame For The Blues. Like the Dr. Lonnie Smith arrangement, this arrangement is in C concert.

If you'd like to play this piece in C concert as played on the "Centerpiece" or the "Spiral" albums, simply purchase the B-flat edition of the lead sheet and use it as your C concert lead sheet.

Hank Crawford recorded Frame For The Blues a second time in July of 1995 with one of his soul mates, organist Jimmy McGriff, on McGriff's "Blues Groove" Telarc session. You'll find these two artists together on many recordings; you can check them out playing it together live on the video above.

We want to make special note of their 1998 "Crunch Time" recording for Milestone Records for two reasons. First, you can hear these two giants play a great soulful version of one of jazzleadsheets.com's standards, Clifford Brown's Sandu, and secondly, because our own Maureen Sickler was there with them at the session to soak up all those soulful sounds in person, as assistant engineer to the legendary Rudy Van Gelder.