February 12, 2003

Forty-some years down the road, alto saxophonist Cannonball Adderley is not mentioned in the same breath as Miles Davis and John Coltrane. Still, he was an important part of jazz's glory days and a member of the Davis band that produced two of its finest moments, the albums Milestones and Kind of Blue. Adderley's solo career, which flourished after his tenure with Davis, produced music that was pleasant, if not particularly innovative, and included the 1966 pop hit, "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy."

Radio Nights was released last fall, along with Rahsaan Roland Kirk's The Man Who Cried Fire, Eddie Harris's A Tale of Two Cities, and Les McCann's Les Is More, to celebrate the debut of Hyena Records, producer Joel Dorn's latest project (in recent years he's been the force behind 32 Records and Label M, which, like Hyena, specialized in music recorded during the '50s and '60s). Radio Nights was recorded live at the Half Note in New York City between late 1967 and early 1968 and is as strong as anything Adderley recorded for Capitol, the label to which he was signed in those days.