Houston Person - Goodness!

Houston Person was very much in a funk/soul jazz vein for Goodness! (1969), his sixth album for the Prestige label. The tenor saxophonist was still relatively unknown at the time he recorded it.

Guitarist Billy Butler and organist Sonny Phillips were the prominent sidemen on the session, which also included Bob Bushnell on bass, Frankie Jones on drums and Buddy Caldwell, congas.

To promote the LP Prestige issued a single with severely shortened versions of Jamilah and the title song.

As you can see Goodness clocked in at just 3:50 on the 45. On the LP it was over nine minutes. The single version is below.

Goodness



The Goodness! album was released on CD by Original Jazz Classics in 1995 and cheap copies of it abound on Amazon and elsewhere. It isn't available as a download.

Here's the full length version of Jamilah from the LP.

Houston Person - Close to You (single)

Like his main influence Gene Ammons, tenor saxophonist Houston Person has often found himself recording as part of an organ combo. He's accumulated an extensive catalogue of releases since he began recording in the 1960s. A good chunk of it, particularly his later albums for Muse and High Note, is available in digital formats.

The Close to You single (the "A" side was Son of Man) was taken from a 1970 Prestige album Person to Person!, recorded by a combo that included guitarist Grant Green and organist Sonny Phillips.

I'm not sure whether the single was sold commercially, since the only copies I've seen have been labelled or stamped as DJ promos. In any case the 45 version of Close to You runs less than half the length of the album cut, which is over five minutes. Below is a link to the single edit that was shipped to radio stations.

Close to You



Person to Person! and another 1970 release Houston Express were combined on a 1996 CD release, Legends of Acid Jazz.

It's out of print but is still available in the Amazon Marketplace. Unfortunately, it carries a rather hefty price tag.

None of Houston Person's recordings for Prestige in the 1960s and '70s appear to have been made available via downloads.

Here's a wonderful Person performance from a date at the Iridium in New York City in January 2012. Excellent audio and video quality.