Lou Donaldson has long been an excellent bop altoist influenced by Charlie Parker, but with a more blues-based style of his own.He helped invent two major jazz movements. In Lou-donaldson 1952, he led a Blue Note recording that became one of the earliest hard bop sessions. The date included Blue Mitchell, Horace Silver, Percy Heath and Art Blakey. Seven months later he recorded with trumpeter Clifford Brown. Then in 1957, Lou began recording a series of albums with organist Jimmy Smith that popularized the sax and organ trio sound. Throughout the 1960s, Lou's merging of the hard Picture6-32 bop feel and r&b groove resulted in a long string of successful albums for Blue Note that were built on catchy sax-organ riffs. The formula revived jazz as popular music in the country's vast network of urban clubs and bars, and the sound remains the major bridge between jazz and soul.
After a few years off records, Lou Donaldson's artistic return in 1981 and subsequent soul-jazz and hard bop dates for Muse, Timeless, and Milestone have found the altoist back in prime form, interacting with organists and pianists alike and showing that his style is quite timeless.
