Wayne Shorter and the Roar of 1964
Celebrating the 60th Anniversary of Wayne Shorter's Monumental Year
Music history is replete with stories about magical gigs that launched careers, songs that went supernova on the radio, and legendary debut albums that put an artist on the map. Those breakout moments on an artist’s timeline continue to spawn books, biopics, and podcasts, in addition to providing foundational fodder for barstool arguments about “when” an artist truly came into their own.
Wayne Shorter's breakout required an entire year—a colossal accomplishment rooted in dedication and perseverance. It wasn’t a single moment, song, album, or gig that catapulted him to fame—nor am I dismissing the decade of woodshedding, road work, and study of his prior decade—but Wayne’s accomplishments in 1964 would make anyone feel like a slacker. Hell, he didn’t even need the entire year! Wayne would enter Rudy Van Gelder Studio on February 10 for his first recording session that year and close the door behind him on Christmas Eve. Calling the 318 days between “productive” understates the hugeness of Wayne Shorter’s achievements.
In 1964, Wayne Shorter:
Signed with Blue Note records, recording three albums as a leader.
Penned twenty four new compositions.
Recorded three albums with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers.
Performed as a sideman on Lee Morgan's Search For The New Land, Grachan Moncur III’s Some Other Stuff, and Gil Evans's The Individualism of Gil Evans.
Left the Jazz Messengers after five years to join Miles Davis's new group, soon to be known as The Second Great Quintet.
Recorded the live album Miles in Berlin with his new Miles brethren that September, only days after joining, and already they sounded like one of the best bands in the world. But that’s a story for another time—first, let’s take a moment to discuss Wayne’s road to ‘64.
Shorter’s creative, imaginative, and artistic proclivities were evident since childhood, and by the time he completed a stint in the army, Wayne and his tenor sax were primed for action. Mid-to-late 50s gigs with Horace Silver and Maynard Ferguson were a warm-up for his first big moment: Shorter enrolled in what some called the University of Art Blakey. Wayne Shorter was invited to become one of Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers.
Shorter spent about five years under Blakey’s tutelage, growing substantially as a player, performer, and composer as he absorbed lessons from a demanding headmaster. Blakey’s high expectations for Shorter were identical to the other Jazz Messengers—commitment, teamwork, musicianship, and compositional contributions. Shorter dug into these assignments while watching Blakey closely to learn how to choose and lead a band. Years in the studio and on the road with his fellow Messengers honed his already formidable chops to a fine edge. Here’s a look at Shorter’s early days with the Jazz Messengers tackling the iconic “A Night in Tunisia” from 1959 with Lee Morgan:
And four years later, leaning into “I Didn’t Know What Time It Was,” this time with Freddie Hubbard on trumpet and an expanded Messengers lineup with Curtis Fuller on trombone.
Shorter’s tenor sax work was marvelous. But it’s composing where Wayne Shorter TRULY over-delivered, driving his tenure as a Jazz Messenger from freshman to valedictorian over ~20 studio and live records. It also became the beacon that attracted the attention of Miles Davis, who’d been circling the Shorter-directed Jazz Messengers as he sought to complete his latest group.
While Art Blakey couldn’t have been happy with Miles for pinching his star player, Blakey was also committed to this kind of turnover as part of the Jazz Messengers prime directive—his band wasn’t a hard-bop tribute or nostalgia act. Churn was a feature, not a bug. Blakey always sought another group of youngsters to mentor and create another generation of talented jazzers. The Jazz Messengers would remain one of hard bops’ longest and most influential talent incubators, producing many jazz legends under Blakey’s hybrid roles of bandleader, drummer, drill Sergeant, teacher, talent scout, spiritual leader, and mentor.
Wayne Shorter bid adieu to the Jazz Messengers with style, choosing to utilize the advanced hard bop he'd evolved with them as the roots for his first Blue Note album as a leader, Night Dreamer. From the first spin, it's clear that Art Blakey's teachings left a mark: hard bop was in Shorter's DNA, and its foundations here are palpable. But Shorter wanted an approach that marched to a different drummer. Enter Elvin Jones, moonlighting from his day job with the John Coltrane Quartet, who’d be the sole constant across Shorter’s three albums for Blue Note that year. To my ears, the presence of Jones has the greatest impact on challenging my expectations when listening to this record in the context of Wayne Shorter’s Jazz Messenger records. With Art Blakey on the drum stool, he’s king of the press roll setup which drops on a dime into a swing that’ll knock you into next week. Jones has a looser attack that sometimes challenges the soloist or adds active accompaniment—why shouldn’t a drum lead, after all?
That freewheeling, exploratory, rule-breaking approach was working for Coltrane, and it was clear that Wayne Shorter wanted in on that action, too. So in addition to Elvin Jones, Shorter invited the rest of Trane's quartet along for the Night Dreamer session—bassist Reggie Workman (also a former Jazz Messenger) and pianist McCoy Tyner. But Shorter wanted a familiar collaborator in trumpeter Lee Morgan—also a fellow Jazz Messenger with deep blues 'n bop roots. The Shorter/Morgan frontline never disappoints, and on Night Dreamer, Morgan’s presence has the additional bonus of giving the session a big dose of individuality—one never gets the sense that this is Shorter trying to imitate Coltrane on a hard bop date. Shorter’s choice of bandmates realizes his new compositions beautifully, transforming Night Dreamer into a farewell postcard to advanced hard bop and a glimpse into where Wayne Shorter was headed. Fast. Wayne wouldn’t make another record quite like it.
When I say it challenges my expectations, I mean that I lose interest in music when it becomes predictable, like when you know the shredtastic guitarist is reaching for "the note" and making "the face" or when the bass drops during a DJ rave set.
I recognize those are part of an entertainer's bag of tricks and are often crowd-pleasers that have their place, and while I’ll occasionally eye-roll when they occur, I’m never one to get in the way of anyone’s good time when it comes to music. Personally, I prefer the sound of surprise. Given the skills of this band, one might expect a busy, wailing, solo-driven ticket to Swingville that makes no local stops. Well, get comfortable and listen carefully. You'll hear the sound of Wayne Shorter coming into his own and on his own terms. Choosing a favorite track is challenging, but the title track or the sole ballad, “Virgo,” is where I’d begin if you’re new to the record.
It’s worth noting that before 1964, Wayne Shorter had clocked the fewest studio hours with drummer Elvin Jones than the other members of the group. Yet something must’ve clicked somewhere, as Jones would remain the sole constant in Wayne Shorter’s dates as a leader that year, though he’d never occupy the drum stool in another Shorter production. That said, Elvin Jones brings the heat to the middle child of Wayne’s ‘64 offspring, JuJu.
Wayne Shorter participated in two more studio dates before leading his next Blue Note session. In July, he joined inside/outside trombonist Grachan Moncur III with soon-to-be-bandmates Herbie Hancock and Tony Williams to record Some Other Stuff. He returned three days later to work on a Gil Evans album. Then, in August, Shorter led his second Blue Note session at Van Gelder Studio, JuJu. The Jazz Messengers were a receding speck in the rearview mirror as Shorter elected to be the sole horn fronting Trane’s rhythm section who joined him from his previous LP: McCoy Tyner-piano, Reggie Workman-bass, and Elvin Jones-drums. This shift from the Night Dreamer's advanced hard-bop quintet format to a modal-driven quartet invokes the Trane atmosphere, as Shorter clearly intends. However, while JuJu is unmistakably an ode to Trane, Shorter’s playing and compositional qualities never waver from “Wayne Shorter Logic”—his unique style is indelible. Shorter’s writing keeps the Trane atmosphere inviting though not overwhelming. Individual musical traits shine brightly, with top marks going to Elvin Jones, who delivers a masterclass in polyrhythms. The title track might be my all-time favorite Jones performance on any record, ever. It’s like a riptide with the undertow relentlessly pulling you in one direction while the tide pushes you in another. Hear for yourself:
A few short weeks after JuJu, Wayne Shorter accepted the offer to join Miles Davis in a group that would become known as the Second Great Quintet. The changes this would catalyze (on both sides) are so seismic the device capable of measuring the ongoing aftershocks has yet to be invented. But hyperbole aside, the first music this group would record would be the standards found in Miles’s live book, and the recording Miles in Berlin captured on 25 Sept showed them to be jaw-dropping with only a handful of gigs under their belt. Here they are three weeks later: