The Forgotten Fusions of Freddie Hubbard (1981-89)

Fusion jazz was as good as dead by 1980. Well, maybe not dead – but definitely not as cool or cutting-edge as it was only a decade before. It was also no longer the “fusion” of jazz, rock and funk it once was. At the turn of the eighties, fusion was much more informed by disco, itself a victim of popular – and, not-so-arguably, racist and homophobic – backlash by then.

For all the jazz players mining fusion throughout the seventies, many of whom became stars during this period, most saw the writing on the wall. The times were changing…yet again. Fusion players began to splinter off: some going back (awkwardly and inconsequentially) to their acoustic roots while others swam easily into the warm waters of “smooth jazz.” Some soldiered on, wherever it took them.

Consider trumpeter and flugelhorn player Freddie Hubbard (1938-2008). He easily and successfully traversed the worlds of bebop, post-bop, modal, free (“new thing”) and soul jazz in the sixties before launching into fusion at CTI in the seventies, beginning with his landmark album Red Clay (1970).

Shortly after winning a Grammy Award for his 1971 album First Light, the trumpeter left CTI for a highly lucrative contract (that CTI could not afford to match) at the mega-major Columbia label, home to fusion legends Weather Report, Herbie Hancock, John McLaughlin’s Mahavishnu Orchestra and (later) Chick Corea’s Return to Forever.

Oh, and someone named Miles – a frequent challenger to Freddie Hubbard in the polls and the charts throughout the years.

Between 1974 and 1980, Hubbard waxed seven studio records for Columbia, including his most divisive album (and a favorite of this writer), Windjammer (1976). Produced and arranged by Hubbard’s fellow CTI All Star alum Bob James, Windjammer became – and remains – Freddie Hubbard’s best-selling and highest-charting album, reaching #85 in the Billboard Top 200 in 1976.

The last Freddie Hubbard album to even crack the Billboard Top 200 – on Columbia or any label – was the superb 1978 Super Blue, essentially a CTI All Stars reunion. Hubbard’s particularly fine, but regrettably-titled Skagly (1980) made a minor dent on jazz radio. But even jazz radio stations were starting to vanish around the country by then.

In October 1980, Columbia “dropped” Freddie Hubbard (as well as Stan Getz and Wilbert Longmire) from the label – a mere five months after the release of Skagly, despite the album reaching number 14 that year on the Billboard Jazz chart. Apparently, that wasn’t good enough.

Oddly, though, Hubbard blamed his lack of success at Columbia on Bob James, of all people.

”I think Columbia relied too much on Bob James to produce jazz artists,” Hubbard told DownBeat in November 1981. “He wasn’t really a jazz producer. He was trying to get me away from jazz, which he did. Bob would just come in and lay down the tracks. I had to fit into what he had laid out. That was a mistake ‘cause there was no looseness.”

Outside of Windjammer, though, James had no known input on any other Hubbard album. It’s also unlikely James would have had the time for Hubbard after their lone album together as James was engaged with setting up his own Tappan Zee label and its artist roster – one that did not include the trumpeter in any way. But at least Hubbard himself considered Windjammer “a pretty good album.”

II.

If Hubbard seemed bitter, his departure from Columbia freed him from whatever burdens Columbia imposed upon him---to do the exact same thing. While he was now a free agent, able to chart the waters of a new decade of ever-evolving tastes, technology and up-and-coming talent (notably a young lion named Wynton) he kept putting out more commercially-oriented fare. For a while, at least.

Now something of an elder stateman, Hubbard, only in his early forties, was busier than ever. He had a strong repertoire of originals and standards and was consistently able to keep a working band together. Hubbard did gigs on both the West and East Coasts, played festival dates all over the world and was often a featured soloist with many college bands.

A lot of these live dates were recorded and quite a few were issued during this period, most with Hubbard’s own consent. Hubbard also took advantage of many recording opportunities for a variety of American, European and Japanese labels.

Even though Hubbard was already part of one of the seventies’ only notable acoustic jazz groups, V.S.O.P. The Quintet (1976-79), he gradually returned to straight-ahead, or, as some would say, “traditional” jazz settings on his own.

The most memorable of these include the none too subtly-titled Back to Birdland (1981 – notable at the time for being digitally recorded), the all-star The Griffith Park Collection (1982), the terrific Sweet Return (1983) and the exceptional Double Take (1985), with Woody Shaw. Not for nothing are these Freddie Hubbard discs his best-remembered from the period.

Later in the decade, Hubbard would also take star turns on better-than-fine acoustic dates co-led by Benny Golson (1987), Kirk Lightsey (1988) and Art Blakey (1989) – all, notably, for labels outside of the U.S.

Still, he kept coming back to fusion. But the subject found Hubbard flip-flopping, as though the next one would be on his terms and the previous ones were on someone else’s terms.

“Everyone thought I was going after the money,” he said. “I’m the type of cat that likes to venture into all kinds of music.” But then he’d continue along these lines: “I know McCoy [Tyner] and Cecil [Taylor] have stuck straight on out with their thing, but my lifestyle is different. I wanna live good.”

While Hubbard hardly cranked out obvious Red Clay (1970) copycats, he did attempt to replicate First Light (1971) a bit more often than the market was willing to bear. Many contemporaneous critics were hostile toward most CTI records. But Hubbard’s CTI releases were held up as the trumpeter’s best recordings, particularly compared to his Columbia discs and these later fusion records.

Freddie Hubbard, whose sense of the market at the dawn of the eighties was probably not as sharp or as attuned as so many of his previous collaborators (consider, say, “Rockit”), he still waxed several albums of worthy music, nominally considered fusion music:

Mistral (1981), Splash (1981), Ride Like The Wind (1982), Life Flight (1987) and Times Are Changing (1989).

Without exception, each of these records – covered in the following posts – have at least one or more notable Freddie moments that are well worth cherishing and a perfect fit in “Hubbard’s Cupboard.”

Freddie Hubbard on Columbia

Wounded Bird Records has rescued many lost, forgotten or neglected LPs - mostly from the 1970s - by licensing them from the original issuers - who would never touch this mostly unprofitable music - for release on CD. Unlike the majors who own most of the music the label issues, Wounded Bird retains all of the album's original artwork, credits and track line ups. While the label doesn't add extras like unissued tracks, alternative takes, new liner notes or historical assessments, it does an exceedingly fine job of mastering the music from the original tapes - or superb sources - and rightly takes pride issuing the albums the way a collector would want the music on CD.

On June 9 - according to amazon.com - Wounded Bird will release six of the eight albums Freddie Hubbard made for Columbia Records between 1974 and 1980 (1975's Gleam has never been issued on LP or CD outside of Japan and 1978's Super Blue was issued on CD in 2007 by the seemingly defunct Mosaic Contemporary label) and two Hubbard compilations on CTI that appeared while Hubbard was recording for the Columbia label. That last sentence should properly end in an exclamation point. It's worth exclaiming.

This surprising announcement is welcome news to those who appreciate the great music Hubbard did for the label, most of which was critically lambasted and snubbed by all but a few at the time. This period of Hubbard's career, perhaps the last of his great run of records, is often dismissed or reviled by many today. Some go as far as to say that Hubbard's Columbia period makes his CTI period sound good.

Not me. This was some of the first Hubbard I ever heard, as I began buying jazz albums at the time his Columbia albums were initially released, and some of the finest. One LP in particular, Windjammer (1976), my first Hubbard purchase (when I obsessed about collecting anything with Bob James's name on it) remains my favorite Hubbard album of all time, even though I concede that he made many better, more artistic albums.

Simply put, this period contains some spectacular music. Hubbard rarely sounded as good as he did on his Columbia albums. As a player, he was at the very top of his game and he sounded in good form throughout. He is firmly in charge of the proceedings.

Even when the music was turned over to such arrangers as Dale Oehler, Bob James, (oddly) Bert DeCoteaux or Claus Ogerman, it was clear that it was Hubbard's choice - not some puppet-master producer's decision. Hubbard also lent quite a few memorable originals to these albums, some of which stayed in his repertoire long after he left the label. Here's a brief run-down of what's in store for CD buyers who will finally get the chance to have Freddie Hubbard's Columbia music on CD.

High Energy (1974): Freddie Hubbard left CTI Records in 1973, having become a much bigger star than most jazz players could ever hope to be, to sign a million-dollar contract with Columbia Records, long the home of Hubbard's hero and fellow trumpeter Miles Davis. In addition to the money, Hubbard sought more control of his music than CTI allowed him, and the opportunity to record with his own band rather than the all-star studio assemblages CTI forced upon him. For his first Columbia album, High Energy (1974), Hubbard did use his own band, a quintet that featured George Cables on piano and Junior Cook on tenor sax (both were also heard on Hubbard's final CTI album, Keep Your Soul Together), plus a collective sweetening of L.A. studio musicians, arranged with surprisingly minimal impact by Dale Oehler. There are two strong Hubbard originals here ("Baraka Sasa" and the album's single, "Crisis"), two excellent Cables originals (the Hubbard-like "Camel Rise," also arranged by Oehler for Bobby Hutcherson's 1975 album Montara, and the slightly well-known "Ebony Moonbeams," which Hubbard also covered on his Japanese-only live LP, Gleam, and Cables also performed on his 1975 solo debut as well as with Hutcherson on the vibist's 1979 album Un Poco Loco) and two Stevie Wonder tunes ("Too High" and the little-known "Black Maybe"). While the arrangements are more minimal than even those that Don Sebesky provided Hubbard at CTI, the electronics quotient is a little higher than usual here with Ian Underwood adding Headhunters-like synth effects (ala Patrick Gleeson), Hubbard employing echo effects and Cables on electric piano throughout. While Hubbard sounds especially strong here, very much in his element, the album never really rises above a genuinely engaging listening experience. But, in praise of the thing, it is a genuinely engaging listening experience.

Liquid Love (1975): CTI provided Freddie Hubbard with several crossover opportunities, one of which, "Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey" from 1971's First Light, even earned him a Grammy Award. But Liquid Love aims at some sort of crossover on Hubbard's own terms, something more of a "black music for black people" thing that Miles Davis wanted for On The Corner. This is the first of Hubbard's own albums that bears his own name as producer. Even the arrangements are from Hubbard or his pianist, George Cables. No orchestra here, but a lot of L.A. studio musicians are meant to either toughen up or soul-up the proceedings. The LP's odd programming finds the crossover material on side one - an odd-choice cover of Maria Muldaur's 1974 hit "Midnight at the Oasis" presages Miles's turn toward Cyndi Lauper's "Time After Time" a decade later, Hubbard's blaxploitation-like "Put It In The Pocket" (the album's single release) and Cables's rather indistinct "Lost Dreams," which the pianist revived on a 1991 Steeplechase CD - and Hubbard's more obvious menu on side two: the almost R&B take of "Liquid Love," harking back to Hubbard's Atlantic period, Benny Golson's "Yesterday's Thoughts" and Hubbard's own "Kuntu." The thirteen-minute "Kuntu," which Hubbard recorded live the month before on his Japan-only album Gleam, is the album's centerpiece, with Hubbard electrifying his horn - still sounding like no one else but him! - and good, long solos from Carl Randall, Jr. (?) on sax and Buck Clark or Myuto (sic: Mayuto)Correa (?) on congas. People either love or hate the fishy illustration on the cover of Liquid Love. Famed designer Storm Thorgerson thinks it's one of the 100 best album covers of all time. I like it too - particularly the awesome typography - but it's unlike any other cover in Freddie Hubbard's discography, and maybe in the history of recorded sound.

Windjammer (1976):. Even in 1976, this record seemed surprising and, to many, hugely disappointing. Hubbard left the auspices of CTI Records in 1973 only to record his most CTI (or Kudu)-like record ever for Columbia in 1976. Turning arrangement, production and, in one case ("Touch Me Baby"), songwriting reins over to keyboardist Bob James, Hubbard seemed to sense that the jazz winds were blowing this way. So, as they say, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em (or as The Simpsons' Mayor Quimby would say, "If that is the way the winds are blowing, let no one say that I don't also blow"). James, who played live behind Hubbard as part of the CTI All Stars several years before and was still recording for CTI himself, was signed in 1975 by Columbia Records to provide A&R services for such acts as Paul Simon, Kenny Loggins, Neil Diamond and Maynard Ferguson. These projects were such huge successes that by 1977, Columbia offered James his own label and Tappan Zee was born. Windjammer was perhaps the least successful project either Hubbard or James had ever worked on. But not only does it serve as a template for the work James would do at Tappan Zee, it really has some terrifically exciting moments that are hugely memorable - at least when given half the chance. Backed by a typically huge group of New York City studio pros, including soloists Eric Gale, Hubert Laws and Michael Brecker (Patti Austin and Gwen Guthrie are among the vocalists), Hubbard seems at times to be sublimated by James's charts or the occasional vocals. This is particularly true on the album's daft single, the MacDonald/Salter feature "Rock Me Arms," and, to an extent, James's own "Touch Me Baby." The covers are worth hearing, particularly James's near brilliant arrangement of Gary Wright's "Dream Weaver." Throughout each passage of the song, James perfectly spices the groove with different keyboard effects that work wonders on the basic melody, aided in no small measure by the unmistakable syncopations of Steve Gadd (who also adds his unique zest to "Touch Me Baby"). Hubbard solos magnificently here, seemingly engaged in James's clever take on the song. James also rethinks Morris Albert's dreadful "Feelings" and Hubbard elevates it to a new level that makes you absolutely forget the drivel of the original (Albert's original always reminds me of Carol Burnett as Eunice performing it on "The Gong Show"). The two Hubbard pieces heard here don't rank high among his output but are solid features nonetheless, particularly the title track, which features great solos by Hubbard and Brecker (and an oddly overdubbed passage by James). Both "Windjammer" and "Neo Terra (New Land)" - which, I believe, has been the only song up until now to find its way onto CD - feature Hubbard's keyboardist of the time, George Cables, shamefully buried deep, deep, deep in the background. This is one heck of a good album, warts and all. As a Freddie Hubbard album, it really isn't all that significant or notable (Scott Yanow calls this and 1981's Splash Hubbard's worst records ever). But taken as a Bob James album with special guest soloist Freddie Hubbard, it’s a monster of a good record.

Bundle of Joy (1977): I remember this album as if it was released yesterday. I always had it, yet I never listened to it. But it's a strangely satisfying record when given half a chance. As a Freddie Hubbard album, it ranks among the least satisfying he ever did. Still, there is much to recommend the album for those willing to sit through - and enjoy - it. Oddly, Bert DeCoteaux was the arranger here. At the time, I thought he was a softie, like somebody who would arrange Vicki Lawrence albums or something. But, oddly enough, he was a soul guy who helmed soulful projects by Albert Ayler (!), Marlene Shaw, The Main Ingredient, B.B. King and Ramsey Lewis. So you know what they were going for. There's a beautiful duet here, "Portrait of Jenny," that Hubbard plays most remarkably with the great, underrated harpist Dorothy Ashby. Even I am surprised how engagingly Hubbard and company covered Bunny Sigler's soulful, semi-disco hit "From Now On" (also covered by Lou Rawls and Linda Clifford). Hubbard really seems to respond to the groove, which ramps up especially nicely during DeCoteaux's nicely constructed bridge. But the best performances to be heard here, as expected, are the Hubbard pieces "Tucson Stomp" and, most especially, "Rahsann" (which, despite the spelling error, I presume, was intended as a dedication to Rahsaan Roland Kirk, who died shortly before this recording and who recorded several Quincy Jones sessions with Hubbard). Like so many like-minded albums of the period, Bundle of Joy, is "over arranged" to a fault and the type of album that jazz lovers revile and vilify. Soloists other than Hubbard are keyboardist David Garfield (on the two somewhat pretty pieces he contributes to the album), Ernie Watts ("Rahsann"), David T. Walker ("Bundle of Joy") and Azar Lawrence ("Tucson Stomp"). Worth a listen, if only to hear what jazz guys had to do in the late 1970s to sell records. Strangely, records like this really didn't sell.


The Love Connection (1979): Freddie Hubbard must have experienced a great deal of frustration and consternation by this late point in his Columbia career. After five years with the label and repeated bows to acceptance or salability, he hadn't found a hit that met with public favor or a successful formula that rekindled the critics' appreciation of his music. So he teamed with arranger Claus Ogerman, who'd recently provided Hubbard's former CTI-mate George Benson with two huge-selling records for Warner Bros. and another former CTI-mate, Stanley Turrentine, with two of his better post-CTI albums for Fantasy. Ogerman, who also provided arrangements for Jobim's best CTI records, doesn't seem like the right match for Hubbard. The trumpeter's title track is proof enough. But it does get better. Among the best songs heard here are the ones where Ogerman's magic gets to shine through. Such examples include Hubbard's "Brigitte," written for Hubbard's wife (and widow) and originally featured on Hubbard's 1973 album Keep Your Soul Together, showing off Ogerman's gorgeous string flairs and a lovely piano solo from Chick Corea. Hubbard rises to the occasion here, as he does on "This Dream," Hubbard's duet with strings and muted brass as well as Corea and bassist Stanley Clarke in top supportive form. The song everyone remembers from this record is Hubbard's lovely "Little Sunflower" (which Hubbard debuted on his 1967 album Backlash), with lyrics and vocals by Al Jarreau. Ignore Jarreau and, even Hubbard to an extent. What Ogerman does here is what he does best. And it gets even better, spectacularly better, on the gorgeous standard "Lazy Afternoon." This is what probably makes the Hubbard-Ogerman connection make the most sense. Both are at the height of their creative and collaborative powers here. Even Ogerman agrees. As he said in his beautiful anthology, Claus Ogerman: The Man Behind The Music (2002), "I say that the slow parts of 'Lazy Afternoon' arranged for Freddie Hubbard are my best work and all I can do as an arranger. This chart and its recording alone was worth my coming to the United States." The more up-tempo part of the track features sensational solos by Hubbard, tenor sax great Joe Farrell and interesting synth lines from Chick Corea. As much as the title track is worth listening to, everything else here is worth hearing too. The Love Connection was also issued on CD in Japan in November 2008.

Skagly (1980): The title of Hubbard's final Columbia album has always been confounding. "Skag" or "scag," in my day (or my way of understanding), was a derogatory term used for ugly girls. But there's a pretty lady pictured on the cover. So that can't be right. Unbeknownst to me, at least at the time anyway, "skag" was also the jargon used to describe heroin. So what exactly is Skagly supposed to mean? Who knows? Perhaps the heroin angle is what led many to believe that Hubbard's fall from the music (or grace) in the early 1990s was drug related, despite repeated insistences that it was due to a busted lip. The rumors still persist. However it's meant, I'm not sure what Hubbard is meant to be celebrating here other than a trip back to his roots. After his many "arranged" albums, Hubbard returns here to a focus on his own band - like he did, to some extent, on his 1974 Columbia debut, High Energy. This band features yet another Joe Henderson clone, Hadley Caliman, on tenor sax, Billy (William) Childs on keyboards, Larry Klein on bass and Carl Burnett on drums. It's a sort of a "back-to-basics" album with two Hubbard originals (the rather lame "Happiness Is Now" and the significant title track, which features a solo break copped from Herb Alpert's "Rise," of all things, and doesn't sound like something someone on smack would be able to do), a typically anachronistic ballad ("Summer of 42"), Larry Klein's "Cascais," arranged to sound like one of Woody Shaw's tracks of the period, and Childs's "Rustic Celebration," which features this pianist - a cross between Herbie Hancock and McCoy Tyner - at his very best. Sadly, the album came and went without much notice at all. Like so many of Hubbard's Columbia recordings, it's absolutely worth the effort, if for nothing else other than the good playing heard, particularly on the title track, by all concerned, even "extras" George Duke on clavinet and Doobie Brother Jeff "Skunk" Baxter on guitar (both on the title track only). Trombonist Phil Ranelin is also prominent in the background of two tracks ("Cascais" and "Rustic Celebration"), both of which seem to be striving for a Woody Shaw sort of thing - something the label, no doubt, forced on Hubbard and certainly hastened his departure to other recording climes. One wonders what Hubbard must have thought of the recordings he made with Shaw several years later.

Wounded Bird is also releasing two Hubbard compilations from his CTI years, Polar AC, which features a beautiful Pete Turner cover and was issued years ago on CD in Japan, and The Baddest Hubbard, which has never been issued on CD before.

The Baddest Hubbard features four songs issued on previous Hubbard releases - all of which should be fairly easy to find on CD outside of this collection. Polar AC contains five songs, three of which only appear here: "People Make The World Go Round," "Betcha, By Golly Wow" and "Son of Sky Dive" (aka "Sky Dive").

Freddie Hubbard – "Mistral" (1981)

Mistral probably derives its title from the cold winterly wind that blew Freddie Hubbard from his major-label perch at Columbia. Recorded over several days in September 1980, Mistral was likely recorded for – and financed by – the Columbia label. The recording was picked up and released a year later by the Japanese East World label and issued in the U.S. by Liberty, home at the time to guitarist Earl Klugh.

Curiously, though, the record is purportedly produced by John Koenig, then head honcho at his father Lester’s revived Contemporary Records. Koenig was responsible for producing the trumpeter’s guest appearances on two terrific records of the period: pianist George Cables’ Cables’ Vision (1980) and fellow CTI veteran Joe Farrell’s Sonic Text (1981). One wonders why this record wasn’t on Contemporary as well.

Joining Hubbard on Mistral’s front line is West Coast jazz legend Art Pepper (also on Contemporary at the time). In their only known recording together, Hubbard and Pepper are linked by pianist George Cables, who was Hubbard’s pianist in the early seventies and Pepper’s pianist in the late seventies. Pepper is not an obvious foil for Hubbard. But he’s no slouch and his warm tone holds its own alongside the leader, particularly when Hubbard is on the flugelhorn.

Cables himself returned to Hubbard’s band after several albums together on CTI and Columbia in the mid-seventies (the two would pair up again on Hubbard’s 1981 acoustic set Back to Birdland).

Perhaps the most notable addition to the line-up is bass wunderkind Stanley Clarke, who was experiencing a burst of his own popularity at the time. Hubbard and Clarke were captured only briefly before this: the latter as guest on the former’s The Love Connection and the former as guest on the latter’s I Wanna Play For You (both 1979).

Trombonist Phil Ranelin returns from Skagly to take a tasty solo on “Bring it Back Home.”

Mistral is a solid slice of good fusion jazz, but maybe a bit more of its time than many of Hubbard’s CTI and Columbia albums. It isn’t programmed as strongly as it might have been: opening with the familiar “Sunshine Lady” doesn’t promise nearly as much as the set’s fiery closer, “Bring it Back Home.”

The program is typical for Hubbard during this time, a few originals (at least one burner and a ballad), the requisite standard (in this case, Cole Porter’s “I Love You”) and some band features. Highlights include Hubbard’s terrifically funky “Bring it Back Home” (handily driven by Cables, Clarke and drummer Peter Erskine) and George Cable’s moody “Blue Nights,” which was also recorded with lyrics around the same time for Japanese vocalist Anli Sugano’s Show Case, also on East World.

Hubbard and company are surely at their best, though, on the album’s straight-ahead pieces, “I Love You,” and Hubbard’s “Eclipse,” first heard on his underrated 1970 Atlantic album The Black Angel. Both pieces were the middle tracks of the original vinyl LP’s two sides, landing like the lyrical second movement of a classical concerto. In other words, these two tracks are perfectly positioned on the record.

It seems someone could have tried crafting singles out of the easy funk of “Now I’ve Found You” or Clarke’s smooth-y “Sunshine Lady” (also recorded several months earlier by Clarke for the 1980 CTI all-star date Fuse One). But no one did. For the record, CTI didn’t try to do anything with “Sunshine Lady” either.

”A first-class mainstream jazz album,” said Billboard (September 26, 1981) of Mistral while Cash Box noted that “Hubbard is in a mellow mood on…this smooth ride.” Both comments seem at odds with one another, but both are true. Mistral is evidence of the tightrope many jazz greats were walking at the time. Here, Freddie Hubbard navigates that fine line particularly well.

Freddie Hubbard – "Times Are Changing" (1989)

”For his Blue Note encore,” reported Billboard magazine on November 7, 1987, “Hubbard wants to do a ‘big production record,’ similar to the early '70s CTI work – like First Light and Red Clay – that enhanced his following. But to do so, the trumpeter says he'll need a bigger budget than he had for Life Flight.

”The producer who best captured this type of sound, says Hubbard, was CTI maven Creed Taylor, although he thinks Bob James came close with Windjammer. He'd like to book Herbie Hancock to run the board for his next date, but says Hancock's schedule may be too crowded.”

On Times Are Changing, the last major-label release during his lifetime, Freddie Hubbard was unable to secure the services or the aid of Creed Taylor, Bob James or even Herbie Hancock. He didn’t get to do a “big production record” either – something that synthesizers made wildly unfashionable at this point.

Odder, still, is the strange delay that it took Hubbard to get out his desired Life Flight follow-up. This suggests there was not much agreement about either what this disc should be or how much money Blue Note would fork over for this sort of record.

The program and the production here is largely overseen by keyboardist and songwriter Todd Cochran, much in the way Marcus Miller was then overseeing such Miles Davis recordings as Tutu (1986) and Music from Siesta (1987). Basically, the nominal leader drops his signature tones over top already-crafted grooves and then it goes to market.

Todd Cochran started his career as a teenager in John Handy’s group and made a name for himself with Bobby Hutcherson (check out the 1971 disc Head On). Cochran recorded two of his own albums as Bayeté for Prestige in the early seventies, memorably waxing the song “Free Angela,” which would later get covered by Santana.

Cochran would go on to form the pop-rock band Automatic Man, a short-lived venture he co-founded with drummer and former Santana co-founder Michael Shrieve. Cochran went on to be a session player and songwriter for sessions by Stanley Clarke, Stanley Turrentine, Stix Hooper and many others.

He had previously worked with Hubbard on Stanley Clarke’s “Together Again,” from the bassist’s 1979 album I Wanna Play for You. He also played on the title song to CTI’s Fuse One sequel Silk (1981), again with Clarke.

Hardly surprising then that Cochran brought some of his friends along for this date, including Michael Shrieve on percussion, Stix Hooper on drums (“Spanish Rose,” “Times ‘R Changin”) and Stanley Clarke on bass (“Spanish Rose”).

Also present throughout is percussionist Munyungo (here as “Munyango”) Jackson, a frequent Cochran associate. Jackson and Hubbard had recently appeared together on Norman Connors’s 1988 “Samba for Maria” and the percussionist was on the 1980 Connors album Take it to the Limit, where Hubbard is the featured soloist on the terrific instrumental cover of Steely Dan’s “Black Cow.”

This disc’s opener, ”Spanish Rose,” is a pleasant, breezy confection that finds Hubbard seemingly comfortable in a south-of-the-border smooth-jazz mode. Clarke and Hooper give the piece a real jazz vibe that is mostly missing elsewhere here.

Things get even smoother on the very eighties-esque “Back to Lovin’ Again,” a piece that sounds as though it could have been on any direct-to-video movie soundtrack of the period. Hubbard’s familiar elegance keeps things interesting, but neither of these pieces have the memorable punch of a typical Hubbard composition. Think “Red Clay,” “Povo” or even “Skagly.”

The Spanish flair continues on “Corazon Amplio (A Song for Bert),” a lovely cover of Sting’s eminently coverable “Fragile,” and the longish “Sabrosa.” Enjoyable and listenable as each of these may well be, all these tracks sound as though they are competing for spots on the Miles Davis/Marcus Miller Siesta soundtrack.

The evocative “Sabrosa” is by trumpeter Tex Allen (Gil Evans, Vincent Herring), who also contributed music to a 1981 Jimmy Cobb album featuring Hubbard. Saxophonist Vincent Herring – who would later join Hubbard’s band and appears on Hubbard’s Bolivia(1991) and MMTC (1995) – also covered “Sabrosa” on his 1995 album Don’t Let it Go.

Remarkably, for all the pop turns here, Blue Note took no chances with Times Are Changing. Several wannabe 45s are heard here, but no singles were ever issued.

Take, for example, “Was She Really There.” This peculiar number gets a vocal turn from then-frequent GRP vocalist Phil Perry, with a muted Hubbard adding sugary squiggles. To be sure, it’s not your average pop confectionary. One wonders who thought it might be.

It’s credited to the mysterious “G.F. Miely,” who turns out to be San Franscisco-based pianist and composer George Mullally. He recorded a few albums in the early eighties credited to “George M’Lely.” Hardly radio-friendly, “Was She Really There” may well have made a better instrumental – for a different album. It’s hard to tell.

That Blue Note translated this disc’s title track into common English from its otherwise Prince-ly derivation shows either how little they were behind the whole project or how much they just didn’t get any of it.

Unfortunately, the song “Times ‘R Changin” is little better than anonymous mid-eighties electro-funk: a knock-off of more interesting fare such as “Rockit” (1983), “Close (To The Edit)” (1984) or an instrumental outtake from Prince’s similarly titled Sign “O” The Times (1987).

”Trumpet vet delivers the ‘production record’ he has promised for two years,” wrote Billboard in May 1989, upon the album’s release. “Though his track record on crossover attempts has been spotty, early radio response puts this in the win column.” (Initially, this was true. But while the record reached a fairly respectable number 19 on the magazine’s Contemporary Jazz Albums chart, Hubbard’s previous effort, Life Flight, hit higher, reaching number 13 on that very same chart.)

”Keyboardist Cochran,” continued Billboard, “has written what may be Hubbard's smoothest fusion effort since his CTI days.” Whoever wrote that obviously hadn’t really listened to (or liked) Freddie Hubbard’s CTI records – or heard any of the studio records Hubbard waxed in the subsequent fifteen years.

Like the earlier Ride Like the Wind, Times Are Changing is more enjoyable than memorable. Hubbard’s playing throughout is on point, but he’s definitely coasting on autopilot here, more or less noodling over top someone else’s music.

If times were changing, then Times Are Changing was probably more backward glance than forward vision.

After this, Freddie Hubbard never made another so-called “production record.” Indeed, health problems and a serious lip injury curtailed much of his ability to record in any situation as prodigiously as he previously had.

The few studio recordings Hubbard waxed hereafter were all straight ahead – with several guest appearances on other artist’s hip-hop records – and, in most cases, contain little of the energy or enthusiasm he displayed on the records covered here.

I, for one, am glad for these records Freddie Hubbard made. I love each and every one. I could only wish this great player, bandmate and composer could have found a better way to navigate his path to a crossover success that likely never happened to his own personal satisfaction.