''Tears of Joy'' is a live double album by trumpeter/bandleader

Don Ellis Donald Johnson Ellis (July 25, 1934 – December 17, 1978) was an American jazz trumpeter, drummer, composer, and bandleader. He is best known for his extensive musical experimentation, particularly in the area of time signatures. Later in his lif ...

recorded in 1971 and released on the Columbia label.Don Ellis discography
accessed March 6, 2015

Reception

Thom Jurek of

Allmusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databa ...

said "''Tears of Joy'' is a Don Ellis classic. The sheer musical strength of this ensemble is pretty much unparalleled in his career. The trumpeter/leader had backed off—a bit—from some of his outlandish and beautifully excessive use of strange and unconventional time signatures, though there is no lack of pioneering experimentalism in tone, color, arrangement, or style. ...Ultimately, ''Tears of Joy'' stands as a singular achievement in a career full of them by a musical auteur whose creativity seemingly knew few if any bounds". On

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, Jim Santella observed "''Tears of Joy'' marked a subtle change in the Don Ellis big band. The trumpeter was gradually drifting toward popular music, and he was beginning to use the new electronic technology to its best advantage. However, he continued to load each arrangement with the kinds of musical features that have always left their unique stamp on his undertakings. Ellis and his other soloists stretch out with virtuosity while complex rhythms and dense counterpoint fill the air, and the band's sections taunt each other with adventurous forays. ...Highly recommended, ''Tears of Joy'' represents vintage Don Ellis big band excitement at its best"Santella, J.
All About Jazz Review
September 13, 2005 ''

The Penguin Guide to Jazz ''The Penguin Guide to Jazz'' is a reference work containing an encyclopedic directory of jazz recordings on CD which were (at the time of publication) currently available in Europe or the United States. The first nine editions were compiled b ...

'' said "''Tears of Joy'' is regarded by some as the best Don Ellis album. It's certainly bold and expansive".

Track listing

''All compositions by Don Ellis except as indicated'' ''Side One:'' # "Tears of Joy" - 2:58 # "5/4 Getaway" - 7:49 # "Bulgarian Bulge" - 4:54 # "Get It Together" (Sam Falzone) - 5:14 ''Side Two:'' # "Quiet Longing" - 3:48 # "Blues in Elf" - 6:41 # "Loss" - 8:21 ''Side Three:'' # "How's This for Openers?" - 8:37 # "Samba Bajada" ( Hank Levy) - 11:31 ''Side Four:'' # "Strawberry Soup" - 17:36 # "Euphoric Acid" (Fred Selden) - 4:25

Personnel

–

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard ...

, flugelhorn, drums, arranger *Lonnie Shetter – alto saxophone,

woodwinds Woodwind instruments are a family of musical instruments within the greater category of wind instruments. Common examples include flute, clarinet, oboe, bassoon, and saxophone. There are two main types of woodwind instruments: flutes and reed ...

*Fred Selden – alto saxophone, flute, soprano saxophone, piccolo, alto flute, arranger *Sam Falzone –

tenor saxophone The tenor saxophone is a medium-sized member of the saxophone family, a group of instruments invented by Adolphe Sax in the 1840s. The tenor and the alto are the two most commonly used saxophones. The tenor is pitched in the key of B (while ...

, clarinet, flute, arranger *Jon Clarke – baritone saxophone,

*Paul Bogosian, Jack Caudill, Bruce Mackay – trumpet *Kenneth Nelson –

French Horn The French horn (since the 1930s known simply as the horn in professional music circles) is a brass instrument made of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. The double horn in F/B (technically a variety of German horn) is the horn most ...

*Jim Sawyers –

trombone The trombone (german: Posaune, Italian, French: ''trombone'') is a musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate ...

*Ken Sawhill – bass trombone *Doug Bixby –

contrabass trombone The contrabass trombone (german: Kontrabassposaune, it, trombone contrabbasso) is the lowest instrument in the trombone family of brass instruments. First appearing built in 18′ B♭ an octave below the tenor trombone, since the late 20th cen ...

tuba The tuba (; ) is the lowest-pitched musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, the sound is produced by lip vibrationa buzzinto a mouthpiece. It first appeared in the mid-19th century, making it one of the ne ...

* Milcho Leviev –

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keybo ...

pianet The Hohner Pianet is a type of electro-mechanical piano built by the Hohner company of Trossingen, West Germany and designed by Ernst Zacharias. The Pianet was a variant of his earlier reed-based Hohner electric piano, the Cembalet, which, lik ...

, clavinet *Dennis Parker – bass *Ralph Humphrey, Ron Dunn – drums *Lee Pastora – congas *Earle Corry, Alfredo Ebat –

violin The violin, sometimes known as a '' fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone ( string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument ( soprano) in the family in regu ...

*Ellen Smith –

viola ; german: Bratsche , alt=Viola shown from the front and the side , image=Bratsche.jpg , caption= , background=string , hornbostel_sachs=321.322-71 , hornbostel_sachs_desc=Composite chordophone sounded by a bow , range= , related= *Violin family ...

*Christine Ermacoff –

cello The cello ( ; plural ''celli'' or ''cellos'') or violoncello ( ; ) is a bowed (sometimes plucked and occasionally hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually tuned in perfect fifths: from low to high, C2, G ...

* Hank Levy – arranger

References

{{reflist Don Ellis live albums 1971 live albums Columbia Records live albums