Mal, Dance and Soul

Mal, Dance and Soul
Studio album by Mal Waldron
Released	1988
Recorded	November 25, 1987
Studio	Trixi Studios, Munich
Genre	Jazz
Length	71:07
Label	Tutu
Producer	Peter Wießmüller, Horst Weber
Mal Waldron chronology
The Super Quartet Live at Sweet Basil (1987) Mal, Dance and Soul (1988) Evidence (1988)

Mal, Dance and Soul is an album by jazz pianist Mal Waldron recorded in 1987 and first released on the German Tutu label.^[1]

This was not the first time that Waldron was commissioned to record the first album for a newly founded record label (cf. ENJA and ECM). The day before Mal, Dance and Soul was recorded, Waldron had been engaged as a sideman for the Marty Cook Quartet featuring Jim Pepper for ENJA, the label that produced Red, White, Black & Blue at the famous Trixi Studio in Munich. Waldron's favourite drummer, John Betsch, was part of that line-up. This was clearly a golden opportunity – with a time tested and brilliant rhythm section right on the spot, comprising Betsch and Ed Schuller on bass - to record a trio album with Waldron.

Pepper had once jammed along with Waldron in Portland, Oregon. Reason enough to stroll into the studio suddenly in the course of the trio session, his sax under one arm, and to declare that he was very keen to join in. And as jazz history would have it, Waldron and Pepper playing in duo, conjured up the ballad "Soul Mates" like a rabbit out of a hat. At the end, some compositions like "Blue Monk", "Solar" and "Golden Golson" were recorded in quartet line-up, much more than a casual jam session. As all this material wouldn't have fit on a Vinyl LP, it was saved up and released later on a CD of the same name.