Herbie Hancock - Cantaloupe Island (comp.1994)

Personnel

Dexter Gordon 

Grant Green

Herbie Hancock

Billy Higgins

Freddie Hubbard

Hank Mobley

Tony Williams

Ron Carter

Track Listing

1-Cantaloupe Island

2-Watermelon Man

3-Driftin'

4-Blind Man, Blind Man

5-And What If I Don't

6-Maiden Voyage

A mini-retrospective of Herbie Hancock's early years as a jazz artist, this six-track CD touches on some of his best-known small-ensemble works from that period. Of his first five albums for Blue Note Records from 1963-1965, Takin' Off, My Point of View, Empyrean Isles, and Maiden Voyage are represented -- his third and perhaps most individually realized LP, Inventions & Dimensions, is not. You get hits "Canteloupe Island," "Watermelon Man," "Maiden Voyage," and three lesser titles, which remove it from "best-of" status. His sixth and seventh full-length Blue Note recordings, The Prisoner and Speak Like a Child, are also omitted. This is a decent, edited, and concise, but far from comprehensive view of Hancock's salad days, which some purport might still be his best.