Requisites

We Free Kings is a 1961 LP by the jazz multi-instrumentalist Roland Kirk. His quartet works through a set of bluesy post-bop numbers, with equal bop and soul. The cover photograph was shot by Marvin Glick and the album length is thirty-eight minutes and forty seconds.

To bring this project to fruition he utilized two different bassists and two different pianists. The personnel were: Roland Kirk on tenor saxophone, manzello, flute, stritch saxophone, Charlie Persip on drums, Richard Wyands on piano on tracks 3-5 & 9, Art Davis on double bass on tracks 3-5 & 9, Hank Jones on piano for tracks 1-2 & 6-8 and Wendell Marshall on bass for tracks 1-2 & 6-8.

All of the compositions are by Roland Kirk except track #2 which was composed by Sam Coslow and Arthur Johnston, and track #5 composed by Charlie Parker. The title track, a Kirk composition, is a variation on the Christmas carol “We Three Kings”.

The nine songs that follow were recorded in New York on August 16-17, 1961 for the Mercury record label. The CD editions of the album include a different version of  the Parker tune Blues for Alice.

Three for the Festival, Moon Song, A Sack Full of Soul, The Haunted Melody, Blues for Alice, We Free Kings, You Did It, You Did It, Some Kind of Love and My Delight.

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