Next up to join Blue Note Records’ Classic Vinyl reissue series: The Three Sounds‘ Soul Symphony. Like the rest of the collection, this edition of the soulful late-1960s standout session was mastered by Kevin Gray directly from the original analog tapes, and pressed on 180-gram vinyl at Optimal.
Soul Symphony, recorded in August 1969 at Liberty Studios in West Hollywood, capped off a run that saw The Three Sounds return to Blue Note in the late 1960s after years spent on labels including Riverside, Verve, Mercury and Limelight. The trio — pianist Gene Harris, bassist Henry Franklin, and drummer Carl Burnett — had already expanded their sound that decade, teaming with the Oliver Nelson Orchestra on 1968’s Coldwater Flat and working for the first time with producer Monk Higgins on that same year’s Elegant Soul.
For Soul Symphony, Higgins returned to compose, arrange, and conduct a full orchestral session, adding french horns, flute, guitar, strings and backing vocalists to the trio’s core lineup. The album’s centerpiece is the nearly 26-minute title track, a sprawling soul-jazz suite that takes up the entirety of Side One. Side Two features four shorter tracks with similar DNA, including “Repeat After Me,” which Higgins built on the kind of call-and-response structure associated with Baptist church services.
The record stands as the final album released under The Three Sounds’ name; Gene Harris would go on to record solo after the group split. Formed in Benton Harbor, Michigan, in 1956, The Three Sounds built its reputation over nine albums for Blue Note between 1958 and 1962, touring widely and recording alongside artists including Lester Young, Lou Donaldson and Stanley Turrentine before this final chapter reunited them with the label.
Soul Symphony is just the latest Three Sounds album to join the Classic Vinyl series. The trio’s collaboration with Turrentine and a 1970 live set from the It Club have also received fresh editions via the series. Other artists represented in the collection include Grant Green, Hank Mobley, Robert Glasper, and Herbie Hancock.
