Mercy, Mercy, Mercy

I recently downloaded it. Fantastic. But then, every Jaco solo is fantastic.

 

It's a Joe Zawinul song that he wrote while in Cannonball Adderley's Jazz Quintet in 1966. It has become something of a Jazz "standard" - I've played it quite a few times in Jazz workshops or Jams. Slightly odd "form" but nothing difficult.

 

Quite an odd form. Great song though. I truly didn't know that Jaco did it.

I suggest the version with Zawinul and both Adderlys.

 

...even '70s Pop-sters The Buckinghams("Kind Of Drag", "Don't You Care", etc) covered "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy"(definitely an example of what is known as 'Soul Jazz'...a sub-genre of Hard Bop).

Jaco was into all that sorta R&B stuff...I imagine he covered this tune on one of the Live In NYC discs.

 

Yes, I've got an album called "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy" which is definitely going for a Soul vibe and although it was a studio project it has a very audible and appreciative audience. I guess this was the Jazzers trying to make their music popular/accessible to an audience that was changing in the 60s.

I mean the Adderleys are definitely Hard Bop, but then Joe Zawinul with electric piano is like a concession to what was happening in popular music; but I suppose they weren't entirely successful in the end, as Jazz in this style diappeared from public view and by about 1970 Zawinul was into full-on Fusion.

If you look at the catalogues - the Adderleys seem to have been doing very well right up to '66 and then - nothing - there are no albums from either of them until 73/74 ??