PLANET D NONET PRESENTS DOCTOR PROFESSOR LEONARD KING

IN TRIBUTE TO JOE WILLIAMS

Eastlawn Records

Leonard King, vocals/cowbell; RJ Spangler, congas/tambourine/bandleader; Sean Perlmutter, drums; Trevor Lamb, double bass; Matt LoRusso, guitar; Michael Zaporski, piano; John ‘T-bone’ Paxton, trombone; James O’Donnell, trumpet/co-leader; Charlie Miller, trumpet/flugelhorn; Tre Smith, baritone saxophone; Christopher Tabaczynski, tenor saxophone; Alex Colista, alto saxophone.

Doctor Professor Leonard King is a long-standing member of the Detroit jazz community.  He is an excellent drummer and a vocalist, with a deep love for the work of the late, great Joe Williams.  One chilly, winter, Sunday afternoon, King asked the Planet D Nonet group if they would be interested in recording a tribute album with him, to honor the Count Basie crooner, Joe Williams.  That’s how this album was born.  It’s a “Live” recording.

Dr. Professor Leonard King spent thirty-five years as the drummer with organist Lyman Woodard’s organization.  For sixteen years, he toured the planet with brilliant saxophonist James Carter.  A very young James Carter began working with Leonard as a teenager in 1984.  Additionally, King leads several different groups including his Proportioned Orchestra, the “Oopapada” quintet and the Dr. Prof. Leonard King 16-piece Orchestra.

King opens this album with a familiar Joe Williams blues composition called “Who She Do.”  The Planet D Nonet band swings for Leonard as he delivers lyrics like, “She’s yours, she’s mine, she’s somebody-elses too.”  Guitarist Matt LoRusso sets the tone with his bluesy introduction.  Mid-way through the arrangement, King shows off his rich, raw scat-singing. Christopher Tabaczynski takes a soulful tenor saxophone solo, and Charlie Miller follows suit on his trumpet.

They slow the groove down on “The Comeback” with Michael Zaporski playing a downhome blues piano. The Doctor Professor is a baritone vocalist. He sings from a deep soulful place, displaying his range and offering an emotional delivery of these memorable blues lyrics.  There are traces of the Billy Eckstein influence when King sings the beautiful ballad “Detour Ahead.”

“Sad Song” is a funky arrangement with percussionist RJ Spangler driving the groove along and Sean Perlmutter steady on trap drums.  This is followed by a tune that Ray Charles made famous back in 1958. Later, Joe Williams covered, “Night Time is the Right Time” in 1966. King and Planet D Nonet have arranged it as a slow blues.

The jazz waltz rendition of the Joe Williams composition “Young Man on the Way Up” features a poignant lyric.  King also covers a song by an old friend of mine, the late great songwriter/singer, Benard Ighner who wrote “Everything Must Change.”  The composition King covers is titled “The Same Old Story.”

This is a “Live” performance captured on tape.  Motown singer, Doctor Professor Leonard King and the Michigan-based band, Planet D Nonet offer a tribute to the wonderful legacy of Joe Williams.  Their wide variety of repertoire covers all the bases, from the thrill of big band jazz to the more intimate ballads.

Reviewed by Dee Dee McNeil

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