‘The Congregation’: How Johnny Griffin Preached A Hard Bop Sermon

‘The Congregation’: How Johnny Griffin Preached A Hard Bop Sermon

On October 23, 1957, a 29-year-old Chicago tenor saxophonist walked into Van Gelder studio in Hackensack, New Jersey, to record his third album The Congregation, for Blue Note, the influential New York jazz label run by producer Alfred Lion. Johnny Griffin had just spent seven months working with Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers but was now focusing on forging a successful solo career. At five foot five inches tall, Griffin was deemed short in statu…