Recorda Me

Joe Henderson (tenor sax), Kenny Dorham (trumpet), McCoy Tyner (piano), Butch Warren (bass) and Pete La Roca (drums). From the album Page One (1963).

Pete La Roca was an American jazz drummer who took this name when he was playing timbales in Latin bands for six years. In 1957 Max Roach recommended him to Sonny Rollins, with whom he stayed until 1959, and participated in the album A Night at the Village Vanguard. That same year he recorded with Jackie McLean and a quartet with Tony Scott, Bill Evans and Jimmy Garrison, and later accompanied pianists such as Steve Kuhn, Don Friedman and Paul Bley.

He also played with Slide Hampton, the John Coltrane Quartet in 1960, Art Farmer, Freddie Hubbard and Charles Lloyd among others. In addition, he formed his own group, worked as the house drummer at the Jazz Workshop in Boston and recorded two albums as a leader. La Roca left music in 1968 to work as a lawyer, but returned in 1979. He died of lung cancer in 2012 at the age of 74.

This popular theme has a catchy melody with Brazilian rhythm at medium tempo and is played by Henderson and Dorham in unison. Henderson begins by performing his solo brilliantly, exchanging intricate phrases with a more moderate melodic line. Dorham follows him with a smooth and uncomplicated solo that he executes with mastery. Then Tyner comes in building up his speech with lucidity while Henderson and Dorham make a sound mattress underneath, and finally the group re-exposes the theme.