29th
Song for My Father is a 1964 album by the Horace Silver Quintet, released on the Blue Note label. The album was inspired by a trip that Silver had made to Brazil. The cover artwork features a photograph of Silver’s father, John Tavares Silver, to whom the title song was dedicated.
“My mother was of Irish and Negro descent, my father of Portuguese origin. He was born on the island of Maio, one of the Cape Verde Islands” (Horace Silver, quoted in Leonard Feather’s original liner notes)
A jazz standard, “Song for My Father” is here in its original form. It is a Bossa Nova in F-minor with an AAB head. On the head, a trumpet and tenor saxophone play in harmony. The song has had a noticeable impact in pop music. The opening bass piano notes were borrowed by Steely Dan for their song “Rikki Don’t Lose That Number”, while the opening horn riff was borrowed by Stevie Wonder for his song “Don’t You Worry ‘Bout a Thing”.
Allmusic reviewer Steve Huey praised the album:
“One of Blue Note’s greatest mainstream hard bop dates, “Song for My Father” is Horace Silver’s signature LP and the peak of a discography already studded with classics…it hangs together remarkably well, and Silver’s writing is at his tightest and catchiest.”
