Mel Cooke, Freelance Writer

Greene - Contributed

For some, midnight is the witching hour, for others it is time to get ready to party. For saxophonist Tony Greene, just around one particular midnight was when the title track of his sixth album blew his way.

"The melody came to me after midnight. I just go to the tape and record, then carried it to the studio the next morning," Greene said.

What he recorded that night was his voice humming the melody. What is about one-third into the 14-track album is his saxophone leading an easy rocking Midnight Blue.

Easy-going reggae rockers are a staple on the set, on which seven original songs are interwoven with five covers, Greene playing soprano, tenor an saxophones throughout. Two of those originals, the hip hop Move In done with rapper Warfare and the closing Smooth Sailing veer from the rockers groove.

Gentle guitar work

Smooth Sailing begins with a sizzle of the surf before the gentle guitar work of Ernie Ranglin, followed by Greene's saxophone, the two musicians having an exclusive, expressive interchange.

Trottin' In, one of the cover versions, goes down the ska path. Greene said that the suggestion to do over the Lloyd Trotman came from Bunny Goodison. Junior Murvin's Police and Thieves was recommended by Greene's co-producer, keyboard player Mallory Williams and Rod Stewart's For the First Time was suggested by Mikey Thompson of KOOL FM. "I did it R&B for them (the radio station) and the reggae version for myself," Greene said.

After Greene played I Can't Take My Eyes Off You at a wedding on the request of the groom "the entire church stand up and clapped and I said I have to record this song". And the opening Concrete Jungle comes from his love of Bob Marley's music.

It has been three and a half years since Greene's last album, Evolution, and he puts the gap down to the extensive touring he has been doing, especially in Europe, with the Gladiators and the Mighty Diamonds. During that time, Greene says "everywhere I go people ask me if I am not doing an album". Midnight Blue was started last November, the title track coming in the process of writing and recording.

Greene says that for instrumental music "internationally it has a better taste. You can get shows and you can get sales, especially in Europe. It is how you put the music together, with good taste, and people will accept it". As for Jamaica, he says "if we put it in front of the people we can get results. If we do not, we won't get results. If we present it to the people they will respond to it".

While his last three albums, the mostly cover versions Evolution, the Christmas offering Bless and the Latin set Square From Cuba were saxophone only, this time around he has a couple guests. Boris Gardiner leads off Happiness, the single from Midnight Blue, before Greene takes the second verse, the order of voice and saxophone reversed on All of My Life, featuring Natasha.

Sax in Dub

The drum and bass pair of Sly and Robbie rock it in Sax in Dub and, apart from that feature role, play on most of the album. Other musicians on the project include Glen Browne, Dalton Browne, Mikey Chung, Howard Brown, Danny Axman, Mallory Williams and 'Sticky' Thompson. Hopeton Williams and Rome Gray play trumpet and trombone respectively, with Desi Young, Pam Hall and Keisha Patterson doing harmony vocals. Errol Brown, Stephen McGregor and Delroy 'Fatta' Pottinger mixed the album, which was mastered in Canada.

Gardiner and Greene will be heading to London in mid-December for a series of shows, as Greene says Happiness is moving in the record stores there. And on October 6, he will do a one-hour solo show at Kendal Macy's in South Beach, Florida, the first in a series in the department store chain's outlets. "I will do it on my own terms, according to the contract. It is going to take about a year to complete," Greene said.

This year marks 37 in the music business for the Alpha Boys' School graduate, who spent six years in the Jamaica Defence Force military band, seven years with the Sonny Bradshaw Big Band, and had stints with the Bare Essentials, Roots Radics and Kotch, then played with Dennis Brown for 14 years as part of Lloyd Parkes and We the People. The solo work began in 1980, at the suggestion of a fellow musician.

"Carl Ayton (drummer) said you must do suppen for yourself," Greene said. "I started my first album with $200." That was Grooving Sax in 1980. Mean Greene followed that debut full-length set.