The Firehouse Five Plus Two: Variations on Some Themes

Jeff Barnhart: Hal, we both enjoyed listening to the Firehouse Five’s first “themed” album, The FH5+2 Goes South, last month that we agreed to cover a few of their subsequent releases. Now, we’ll take a listen to the albums (all starting with “The Firehouse Five Plus Two”) Plays For Lovers (1956; Good Time Jazz L-12014), Goes to Sea (1957; GTJ L-12028), and Crashes a Party (1960; GTJ M-12038). In all there were ten “concept” releases, and sometime over the next couple of years we’ll cover all of them. We’re grouping three in one column this time around because there are varying degrees of actual “jazz” content on them. Hal, we may differ in opinion on some of these albums, but that helps to make sharing this column so exhilarating! For instance, you mentioned there are less memorable tracks on Plays For Lovers than on Goes South. However, there’s a lot I enjoyed on this second release. Could you elucidate before we discuss specific sides? Hal Smith: Jeff, these three releases contain very few tracks that I really like. But Plays For Lovers does include three of my favorites: “I Can’t Believe That You’re In Love With Me” is given a West Coast two-beat treatment. Danny Alguire’s great trumpet leads the way, with terrific playing by Ward Kimball on trombone and George Probert on soprano sax in the front line. Pianist Frank Thomas, Banjoist Dick Rober