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Rich had been out of the Dorsey band for about a month by the time he made his first instrumental date of 1955 for Norgran in New York, this time as the Buddy Rich Ensemble. Shortly before leaving he had recorded a major part of the Dorsey band’s book in a marathon session ultimately issued by Columbia on three LPs after Dorsey’s death. They remain an exciting testament to Rich’s impact on the band. (Tom Lord’s Jazz Discography gives May 7 as the date of the Dorsey sessions. But that’s doubtful since contemporary press accounts reported Rich’s departure in mid April. And it’s unlikely, given their bitter feud, that Rich would have returned to Dorsey simply to record. In all likelihood, no accurate dates were kept of the tapes, which were made privately by Dorsey and later acquired by Columbia.) For this session, though, Rich worked in the Granz jam session mode – two trumpets and two saxes – without written charts and backed by Oscar Peterson and Ray Brown with Freddie Green keeping the time in a soft groove. Aside from the imperious Ben Webster, the other horns are drawn from the starting solo lineup of the Basie band, then under contract to Granz. Webster leads first chorus on Sunday, a long-time standard that had been the breakthrough hit for composer Jule Styne in 1926 and had become especially familiar in recent years as the theme song of The Phil Harris-Alice Faye Show on radio. The rhythm section is perfect all the way – balanced and always attentive. Frank Wess takes the first tenor chorus, followed by the tart Thad Jones, two choruses each. Peterson’s three provide the structural breakpoint between the horn solos, before Webster comes back with his unmistakable strut and swagger. The other horns prod him on in his third chorus. Joe Newman takes his three and then part of a forth before it all resolves in the last 16 bars.

Rich noodles briefly on the hi-hats before dropping into a fast Basie-like groove on The Monster, which quickly turns into a dazzling exchange of musical athleticism between Rich and Peterson. Few of us ever manage to achieve what we admire. So we take solace by simply admiring, with some regret and constant vicarious amazement, those few who do something better than anybody else in the world. It’s a world apart from our own, but one in which Rich was always completely at home, whether it was with Dorsey, Shaw, Parker or in this case Peterson – all the best there ever was. It is also what makes cutting contests such as this such grand musical sport. Webster, Jones, and Wess each take theirs’, before Newman and Jones start finishing each other’s sentences through four chase chouses. About midway through Rich takes over for a four-and-a-half minute turn – long indeed, but without becoming redundant or falling into repetitive cycles – always a problem for those of us amateurs who blow our best stuff in the first 16 bars. One’s only regret is not being able to see Rich in action. He’s earned his rest by the time of the ballad medley, featuring Webster, Wess, Peterson, Brown, Newman and Jones, each for a single chorus.

The entire output of May 16 was joined with Rich’s vocal session in January to fill out a Norgran LP called Sing and Swing with Buddy Rich, issued in November. In a four-star Down Beat review, previously cited, Nat Hentoff said of the album, “there’s a lot of blazing blowing…with Webster the better tenor,” but found the drum solo (“much too long in a non-visual medium”) and strings backing the vocals cause for deducting a star from what would have been a perfect five.