For this article, I'd like to take you back in time to 1972- a long time ago! I was doing my first recording under my own name for the Mainstream label. I had just finished a session with saxophone great Paul Jeffrey, working on his 1971 album Watershed. My record, Windows, was released in '73. It featured Michael Moore on bass, and Bill Goodwin on drums. The guitar I was using at the time was an old Gibson L7 from around 1951. It was in bad shape with all kinds of scratches and nicks. A pickup had been drilled into the body so it wasn't worth anything to the vintage collectors. It had a very long and worthy past and was one of the best-sounding instruments I ever played.

Mainstream records produced most of their recordings at the old Mercury studios on West 57th street. We recorded the Windows session in a rather large room with just a trio; I felt at first that there would be too much echo. The amp I was using was an old Ampeg GT10 with two 12-inch speakers - very big and booming and a forerunner to the Roland Jazz Chorus.

My concern was well-founded. The first take we did sounded awful! - very washed out because of the echo. As producer Bob Shad was not at the session due to some family problem, it was up to me to find a way to make it work. It was, in fact, the only recording I ever made without a producer- except for Jazz Guitar Christmas. I was lucky enough to have Ernie Wilkins (no relation) on the recording console. He was very receptive to any suggestions on how we could make a go of this.

I thought we should play as soft as possible without sacrificing the playing. I turned the Ampeg amp down to about a 2, not 11! Then I had Ernie raise the volume in our headphones and we nailed it. We finished the whole session in 6 hours, an hour per tune. After a little layering, we had a satisfactory unmixed recording.

The mixing part was the most fun I can remember in a studio. Still minus Bob Shad, I had all the time I needed to experiment with sounds and dynamics. When a phrase I played was a little bit obscured in the low register, I simply raised it up in the mix! How simple is that? I added some snazzy EQ on the solo in "Red Clay".

The session was a very satisfying experience for all of us. We managed to take a possible disaster and turn it into a winner. I still believe it is one of the best-recorded of all my solo and sideman sessions.