[A] I only had two Heath's first two albums in the database: The Thumper, which I probably bought in the 1990s and found too bebop at the time, and Really Big!, which I got a reissue of when I was writing Recycled Goods and liked a lot. I looked through what I could find, and wrote them up here. I thought I had a copy of Little Man Big Band (1992), but couldn't find it, even to stream. Given his early focus on arranging, big bands were a natural extension, but I found myself liking his basic quartets best, even though he's never spectacular. His brothers were first-rate roll players, and Percy's only album as a leader (A Love Song) is a delight.

I'm reluctant to go back and revisit the ones I've heard, although there's a good chance that The Thumper belongs in one of the B+ tranches. Same with Shorter, although a revisit to Adam's Apple raised the grade significantly (but not quite to A-). Instead, I made an effort to listen to the records I had missed (same link as above), finding good stuff early and some pretty awful albums during and after his Weather Report period -- a band I have little respect for, but their 3-CD box (Forecast: Tomorrow) did eke out a B+(**). He returned to form with the quartet he formed around 2000, although I haven't liked his attempts to expand on the quartet (Alegria, and especially the highly praised Emanon). I did give his 2-CD The Classic Blue Note Recordings an A, but as I'm writing this I'm playing his earlier Blue Note compilation, The Best of Wayne Shorter, and I'm not blown away.