Performances
Though the album's ties to the avant-garde have sometimes been noted (as in the The Penguin Guide to Jazz, Allmusic.com), the tunes are quite rigidly and conventionally structured. Almost all of them begin with a brief written introduction, followed by one or two statements of long-lined theme, played in lockstep harmony by the two horns. All of the pieces follow the head-solo-head format, long a standard in bebop.
Shorter's laconic, austere soloing on Speak No Evil is in marked contrast to his earlier, grace-note-laden, Coltrane-derived style. Several of the other performers cue the emotional pitch of their performances to the leader's newfound terseness: several critics have noted that Jones, Carter and Hubbard are uncharacteristically low-key, although Hancock is mostly himself. Hubbard's contributions are in fact limited to four of the album's tracks; he lays out completely on "Infant Eyes", and appears only on the two statements of theme bookending "Dance Cadaverous". Neither Jones nor Carter perform solos on this album.
Read more about this topic: Speak No Evil
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