Pianist James Williams was a key figure in the history of Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers, the link man between the 1960s and 1980s, who joined in 1977 and held the ship together at a time when the personnel were changing and when Blakey’s mainstream hard bop style was deemed out of fashion. He was a young player around whom Blakey built the youthful renaissance of the band in the 1980s with the likes of the Marsalis brothers.

Focus was recorded in 1977 during a Messengers tour of Italy when Williams took time out from his Messenger commitments along with Dennis Irwin to record for Sergio Veschi’s Red Records. It was a time when Williams’ solos did not hold back with their everything-but-the-kitchen-sink complexity, his solo on ‘Reflections in Blue’ on Blakey’s In My Prime: Vol. 1 was a good example of how he could raise the roof, but how would he fare away from the inspirational drummer? In the duo format with Irwin he is more reflective – Ellington’s ‘In a Sentimental Mood,’ Bronislav Kaper’s ‘Invitation’ – self-conscious even, but his original title track and Irwin’s ‘Mimosa’ are a good example of why he was so highly regarded by his peers with his harmonic understanding and sense of immediacy be brings to his playing.

Williams would increasingly find his own voice while a Messenger, so that by the time of Straight Ahead and Album of the Year from 1981, signs of artistic growth and a more rounded, mature style are very much apparent.