Both of these releases would have to be called not only early, but minor, Coltrane. Acrobat, to be fair, describe their contents as a “footnote” to his career, and the then 17 and 18-year-old Draper is really not up to the standard of his colleagues; in particular, the first of the two sessions under his own name finds him fluffing notes and playing woefully sharp at times. The tracks on Essential Jazz Classics are anything but – coming from the period when Prestige realised the economies possible from doing studio ‘blowing sessions’ and when Trane, having just been fired by Miles, was available on a daily basis. Mal Waldron was hired to provide heads and backings, and the three-and-a-half original LPs here do little for his long-term reputation; incidentally, the Wheelin' And Dealin' album was also included (without the two alternate takes) on the recent Frank Wess reissue (see Short Cuts, Jazzwise 187). Despite occasionally arresting ideas from the other players, it's only the Coltrane solos that constantly grab the attention. Doubtless this is why fans of late-1950s jazz took such pains to log and collect all of these albums.