When David Sanborn released his first album, Taking Off in 1975, jazz funk was in its infancy and his keening, vibrato-laden alto sax sounded both rooted and fresh minted. Supported by streetwise studio arrangements played by the likes of The Brecker Brothers, drummer Steve Gadd and keyboard wizard, the late Don Grolnick, Sanborn created music that was both serious and accessible. Accessibility led to success, Sanborn's sound dominated commercial sax, and a legion of copiers reduced a soulful legacy to cheese. But good music stands the test of time, as these early Sanborn albums confirm. Sanborn mixed be-bop into the soul-jazz legacy of Hank Crawford – just check out ‘Butterfat’, the opening number of 1975's Taking Off – and created a style that was full of drama, romance and the blues. And this was matched note for note by the tight riffs, corner-cruising rhythms and orchestrated strings that backed him – the triptych ‘Black Light’, ‘Blue Night’ and ‘Flight’, again from Taking Off, still sets the spine a-tingle. The 1978 album Heart to Heart is gentler, with acoustic guitar more to the fore, but the big-band backed ‘Short Visit’ edges toward dissonance, Don Grolnick's ‘Lotus Blossom’ is a lovely ballad, and Sanborn preaches from the pulpit on ‘Sunrise Gospel’. 1981's Voyeur, with Marcus Miller on bass, returns to the funk. The grooves are smoother, and, following trends in studio technology, the backing synth-heavy. Sanborn blows his socks off, and the album still sounds great – try ‘Wake Me When It's Over’ as a taster – but it was a turning point that ended up as Smooth Jazz. One minor point, all three CDs were in the Warner Brothers Original Album Series five-CD set, which was released in 2010.