Strollin is a jazz tune written by Horace Silver and first recorded by The Horace Silver Quintet in 1960. It opens the Blue Note album Horace-Scope, Silver’s first album of the 1960s, with Blue Mitchell on trumpet, Junior Cook on tenor sax, Gene Taylor on bass, and Roy Brooks on drums. The piece is instrumental hard bop with a soulful, repetitive groove built on cycle-of-fifths progressions, and it features a call-and-response feel at times; bar 17 uses a tritone substitution. The track runs about 4 minutes and 59 seconds and was recorded on July 8–9, 1960 at Van Gelder Studio in Englewood Cliffs, NJ. Horace-Scope is praised for its soulful grooves and strong group interplay, and Strollin has been covered by several artists, becoming a staple in Silver’s catalog.
Key facts:
- Original artist: Horace Silver Quintet
- Year: 1960
- Album: Horace-Scope
- Genre: Jazz, soul-bop / hard bop
- Length: 4:59
- Recording: July 8–9, 1960; Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ
- Notable features: cycle-of-fifths progressions, call-and-response feel, tritone substitution at bar 17
- Personnel: Horace Silver (piano), Blue Mitchell (trumpet), Junior Cook (tenor sax), Gene Taylor (bass), Roy Brooks (drums)
