A Night at Birdland, Vols. 1–3 are three separate but related 10" LPs by the Art Blakey Quintet recorded live at the Birdland jazz club on February 21, 1954, and released on Blue Note later that year, in July, October and November respectively. The quintet features horn section Clifford Brown and Lou Donaldson and rhythm section Horace Silver, Curly Russell and Blakey.
The recording was produced by Alfred Lion and engineered by Rudy Van Gelder for Blue Note. The reissues were produced by Michael Cuscuna.
They are considered some of the earliest hard bop recordings.[citation needed]
After Blue Note discontinued their 10" series, A Night at Birdland was recompiled on two 12" LPs and given new artwork. A Night at Birdland, Vol. 1 (BLP 2037) was put on Side A of Volume 1 (BLP 1521) backed with two tracks of the three tracks from A Night at Birdland, Vol. 2 (BLP 2038) ("Mayreh" and "A Night in Tunisia"), with Volume 2 (BLP 1522) comprising A Night at Birdland, Vol. 3 (BLP 2039), "Wee-Dot" and an alternate take of "Quicksilver."
The complete recordings weren't available commercially until 1984 when the remaining four tracks were released in Japan by Toshiba as A Night at Birdland, Vol. 3 and the whole concert was released as part of the Complete Blue Note and Pacific Jazz Recordings of Clifford Brown box set, before being released on the CD reissues of the twelve-inches three years later.
The Penguin Guide to Jazz put the recording in their "core collection."
A reviewer for allaboutjazz.com said simply that "Blakey and company had clicked that night at Birdland."[4]
AllMusic mentions that, on this first album, "all of the participants [are] in inspired form. Classic bop."[5]
Bob Blumenthal, renowned hard-bop writer, refers to this as a historical jazz milestone.[6]