Sometimes it only takes a single sublime statement to define an artist's sound. For composer-saxophonist Oliver Nelson, that would be The Blues and the Abstract Truth, an innovative 1961 release that mixed funk and sophistication in equal proportion. Born in 1932, the academically trained Nelson played for Count Basie and Duke Ellington, worked as house arranger at the Apollo Theater and recorded dozens of albums as a bandleader. In 1967 he moved to Los Angeles, where he wrote for Hollywood before his death in 1975.