Cary Kilner's Picks: Volume 26
Jeremy Pelt — Little Girl Blue This is a gorgeous tune and performance. Note how he plays the verse of the tune rubato. This provides an interesting contrast to the refrain (the main part of the tune). This is not common, but is done periodically by jazz artists with musical show tunes, where the sung verse is used to introduce the story-line of the refrain. https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=JzpEZmIDEOE&list=RDAMVMJzpEZmIDEOE Clifford Brown — Joy Spring Dig a classic bebop tune and performance. Beautiful melody, nice musical solos, relaxed swing tempo. Who can argue with this music? Note that the drummer never uses sticks; he stays with brushes throughout (probably Max Roach). https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=FE1t6lUVB_k&list=RDAMVMFE1t6lUVB_k Jean Luc Ponty — You’ve Changed Check out the beautiful recording quality of the SABA studio for the subtleties of his playing. His tonal quality and the nuances of his articulation are faithfully retained in this recording. And such a tasty European rhythm section. You need to check out the other tunes on the album. IMHO, when he went electric in the various fusion bands his sound went to hell. This is such a gorgeous interpretation of a classic show tune. I wrote out the interesting reharmonization for my own use. The acoustic European rhythm section works so slowly and deliberately behind his playing — a classic! Dig the ending — the coda! Dig the beautiful piano solo and bass playing in half time. Then check out when they go into 4/4 and the drummer goes to sticks. And THEN when Jon Luc comes in at the peak of the pianists energetic solo — it don't git no better than this! Whoever said that Europeans can't play jazz? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAr45SZp_fo Fred Hersch — Rain Check Time for more of this wonderful pianist, playing a Billy Strayhorn standard. Wonderful trio work! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRnjMwyEKWw Gordon Goodwin Big Phat — It’s Not Polite to Point Time to revisit this great big-band. I’ve got nothing more to say about this other than to listen to them swing! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76sImG7bCYA |