Recording of the Month

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Thursday, November 21, 2024

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: Written by: Rad Bennett; Category: Recording of the Month; Created: 01 December 2014

The Last Shot Got Him Cattail 2014
Format: CD

Musical Performance: ****
Sound Quality: ****1/2
Overall Enjoyment: ****

Sometimes, smaller forces make for a great recording. Here we have blues singer Scott Ainslie and his Gibson L-50 archtop acoustic guitar, bass added on one track, steel-string banjo on another. That is exceptionally minimal, yet this delightful disc has given me more enjoyment than all the loud ones I received recently.

Ainslie is a teacher and historian as well as a performer, and has devoted most of his life to researching the songs and style of Mississippi John Hurt. OKeh Records talent scouts discovered Hurt in the late ’20s and made a series of 78rpm recordings in Memphis. Based on sales, three Mississippi performers were invited to record at OKeh’s New York City studios. Hurt was one of them.

: Written by: Joseph Taylor; Category: Recording of the Month; Created: 01 November 2014

Beautiful Jazz WilderJazz 1401LP
Format: LP

Musical Performance: ****
Sound Quality: ***1/2
Overall Enjoyment: ****

The French-born jazz pianist Christian Jacob has an impressive discography that includes work with Maynard Ferguson, Bill Holman, and Flora Purim, and he has been a member of singer Tierney Sutton’s touring and recording band for nearly 20 years. The sticker on the shrink wrap of the LP version of Beautiful Jazz -- his first solo piano recording -- proclaims, “LP recorded & produced entirely in analog,” so I was surprised to notice that it was engineered and mixed by Mark Waldrep, a firm advocate of digital sound.

: Written by: Rad Bennett; Category: Recording of the Month; Created: 01 October 2014

Time & Place Indirecto IR16
Linn Records AKD423
Format: Hybrid Multichannel SACD

Musical Performance: ****1/2
Sound Quality: ****
Overall Enjoyment: ****

In the past, I have written that I anticipate every new album from Claire Martin the same way that I used to anticipate the albums of the late Peggy Lee. Martin is just as much jazz royalty as was Lee. I never listen to Martin’s albums to determine whether they are good or not; excellent is a given. I listen to find out what new explorations are taking place, and what new directions are being taken.

: Written by: Joseph Taylor; Category: Recording of the Month; Created: 01 September 2014

Juice Indirecto IR16
Format: CD

Musical Performance: ****
Sound Quality: ****
Overall Enjoyment: ****

A Go Go, John Scofield’s first collaboration with Medeski Martin & Wood (1998), didn’t list the younger musicians on the front cover, but their performance was vital to the album’s musical success. Scofield was already an established jazz guitarist known for memorable, accessible tunes that nonetheless challenged listeners, but MMW added some jam-band looseness and upped the already high funk quotient of Scofield’s music. The result was a triumph -- fun and brainy at once.

: Written by: Rad Bennett; Category: Recording of the Month; Created: 01 August 2014

West Side Story Michael Tilson Thomas, San Francisco Symphony Orchestra and Chorus

San Francisco Symphony SFS 821936-00592-2
Format: Hybrid Multichannel SACD (2)

Musical Performance: ***
Sound Quality: ****
Overall Enjoyment: ***1/2

West Side Story, Leonard Bernstein’s unlikely Broadway hit, has not suffered for recordings. There are the original-cast recording (1957) and the soundtrack of the film version (1960), as well as recordings by a revival cast and an English studio cast. Then there’s the controversial recording on Deutsche Grammophon led by Bernstein himself (1985). For reasons known only to him, he chose to cast this one with opera singers: Kiri Te Kanawa and José Carreras were the star-crossed lovers.

: Written by: Rad Bennett; Category: Recording of the Month; Created: 01 July 2014

Life in the Bubble Telarc TEL 35453-02
Format: CD

Musical Performance: ****
Sound Quality: ****
Overall Enjoyment: ****

Gordon Goodwin’s Big Phat Band first attracted my attention when I heard their second album, XXL, in surround sound (DVD-Audio, Silverline 2882069). I thought that the band was fabulous, and the use of surround most clever and appealing. There’s no surround on this CD, of course, but Goodwin’s band still sizzles.

: Written by: Joseph Taylor; Category: Recording of the Month; Created: 01 June 2014

Chameleon Concord Records CRE-34113-02
Format: CD

Musical Performance: ***½
Sound Quality: ***½
Overall Enjoyment: ***½

Smooth jazz is a genre I usually avoid. It’s too . . . smooth. Calling it jazz seems blasphemous, as it’s so calculated to please. Drummer Harvey Mason Sr. has done his share of smooth jazz with Fourplay, but his long list of credits includes work with Herbie Hancock, notably on the groundbreaking Head Hunters, of four decades ago. Mason’s first album for Concord Records, Chameleon, leans more in the direction of Hancock’s funk jazz than of the laid-back approach of Fourplay, and Mason’s sure hand ensures that it grooves.

: Written by: Rad Bennett; Category: Recording of the Month; Created: 01 May 2014

The Musical Voyages of Marco Polo World Village Music WVF 479092
Format: CD

Musical Performance: ****
Sound Quality: ****
Overall Enjoyment: ****

In wanting to find recordings of new and different sounds that would show off my audio system, my audiophile journey has led me to explore many unique recordings I might otherwise never have come across. This winter, that journey led me again to a favorite label, World Village Music, and the explorations of another adventurer, Marco Polo.

: Written by: Joseph Taylor; Category: Recording of the Month; Created: 01 April 2014

Bring It Back Jazz Village JV579001
Format: CD

Musical Performance: ****
Sound Quality: ****
Overall Enjoyment: ****

The title track of Catherine Russell’s Bring It Back opens the album with a swinging blues punch in a traditional arrangement that still manages to sound fresh and up to date. Russell’s father was a jazz musician who worked with Louis Armstrong, among others, and Bring It Back reaches back to early jazz for its style and inspiration. Russell and her band ensure that the result isn’t a museum piece, but an affirmation of jazz in its many forms.

: Written by: Rad Bennett; Category: Recording of the Month; Created: 01 March 2014

Beautiful Life Concord CRE-34171-02
Format: CD

Musical Performance: ****
Sound Quality: ****
Overall Enjoyment: ****

Concord Jazz once released almost nothing but jazz recordings. The label’s name has since been changed to Concord Records, and now they seek out artists in transition who are embracing and reimagining a wide range of styles.

Diane Reeves is such an artist. Revered for her jazz recordings, on Beautiful Life she includes enough R&B, soul, pop, and Latin music that we can say that jazz is now merely an influence, not the main course. One thing Reeves hasn’t changed is her full, gorgeous voice -- now darkened and warmed, it sounds even better than before. Also intact are her accuracy of pitch and sensitivity of phrasing; hers is a great voice that has mellowed in the best possible ways. Terri Lyne Carrington produced the album, and seems totally committed to creating the sound that best shows off Reeves’s voice.