# Jazz that swings



## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

The best live Stan Getz recording that some of his fans have probably never heard - a master at work playing some unbelievable solos and heart-melting ballads with Rufus Reid (bass), Victor Lewis (drums), and Kenny Barron (piano). Stella by Starlight and What's This Thing Called Love are two of the highlights on an overall swinging album. I've listened to a lot of Getz over the years and I can honestly say that I've never heard him play a bad harmonic change, and he played by ear, but what ears!


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

This one swings so hard it gets me every time. It's perfect.  Ray Brown on bass, Lou Levy on piano, Stan Levy on drums. The duet between Mulligan and Getz is sensational. (On some of the tracks off this album, they switch horns.)


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Off one of best albums Art Pepper ever did. Jack Sheldon on trumpet with a ferociously swinging Pete Jolly piano, Jimmy Bond bass, and Frank Butler drums. This was Art in his middle period playing his Martin alto. After getting busted (again), he was later to completely revamp his style after his molecules had been rearranged by hearing John Coltrane. For me, "swing" is when the rhythm section is sounding like a well-tuned Rolls Royce sweetly cruising down the highway without a care in the world.


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Not everyone thought Eric Dolphy belonged in Coltrane's classic quartet, but he proved the critics wrong. In "Spiritual", both are at their soulful and devotional best talking, preaching, singing through their horns - a perfect example how the great jazz soloists can sound like they are trying to speak in words - one of the best examples ever for horn players to study how it's done. (Louis Armstrong, Bix Beiderbecke, Frank Trumbauer, and Lester Young had the same ability.) Great rhythm section. I've heard this track over 40 years and there's still a thrill in it. Listen how the tempo is subtlely tapered off at the end to add depth and feeling. Within two years, Dolphy would be gone from complications of diabetes, and within four, Coltrane would be gone from liver cancer. They continue to exert their influence on sax players.


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## Dr Johnson (Jun 26, 2015)




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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Desmond's harmonic sense was unique and has never been duplicated. Mulligan's big fat warm sound is a miracle. The interplay between them is sublime.






Here's more great well-recorded Desmond after he left Brubeck and had his own Canadian group that featured Ed Bickert on guitar, Gerry Fuller on drums, and Don Thompson on bass. He could find a note out in left-field that gave his solos an unexpected sense of surprise. Paul's playing seemed deceptively simple on the surface but was actually highly subtle and sophisticated. He was hard to know, deeply introverted, and rare appeared comfortable in his skin, often self-deprecating. His velvety and gorgeous tone was greatly influenced by Lester Young and Lee Konitz. At his best, he had the genius to draw in the listener with his whisper of a sound and melodic lyricism. After he left Brubeck, he never played with another jazz pianist because he didn't want to confuse listeners. Everything was working for his Canadian group when it performed in Edmonton in front of an appreciative audience. Just beautiful with an understated but subtly swinging rhythm section.


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

The great Dexter Gordon with Freddie Hubbard and Horace Silver...


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Many years later...


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Coltrane and Sonny Rollins...


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)




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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

*Oscar Peterson - The Great Connection*-one of his best albums that few seem to have heard. Swings like crazy with _Just Squeeze Me_ as the highlight he keeps building and building and building and taking to the next impossible level of swing, with Nils Henning Orsted-Pedersen on bass and Louis Hayes on drums._ Smile_, written by Charlie Chaplin, is gorgeous.


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## Casebearer (Jan 19, 2016)

^^^^^
Live at The Village Vanguard is such a great album. You never get enough.


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

*An Oliver Nelson Jazz Classic - Stolen Moments*


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## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

Choices of an amateur clarinetist:






Of course the Carnegie Hall version is legendary, but the sound is not as good.

And from my favorite jazz clarinet album:


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