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Stan Getz and Bill Evans Album on Verve


Teasing the Korean

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I've accumulated lots of stuff by both artists over the decades, but I only recently stumbled across this. I'm talking about the 1964 session.

It is certainly nothing great, but I don't think it's as bad as some of the reviews I've read.

Stan Getz seems really scattered and disjointed at times - it's like he's throwing out ideas with no sense of continuity.

Bill Evans generally sounds good. There is a spot on "My Romance," I think, where I expected a piano solo but there's just bass and drums, both of which just continue with the groove as opposed to soloing. Not sure if that was deliberate, or if Bill wanted to abandon the take at that point.

I have the 70s twofer vinyl issue. The CD has more tracks. I wonder if the best ones were on the LP and the weaker ones made it to the CD, and if so, if reviewers are picking up on the bonus tracks.

Edited by Teasing the Korean
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The story goes that this session was considered a failure, and that neither artist wanted it to be released. It first came out in the early 1970's, after both had left the label. I always thought that they seemed a little detached, not really hitting on all cylinders. When the session came out on CD, I gave it another chance, and over the years I've come to like it quite a bit.

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The story goes that this session was considered a failure, and that neither artist wanted it to be released. It first came out in the early 1970's, after both had left the label. I always thought that they seemed a little detached, not really hitting on all cylinders. When the session came out on CD, I gave it another chance, and over the years I've come to like it quite a bit.

If you have the dreaded "Metal Box" of Evans, you can tell by the alt. tk's & false starts that they were struggling during this session. IMHO, one of the worst in the Evans' Verve catalog.

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I love the album, and have ever since it first came out.

"Night and Day" really cooks, and is followed by a great "But Beautiful". But I like it all, including the joke item where Bill plays stride and Elvin imitates Gene Krupa.

It's good to hear Stan and Bill with Elvin (the only time for Bill, I think), not to mention Ron Carter and Richard Davis.

This was a kinda unauthorized release in 1974, produced by someone who didn't know much about it. Two other precious, unapproved Verve albums that they also put out at that time are one with the Clark Terry - Bob Brookmeyer quintet, and one of various items by Gil Evans, including a marvelous quartet version of "Cheryl" (trombone and rhythm section) that was excluded from the CD issue. (Michael was in one of his pompous moods when he produced the CD, lol.)

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If you have the dreaded "Metal Box" of Evans, you can tell by the alt. tk's & false starts that they were struggling during this session. IMHO, one of the worst in the Evans' Verve catalog.

Do you sense that they were having an off day, or was there something weird going on between SG & BE?

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If you have the dreaded "Metal Box" of Evans, you can tell by the alt. tk's & false starts that they were struggling during this session. IMHO, one of the worst in the Evans' Verve catalog.

Do you sense that they were having an off day, or was there something weird going on between SG & BE?

I think it's both in this case. While a couple of things work, there just seems to be a lack of connection between Getz & Evans. In some way, even though they have similar styles, yet, at the root of the thing, there is, to my ears, a lack of compatibility between the two. But, who knows, maybe they couldn't get a score that day, so they were off.

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The story goes that this session was considered a failure, and that neither artist wanted it to be released. It first came out in the early 1970's, after both had left the label. I always thought that they seemed a little detached, not really hitting on all cylinders. When the session came out on CD, I gave it another chance, and over the years I've come to like it quite a bit.

If you have the dreaded "Metal Box" of Evans, you can tell by the alt. tk's & false starts that they were struggling during this session. IMHO, one of the worst in the Evans' Verve catalog.

I don't think it's as bad as all that. Bill sounds a bit intimidated by Elvin and somehow not at his best, but there's still good playing by heavyweights on this. I thought Stan sounded fine. It's worth having and playing once in a while b/c it's a band of this caliber.
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"Funkalerro"'s a bad motherfucker, but the rest of it didn't move me one way or the other.

I recommend the live version of "Funkallero" done by Evans' trio with Getz as guest artist performed at Laren in '74. The CD is titled BUT BEAUTIFUL (Milestone MCD-9249-2) released under Evans' name.

410eVepBezL._SL500_AA240_.jpg

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In the liner note to the 70s twofer album I picked up, Bob Blumenthal states that the reason the LP wasn't issued at the time had to do with Getz's commercial success with bossa nova.

Then again, he says a bunch of things about Brazilian music and bossa nova that indicate a lack of knowledge of the subject matter, so I'll take the whole essay with a grain of salt.

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  • 2 years later...

I had the opportunity to hear a few tracks off this album yesterday when WKCR on there Sunday Jazz Profile show featured the music of Stan Getz. I enjoyed the Stan Getz & Bill Evans tracks featured and will most likely pick this up at some point. Good stuff.

Edited by Tom 1960
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"Funkalerro"'s a bad motherfucker, but the rest of it didn't move me one way or the other.

I recommend the live version of "Funkallero" done by Evans' trio with Getz as guest artist performed at Laren in '74. The CD is titled BUT BEAUTIFUL (Milestone MCD-9249-2) released under Evans' name.

410eVepBezL._SL500_AA240_.jpg

I wonder why this wasn't included in the Bill Evans Milestone box.

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"Funkalerro"'s a bad motherfucker, but the rest of it didn't move me one way or the other.

I recommend the live version of "Funkallero" done by Evans' trio with Getz as guest artist performed at Laren in '74. The CD is titled BUT BEAUTIFUL (Milestone MCD-9249-2) released under Evans' name.

410eVepBezL._SL500_AA240_.jpg

The liner notes to this CD make it plain that there was some tension between Getz and Evans on this performance (Getz' fault mostly, it seems, no surprise there). It got to the point where Evans refused to comp behind Getz on one tune.

So it's not hard to imagine that there were some major issues on the '64 studio session.

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"Funkalerro"'s a bad motherfucker, but the rest of it didn't move me one way or the other.

I recommend the live version of "Funkallero" done by Evans' trio with Getz as guest artist performed at Laren in '74. The CD is titled BUT BEAUTIFUL (Milestone MCD-9249-2) released under Evans' name.

410eVepBezL._SL500_AA240_.jpg

The liner notes to this CD make it plain that there was some tension between Getz and Evans on this performance (Getz' fault mostly, it seems, no surprise there). It got to the point where Evans refused to comp behind Getz on one tune.

So it's not hard to imagine that there were some major issues on the '64 studio session.

Careful, you're moving awfully close to saying something bad about Stan. We know where that got us last time.

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"Funkalerro"'s a bad motherfucker, but the rest of it didn't move me one way or the other.

I recommend the live version of "Funkallero" done by Evans' trio with Getz as guest artist performed at Laren in '74. The CD is titled BUT BEAUTIFUL (Milestone MCD-9249-2) released under Evans' name.

410eVepBezL._SL500_AA240_.jpg

If you're going to hear those two together, this live set is the way to do it.

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  • 6 years later...

Ha ha. That's a good one. Thought Elvin was Paul Motian. Were the notes written by an office junior?

At the end of the day, bottom line, when all is said and done (insert another overused cliché), I am very grateful to be able to hear these two sessions, and I don't think the music hurts Evans's and Getz's reputations in the slightest. Verve probably left it unreleased for the same reason they didn't issue "Nobody Else But Me" (which has the quartet with Gary Burton): they were pushing Getz playing Bossa Nova.

I am annoyed when one man decides not to issue a track, and I'm glad that a different person got access to this material and the two Gil Evans quartet tracks, Cheryl and Ah Moore. I am still hoping that someone (Don Was?) will issue some Blue Note that Michael Cuscuna rejected, especially the large number of unissued Three Sounds performances (how bad could those possibly be?).

Edited by Shrdlu
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