Oh Baby! What An Arco Bass Solo!

[Hot Ptah]

I just picked up the 2008 King Records release of Richard Davis with Junior Mance, "Blue Monk".

It's a duet album, with the following exceptions: Richard Davis plays solo bass on "Summertime" and "Dear Old Stockholm". Junior Mance plays solo piano on Ellington's "A Single Petal of a Rose."

Richard Davis' arco bass solo piece here, "Summertime", is one of the few recorded performances by anyone which made me literally shout out loud during my first listen. There have been few, if any, recorded arco bass solos like it, ever.

I have been puzzled as to why many of Richard Davis' recordings over the years have not really captured the magic I have heard him create in live performance. This "Summertime" does, for sure.

It is shorter, and arranged quite differently, than his duet with Elvin Jones on "Summertime" on "Heavy Sounds". It makes just as much, or more, of an impact, to me.

It is good to hear that a 79 year old (I guess he was 77 at the time of this performance) is still at the top of his game.

[Guest Bill Barton]

Thanks for the heads-up on this recording. It's not one with which I'm familiar. Davis, along with David Izenson, is one of the very few jazz bassists I could listen to playing arco all day long.

Years ago I heard him in duo with the brilliant poet Jayne Cortez, doing much of the material from Celebrations and Soltitudes. His arco playing was both beautiful and intense - a great, great concert.