Bill Evans
Live at Art D’Lugoff’s Top of the Gate
You want straight-ahead jazz? Here it is with Bill Evans’s double CD, Live at Art D’Lugoff’s Top of the Gate. This album, with an excellent booklet included, will fly off the shelves as jazz-hungry fans add it to their collection.
The tracks were recorded on October 23, 1968 in Greenwich Village, New York City, during what many consider jazz’s greatest era.
These lines from his biography sums up Evans’s philosophy: “Evans never embraced new music move- ments; he kept his style intact. For example, he lamented watching [Miles] Davis shift his style towards jazz fusion. He commented that electronic music: ‘just doesn’t attract me. I’m of a certain period, a certain evolution. I hear music differently. For me, comparing electric bass to acoustic bass is sacrilege’.”
Evans died in September, 1980. He was born in New Jersey. His father was of Welsh descent and his mother an Ukrainian Rusyn. As with many jazz greats, he studied classical piano interpretation before moving into jazz and in 1950 started his first jazz trio. His impressive discography runs from 1956 to 1980 and lists about 80 records.
The trio on this album is Evans (piano), Eddie Gomez (bass) and Marty Morell (drums). The 17 tracks include Witchcraft; ’Round Midnight; Alfie; Yesterdays; In a Sentimental Mood and Someday My Prince Will Come.
Joy of Jazz 2012
Our competition CD features a selection of 15 tracks from this year’s Joy of Jazz festival.
The fest mixed international artists with local musos and provided an eclectic list of many jazz genres. If you were there, you will want this album. If you weren’t there, same applies.
Here are some artists and their recordings: Wycliffe Gordon: Dig This; Monty Alexander: I Just Can’t See For Looking; Kurt Elling: No Fear; Jimmy Dludlu: Tonota and Caiphus Semenya: Matswale.
Both albums reviewed today are distributed by Sheer Sound, to whom thanks go for sponsoring our prize.
• WIN! WIN! WIN!
There are five CDs on offer today.
To enter, answer this question: What song did Kurt Elling sing at this year’s Joy of Jazz festival?
Please submit only one entry by |e-mail to: [email protected] and include your name, postal address and contact numbers. Competition closes at noon on Saturday.