The Vortex Jazz Club, 11 Gillett Square, London N16 8AZ | Bookings 020 7254 4097 | Email Info at Vortex

CD reviews

New cd releases

 

Browse CD reviews

A  B  C  D  E  F  G  H  I  J  K  L  M  N  O  P  Q  R  S  T  U  V  W  X  Y  Z 

Join the Vortex
email list

To receive monthly gig details, news and ticket offers.



RSS feeds

For news, gig and CD reviews and information about the club.

Click on the link below to get the subscribe address
Vortex news

For more informaton about RSS see the
RSS help pages

Gerry Mulligan/Charlie Christian

Jeru/The Original Guitar Genius

Properboxes 96/98

The great advantage of boxed collections such as the two above, apart from the obvious one of being extremely reasonably priced, is that they allow listeners, by conveniently juxtaposing hitherto scattered material, to reassess reputations, re-examine established 'truths' about legendary players.

Gerry Mulligan is a case in point: his three key elements are frequently thought to be his considered approach to jazz composition, his place at the birth of 'cool' courtesy of his arrangements for Miles Davis's nonet at the end of the 1940s, and his presiding over one of the most influential small groups in jazz, his pianoless quartet with Chet Baker.

This anthology reveals a truth inevitably more nuanced than that suggested by such bald assumptions. His compositions ('Jeru', 'Walkin' Shoes', 'Rocker' etc.) are indeed carefully considered and consequently justly seen as classics, but they are also, as this set proves, also superb vehicles for wonderfully informal extemporisations in both small- and larger-ensemble settings.

His baritone solos, too, particularly in live performances such as the superb 1954 Salle Pleyel concert that concludes this consistently excellent compilation, are gems of elegance, sophistication and controlled power.

The band involved in this concert, including as it does Bob Brookmeyer on valve trombone, also demonstrates that Mulligan is as at home being complemented by a similarly pitched instrument as by Baker's limber trumpet.

A great place to start for Mulligan novices, and fascinating for aficionados. The Christian set inevitably concentrates on the Texas-born guitarist's Goodman sextet work, in which he shines with his long-lined, dexterous, supple, joyous solos on such staples as 'Rose Room', 'Flying Home', 'Stardust', 'Honeysuckle Rose' etc., but it also showcases his less celebrated skill as a provider of instantly memorable themes and riffs.

His much-vaunted innovatory playing in the nascent bebop idiom figures on Disc Four; received opinion has it that this establishes him as a seminal bop pioneer; while many may agree, some may think that the swing idiom, with its relatively uncomplicated, airy straightforwardness, provided him with a more sympathetic musical environment.

What is indisputable, however, is that the music on the four discs more than justifies the set's title; this is another intriguing, compulsively playable anthology in what is becoming an indispensable series, and one that should be required listening for anyone wishing to investigate the origins of a tradition that has now culminated, via the likes of Tal Farlow and Barney Kessel, in everyone from Pat Martino to Bill Frisell and Mike Stern.