This edition of 'Desmond's Quotes' is rather unique. How so? This one features Paul Desmond quoting from none other than himself! As always, there's a backstory that's worth exploring so let's get to it! It's 1964, and the Dave Brubeck Quartet is in London, England. They're in the TV studios of the BBC to film [...]
Born 101 years ago on this day in October, Thelonious Monk's birthday is a great excuse to put a record or two of his on the turntable. My record of choice? The Music The Tune: "Straight, No Chaser" Recorded: 1966-67 Personnel: Charlie Rouse: Tenor Sax Thelonious Monk: Piano Larry Gales: Bass Ben Riley: Drums Considering [...]
Speaking of "Summertime"... The Music The Tune: "Samba With Some Barbecue" Recorded: 20 November, 1968 at Van Gelder Studios, Englewood Cliffs, NJ Personnel: (deep breath...) Paul Desmond- Alto Sax Paul Faulise, Bill Watrous, and Kai Winding- Trombone John Eckert, Joe Shepley, and Marvin Stamm- Trumpet/Flugelhorn Ray Alonge and Tony Miranda- French Horn Joe Beck- Guitar [...]
Summertime, and the living was somewhat easy. I'm not sure if the fish were jumping, but here in Alabama the cotton is indeed high (acres of land alongside the roads around town are full of fields of cotton. Yep, this is ALABAMA Alabama). The calendar says it's now officially Fall, but nobody told the weather [...]
It's another soggy grey day here in north Alabama, and as such, out comes the reflective music. Here's a record I found during my cross-country tour this summer. To the music! The Music The Tune: "Festive Minor" Recorded: 15 January, 1959 in New York City Personnel: Gerry Mulligan- Baritone Sax Art Farmer- Trumpet Bill Crow- [...]
It's high-time for another installment of 'Desmond's Quotes', and this one's a bit unusual. This post features performances taken from radio broadcasts of the Dave Brubeck Quartet at the Blue Note in Chicago, Illinois. Recorded in March of 1953, these recordings find the group on fire, Paul Desmond especially so. Aside from showing his tasty [...]
After a summer full of traveling and other activities, it's time to get back to writing more regularly. Here in northern Alabama, it's a dreary, gray day with lots of rain, which made me want to put a record on that was a solid swinger but in a mellow groove. Enter the dependable Billy Taylor. [...]
After a momentary break, it's time to get back to some Brubeck, the reason why I began this website! This is one of those rarer bootleg albums, where the information surrounding the recording is actually pretty well-documented. It's the album pressing itself that is confusing and unclear. With that, on to the music we go! [...]
Before politics completely prevents it, here's another album that was not made in America, but in the land out back, down under, but not in the upside down- Australia! There's not much more to add, so to the music we go! The Music The Tune: "Decidedly" Recorded: 1960 in Sydney, Australia Personnel: Don Burrows- Clarinet [...]
This is an album I've been looking forward to writing about from the moment I created this blog. The product of Playboy Magazine's first jazz poll, Hugh Hefner decided to create an album to honor the winners of the poll. By releasing such a project, Hefner and the folks at Playboy provided a snapshot of [...]
