STAN GETZ - Getz at the Gate: The Stan Getz Quartet Live at The Village Gate
Available as a 3LP, 2CD and Digital edition
Stan Getz (tenor); Steve Kuhn (piano); John Neves (bass); Roy Haynes (drums)
Recorded November 26, 1961
Getz in 1961 arrived back in the USA with a problem: after a two-year stay in Europe, things had changed. Coltrane was in the ascendant; Ornette Coleman was setting the pace; audiences had started to listen to a different kind of jazz. The praise that Getz was used to was no longer automatically there. Getz was determined to succeed, to show that he was still a voice in contention. He assembled a group with Steve Kuhn on piano and Roy Haynes on drums with Scott La Faro on bass. That group played at the Newport Jazz Festival. Getz in the middle of the year worked with Eddie Sauter to create the ground-breaking album ‘Focus’. There was an album with Bob Brookmeyer and dates at Birdland. A few weeks after this Village Gate recording, bossa nova came into Getz’ life and his playing took a different course. This November 1961 album is then a juncture, a moment in time. The baffling aspect is why this recording was put to one side by Verve and forgotten. Marketing?
The music is extraordinary and is as good as anything Getz produced before or after. Roy Haynes bestrides the album propelling all the pieces with restless panache. His taste and energy are impressive. The faster pieces are hit hard, the gentler compositions accompanied by brushwork that is delicate, nuanced yet driven. If you had not realised before, you are shown that this is a master drummer at his first peak.
Getz realising that the world was changing sought out musicians that had worked with Coltrane. Jimmy Garrison who Getz used occasionally was part of John Coltrane’s quartet. Scott La Faro had worked with Ornette Coleman. Pianist Steve Kuhn worked with John Coltrane for three months after Coltrane left Miles Davis in 1960. His playing here with Getz is inventive, quirky and more than melodic.
Bass player John Neves appeared on ‘Focus’ and on the Brookmeyer-Getz sessions recorded at that time. Here he does not have the depth of La Faro or the avantgardisms of Garrison but he sustains himself well in the challenging environment created by Haynes and Kuhn.
Getz himself veers from the sheer beauty of ‘Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most’ to the frenetic yet lucid pace of ‘Airegin’. It is noticeable that many of the solos are embellished with modish tropes. ‘Impressions’’, a piece by Coltrane, is based on ‘So What’ and is introduced with that title on the recording. Throwing in a piece like that is inviting comparison, although Coltrane is reputed to have said about Getz "Let's face it--we'd all sound like that if we could." Nevertheless, Getz did at this point try to appeal to those who appreciate a tougher sound.
The quality of the recording is impressive. The subtlety of the Getz tone is captured as well as the crispness and zing of the Haynes percussion. There is space, depth and the kind of clarity that makes listening intense, giving added insight.
Hearing Getz at full cry, suffused with joie de vivre, before he descended for a time into the compromises and riches of his bossa nova period is pleasurable because of the new dimensions revealed about this remarkable artist. It is a recording to be treasured.
Reviewed by Jack Kenny
Available as a 3LP, 2CD and Digital edition
Stan Getz (tenor); Steve Kuhn (piano); John Neves (bass); Roy Haynes (drums)
Recorded November 26, 1961
Getz in 1961 arrived back in the USA with a problem: after a two-year stay in Europe, things had changed. Coltrane was in the ascendant; Ornette Coleman was setting the pace; audiences had started to listen to a different kind of jazz. The praise that Getz was used to was no longer automatically there. Getz was determined to succeed, to show that he was still a voice in contention. He assembled a group with Steve Kuhn on piano and Roy Haynes on drums with Scott La Faro on bass. That group played at the Newport Jazz Festival. Getz in the middle of the year worked with Eddie Sauter to create the ground-breaking album ‘Focus’. There was an album with Bob Brookmeyer and dates at Birdland. A few weeks after this Village Gate recording, bossa nova came into Getz’ life and his playing took a different course. This November 1961 album is then a juncture, a moment in time. The baffling aspect is why this recording was put to one side by Verve and forgotten. Marketing?
The music is extraordinary and is as good as anything Getz produced before or after. Roy Haynes bestrides the album propelling all the pieces with restless panache. His taste and energy are impressive. The faster pieces are hit hard, the gentler compositions accompanied by brushwork that is delicate, nuanced yet driven. If you had not realised before, you are shown that this is a master drummer at his first peak.
Getz realising that the world was changing sought out musicians that had worked with Coltrane. Jimmy Garrison who Getz used occasionally was part of John Coltrane’s quartet. Scott La Faro had worked with Ornette Coleman. Pianist Steve Kuhn worked with John Coltrane for three months after Coltrane left Miles Davis in 1960. His playing here with Getz is inventive, quirky and more than melodic.
Bass player John Neves appeared on ‘Focus’ and on the Brookmeyer-Getz sessions recorded at that time. Here he does not have the depth of La Faro or the avantgardisms of Garrison but he sustains himself well in the challenging environment created by Haynes and Kuhn.
Getz himself veers from the sheer beauty of ‘Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most’ to the frenetic yet lucid pace of ‘Airegin’. It is noticeable that many of the solos are embellished with modish tropes. ‘Impressions’’, a piece by Coltrane, is based on ‘So What’ and is introduced with that title on the recording. Throwing in a piece like that is inviting comparison, although Coltrane is reputed to have said about Getz "Let's face it--we'd all sound like that if we could." Nevertheless, Getz did at this point try to appeal to those who appreciate a tougher sound.
The quality of the recording is impressive. The subtlety of the Getz tone is captured as well as the crispness and zing of the Haynes percussion. There is space, depth and the kind of clarity that makes listening intense, giving added insight.
Hearing Getz at full cry, suffused with joie de vivre, before he descended for a time into the compromises and riches of his bossa nova period is pleasurable because of the new dimensions revealed about this remarkable artist. It is a recording to be treasured.
Reviewed by Jack Kenny
