Ain't Misbehavin ': Live at the Jazz Showcase
| Ain't Misbehavin ': Live at the Jazz Showcase | ||||
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| Live album by Marian McPartland and Willie Pickens | ||||
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| Label (s) | Concord | |||
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CD |
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9 |
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Ain't Misbehavin ': Live at the Jazz Showcase is a jazz album by Marian McPartland and Willie Pickens , which was recorded on December 22nd to 24th, 2000 at Chicago jazz club The Jazz Showcase and was released in 2001 by Concord Records .
The album
The live performance of Marian McPartland and Willie Pickens was preceded in 1997 by a radio recording for McPartland's NPR program Piano Jazz , which, for once, was recorded live in Pittsburgh instead of the other piano jazz episodes in the NPR studio in North Carolina. In 1999 the two performed together at the Chicago Jazz Festival ; This was followed by a one-week engagement in the jazz club The Jazz Showcase in the week before Christmas 2000.
McPartland and Pickens played a program of well-known jazz standards a . a. by Duke Ellington , Fats Waller , Benny Golson and Cole Porter , but also rather unknown titles such as Autumn Nocturne . McPartland and Pickens played five tracks in a duo, Ain't Misbehavin ' , Along Came Betty , It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing) , Night and Day and Just One of Those Things . Two titles play the piano solo, McPartland plays Close Your Eyes and Autumn Nocturne , Willie Pickens, the Rodgers and Hart -number Spring Is Here and Harold Arlen's pop song It's Only a Paper Moon .
Track list
- Marian McPartland & Willie Pickens: Ain't Misbehavin ': Live at the Jazz Showcase (Concord CCD-4968-2)
- Ain't Misbehavin ' ( Harry Brooks / Andy Razaf / Fats Waller ) - Marian McPartland & Willie Pickens - 7:17
- Along Came Betty (Benny Golson) - Marian McPartland & Willie Pickens - 6:24
- Close Your Eyes (Bernice Petkere) - Marian McPartland - 4:22
- It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing) (Duke Ellington / Irving Mills ) - Marian McPartland & Willie Pickens - 8:11
- Spring Is Here ( Lorenz Hart / Richard Rodgers ) - Willie Pickens - 7:06
- Night and Day ( Cole Porter ) - Marian McPartland & Willie Pickens - 8:23
- It's Only a Paper Moon ( Harold Arlen / EY Harburg / Billy Rose ) - Willie Pickens - 4:45
- Autumn Nocturne (Kim Gannon / Josef Myrow) - Marian McPartland - 4:50
- Just One of Those Things (Cole Porter) - Marian McPartland & Willie Pickens - 7:42
reception
Thom Jurek gave the album the second-highest rating of four stars in Allmusic and praised the fact that McPartland and Pickens managed to emphasize their differences rather than their similarities with their program of piano duets. "But somehow it works, and so well that the listener is amazed at the fact that this was a unique event." The interplay between the two is unique and the individual voices can be heard in the respective channels: "Heard in the right channel you get the shrill, bluesy, dark and haunted tone of Pickens, in the left channel the more reserved and traditionally elegant of McPartland. ”But what you experience in their exchange, as in the first track Ain't Misbehavin ' , like their two Incorporate incomparability without compromise; they meet in the striped harmonies and then move away from each other in the solos, come back together in the melodies with splendidly painted backdrops of chords and clusters . It's a wonderful pairing, full of surprises and natural, free-flowing musical interplay. According to Thom Jurek, Pickens "steals the show" in his two solos.
Richard Cook and Brian Morton also give the album the second highest rating of 3½ stars in The Penguin Guide to Jazz and emphasize the old-time character of the recording, in which two contrasting styles collide in cooperation.
Nancy Ann Lee considered the album to be one of Marian McPartland's best duo productions in her review at JazzTimes . One of its highlights is Ellington's It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing) , the “grandiose thrilling” up-tempo two-player game by the old warhorse Night and Day , and her lively four-handed finale, Just One of Those Things and Pickens' powerful solo rendition of It's Only a Paper Moon .
According to Dave Nathan, who reviewed the album at All About Jazz , the two pianists were "in tip top shape" and the back and fourth interplay during the middle section of Ain't Misbehavin ' was "a pleasure to hear". This is not a cutting contest at all , which can be explained by McPartland's British character. Instead, it's a mutually respectful execution of the ideas each other has thrown out. Crème de la crème des duo is the unusual approach to It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing) , where McPartland offers a slow introduction before Pickens joins in with a more deliberate than usual version of the Ellington classic . Other highlights of the concert recordings include the author Pickens' “Dance over the keys” in the highly syncopated It's Only a Paper Moon : “While his left hand sets the bass line , his right hand rushes the melody up and down.” It is hard to believe that there was only one player at the keys. In contrast, McPartland offers a fluently rhapsodic execution of Autumn Nocturne , where all her sensitivity to this music is displayed.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Neil Tesser , Liner Notes .
- ^ The album at Concord Music Group
- ↑ Review of Thom Jurek's album at Allmusic (English). Retrieved November 6, 2012.
- ↑ Cook / Morton, p. 1007 (6th edition, 2003).
- ^ Review of Nancy Ann Lee's album at JazzTimes
- ^ Review of the album at All About Jazz