Focus (album)

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Focus
Studio album by Stan Getz

Publication
(s)

1961

Label (s) verve

Format (s)

LP, CD

Genre (s)

jazz

Title (number)

7/9

running time

37:54 (LP), 43:20 (CD)

occupation

production

Creed Taylor

chronology
Jazz Jamboree '60
(1960) 		Focus Jazz Samba
(1962)

Focus is a jazz album by Stan Getz and a string ensemble under the direction of Hershy Kay , with arrangements and compositions by Eddie Sauter , recorded on July 14th and 28th and September 1961 and released on Verve Records .

The album

The admiration of the saxophonist Stan Getz for the music of the composer and arranger Eddie Sauter goes back to the 1940s; as early as 1945 the young Getz played Sauter titles such as Clarinet a la King , Superman and Moonlight on the Ganges , which he had written for the Benny Goodman band. In 1955 Getz worked briefly with the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra as part of a concert gig ; at a rehearsal he had played Sauter arrangements and was enthusiastic about his music. At the end of the 1950s, Stan Getz went to Copenhagen , Sauter worked in Baden-Baden with the Südwestfunk -Orchester.

After the two returned to the United States, Getz commissioned Eddie Sauter as arranger and composer; he should write a larger work for him. For the orchestral work Focus , Getz was the only soloist to be surrounded by a concerto grosso frame, but ultimately with some unusual differences: The scores of the soloist Getz were not written out in full, while Sauter only created the accompanying string arrangements as complete compositions . Sauter's conception was based on the subtle rhythmic structure of a classical string quartet instead of the conventional basis of a swinging jazz rhythm group, but tried hard to differentiate itself from the "syrupy" string arrangements of the easy listening that was common at the time .

“I hated the idea of ​​flat background music that had no meaning in itself. I knew very well that I didn't want to do it that way ... I wanted this music to have soul; there should be an element of truthfulness in it, not just some feat. Therefore, I wanted to write pieces that had a continuity of idea and form and thus a thematic strength. "

- Eddie Sauter

The result of this conception had such thematic strength that Stan Getz had the impression at first that he would not fit into it stylistically.

"Eddie asked if I would come over after he wrote the first drafts. I saw what he had written down and couldn't imagine what he wanted. But as soon as I started playing, I knew ... there was something in the beautiful score that was exactly the vehicle for what I was looking for, new sounds, new freedom and simply suited to me. "

- Stan Getz

Stan Getz himself brought two jazz musicians to the recording sessions, the (relatively unknown) bassist John Neves and the drummer Roy Haynes , who can only be heard in the track I'm Late, I'm Late . The cellist Hershy Kay , an old friend of Sauter, was in charge of the string ensemble with a total of seventeen strings, harp and percussion . Kay had previously orchestrated Richard Rodgers' music for the TV series The Valiant Years with him . Hershy Kay selected the Beaux-Arts String Quartet as the core of the ensemble , with violinists Gerald Tarack and Allan Martin , Jacob Glick (viola) and Bruce Rogers (cello). They had previously worked on a third stream project with John Lewis , the Modern Jazz Quartet , Jimmy Giuffre and Gunther Schuller ( Third Stream Music ).

Ultimately, the success (or failure) of the Focus project depended on Stan Getz's ability to get used to this formal language created by Eddie Sauter; he had "written his compositions for him", while at the same time leaving him enough space for improvisations - inside and outside the textures. Most of these compositions had an impressionistic, sketchy character, like pictures, portraits of landscapes; Getz 'phrases should then help these images to “formulate more precisely”.

Her , for example, had the tender character of a portrait; it was the saxophonist's homage to his mother, who died during the recording sessions. I'm Late, I'm Late (influenced by Lewis Carroll's White Rabbit ), on the other hand, was assembled from two alternate takes to create one long take . The open character of Sauter's material gave Getz the opportunity to vary his answers despite repeating the orchestral part.

The opening of I'm Late, I'm Late is almost identical to the beginning of Béla Bartók's music for stringed instruments, percussion and celesta .

The restless Night Rider opens with Getz 'rushed rubato sounds that run counter to the asymmetrical string arrangement. Its episodic structure anticipates the second Getz / Sauter collaboration, the August 1965 soundtrack album Mickey One for the Arthur Penn film of the same name .

Excerpts of the recording session were shown on the Edie Adams Show on ABC on September 26, 1963. The first live performance of the Focus album took place on October 18, 1963 in the Hunter College Assembly Hall in New York; in the first part of the concert Stan Getz played with his quartet, a. a. with Jimmy Raney . In the second part the string ensemble played under the direction of Eddie Sauter.

title

  1. I'm Late, I'm Late - 8:08 am
  2. Her - 6:11
  3. Pan - 3:55
  4. I Remember When - 5:01
  5. Night Rider - 3:55
  6. Once Upon a Time - 4:46
  7. A Summer Afternoon - 5:58

All compositions are by Eddie Sauter.

  • The re-release of the album on CD in 1997 includes two additional tracks:
  1. I'm Late, I'm Late (45 rpm issue) - 2:28
  2. I Remember When (45 rpm issue) - 2:58

Rating of the album

Richard Cook and Brian Morton rated the album in the Penguin Guide to Jazz with the highest grade of four stars and count it among the highlights of the saxophonist's record work; it was probably his "greatest hour". No one would have arranged for Getz as well as Sauter, whose “radiant and shimmering score continues to enchant.” This is not “Art Jazz” and Sauter does not have the mysterious power of Gil Evans ; nor did it have the character of a suite or a concert, but rather a series of episodes over which Getz's tenor hovers and slides through. One of the highlights is Her , which Getz dedicated to his mother.

Brian Priestley highlights Focus in his Getz article in the Jazz Rough Guide from the extensive Getz discography and calls it a uniquely successful encounter between Getz and a string ensemble playing original material by Sauter. In the same work, Digby Fairweather wrote about Sauter: " Focus is one of the albums that would have been created with the most dynamic use of strings in connection with jazz."

Stephen Cook in the All Music Guide also counts Focus among Getz's best albums and awards it with the second highest rating; In contrast to the Bossa Nova recordings made shortly afterwards, Getz shows his extensive talents as a saxophonist here; he never lacks ideas or drive, like a mutton hopping and yapping in I'm Late, I'm Late ; He answers ingeniously the shadows of the strings in the great ballad I Remember When . This was probably Getz's most challenging recording session and his greatest moment. Focus wandered the empty jazz landscape outside of Bop with an awesome and memorable effect.

The music magazine Jazzwise added the album to The 100 Jazz Albums That Shook the World list ; Keith Shadwick wrote:

“Nothing about soloist-plus-string recordings in the history of jazz could prepare an uninitiated listener for what this album has in store. Getz's assignment to his favorite arranger and composer Eddie Sauter was completely open. What Sauter delivered was a suite that stood completely independent as music, regardless of what Getz would add melodically to it, but that left Getz enough space to create the largest possible soundscape, in which he stood between all the parts of the concise, expressive score. and moved. Focus stands alone as a great solitaire in the jazz tradition, but is a classic of the genre that is reverently quoted ”.

literature

Web links

References and comments

  1. ↑ Hershy Kay (1919–1981) studied cello at Philadelphia's Curtis Institute of Music | Curtis Institute and initially played in various orchestras. Kay then switched to arranging and worked for Broadway theater productions in 1944. He was also active as a composer himself; he wrote the Western Symphony and the ballets Stars and Stripes and Cakewalk .
  2. ↑ Bartók was an early patron of Sauter's work; he understood this title as a homage to the composer.
  3. ↑ Nicholas Churchill: Annotated Bibliography and Filmography on Stan Getz .
  4. ↑ Stephen Cook in the All Music Guide
  5. ↑ In the original: “Nothing in the history of jazz soloist-plus-strings recordings could prepare the uninitiated listener for what this album delivers. Getz's commission to his favorite arranger / composer Eddie Sauter was completely open-ended. What Sauter delivered was a suite that stood up as music independently of anything Getz might add melodically but that left him plenty of room to create the most gorgeous tapestry of sound and emotion, interweaving between all the richness of Sauter's lean, expressive scores. Focus stands in glorious isolation even within the jazz tradition but is a certifiable classic within the genre that others still cite in awe ”.
  6. ^ The 100 Jazz Albums That Shook The World
  1. ↑ Getz Article by Priestley
  2. ^ Sauter article by Fairweather
  1. ↑ Penguin Guide; Getz article.
  • Steve Lake: liner notes 1978
  1. ↑ cit. after Steve Lake, liner notes
  2. ↑ cit. after Steve Lake, liner notes
  3. ↑ Quoted from Steve Lake, liner notes 1978.
  4. ↑ Stan Getz in an interview with Arnold Jay Smith, quoted in based on the liner notes by Steve Lake in 1978.
  5. ↑ cit. after Steve Lake, liner notes