Brilliant! And brilliant again. These giants of jazz always knew how long a tune should last, and kept the improvisation anchored in the tune. Oh to be young again and hearing Mulligan (and Baker) for the firsts time.
Gerry's tone and style is like favorite candy ... hard not to take an extra bite ... been listening to this guy for almost 60 years ... and his sound immediately brings me back to the Chicago Ave music store when I first heard him ... how lucky was I?
The pianist is Bob Brookmeyer, best known as a valve trombonist, a great improvisor with a distinctive and immediately identifiable sound, but also one of the most interesting composers and arrangers of his generation. Bob and Gerry worked together for many years. In Gerry's landmark early '60s Concert Jazz Band, the two shared the piano chair in addition to playing their horns.
His notes shimmered like diamonds. This probably is my very first turn-on to jazz as a maturing teen in the 1960s. This man, this horn, this towering great example of low-pitched saxophone control, married to the greatest sense of improvisation, melody, scale, and arpeggio. This artist. Oh, Those days.... It bloomed for me from there....I'm a retired professional bassist. I said goodbye to all that when the phone stopped ringing for nearly every live- sightreading musician, circa 1985-ish on, thanks to DJs and then into electronic technology= synthesizer killing live gigs AND studio work !!.. Happily I'm back now on my first love, jazz and classical guitars, starting circa 1963 from suburbs into NYC .... M. Los Angeles PS. Whomever composed PD&MB : Thanks for your genius !...Sorry, don't know this one [ yet ] ....
My favorite Mulligan piece for all time, and I have been listening to him since the 1950's. I have a copy of the first Mulligan Quartet, a 10 inch Pacific Jazz lp.
Polka dots' is in my estimation one the greatest jazz ballad tunes ever written. The basic tune is so full of improvising type motifs , that it hardly needs any extra interpolating ideas but the added perfection of Gerry's playing just about makes it for me. On a par with Coleman Hawkins "Body and Soul" and I realize that is saying something.
hard to argue! lol. Have you listened to Dexter Gordon's rendition with Oscar Peterson Trio? (Not saying this version isn't on par, just suggesting another great example of how this song enables creative fly)
Gerry Mulligan appears with his then-wife Judy Holiday in a cute scene together in the film "Bells Are Ringing" which has some great toons like "Just In Time" & "The Party's Over" He also did a great deal of un-credited work on "Birth Of The Cool" with Miles Davis. Gerry Mulligan & Judy Holiday made an album together which I heard on radio years ago. I wonder if any of it is on youtube...?
Esta gravação foi realizada em Dezembro de 1954, em Stockton,. Califórnia. Mulligan, barítono; Bob Brookmeyer, piano; Red Mitchell, baixo e Larry Bumker, bateria. Mas infelizmente não consta do LP postado. Só nos CDs com a íntegra dos Califórnia Concerts. Mas parabéns pelo upload.
must have been around 1960. Jerome Richardson ( played baritone sax on a couple of Mingus recordings) questioned Mulligan, when he entered the Village Vanguard with a Selmer. Mulligan reappeared with his 1932 Conn.
it's a 5 digit VI, below the number 80k (from certain features that change at that serial range) They're the most similar to Gerry's preference of Conn but with better ergos.
