Customer Reviews

At the Village Vanguard

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is the album to purchase for the listener who doesn't insist on having every note Bill played on that now-celebrated Sunday on June 25, 1961. Originally released as 2 albums--"Sunday at the Village Vanguard" and several months later as "Waltz for Debbie"--the session has been distilled to this single, remastered CD, which omits "Alice in Wonderland," "Detour Ahead," and "Some Other Time." On the other hand, if you had purchased the two original vinyl recordings, you would not have access to "I Loves You Porgy," which is on this single disk. Pricing, too, can be highly erratic (one of the original "Waltz for Debbie" albums is going for twice the price of this consolidated album). For current background on this rare, priceless recorded moment in jazz history, see the article by Adam Gopnik in the 8/13/2001 "New Yorker." How reassuring it is to find that, despite the digital din and MP3 madness that now consume us, the legacy of Bill continues to be with us. Any representative collection of Bill Evans' music must include this seminal recording, as vibrant and scintillating today as when it was first released. At the same time, because Bill was an artist who experienced an incredible surge of creative energy in his final days, "The Paris Concert" is no less essential to an appreciation of his romantic genius.

This album is the reason why Bill Evans, Scott LaFaro, and Paul Motian are celebrated as the inventors of the modern piano trio vocabulary: everyone from Herbie Hancock to Keith Jarrett to Chick Corea to Brad Mehldau to Fred Hersch totally *copped* their approaches to playing from this recording. Scott LaFaro, the young bass player, reinvented the bass as a co-lead instrument (Jaco Pastorius, Phil Lesh, etc etc followed in his footsteps) at these shows -- and then tragically died in a car accident a week later. This is the most telepathic trio music ever recorded. And the subtlety and lyricism of Evans was at its peak -- after this, everything else was an attempt to hike back to the summit reached here. It's lovely, heartbreaking, eternal music.

Get Sunday at the Village Vanguard and Waltz for Debbie instead because, if you buy this and love it (and you will), you will want the complete documentation of these sets, not a compilation of "most" of it.

Bill Evans was possibly the finest of all modern jazz pianists. His music had all the virtues of great jazz--spontaneity, soul, the sense of living in the present--along with the refined beauties of classical playing. This CD contains possibly the best of his recorded performances, and his colleagues here, Scott LaFaro and Paul Motian, were arguably the most congenial that he ever had. The trio is recorded here at its peak, just ten days before before LaFaro's sudden death--in fact this was the last time they ever played together. Every music lover ought to own this recording.

It would be crazy to withhold a 5-star rating from this music, but I don't really recommend the CD. The music is wonderful - ten tracks from a famous live date by one of the best-ever small groups in jazz, the Bill Evans `first trio' at the Village Vanguard in 1961. But who would want a selection which omits three particularly good tracks: the ballads "Detour Ahead" and "Some Other Time" and the gently swinging waltz, "Alice in Wonderland"?

Probably the best alternative is to buy the two separate Village Vanguard albums: `Waltz for Debby' and `Sunday at the Village Vanguard'. Opinions may differ about which is the best of the two; but I think that `Waltz for Debby' is the one to go for first if you aren't ready to buy both. That entirely subjective recommendation is because I think that Evans was playing particularly well at slow and slowish tempos on this occasion and there are more examples of this on `Waltz for Debby' than on `Sunday at the Village Vanguard', notably the sublimely lyrical "My Foolish Heart" and the moving "I Loves You Porgy" (but you also need to hear "My Man's Gone Now", the one piece at slow ballad tempo on `Sunday at the Village Vanguard'). To save later regrets, buy the versions that contain alternate takes of some of the tracks, unless, as some listeners do, you think an original album is spoilt by the inclusion of material which the artist `rejected'. Even if these takes are not essential they at least make the CDs better value.

Another alternative, for `completists' who don't mind the expense, is to buy the 3-CD `Complete Village Vanguard' set on the Japanese label, JVC Victor (VICJ-60951), which has all the available tracks from the sessions including alternate takes. I think it is only available as a pricey import. An even pricier alternative is to buy the complete Riverside recordings box set, which includes this `complete Village Vanguard' material. Isn't it amazing that more than 40 years after the event there is still not an official, well remastered, sensibly-priced `Complete Village Vanguard' set which doesn't need to be expensively imported, and which would surely fit onto two CDs?

However, if a one-disc selection is what you want, you could consider another alternative, which is to track down, if you can, the selection available on the Italian `Giants of Jazz' label in its `Immortal Concerts' series, under the title `Waltz for Debby/Village Vanguard' (53207). It includes "Detour Ahead", "Some Other Time" and "Alice in Wonderland" which this Fantasy version omits, and it omits "Solar" and "Jade Visions" which the Fantasy includes. It is better value, with 11 tracks in good (if not the best possible) sound on a label which usually retails at budget price. However, at the moment it is difficult to get hold of.

But my recommendation is to avoid selections. This is music to live with and to come back to again and again, so you might as well go all the way and buy either the `Complete Village Vanguard' edition or the two separate constituent albums.

I also recommend that anyone interested in this music should look up Adam Gopnik's New Yorker article, "That Sunday", which marked the 40th anniversary of the Village Vanguard date in 2001. It can be found on the Bill Evans Web Pages site.

This is truly one of the great jazz trio recordings by any artist(s). Any lover or student of jazz must add this to their collection.

This is a great CD for popping in the CD player and just listening to it. Critics consistently regard this CD as a jazz masterpiece. I rate this CD as an essential CD for the beginner jazz collection. It is very likable to almost anyone new to jazz, and yet it is respected as among the most influential jazz music made for jazz musicians. This is great music.

Two previously-released masterpiece albums were combined to make this one CD: "Sunday at the Village Vanguard" and "Waltz for Debby." You get the best of both albums on one CD for a better price. Both of those albums were taken from one legendary concert at a club called the "Village Vanguard."

The editors of the distinguished "Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD" awarded the albums the highest score possible and the rare "Crown" designation, I believe, meaning that they deserve special recognition for being unusually excellent.

This CD by the Bill Evans Trio is distinguished as being among the greatest in Jazz history.

What made this jazz trio - and this CD - so great was the addition of the virtuoso bass player Scott LaFaro. The Legendary Bill Evans had been looking for such a bass player for awhile, and when he finally found him it led to these masterpiece recordings. This was an artistic peak, and we can only imagine what great music the group would have continued to make.

Unfortunately, LaFaro was killed in a car accident 10 days later. Evans was understandable devestated, and the decision was made to first release an album from the concert featuring LaFaro. A second album was released later for the rest of the concert. Both are excellent albums, but you can get the best of both on this one CD.

To learn more about these two albums and the music on this CD, I suggest you search for the original two albums by name here at Amazon.com and read about them individually. The descriptions for original albums contain more information at Amazon.com than this CD, which combines the two.

This CD combines both albums by omitting some of the multiple takes of songs from the original two albums. The original albums shows brilliant improvisation through the differences in the multiple takes, but this CD is the best value and more enjoyable for general listening. Buy the original two albums if you want to hear the great improvisations. Buy this one CD if you want the best jazz music made at a better price.

A masterpiece.

Bill Evans is brilliant as usual. But LeFaro's bass more often competes with Evans than complements him. Very often they seemed to be playing two different works at once, resulting in a clumsy and tiresome mess. If you appreciate an improvisational feel, then you may care for this, but it too often feels more like "random jazz" than anything else. I far prefer the well orchestrated "Everybody Digs Bill Evans."