Conquistador

Maynard Ferguson | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (October 25, 1990)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Sony
• ASIN: B00000258L
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #418,951 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Rocky was the celluloid underdog, and Maynard the musical one: a jazzman who, against all odds, scores a smash on the pop charts! He did it with Gonna Fly Now (Theme from Rocky) , and the rest of this 1977 LP is just as heroic! --This text refers to an alternate Audio CD edition.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A music fan from Detroit, September 14, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Conquistador (Audio CD)

In 1977, I attended my 3rd MF concert at the Prom Center in St. Paul. Conquistador done live convinced me to expand my own musical horizons, and drove me to become a better ensemble player, but more than that, infused me with the passion to improvise. The entire band filtered into the audience while Maynard and the rhythm section remained onstage, one musician every 20 feet or so, and created an aural vision which to this day blows me away - Mark Colby stood within 6 feet of me and the power and passion he wrung out of his tenor sax during his extended solo absolutely stunned me. I think I forgot to breathe.
It may have been Maynard's first appearance in a jump suit, or maybe the first time he showed up with bi-focals, which he joked about self-depracatingly, but the vision did not detract from the power...it elevated his considerable reputation. If you ever doubt Maynard's technical virtuousity, take one of his vinyl albums from the MF Horn to Conquistador era, and play it at 16 rpm, so he sounds like he's playing a trombone...your ear cannot hear it when he plays, but Maynard actually hits and clearly intones more notes per second than you would have thought possible. The Lip is quicker than the Ear.
The defining tune at the height of Maynard's Columbia era isn't Theme from Rocky, it is Conquistador. Listen and live the Power of "Boss".

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Bit corny?, January 10, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Conquistador (Audio CD)

Speaking as a schooled musician (both classical and jazz) I implore all jazz purists to get off their high horses and admit that conquistador is one of the benchmark albums of great brass driven jazz/rock. With around 100 albums to his credit over the past 49 years, Maynard has touched upon various styles of jazz, big band and smaller combos and in the 70's, big surprise! rock and disco! Was such a direction commercially motivated? Most certainly. Most of the jazz greats who were still active at the time had found themselves admitting the influence of rock and funk. Heck, Miles Davis initiated this move towards rock in the late 60's!
The fact is, good music is good music whether its played on all acoustic instruments to a swing beat or electrified to a disco rock beat. Maynard and all his collaborators on Conquistador elevate potentially banal forms,(disco) and make something that is driven, funky, beautiful and exciting in the highest sense. And hearing something like "Star Trek" or Mr.Mellow in all their 70's inflected arrangements brings an indulgent smile to my face everytime! By all means, check out earlier Maynard too! There's a rich lode of great music to be mined. (Provided you can find them on CD: What a crime.) But don't miss out on this album or "Carnival" (on Wounded Bird Records) and Columbia! how about reissuing "MF Horn 2" Been waiting 15 years for it!

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars 2nd favorite Maynard album, July 2, 1999

By 

K. Bortz "fins up!" (Delmont, PA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Conquistador (Audio CD)

I agree with other reviewers - great album to start with for someone who's never heard MF. It was for me back in 1982. Rocky is nothing shy of aural adrenaline, but the two songs that really hit me are Conquistador(very haunting) and Soar Like an Eagle (every day becomes a hot sunny summer day and life is great). Star Trek (too much disco, though not as much as MF got into on Pagliacci, Rocky II, etc.) and The Fly just don't do it for me, keeping this from being 5 stars.