Customer Reviews

Jazz Moments

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If occasionally you like your soul touched by a fine relaxed jazz trio then you will like this one. Less syrup than found with Shearing's quintet work; this is my all-time favourite jazz trio recording. Got the old vinyl and was amazed to find the re-release on CD. Buy it for those evenings when you are feeling a little introspective and want to listen to something evocative.

So glad to see this classic album updated to CD, I "inherited" the original 1962 vinyl from my parents and still love the music. His "Gone With the Wind" is haunting and beautiful, as is "When Sunny Gets Blue." Not a lemon in the bunch, well worth owning.

This album has been around for a while, but nothing pleases me more than the re-release of it. Probably because I wrote one of the tunes(The Mood Is Mellow)on it. I thought it was dead, not having heard from anyone for YEARS about it, but the quality is great and the approach impeccable. I, of course, recommend it without hesitation. Gene Me(i)gs

Jazz Moments was a vinyl album in my parent's closet . . . discovered just as I was turning the corner from rock to jazz and just as I was switching from frustrated bedroom guitarist to bassist in the middle school jazz band. Shearing, who needs no introduction, is typically brilliant. But this album is a testament to the importance of sidemen--Vernel Fournier on drums and Israel Crosby on bass. It is Crosby's story I wish to tell, and his story that's sad.

This is one of the last recordings by a man lost before his time. Perhaps because of the time--as jazz reached its peak and just barely pre-Beatles, Crosby is lost to all but the most lucky of listeners. Israel Crosby jumped into the jazz world from Chicago to work with the best. My exposure has been via Shearing and Ahmad Jamal.

Crosby's bass playing reveals what history did not. An intelligent, funny, and loving man. On up-tempo pieces you can hear his smile, feel his wit. On mellower pieces you share his pain or passion. Very few bassists played the instrument as a whole as he did--his bowed pieces are virtuosic and contribute importantly to the piece. While he could walk with anyone, he also displayed combo bass playing that seems to hint at the way great rock bassists contributed to their craft--woven into the music as an integral component--not merely the all-too-common tacked-on rhythm section found in many jazz groups.

This is a great album that captures a moment, and captures a man, three men, at that moment. I highly recommend it. ClevelandBill at mac dot com.