Product Details

• Format: NTSC
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Kultur Video
• VHS Release Date: October 22, 1991
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6301816153
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #497,544 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Art Blakey really steams up the Smithsonian in this session., December 27, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Jazz at Smithsonian [VHS] (VHS Tape)

This movie is a must for all Blakey fans. Wynton Marsalis leads the 3-man horn section to deliver a powerful and exhilerating performance. Blakey gets the group rolling and once they start jamming there's no stopping them. Blakey sets the stage with his "Jazz Messengers" for Wynton and Branford Marsalis, as he did for Curtis Fuller, Freddie Hubbard, and Cedar Walton. All four songs on this set are amazing, and Wynton is featured all alone in the horn section on one. Everyone in this does an amazing job.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic, May 28, 2000

By 

A customer "mistermaxxx" (usa) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Jazz at Smithsonian [VHS] (VHS Tape)

I've Seen this Concert So Many Times&I Never Get Bored with It.Art Blakey is One OF The Baddest Musicians Ever Period&Here He has The Great Talents of The Marsalis's Brothers Here.Wynton&Branford.The Music&Arrangements are Fantastic.A Must Have.

3.0 out of 5 stars Wynton's Messengers, June 7, 2006

By 

Samuel Chell (Kenosha,, WI United States) - See all my reviews
(TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Jazz at Smithsonian [VHS] (VHS Tape)

This is a video of one of Blakey's more cohesive ensembles, with the unusual attention to dynamics and the employment of Dixieland textures in the closing theme both testifying to the influence of Wynton Marsalis. The program is primarily "neo-bop," opening with two original numbers based on a minor scale, or Dorian mode, followed by a Wynton feature on Kurt Weil's "My Ship." His playing throughout is flashy if not slick (with a curiously conservative Branford on alto sax and a taking-care-of business Bill Pierce on tenor), but all three horns are lacking in warmth, lyricism and, at times, melodic logic. The star of the session, to my ears, is the unsung pianist, Donald Brown. He's the only musician who "eats up" the "I Got Rhythm" chord changes of the final complete number.

The audio is no better than a "C". Worse, Blakey's drums are mostly lost in the mix. Look for a far more engaging video, "Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers," recorded live in 1976 in Umbria, Italy. Featuring Bill Hardman and Dave Schnitter, the trumpet player and tenor man who played longer with Blakey than any other frontline, this strikingly filmed DVD also presents a rare opportunity to make the acquaintance of these superb, but underrated and largely forgotten, musicians.