The Modern Jazz Quartet & Jimmy Giuffre: Complete Recordings [EXTRA TRACKS] [IMPORT]

The Modern Jazz Quartet, Jimmy Giuffre

Product Details

• Audio CD (December 5, 2005)
• Original Release Date: April 10, 2006
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Extra tracks, Import
• Label: Lonehill Jazz Spain
• ASIN: B000BYAD16
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #83,647 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

Track Listings

1. Fugue for Music Inn - Jimmy Giuffre, The Modern Jazz Quartet

2. Serenade - Jimmy Giuffre, The Modern Jazz Quartet

3. Fun - Jimmy Giuffre, The Modern Jazz Quartet

4. Capo - The Modern Jazz Quartet

5. Finé - The Modern Jazz Quartet

6. Blues in E Flat - Teddy Charles, Jimmy Giuffre, , Herbie Mann, Oscar Pettiford, Pee Wee Russell, Rex Stewart

7. In a Mellotone - Teddy Charles, , , Herbie Mann, Oscar Pettiford, Pee Wee Russell, Rex Stewart

8. Quiet Time - Teddy Charles, Jimmy Giuffre, , Herbie Mann, Oscar Pettiford, Pee Wee Russell, Rex Stewart

9. Body and Soul - Ray Brown, Teddy Charles, , , Herbie Mann, Oscar Pettiford, Pee Wee Russell, Rex Stewart

10. Oh Bess, Oh Where's My Bess? - The Modern Jazz Quartet

11. Two Degrees East, Three Degrees West - The Modern Jazz Quartet

12. God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, Variation No. 1 - The Modern Jazz Quartet

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

This important edition contains all of the recordings by the Modern Jazz Quartet featuring Jimmy Giuffre as the guest artist, recorded on August 1956 and 1957 at the Music Inn. As bonus tracks this CD concludes -due to a lack of space with three MJQ only interpretations. Disconforme. 2005.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best jazz albums ever, March 8, 2007

By	Repps Hudson "Jazz all the time" (University City, MO) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I first heard this recording when I was in high school in the early 1960s (John Kennedy was president). For many years, it was not available on CD, but recently it has been released and all I can say today is it's even better listening now than it was more than 40 years ago. I have hundreds of jazz recordings, and dozens of the Modern Jazz Quartet, an elegant ensemble if ever there was one.
This album, recorded at the legendary Music Inn in western Massachusetts, is subtle, sublime and among the best ever made. The members of MJQ are at their peak, and their guests, particularly Jimmy Guiffre, are so fine.
Buy it. You won't regret it if cool jazz from the 1950s is your thing.
Repps Hudson
St. Louis

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fresh and fun 50+ years later, September 12, 2008

By	John Grabowski (USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

Amazon Verified Purchase

It's hard to believe these recordings from the Modern Jazz Quartet and Jimmy Giuffre are more than 52 years old! The Beatles weren't even the Quarrymen yet. Listen to most other music from the same period and tell me how dated it sounds. Now listen to this--fresh and inventive and still daring and original.

At this juncture in the MJQ's history, John Lewis was still more dominant than Milt Jackson in the quartet, despite the fact that the group had just morphed from a group led by Milt (called the Milt Jackson Quartet--hence they were able to keep the initials MJQ). That shows here--the tunes are filled with fugues, intricate counterpoint and other elements that dominate European "classical" music. Giuffre is also rather "cool" and academic, furthering the baroque cool of many of these pieces. For a few numbers another clarinetist, the more traditional Pee Wee Russell, joins in, and oddly the very old and the very new mix without difficulty (such is often not the case, which is another thing that makes this album so extraordinary). On the remaining tracks, we have Herbie Mann, Oscar Pettiford, Pee Wee Russell, Rex Stewart--again the old mixing with the new. Some of these musicians we don't hear enough of, and have been unjustly neglected in the jazz world.

Lewis' interest in forms and textures manifest themselves in such wonderful compositions as Two Degrees East, Three Degrees West and A Fugue for Music Inn--pieces that meld jazz and classical without ever forcing either into unnatural contortions, unlike a good deal of the "Third-Stream" material of the 50s and early 60s. DaCapo, Finé and Fun show how well Lewis can build drama and excitement in the leisurely way classical music does as a matter of course but which jazz rarely tries, probably because jazz was born and nurtured in loud, busy nightclubs and not in quiet concert halls. It's true that if like more hard-driving or funky jazz, the quiet reserve of the MJQ may not be for you. But I still think that in the Lewis and Giuffre compositions in particular we have some of the best cool jazz of the time. The standards, Body and Soul and In A Mellotone, are less successful in my opinion, and the ultimate reading of England's Carroll (here called God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen) is to be found on the MJQ's Last Concert album on Atlantic. Then there's the gorgeous Where's My Bess? in which Lewis, who wrote the arrangement, captures perfectly the qualities of pathos and reflection of Gershwin's opera perfectly.

I have a slight complaint with the remastering. I originally had the Giuffre material on an Altantic LP from the 1980s and I can tell you the distortion one hears in Lewis' comping on Two Degrees was not nearly as bad on that album. More bass is also needed; one can barely hear Heath in many of these performances, and again, he was louder (though still a little deficient) in the vinyl release. In short, despite the age of this recording, the sound could have been better.

But this is nonetheless a valuable release, with great liner notes. If you love the MJQ, John Lewis' compositions, Third-Stream music, or Giuffre, Russell and Stewart, this album is a must-have.