Customer Reviews

Stir It Up: Music of Bob Marley

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

 

 

I was blown away when i picked this up yesterday. Monty not just with his trio, but with a reggae band as well. The result is a superb hour of Bob Marley tunes played by a thrilling combination of jazz and reggae artists.

The album starts off with Jammin and then just gets better and better. There's a great gospel/reggae version of No Woman no Cry, a wonderful ska version Of I Shot the Sherriff, and tracks like Stir it Up and Could you be Loved are gonna be on played on my cd player all through summer. If you don't know, Monty he is from Jamaica so his background is perfect for this project (probably why Sly Dunbar agreed to be on the record). His piano playing is very accesible and not long winded like so many jazz musicians nowadays. For me this is his best record in years.

Sublime! If there is anyone who wants to hear creditable interpretations of Bob's music, then this is the cd to buy. The piano sweetly plays Bob's melodies as the musicians effortlessly switch between reggae and jazz; and the reggae sections will give you a very close feel to what the originals are like. Monty's choice of songs is also good (let's face it there are are a lot of songs to choose from) - from songs that first brought Bob to international prominence(No Woman No Cry, Natty Dread) to later favourites(Jamming, Could You Be Loved), and to include my all time fave Crisis is just unerring. Forget other tributes that are on offer - this is the best!

As a Bob Marley fan,I was nervous that this cd would not do justice to the originals from the master himself.Well, I was pleasantly surprised,an outstanding effort by Mr.Alexander.This cd is the perfect antidote for everyday stress especially from work.This is an excellent blend of reggae and jazz with masterful piano work.Highly recommended to the Bob Marley fans that can apppreciate these classic songs..my favorite track is #9.simply smooth, elegant.

Monty and his crew take Bob's music to a different level and yet he ads a dimension that even Bob would be proud of. He combines both the jazz and reggae and interweaves both so perfectly as one and yet still remaining true to Bob's music in Monty's own personal interpretation of Bob's music. Monty and his musicians honors both the jazz and Reggae and yet this cd remains a reggae disc with touches of Jazz flavored throughout. Splendid job by Monty and his pals.

Jazz pianist Monty Alexander is joined on this session by his regular rhythm section and by a Jamaican aggregation in an attempt to fuse together the reggae sounds of Bob Marley and the sounds of straight ahead piano jazz. Without vocals, the resulting music is sometimes a bit thin, sounding a bit too much like cocktail jazz in places--but even in those moments, it sounds like really good cocktail jazz (but it never sounds like really good reggae, alas--but if it did, it would no longer be very good cocktail jazz, much less really good jazz). The best cuts are the two in which trombonist Steve Turre joins in, "Running Away" and "I Shot the Sheriff." A recording with more Turre would be really jammin', but when all is said and done, this recording is pretty good. On the sonic side, this CD apparently marks the debut of Telarc's use of the Sony DSD system for making recordings (bit-mapped down to standard 16-bit CD format, of course).

While I've not been a particular fan of Bob Marley's music, these performances by Monty Alexander give the music great accessability. Alexander is a consumate musician; these performances are first rate and reward the listener handsomely.

Been a long time fan of bob marley it was one of the greatest delight of my life when i first saw this cd. I was not disappointed the renditions are superd. For all monty and by extension marley fans this is a must have.

This is a pleasant enough recording, but has nowhere near the emotion of the originals. Much like the elevator-music reviewer, I find it only a pleasant diversion - but that in itself makes it mostly worthwhile.
My main reason for writing this at all is that if you search "SACD" in Amazon, this comes up as an SACD. It most definitely is not, and I think the DSD logo on the label has some confused. It is advertised as recorded in DSD, and then down-sampled to CD. So, you get a CD. You can't stuff 24 bits into 16 without losing the resolution that makes 24 bits better. Just enjoy it for what it is, but that's all you get.

Telarc SACD is a very good recording. 5 stars.
Previous reviewer wrote,"Not having been exposed to Monty Alexander previously, I was worried this cd would be "elevator" music- unpalatable piano renditions of an artist that I very much like."...and then said he was pleasantly surprised. I was not. Elevator music compared to the real thing. 3 stars.

Sinceramente, no me agrada el reggae, por lo que dudaba que este disco fuera a parecerme bueno en lo absoluto cuando un amigo (al que le gusta el jazz como a mí) me lo prestó. Para mi sorpresa, me lo compré ese mismo fin de semana. ¡Es excelente!

Se los recomiendo ampliamente.