Michel Legrand Featuring Miles Davis - Legrand Jazz (Impex Records) LP
The greatest assembly of musical talent ever on one album! Features Performances by John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Bill Evans, Ben Webster & 27 More Jazz Greats! Pressed at Record technology for silent surfaces and true fidelity to the analog source.
Academy and Grammy ® Award-winning composer/arranger Michel Legrand (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, Summer of ’42, The Thomas Crown Affair) was not a household name in America in 1958, but he was renowned among musicians and a life-long fanatic of American jazz and its players. Legrand Jazz is the result of Legrand traveling to America and using his Columbia Records contract to enlist label mates (and soon to be legends) Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Paul Chambers, Ben Webster, Hank Jones, Herbie Mann, Phil Woods, Donald Byrd, Art Farmer, Sheldon Powell, Teo Macero, Milt Hinton, Jimmy Cleveland, and others to record his fantastical reimagining of 11 jazz standards. Not merely content to lay down another Parisian hard-bop play-along, the 27 year old worked against type and expectations at every turn, creating a moody, idiosyncratic landscape for unusual call-and-response chase solos, washes of harp and vibes, and sultry horn canvases. Davis, Coltrane and the others manage to fall in with the diverse, mellow flow of Legrand’s arrangements while keeping their unique musical voices.
Impex’s pristine release was mastered by Chris Bellman on Bernie Grundman’s All-Tube cutting lathe from a 2-track, all-analog mix down of the original studio work prints, made especially for Impex Records by Mark Wilder at Battery Studios in New York. The results are revelatory. The large recording space is captured in every detail, while Davis’ full force dynamic variations come through with incredible veracity. The gentle ebb-and-flow of Legrand’s parts highlight microtonal fluctuations on every track. You are along for a magic carpet ride of large jazz ensemble recording when you drop the needle into these grooves.
Musicians:
Michel Legrand, conductor, arranger (All songs)
Tracklist:
1. The Jitterbug Waltz
2. Nuages
3. Night In Tunisia
4. Blue and Sentimental
5. Stompin’ at the Savoy
6. Django
7. Wild Man Blues
8. Rosetta
9. ‘Round Midnight
10. Don’t Get Around Much Anymore
11. In a Mist
Impex IMP6030-45