Hand picked records important to the history of Soul Strut.
This record, by the odds, should not work. And were it not for my complete faith in Gary Mcfarland, I’d have run away from it screaming right after I read “An attempt to meld the Classical & Jazz idioms”, or whatever jive-ness is written on the back. But I was brave, and people lemme tell ya, everything is right about this one! Gary don’t play on it, but he wrote & arranged the whole thing. Steve Kuhn is in fine form, and he’s backed by some of the great players who frequented Impulse releases at the time. (names elude me right now) Plus there’s a small group of strings on one side & reeds on the other, which is a nice touch. The music is hard to describe. It’s very much Jazz, so you can basically ignore the Classical references which are so hyped on this. Which in my opinion is a good thing.
ALBUMS THAT YOU KNOW ARE DOPE....