Jimmy Giuffre's Tangents in Jazz is something you'll like if you care for weird angular jazz. It's kind of a link between Raymond Scott and Eric Dolphy, I suppose. It's quite structured, but not in any traditional or obvious way. Also, this particular file is only like 25 MB over 35 minutes, so you won't have to invest much time at all in obtaining and listening to it.
Such Sweet Thunder is a suite of Shakespeare-inspired songs by Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn. It's from 1957, so the sound quality is sterling compared to some of the old 78s that pop up on best-ofs and so forth, which may scare more than a few away from Ellington. If you've been ignoring this thread so far (which is probably most of you), this album is as good a place as any to dive in, since almost all the songs are quite short and to the point, without going astray in meandering jams, if that's what had been keeping you away. Don't think of it as academic cerebral elitist jazz, 'cause it's not at all. It's just American music. Sure, I suppose it's fun to approach it like "Oh, this one's about Hamlet," or "oh, Iago + the three witches, interesting combination," but it's not crucial to the appreciation of the music. That part where the horns all come in on "The Star-Crossed Lovers" requires little above and beyond having ears. I'm fond of everything on here, but the title track and "The Star-Crossed Lovers" are my favorites, both of which I got to play in high school, incidentally. This reissue that I own is loaded with bonus tracks (mostly of the alternate take/stereo mix variety) that take it up to about 76 minutes on the disc, and since a lot of them would be kind of extraneous to you guys and push the RAR file well over 100 MB, consider this an abridged version for evaluation purposes. If you're impressed and want the full thing at 320, you can ask me for it, or find it on slsk, or just go out and buy it for $11.
Such Sweet Thunder is a suite of Shakespeare-inspired songs by Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn. It's from 1957, so the sound quality is sterling compared to some of the old 78s that pop up on best-ofs and so forth, which may scare more than a few away from Ellington. If you've been ignoring this thread so far (which is probably most of you), this album is as good a place as any to dive in, since almost all the songs are quite short and to the point, without going astray in meandering jams, if that's what had been keeping you away. Don't think of it as academic cerebral elitist jazz, 'cause it's not at all. It's just American music. Sure, I suppose it's fun to approach it like "Oh, this one's about Hamlet," or "oh, Iago + the three witches, interesting combination," but it's not crucial to the appreciation of the music. That part where the horns all come in on "The Star-Crossed Lovers" requires little above and beyond having ears. I'm fond of everything on here, but the title track and "The Star-Crossed Lovers" are my favorites, both of which I got to play in high school, incidentally. This reissue that I own is loaded with bonus tracks (mostly of the alternate take/stereo mix variety) that take it up to about 76 minutes on the disc, and since a lot of them would be kind of extraneous to you guys and push the RAR file well over 100 MB, consider this an abridged version for evaluation purposes. If you're impressed and want the full thing at 320, you can ask me for it, or find it on slsk, or just go out and buy it for $11.
