Hey, Severius!

Music Lane

It's all about the music, dude! Sit down, relax and listen to some tunes.

I followed your recent jazz review thread over to the Blue Note board, where Chris Albertson's "educated guess" was wrong.
The recording engineer for "The Little Giant" was Jack Higgins at Reeves Sound Studios, not Ray Fowler at Plaza Sound. If you'd like to hear more of Higgins' work, I suggest "Mulligan Meets Monk." The session starts off slow but gains momentum with each tune, ending with a rousing version of Monk's "I Mean You." It's arguably the best and most-revealing recording of the full range and rich tone of Gerry Mulligan's baritone sax. Wilbur Ware's low-register bass, Shadow Wilson's percussion, and, of course, Thelonious Monk's piano are all 'there' -panned, but nonetheless very natural sounding. Higgins also engineered the sublime airy sound of Chet Baker's "Chet" album -but you don't like ballads, right?
Regarding Ray Fowler, the best that I've heard of his works are his "live" location recordings. Thelonious Monk w/Johnny Griffin "In Action" and "Misterioso" are both from the same 1958 'hot' sessions at the Five Spot. And from the same venue, there's Pepper Adams w/Donald Byrd "10 to 4 at The Five Spot." All of the above in-print on Riverside/OJC LP/CD in excellent stereo sound, and highly recommendable.
Higgins and Fowler both made some fine recordings for Riverside, but neither was immune to an occassional blunder :-(
IMO.
~Jay

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The Cable Cooker

Topic - Hey, Severius! - Jay 10:04:09 12/12/02 (1)

Thanks A Mil! - Severius! 16:26:08 12/12/02 (0)

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