JIM HALL & BOB BROOKMEYER
Live At The North Sea Jazz Festival (Challenge)
Reviewed by Shaun Dale

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Jim Hall, who ranks high on anyone's list of the top jazz guitarists, and Bob Brookmeyer, who *is* most people's list of the top jazz valve trombonists, had a long association before teaming up in the late seventies to form a unique duo. They had originally played together over 20 years previously in a unique trio, the Jimmy Guiffre Three, with Guiffre's reed work augmenting the guitar and trombone. Thus, the notion of a jazz act with no bass, piano or drums for rhythm might seem like an unusual arrangement to most listeners, but it was a familiar circumstance for Hall and Brookmeyer.

This release documents their performance at the 1979 North Sea Jazz Festival, and while it's been a long time coming, the music presented doesn't suffer a bit from the passage of time. Two talented musicians, each possessing a deep creative impulse and the chops to match, working over a set of standards (with one original composition, "Sweet Basil," by the duo) in a way that is anything but "standard." The recording reveals a bit more of the setting than might be ideal, with some occasional clatter or comment leaking through from offstage, but the music is so good that such minor distractions will offer no impediment to the enjoyment of anyone who gives this disc a spin. Or several spins, as will inevitably happen once you hear it.

Track List:

Skating In Central Park * I Hear A Rhapsody * My Funny Valentine * Body And Soul * Sentimental Mood * Darn That Dream * St. Thomas

© 1999 - Shaun Dale