Gerry Gibbs • Songs From My Father
Fast-forward 66 years to Gerry Gibbs’s double-CD release, a tribute album to his 97-year-old father. Caught within a global pandemic, the production of the album (Gibbs’s thirteenth release) took close to a year to complete, using recording venues in New York, New Jersey (Van Gelder Studio) and California. Putting the recording sessions together required thousands of miles of travel and countless hours of planning. The album also, regrettably, proved to be Chick Corea’s last recorded performance. With the exception of one track, the tunes on Songs From My Father are Terry Gibbs compositions. All 19 feature drummer Gerry Gibbs setting the pace in one of four trio settings, each comprised of hand-picked, A-list pianists and bassists: Chick Corea and Ron Carter, Kenny Barron and Buster Williams, Patrice Rushen and Larry Goldings, Geof Keezer and Christian McBride. Additional percussion by Gerry Gibbs’s wife, Keyshie, is heard on disc one, highlights of which include a jaunty romp through bebop titled “Bopstacle Course”; a nice, relaxed gallop tempo on “Take It From Me”; a tropical mood established on “Sweet Young Song of Love”; and a dreamy, melancholy, organ-infused “Lonely Days.” The disc closer, the medium-tempo bopper “Hey Chick,” features a vintage 1961 Terry Gibbs vibes solo (with Gerry’s drums and Larry Goldings’ organ overdubbed). Each of the four trios also make spirited appearances on this track. Disc two highlights include “T&S,” a loping, straight-ahead jazz swinger featuring some fine Kenny Barron piano work; “Lonely Dreams,” a melancholy ballad with more outstanding Barron piano; “Pretty Blue Eyes,” a noir-ish intro melding into a spirited romp, complete with Hammond B3; and the album’s closer, “Tango for Terry,” a Chick Corea composition serving as a reminder of how much Corea's exceptional melodic, harmonic and rhythmic ideas will be missed. Adding this ninety minutes of first-class trio jazz to Whaling City Sound’s roster
of over 75 releases, founder Neal Weiss furthers his company’s goal of offering the
discerning music lover exciting performances featuring faultless musicianship,
high-quality sound and tasteful, informative packaging. The mastering, by Mike Marciano at
Systems 2 Studio, completes this labor-of-love set, whether the music comes from digital
or analog sources. From the woody character of the double bass, the bite of the Hammond
B3, the sharp, percussive nature of the piano, and the dynamic snap of the drums and
shimmer of the cymbals, to the re-creation of a believable recording space in your
listening room, you’ll hear what high-end audio exists for. |
ver the years, one of my go-to jazz LPs has been Terry
Gibbs’s self-titled EmArcy release from 1955. Aside from its display of outstanding
musicianship, it has never failed to remind me of a quintessential quality of jazz --
exuberance, or as the French might say, joie de vivre. Gibbs was an innovative,
virtuosic vibraphonist whose music embodied the best of bebop. Whereas free jazz, fusion
and other flavors of the day often leave me emotionally cold, that EmArcy album always
manages to get my head bobbing and my feet tapping.