Oscar Peterson Trio + Clark Terry - Oscar Peterson Trio + One (1983 Japanese Mercury Vinyl LP)

Vinyl: EX
Sleeve: VG+
Obi: VG+

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Oscar Peterson Trio + Clark Terry - Oscar Peterson Trio + One | Vinyl LP - 1983 Japanese Mercury Reissue (195J-14, Nippon Phonogram)

Terry had played with Count Basie and Duke Ellington through the 1940s and 1950s, spent a decade as the first African American staff musician on a major US television network (NBC's Tonight Show), and mentored both Miles Davis and Quincy Jones. By 1964 he was one of the most versatile brass players in jazz, equally fluent on trumpet and flugelhorn, and equally capable of hard bop or swing. This session catches all of it. "Blues for Smedley" is the longest track at nearly seven minutes, Peterson and Terry trading ideas over Brown and Thigpen in a medium-tempo blues where Terry's muted trumpet sits close to the microphone and Peterson's comping stays spare. "Mack the Knife" stretches past five minutes with Terry's open horn cutting through the arrangement. "I Want a Little Girl" is a ballad where the flugelhorn's warmer, rounder tone replaces the trumpet. "Squeaky's Blues" swings hard and fast. "Roundalay," another Peterson original, is more considered, with a composed melody that gives both soloists structured material to work through. "They Didn't Believe Me" is the Jerome Kern standard played as a ballad.

Then there's "Mumbles." Two minutes, no words (or all words, depending on how you listen), Terry scatting in a stream of syllables that sound like language but aren't, the trio swinging behind him. The story is that the band had some extra studio time and were fooling around. What came out became Terry's nickname for the rest of his career and led to a full album of the concept on Mainstream the following year. "Incoherent Blues" closes the album in the same vein, Terry vocalising over a slow blues with Peterson, Brown and Thigpen dropping out periodically to leave him completely exposed. Peterson's liner notes accompany the session.

This is the 1983 Japanese stereo reissue on Mercury 195J-14, from the Oscar Peterson Original Mercury Collection, manufactured by Nippon Phonogram Co., Ltd.