Stan Getz / João Gilberto - Getz/Gilberto (1982 Japanese Verve Gatefold Vinyl LP)

Stan Getz / João Gilberto (feat. Antônio Carlos Jobim) - Getz/Gilberto | Vinyl LP - 1982 Japanese Verve Reissue (23MJ 3162, gatefold, Polydor K.K.)

Getz/Gilberto is the album that turned bossa nova from a Brazilian secret into a global sound. Recorded over two days in March 1963, it brought together the American tenor saxophonist Stan Getz, fresh from the success of Jazz Samba, and two of the men who had invented the style in Rio, guitarist João Gilberto and composer Antônio Carlos Jobim. The music is hushed and unhurried, Getz's warm tenor curling around João's soft guitar and half-sung Portuguese, Jobim's piano placing chords like stepping stones. Six of the eight songs are Jobim's. The one everyone knows is "The Girl From Ipanema", and the reason it travelled is a late decision in the studio: João's wife Astrud, who had never sung professionally, was asked to deliver the English lyric, and her plain, cool, slightly hesitant voice became the sound of bossa nova for the rest of the world. "Corcovado" and "Desafinado" are nearly as lovely, and the whole record moves with a lightness that hides how carefully it is made.

The record broke every expectation set for it. It reached number two on the American pop charts, stayed on them for close to two years. Astrud Gilberto, whose voice carried the hit "The Girl From Ipanema", went uncredited on the original sleeve and was paid a flat session fee, a slight the record's history has never quite lived down. Sixty years on it remains one of the best-selling jazz albums ever made, and one of the few that a newcomer and a lifelong listener will hear the same way.

This copy is the 1982 Japanese reissue on Verve, part of the Bossa Nova Special series, manufactured by Polydor K.K., catalogue number 23MJ 3162, in a gatefold sleeve.