Montreux Through The Decades: Jazz Recordings, Part One

To celebrate Montreux Jazz Festival's 50th edition in 2016, and as a posthumous tribute to the festival's founder, the late Claude Nobs, All About Jazz is launching a new column entitled Montreux Through the Decades, which will periodically present reviews of officially released live recordings from MJF, from its first edition in 1967 to the present. This first batch of multiple reviews features ten jazz recordings spanning the years 1968 to 2012. To coincide with this year's MJF two further multiple reviews will cover blues, soul and funk, and then rock, pop and folk.

Bill Evans
Bill Evans at Montreux Jazz Festival 1968
Verve
1968

This recording of a short-lived Bill Evans trio at the Montreux Jazz Festival would give the pianist another Grammy award, his first having come with Conversations with Myself (1963) a few years earlier. Captured by Radio Suisse Romande and released promptly by Verve in 1968, the one-hour concert is also notable for being Jack DeJohnette's only recording with Evans. The drummer, who had recently left Charles Lloyd's group, would soon move on to be replaced by Marty Morell, but his short tenure with Evans had a significant impact on the pianist, as can be heard throughout this lively trio performance, with Evans evidently inspired.

DeJohnette's empathetic animation—on sticks and brushes alike—in tandem with Eddie Gomez's visceral approach, lights a fire under Evans, who responds with an exuberance rarely heard before, particularly on an extraordinary version of "Someday My Prince Will Come," where the pianist is at his most expansive and uninhibited, unleashing thrilling Art Tatum-esque runs.

There's little of Evan's more customary introspection on these ballsy workouts, and even on the two balladic solo piano pieces, "Quiet Now" and a beautiful rendition of "I Loves You Porgy," Evans is in cheery, playful form. As Brian Priestly noted in his liner notes to a 1998 CD reissue, it was unusual for Evans to perform solo pieces in a trio setting, which make this Montreux set all the more special.

Puerto Rican bassist Gomez had only been with Evans for two years at the time of this Montreux performance but his muscular, guitar-like attack clearly excited Evans, who atypically devotes an entire number ("Embraceable You") to the bassist. Gomez also illuminates the Earl Zindar's "Mother of Earl," and "One for Helen," one of two Evan's originals along with "Walkin' Up" that bookend this memorable concert.

Bobbi Humphrey
Cookin' with Blue Note at Montreux 1973
Blue Note
1973

Festival director Claude Nobs was partly right when he said by way of introduction to flautist Bobbi Humphrey's Montreux Jazz Festival appearance that there hadn't been that many female jazz artists in the history of jazz. Or at least, not that many in 1973 were given top billing at festivals or led bands. Humphrey had been spotted by Dizzy Gillespie in a school competition and with his encouragement moved to New York, where within days she had played with Duke Ellington. Such endorsements no doubt paved the way in 1971 for Humphrey to become the first woman instrumentalist since German pianist Jutta Hipp in 1954 to be signed by Blue Note.

This concert features tracks from Flute In (Blue Note, 1971) and Dig This! (Blue Note, 1972), stretched to two or three times their studio length and showcasing Humphrey's undoubted virtuosity. Humphrey and guitarist Barney Perry's unison melody introduces Alphonse Mouzon's "Virtue" with bassist Henry Franklin's mantra-like ostinato and drummer Keith Killgo's bustle providing anchor and spring-board respectively for Humphrey's four-and-a-half minute exploration -a fluid solo of continuous invention and melodic taste.

Humphrey leaves substantial room for her sidemen to stretch out on Stanley Turrentine's "Sugar" and shares protagonism with electric pianist Kevin Toney on Dick Griffin's "Sad Bag," which Humphrey steers seamlessly from seductive ballad to breezy workout, her playing lyrical and warm- toned throughout. Toney takes the baton and goes up a gear with an animated solo before Humphrey's returns to see the tune quietly home, her unaccompanied flute providing a delightful ending. A grooving, jazz-funk take on Bill Wither's "Ain't No Sunshine," with Humphrey and Toney once again stretching out impressively, closes an engaging concert on a high note.

The crowd's enthusiastic response during the performance, between songs and at the end is testament to the impact Humphrey made at Montreux Jazz 1973 and a ringing endorsement of her talent.

Dizzy Gillespie
The Dizzy Gillespie Big 7 at Montreux Jazz Festival 1975
Pablo
1975

As part of a Pablo recording artists' package featured at the Montreux Jazz Festival '75, Dizzy Gillespie leads an all-star band of some of the most celebrated names in jazz of the previous thirty years. There are no real surprises in a set list that draws from the beboppers songbook and the music follows an unwaveringly predictable pattern of opening melody followed by a sequence of solos and then a return to the head. While the songs and the idiom border on the clichéd, the musicianship is unquestionably out of the top drawer.

The septet opens with the Sigmund Romberg/Oscar Hammerstein hit from 1928, "Lover Come Back to Me"; Gillespie's lyrical intro soon gives way to Niels Henning Orsted Pederson's fast-walking bass and Micky Roker's industry on the kit; the duo's up-tempo time-keeping stokes the fires of Eddie Lockjaw Davis, Milt Jackson, Gillespie, Johnny Griffin and Tommy Flanagan in turn, where free-wheeling individual virtuosity is the order of the day.

In spite of the all-star nature of the band the musicians are well familiar with each other. In the previous decade Roker had played frequently with both Gillespie and Jackson, while Davis and Griffin had recorded no fewer than ten albums together in their co-led group between 1960 and 1962 on the Prestige label. Orsted Pederson, the go- to bassist for all the great American musicians visiting Denmark in the 1960s and 1970s had recorded a couple of live recordings with Gillespie prior to this Montreux outing. Given the shared history of the musicians, the unadventurous arrangements and familiar bebop template of these well-known standards comes across as just a little stale, not matter how passionate the playing.

And the soloing is full of verve, from all concerned, though Orsted Pedersen only gets a run out towards the end of "I'll Remember April," another fast-temp workout. The first collective breather comes after half an hour, with a slow, bluesy rendition of "What's New?, Bob Haggart/Johnny Burke's 1939 hit. Davis sets the tone with a mellifluous solo and the measured improvisations that follow from Gillespie—not without fire—Griffin and Jackson receive soulful, nuanced support that's largely absent in the break-neck tempos elsewhere in the set.

"Cherokee" once again reignites the bebop juggernaut with extended closing statements from all bar Orsted Pederson. The music is exhilarating in places, to be sure, but twenty years after Charlie Parker's death it sounds like an anachronism.

Weather Report
Live at Montreux 1976
Eagle Rock
2007 (DVD)

Weather Report was always a band in transition and this 1976 Montreux Jazz Festival appearance finds the jazz-fusion pioneers led by Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter at a particularly fascinating crossroads. In switching from percussion to the drum chair—replacing Chester Thompson—six months earlier, Alex Acuña became the band's ninth drummer, while Manolo Badrena—formerly of Miles Davis—-became the band's eighth percussionist at around the same time. The biggest change, however, saw the arrival of Jaco Pastorius, who joined half-way through the recording sessions for Black Market (Columbia, 1976), and it's the music from that essential album that features in this electrifying performance.

With digitally remastered sound and four cameras highlighting the intensity and emotion in the playing—Acuna and Badrena's joie de vivre contrasting with Zawinul and Shorter's seriousness—this is Weather Report captured at its most exhilarating. The tight arrangements of "Elegant People" and "Scarlet Woman" allow plenty of room for freedom, with the lines between comping and soloing from all thrillingly blurred. The sweat is literally pouring off the players—the cool Pastorius apart—from the get go, and so charged is some of the interplay from Acuna and Badrena that it made it would way onto the next studio album, Heavy Weather in unedited form as "Rumba Mama."

With the band touring Europe to promote Black Market, there were already signs of the way ahead, with Zawinul toying with the melody to "Birdland"— the Grammy-nominated tune from Heavy Weather—on the intro to "Dr. Honoris Causa," before the band enters more loosely explorative terrain on "Directions," both Zawinul compositions from I Sing The Body Electric (Columbia, 1972).

The duets between Acuna and Badrena, and another between Zawinul on classically-influenced piano and Shorter are fascinating exchanges between virtuosic and imaginative musicians, but it's Pastorius' harmonically sophisticated solo bass piece, "Portrait of Tracey" that stands out as something out of the ordinary. Still, the greatest moments are when the quintet is firing on all cylinders on stonking versions of "Barbary Coast"—complete with the familiar train horn intro—"Black Market" and the "Gibraltar," which brings an unforgettable show, in turn lyrical and visceral, to a simply stunning climax.

Little wonder that Weather Report remains so influential to this day. One for the ages.

Sun Ra Arkestra
Live at Montreux 1976
Inner City Jazz
2012

This double CD is a visceral document of Sun Ra and his Arkestra, just over twenty years into its legendary musical odyssey. The twenty-one piece band, which includes three dancers, roars its way through a thrilling set that, stylistically, spans a broad arc of jazz history. Though undoubtedly influenced by bandleader Fletcher Henderson—for whom Ra arranged in the 1940s—and by Duke Ellington, there's never been a large ensemble quite like those led by Sun Ra, as this memorable concert amply demonstrates.

The band dives headlong into avant-garde exploration on "Of the Other Tomorrow," where ecstatic polyphony is punctuated by wonderfully charismatic improvisations by Elo Omo on bass clarinet, Marshall Allen on alto and Ra on piano. Across the two discs Ra impresses with some of his most adventurous unaccompanied piano solos ever captured on live record, as boldly uninhibited as Cecil Taylor at one extreme, as refined as Count Basie at the other.

For all his virtuosity, Ra's true instrument, like Ellington and Basie, is his orchestra—a simultaneously primal and sophisticated one at that. Take the breathless flow of ideas on "On Sound Infinity Spheres," which twists its way through dense free-jazz cacophony, Ra's moog-driven sci-fi impressionism and extraordinary solo spots by John Gilmore, trumpeter Chris Capers and altoist Danny Davis. The band out-bops the be-boppers on a devilishly fast and furious rendition of Billy Strayhorn's "Take the "A" Train," swings like Basie's orchestra on the celebratory "El is the Sound of Joy" and frequently howls, cries and sings like a Charles Mingus group on fire, notably on the aptly titled "Gods of the Thunder Realm." Dissonance and harmony are two sides of the same coin on the strangely hypnotic "Lights on a Satellite."

Following a terrifically uproarious free-for-all, vocalist June Tyson leads the Arkestra—and the rhythmically attuned clapping audience—through the call-and- response mantra of the signature "We Travel the Spaceways."

The glorious sound of surprise indeed.

Carmen McRae
Live at Montreux 1982
Acrobat
2005

Carmen McRae was renowned for being a perfectionist, so the singer should have been pleased with this concert, which sees her give a masterclass in jazz standards delivery. With tasteful accompaniment from bassist John Leftwich, drummer Donald Bailey and pianist Marshall Otwell McCrae demonstrates the sort of nuanced expression and technical control that's influenced singers from Norma Winstone to Diana Krall.

Following breezy renditions of "Nice Work if you can Get it" and "Do Nothing Til You Hear From Me," McRae hits her stride on the bluesy stroll of "Everything a Good Man Needs," her sassy delivery framed by short solos from her sidemen. The singer's stretching out of a single word, never mind a phrase, is seen to great effect on the brushes-led "Body and Soul," with the last utterance of the word "soul" drawn out into a nine-syllable delight. McRae, like her contemporary Sheila Jordan, digs into the emotional core of a ballad's lyrics, with "My Funny Valentine" and "Everything Happens to Me—where the full range of her voice is felt—-providing highlights of the set. The duet with Otwell, her pianist of six years, on another beautiful ballad "Don't Misunderstand," recalls her collaboration with George Shearing.

McRae's penchant for Latin numbers brings mixed results. An English-sung interpretation of Brazilian singer-songwriter Djavan's "Flor de Lis" sees McCrae and trio negotiate a nifty change of tempo, with the singer carving out an effortlessly fluid scat. "Besame Mucho" is tackled in the original Spanish, though McRae's anglicized pronunciation detracts from her emotive delivery.

The band cooks on Paul Desmond's vampy "Take Five," with McRae reprising the role she performed on Dave Brubeck's album Take Five Live (Columbia, 1961), one of three Brubeck albums the singer graced. "Them There Eyes" swings buoyantly and briefly, while a samba vibe infuses the up-tempo "No More Blues," featuring McRae's most impressive vocal improvisation of the set. Billy Joel's "New York State of Mind" follows a slow, bluesy groove with McRae cajoled by Otwell's gently funky lines.

Vintage stuff from the ever-classy McRae.

Monteiro, Young & Holt
Live at Montreux 1988
Jazznote Records
2011 (CD + bonus DVD)

It took persistence, but Claude Nobs finally got his wish when he persuaded Isaac Redd Holt and Eldee Young to return to Montreux Jazz Festival, twenty years after their rousing performance as Young-Holt Unlimited in 1968. This concert sees the two former Ramsey Lewis Trio members in top form, led by the exciting young Singaporean pianist Jeremy Monteiro and with special guests ODonel Levy and John Stubblefield. It's a high-octane performance of tremendous energy, virtuosity and passion, prompting Nobs to describe it as an "unforgettable set which will remain a classic of the first twenty two years of Montreux."

Remarkably, this concert began at 5am, five hours later than originally scheduled, but rather than arriving jaded and tired—which would have been understandable— instead Monteiro, Young and Holt come charging out of the blocks on an energized version of the standard "All the Things You Are," where Monteiro gives early notice of his outstanding chops with a solo of great melodic fluidity and rhythmic panache.

O'Levy brings bluesy bite to Luiz Bonfa's "Black Orpheus," in turn inspiring Monteiro, who then trades back and forth with the Baltimore guitarist in a thrilling exchange. Monteiro's elegant composition "Carousel in a Child's Mind" has the feel of a classic and features Stubblefield on soprano saxophone. A collaborator with the likes of Anthony Braxton, McCoy Tyner and Miles Davis, Stubblefield's keening pyrotechnics are juxtaposed against more lyrical—though equally animated—interventions from O'Levy and Monteiro, over Holt and Young's propulsive rhythmic drive.

The irrepressible Young holds centre stage with a sassy vocal on a mightily swinging "Storming Monday," where groove, chops and fun intertwine in an irresistible cocktail. To the roars of a sizeable crowd, the five musicians finish on a high, with a roaring jazz-funk version of Miles Davis' "All Blues," with vibrant closing statements from all.

One of the best live recordings from Montreux Jazz' extensive vaults. Unforgettable indeed.

Miles Davis & Quincy Jones
Miles & Quincy Live at Montreux 1991
Warner Bros
1993

Only Claude Nobs, a close friend to both Davis and Jones, could have made this historic concert happen. To persuade these two iconic musicians to perform together on stage for the first time ever was already a major coup, but to convince Davis to revisit music he had recorded decades before was something really rare indeed. Davis, the musical chameleon par excellence, always finished with one project and moved on without a backwards glance, but for one magical evening, Davis turned back the clock to perform music from his famous collaborations with arranger Gil Evans. The recording was one of the last in Davis' lifetime, as he died a little over two months later.

Using Gil Goldstein's transcriptions of Gil Evans old charts, Jones conducts a large ensemble of nearly fifty musicians from the Gil Evans Orchestra and the George Gruntz Concert Jazz Band through stirring selections from Miles Ahead (Columbia, 1957), Porgy and Bess (Columbia, 1959) and Sketches of Spain (Columbia, 1960). The sound quality is excellent, so too the playing of the ensemble and of the chief soloists, saxophonist Kenny Garrett and trumpeter Wallace Roney.

Davis features far more than was originally expected, given that his declining health had forced him to skip rehearsals in New York. His tone is warm and in turn tender, and his voice strong soloing on "Boplicity," which goes back to the 1949 Birth of the Cool session. Elsewhere his interventions are short but unmistakable, leading the way before handing the reins to Roney and Garret.

Maria Schneider transcribed and orchestrated a sumptuous version of "Miles Ahead" but it's the medley from Porgy and Bess that gets the biggest cheer of the night. The greatest musical drama, however, undoubtedly comes during the finale from Sketches of Spain, where, appropriately, Davis leads "Pan Piper" before the familiar martial drums pattern—played by John Riley—kicks off a rousing eleven-minute version of "Solea." It was to be Davis' last hurrah.

Carlos Santana & John McLaughlin
Invitation to Illumination:Live at Montreux 2011
Eagle Rock
2013 (DVD)

This historic reunion of Carlos Santana and John McLaughlin came thirty eight years after Love, Devotion and Surrender (Columbia, 1973), their collaboration inspired by the spiritual guru Sri Chimnoy and John Coltrane's music. Tantalizingly, the album aligned members of Mahavishnu Orchestra and Santana's band, though the results divided critics and fans alike. Both guitarists have enjoyed a long association with Montreux Jazz Festival—Santana first appeared in 1970 and McLaughlin in 1972—and there's festive energy about this performance, which revisits Love, devotion and Surrender and myriad other influences common to these two guitar icons.

As you might expect, there are plenty of pyrotechnics from both guitarists, with an all-star band featuring Dennis Chambers, Benny Rietveld, Etienne Mbappe and Cindy Blackman Santana lending plenty of rhythmic muscle. Santana kick-starts the party with his trademark ecstatic crescendos on a shortened version of McLaughlin's "The Life Divine." Once past the—ironically—uninspired, clunky medley that weaves a trail through Coltrane, Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin and Sun Ra, the true fireworks begin.

McLaughlin replicates his incendiary playing on Miles Davis' "Right Off," from the soundtrack Jack Johnson (Columbia, 1973), with David K. Matthews' terrific synthesizer solo setting the clocks back to the time of flared trousers. Sonny Sharrock appeared uncredited on that landmark album but Santana pays tribute to the guitarist on a searing version of Pharoah Sanders's "Venus/Upper Egypt," the original 1966 recordings of which featured Sharrock. McLaughlin and Blackman stoke each other's engines on fiery versions of "Vuelta Abajo" and Carla Bley's "Vashkar," staples of Tony Williams' Lifetime -material which McLaughlin jokes he hasn't played "for about a hundred and fifty years."

Occasionally, the sense of nostalgia and homage that permeates the music threatens to take the edge off the collective force of the band, with the "Love Supreme" chant overstaying its welcome and John Lee Hooker's "Shake it Up and Go"—featuring festival director Claude Nobs on harmonica—failing to rise much above an old pal's loose jam. However, there are plenty of highpoints, notably the acoustic guitar duets on a lyrical interpretation of Coltrane's "Naima" and a strikingly original flamenco take on British composer Cyril Scott's 1905 composition "Lotus Land Op 47, 1"—written for solo piano—which suggest that an acoustic album from these two could be huge.

An extended version of the traditional gospel "Let Us Go Into the House Of the Lord," propelled by Paul Rekow's congas, has all the emotive intensity of the original Santana/McLaughlin collaboration from 1973, whilst "Black Satin," from Miles Davis' On The Corner (Columbia, 1972)—an energetic, hard-driving rocker that leads into a spectacular Blackman solo—sees sparks fly.

A unique concert in the history of the MJF that captures two legendary guitarists in scintillating form.

Neil Cowley Trio
Live at Montreux 2012
Eagle Records
2012

In reviewing Displaced (Hide Inside Records, 2006), Neil Cowley Trios' debut, UK jazz provocateur Stuart Nicholson was pretty much on the money in 2006, he described composer/pianist Cowley as "the most exciting artist since the likes of F-ire Collective, Polar Bear and Acoustic Ladyland." Six years later, by the time of this Montreux performance, Cowley's trio was riding the crest of a wave, with multiple awards and rave reviews greeting each of its subsequent studio albums. For its fourth studio album, The Face of Mount Molehill (Naim Jazz, 2012), strings marked a significant departure for the trio. That album provided the guts of this enthralling performance in the Montreux Jazz Festival's Miles Davis Hall, complete with string quartet.

The gentle, warming romanticism of the piano solo number "Lament" is juxtaposed strikingly with the pulsating drama that follows. There's as much of the rocker in Cowley's aesthetic on a tracks like "Rooster Was a Witness" and "Fables" as there are elements of dance, pop, classical and jazz. Everywhere, Cowley's penchant for hypnotically circling motifs evokes the minimalism of Terry Reily, albeit executed with more searing intensity.

Violinists Miles Brett and Julian Ferraretto, cellist Alex Eichenberger and violist Helen Sanders-Hewett had already toured the UK with the trio and they provide a sumptuous carpet to Cowley's uniquely simple yet grandly epic compositions. The chemistry is pronounced on the splendidly riff-heavy "How Do We Catch Up," where Cowley marries orchestral gravitas with poppish flare, and on the spacious, melodically fine "Meyer," the sole track co-penned by bassist Rex Horan and drummer Evan Jenkins.

There's tremendous collective energy in these powerful narratives, with Cowley's dancing left and right hand dialog steering the ensemble in his unique orbit. An inherent drama courses through the veins of the music, no more so than on the blistering trio number "She Eats Flies," an episodic tour de force that reaches a crushingly intense climax.

Tracks and Personnel:

Bill Evans at the Montreux Jazz Festival

Track Listing: One for Helen; A Sleepin' Bee; Mother of Earl; Nardis; Quiet Now; I Loves You, Porgy; The Touch of Your Lips; Embraceable You; Someday My Prince Will Come; Walkin' Up.

Personnel: Bill Evans: piano; Eddie Gomez: bass; Jack DeJohnette: drums.

Bobbi Humphrey: Cookin' with Blue Note at Montreux

Track Listing: Virtue; Sugar; Sad Bag; Ain't No Sunshine.

Personnel: Bobbi Humphrey: flute; Kevin Toney: electric piano; Barney Perry: guitar; Henry Franklin: bass; Keith Killgo: drums.

Dizzy Gillespie: Dizzy Gillespie's Big 7

Track Listing: Lover, Come Back to Me; I'll Remember April; What's New?; Cherokee.

Personnel: Dizzy Gillespie: trumpet; Milt Jackson: vibraphones; Eddie 'Lockjaw' Davis: tenor saxophone; Johnny Griffin: tenor saxophone; Tommy Flanagan: piano; Neils-Henning Orsted Pedersen: bass; Micky Roker: drums.

Weather Report: Live at Montreux 1976

Track Listing: Elegant People; Scarlet Woman; Barbary Coast; Portrait of Tracey; Cannon Ball; Black Market; Drum and percussion duet; Piano and saxophone duet; Dr Honoris Causa/Directions; Badia; Gibraltar.

Personnel: Joe Zawinul: keyboards; Wayne Shorter: saxophone; Jaco Pastorius: fretless bass; Alex Acuna: drums; Manolo Badrena: congas, percussion.

Sun Ra and his Arkestra at Montreux Track Listing: CD 1: For the Sunrise; Of the Other Tomorrow; From Out Where Others Dwell; On Sound Infinity Spheres; The House of Eternal Being; Gods of the Thunder Realm; Lights on a Satellite; CD2: Take the "A" Train interlude); Take the "A" Train; Prelude; El is the Sound of Joy; Encore 1; Encore 2; We Travel the Spaceways.

Personnel: Sun Ra; piano, solar organ, moog; John Gilmore: tenor saxophone; Marshall Allen: alto saxophone; Danny Davis: alto saxophone, flute; Pat Patrick: baritone saxophone; flute; James Jackson: Ancient Infinity Egyptian Drum, bassoon; Elo Omo: bass clarinet; Danny Thompson: baritone saxophone, flute; Reggie Hudgins: soprano saxophone; Ahmed Abdullah: trumpet; Chris Capers: trumpet; Al Evans; trumpet; Vincent Chancey: French horn; Craig Harris: trombone; Stanley Morgan: congas; Clifford Jarvis: drums; Larry Bright: drums; Hayes Burnette: bass; Tony Bunn: electric bass; June Tyson: vocal, dancer; Judith Holten: dancer; Cheryl Banks: dancer.

Carmen McRae: Live at Montreux

Track Listing: Nice Work If You Can get It; Do Nothing til You Hear from Me; Everything a Good Man Needs; Body and Soul; Them There Eyes; My Funny Valentine; No More Blues; Everything Happens to Me; Upside Down; Take Five; Besame Mucho; New York State of Mind; Don't Misunderstand.

Personnel: Carmen McCrae: vocals; Marshall Otwell: piano; John Leftwich: bass; Donald Bailey: drums.

Monteiro, Young & Holt: Live at the Montreux Jazz Festival

Track Listing: All the Things You Are; Black Orpheus; Carousel in a Child's Mind; Stormy Monday; All Blues.

Personnel: Jeremy Monteiro: piano; Eldee Young: bass, vocals; Isaac 'Redd' Holt: drums; John Stubblefield: tenor and soprano saxophone; D'Donel Levy: guitar.

Miles Davis & Quincy Jones: Miles and Quincy Live at Montreux

Track Listing: Boplicity; Miles Ahead Medley: Springsville; Maids of Cadiz; The Duke; My Ship; Miles Ahead; Blues for Pablo; Porgy and Bess Medley: Orgone; Gone, Gone, Gone; Summertime; Here Come De Honey Man; The Pan Piper; Solea.

Personnel: Miles Davis: trumpet; Quincy Jones: conductor; Kenny Garret: alto saxophone; Wallace Roney: trumpet; The Gil Evans Orchestra: Lew Soloff: trumpet; Miles Evans: trumpet; Tom Malone: trombone; Alex Foster: alto saxophone, soprano saxophone, flute; George Adams: tenor saxophone, flute; Gil Goldstein: keyboard; Delmar Brown: keyboard; Kennwood Dennard: drums on "Orgone," percussion on other selections; The George Gruntz Concert Band: Marvin Stamm: trumpet, flugelhorn; John D'erath: trumpet, flugelhorn; Jack Walrath: trumpet, flugelhorn; John Clark: French horn; Tom Varner: French horn; Dave Bargeron: euphonium, trombone; Earl McIntyre: euphonium, trombone; Dave Taylor: bass trombone; Howard Johnson: tuba, baritone saxophone; Sal Giorgianni: alto saxophone; Bob Malach: tenor saxophone, flute, saxophone; Larry Schneider: tenor saxophone, oboe, flute, clarinet; Jerry Bergonzi: tenor saxophone; George Gruntz: piano, leader; Mike Richmond: bass; John Riley: drums, percussion; Manfred Schoof: trumpet, flugelhorn, Ack von Royen: trumpet, flugelhorn; Alex Brofsky: French horn; Roland Dahinden: trombone; Claudio Pontiggia: French horn; Anne O'Brien: flute; Julian Cawdry: flute, piccolo, alto flute; Hanspeter Frehner: flute, piccolo, alto flute; Michel Weber: clarinet; Christian Gavillet: bass clarinet, baritone saxophone; Tilman Zahn: oboe; Dave Segezzo: oboe; Xavier Duss: oboe; Judith Wenziker: oboe; Christian Rabe: bassoon; Reiner Erb: bassoon; Xenia Schindler: harp; Conrad Herwig: trombone; Roger Rosenberg: bass clarinet, baritone saxophone; Benny Bailey: trumpet, flugelhorn; Carles Benavent: bass, electric bass; Grady Tate: drums.

Carlos Santana & John McLaughlin: Invitation to Illumination

Track Listing: CD 1: Echoes of Angels/Introductions; The Life Devine; Medley: Peace on Earth/A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall/Stairway to Heaven/Our Prayer/SOCC; Right Off; Vuelta Abajo; Vashkar; The Creator Has a Master Plan; Naima; Lotus Land Op 47, No 1. CD 2: Downstairs; Venus/Upper Egypt; Let Us Go Into the House of the Lord; Black Satin; Cindy Blackman drum solo; A Love Supreme; Shake it Up and Go.

Personnel: Carlos Santana: lead electric and acoustic guitars, vocals; John McLaughlin: lead electric and acoustic guitars, vocals; Dennis Chambers: drums; David K. Matthews: keyboards; Tommy Anthony: guitar and vocals; Paul Rekow: congas, percussion; Etienne Mbappe: bass; Benny Rietveld: bass; Tony Lindsay: vocals; Andy Vargas: vocals; Claude Nobs: harmonica.

Neil Cowley Trio: Live at Montreux 2012

Track Listing: Lament; Rooster was a Witness; Distance By Clockwork; Slims; Hug the Greyhound; Box Lily; How Do We Catch Up; Hope Machine; Meyer; Fable; The Face of Mount Molehill; She Eats Flies.

Personnel: Neil Cowley: piano; Rex Horan: bass; Evan Jenkins: drums; Julian Ferraretto: violin; Miles Brett: violin; Alex Eichenberger: cello; Helen Sanders-Hewett: viola. .

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