Jazz Articles

The NDR Big Band: Plays Benny Goodman

by Jack Bowers
November 1, 1999

This charming two–disc set by Germany’s world–class NDR Big Band was recorded in 1998, sixty years after clarinetist Benny Goodman’s legendary concert at Carnegie Hall in New York, and is meant to salute that memorable occasion. It’s not an exact re–creation, thank goodness, but a number of arrangements written especially for the Goodman band were meticulously transcribed from source materials, so what is heard — aside from the soloists, who are emphatically up–to–date — is in essence what was presented ...