Jazz Articles about Paul Desmond

Paul Desmond: Autumn Leaves: The Lost Vocal Session

by Ken Dryden
April 1, 2007

Doug Ramsey's award-winning, critically acclaimed biography Take Five: The Public and Private Lives of Paul Desmond revealed a lot about the late alto saxophonist, a quiet man who was a brilliant musician, humorous writer and quick-witted punster. But even Ramsey didn't learn of this previously unknown session until a few months ago. It was recorded during the making of the album 1975: The Duets with Dave Brubeck. Desmond, who at the time was seeing a young lady in her early ...

Paul Desmond-isms

by AAJ Staff
September 19, 2005

Alto saxophonist Paul Desmond worked with pianist Dave Brubeck for 18 years. He's best known for his composition “Take Five," which helped make Brubeck's record Time Out a mega-hit. Desmond's saxophone playing was always marked by an unusual fluidity and warmth. Through a number of solo records, he expanded on a relaxed but sophisticated sound.Who would have guessed that Paul Desmond had a wickedly acerbic wit, ironic and self-deprecating at the same time?“I have won several ...

Take Five: The Public and Private Lives of Paul Desmond

by Ken Dryden
June 5, 2005

Doug Ramsey Take Five: The Public and Private Lives of Paul Desmond Parkside Publications ISBN: 0961726679 2005

Paul Desmond was an integral part of the Dave Brubeck Quartet for seventeen years and a brilliant lyrical alto saxophonist who sought a personal sound on his instrument, one of a few emerging saxophonists in the early 1950s who chose not to copy the furious bop licks of Charlie Parker. He was also the composer ...

Take Five: The Public and Private Lives of Paul Desmond

by Brian P. Lonergan
June 5, 2005

Doug Ramsey Take Five: The Public and Private Lives of Paul Desmond Parkside Publications ISBN: 0961726679 2005

Paul Emil Breitenfeld is better known by jazz fans as Paul Desmond and still more widely known as “the guy who wrote 'Take Five'". Desmond's distinctive alto sound and his inventive and impeccably constructed solos go far beyond the composition of his greatest hit, as catchy as that tune is. Now, almost three decades since ...

Dave Brubeck Quartet: Jazz at the College of the Pacific

by David Rickert
December 1, 2004

Before he hit it big with Time Out, Dave Brubeck found a niche market with the college crowd. The tweed coat and horn-rimmed glasses set were eager to soak in all that he had to offer, and Brubeck can take part of the credit for turning jazz into a more academic pursuit than it was previously held to be.

His earliest recordings, such as this one from 1953, were mostly standards recorded in various live venues at colleges around the ...

Paul Desmond: Cool Imagination

by David Rickert
May 10, 2003

Anyone remotely familiar with “Take Five” will recognize Paul Desmond’s dry, feathery alto instantly. However, Desmond often lived in Brubeck’s shadow, and many may not know that Desmond also recorded several fine albums as a leader as well. Brubeck and Desmond had an unwritten contract that the altoist would not play with any other pianist, and Desmond was lucky enough to enlist guitarist Jim Hall as a sideman. Hall has a light, nuanced style more suited to Desmond’s approach than ...

Dave Brubeck Quartet: Jazz Impressions of Japan

by Wayne Zade
September 1, 2001

Like Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, and their groups, Dave Brubeck and his first great quartet were among the first jazz musicians after World War II to travel diplomatically in the service of peace throughout the world. Armstrong released Ambassador Satch in 1955, and Brubeck released The Real Ambassadors, with Armstrong, Carmen McRae, and others, seven years later—helping, maybe, to thaw the Cold War.