Dave Brubeck Trio: Live From Vienna 1967

The lure of a lively good party has long made Hamburg, Germany, a global destination spot. Young and old, male and female, and all in between have, at one time or another, succumbed to the city's salacious history, its tantalizing port of entry, its raucous streets, denizens, and rathskellers. So, can we really judge or speculate (then and now) why Paul Desmond, famed saxophonist, composer, and one fourth of the great one mind that was The Dave Brubeck Quartet just never made it to the November 12, 1967 gig at the Konzerthaus, documented so vividly here on Live From Vienna 1967?

Having already notified Desmond, bassist Eugene Wright and drummer Joe Morello of his wishes to spend more time with his family, this European tour would be the classic quartet's last. But did they play like men walking the plank? You know they didn't. They couldn't. And it is well documented on such high calibre recordings as Their Last Time Out: The Unreleased Live Concert, December 26, 1967 (Columbia/Legacy, 2011), The Last Time We Saw Paris(Columbia, 1968), and Buried Treasures (Columbia, 1998).

But the guys truly up their game as a trio in Desmond's absence on Live From Vienna 1967. Vamping and improvising on the spot in real time to fill the spaces where Desmond would mightily soar or turn a quick phrase, Brubeck, Wright, and Morello play like a trio born to be, well a time-honored trio. "St. Louis Blues" breaks with such immediacy that a listener might think they were listening to the trio in mid set flight, but this is only the beginning of a one-of-a-kind recording which truly (at a brisk forty-five minutes) goes by way too fast. "Swaneee River" is a spirited, polyrhythmic romp, with Morello especially in a teasing, playful state of mind. If the trio and evening's two thousand or so attendees missed Desmond they never let on, and we are all rewarded with an eloquently supple and buoyant "Someday My Prince Will Come" and a Wright-charged swing crazy take of "Take The A Train."

https://soundcloud.com/davebrubeck/sets/dave-brubeck-trio-live-from/s-9fDCT7qqzYl? si=fa34c5e610be4a109c4cf35e53ae81c2&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaig n=social_sharing

Comments