Art Pepper and Warne Marsh

There are great jazz musicians. And then there are great pairings of great jazz musicians. Some of these pairings you know, some may be less familiar. A duo in the latter category was West Coast alto saxophonist Art Pepper and New York tenor saxophonist Warne Marsh. On the recordings by these two players, you get two artists who personified a cooler, drier sound on the reed instrument. By cooler and drier, I mean smooth, no vibrato, relaxed and behind the beat.

As far as I can tell, Pepper and Marsh made four recordings—The Way It Was! in November 1956, Free Wheeling in December 1956, Art Pepper & Warne Marsh at Donte's recorded in Los Angeles in April 1974 and the Foxy Lady Session in Los Angeles in April 1975.

The Way It Was! was recorded for Contemporary and featured Art Pepper (as), Warne Marsh (ts), Ronnie Ball (p), Ben Tucker (b) and Gary Frommer (d).

Free Wheeling was recorded for Vanguard and featured Art Pepper (as) Ted Brown and Warne Marsh (ts) Ronnie Ball (p) Ben Tucker (b) Jeff Morton (d). Pepper and Marsh and Brown are on tracks 1, 2, 4, 5, 8 and 9.

Art Pepper & Warne Marsh at Donte's appears on Laurie Pepper's Widow's Taste label and featured Art Pepper (as), Warne Marsh (ts), Mark Levine and Bill Mays (p), John Heard (b) and Lew Malin (d).

And the Foxy Lady Session appears on the Bandcamp label and featured Buddy Collette (cl,fl), Art Pepper (as), Warne Marsh (ts), Mike Lang (keyboards), John Morrell (g), Carol Kaye (b) and Tommy Vig (d).

Here's the full The Way It Was! album...



Here's the Free Wheeling session. Remember, Pepper is not on tracks 2, 6 and 7...