Perfection: Elliot Lawrence - But Not For Me (1955)

In need of cash in the late 1940s, Gerry Mulligan sold bandleader Elliot Lawrence a trove of arrangements. As Elliot told me in an interview before his death in 2021, “Early on, I had bought all of Gerry's arrangements. I paid him $50 per chart. If he wrote an original and arranged it, I’d pay him $150. Naturally, I signed up the publishing so they would remain with my band."

One of those Mulligan arrangements was the masterful “But Not for Me," which the Elliot Lawrence band first recorded in 1950 for an Armed Forces Radio Service Transcription called “Land's Best Bands." Elliot's first studio recording of the song came on July 1, 1955, for Fantasy Records.

The all-star band on that date: Nick Travis, Bernie Glow, Al Derisi and Stan Fishelson (tp); Eddie Bert, Ollie Wilson and Paul Selden (tb); Tony Miranda (fhr); Sam Marowitz and Hal McKusick (as); Al Cohn and Eddie Wasserman (ts); Charlie O'Kane (bar); Elliot Lawrence (p); Buddy Jones (b); Don Lamond (d) and Gerry Mulligan (arr). As far as I can tell, the solos in order are by Elliot Lawrence, Hal McKusick, Nick Travis and Al Cohn.

Here's But Not for Me, featuring Mulligan's superb reed writing...