Terry Gibbs: Dream Band, Vol. 7: The Lost Tapes, 1959

In 1959, vibraphonist Terry Gibbs and his recently formed big band set up shop at the Seville, a Los Angeles nightclub owned by Harry Schiller. Many of those early sessions were taped, at Gibbs' request, by famed recording engineer Wally Heider before being left on a shelf and forgotten. After two weeks at the Seville, Gibbs and the band moved to a second club, the Sundown. The band was successful, drew large crowds, and was soon recording, first for Norman Granz at Verve Records, then for Jack Tracy at Mercury. By 1985, Gibbs and the ensemble, renamed the Terry Gibbs Dream Band (a name he had to be talked into using), was under contract to Fantasy Records, releasing many of the tapes made by Heider at the Sundown, which became Vols. 1-5 of the Terry Gibbs Dream Band for Fantasy.

In 1994, an earthquake in Northridge, CA, caused considerable damage to Gibbs' home there, so he called on a friend, jazz historian Rod Nicas, to help him reorganize his collection. Nicas found most of the band's recordings that were taped by Heider, and one of them, labeled "Dream Band," became Vol. 6, One More Time, in 2002. The Seville tapes remained secluded for twenty-two more years until Gibbs' son, Gerry, who was digitizing every recording his father ever made, came across one labeled "1959 Jazz Party." On listening, the elder Gibbs remembered them as sessions recorded at the Seville. There were half a dozen songs on the tape, and Nicas told Gibbs he had found twelve more never-released charts taped that same year at the Sundown.

With awesome sound by Heider, superb arrangements by Bill Holman and others, and the Dream Band swinging like there was no tomorrow, those overlooked but nonetheless marvelous tapes became the bedrock of Dream Band Vol. 7: The Lost Tapes, a luminous and eloquent pastiche that is a rip-snorter from start to finish—not only a remarkable historic treasure but the perfect instrument with which to mark Terry Gibbs' one hundredth birthday on October 13, 2024. As Holman is now gone (he died in May 2024, age ninety-six), Gibbs is perhaps the last remaining member among the array of young boppers who helped change the shape and tenor of jazz— especially on the West Coast—in the 1940s and '50s.

Holman arranged eight of the album's eighteen numbers, the second of which—"It Might as Well Be Swing"—neatly summarizes every number the Dream Band performs, from the high-powered opener, Cole Porter's "Begin the Beguine," to the last shout chorus on the Lionel Hampton signature, "Flying Home." Even the ballads—"My Reverie," "Getting Sentimental," "Morning Sunrise," "Moonglow," "Prelude to a Kiss"—burst with the sort of gusto that would have made swinger supreme Buddy Rich smile from ear to ear. And considering who scored them—Holman, Marty Paich and Al Cohn (three each), Med Flory (two) and Bob Brookmeyer (ditto)—there's little wonder they score so high on the rhythmic meter.

Sound quality, thanks to Heider's genius, is remarkably clear and well-balanced for sessions recorded live more than sixty years ago. Every section is variable and distinct including the band's marvelous rhythm component, anchored throughout by master timekeeper Mel Lewis. And those soloists!—not one of whom was less than a renowned superstar, from Gibbs—awesome at every turn—to tenors Holman, Flory and Bill Perkins; altos Joe Maini and Charlie Kennedy; trumpeters Conte Candoli and Stu Williamson; trombonists Carl Fontana, Bob Burgess and Bob Enevoldsen; pianists Lou Levy and Pete Jolly, bassists Buddy Clark and Max Bennett, and drummer Lewis, every one of them at the top of his game. In other words, if you're looking for a feeble phrase or false note, you won't find any here. The same can be said for the band as a whole; everything slides neatly into place on every number, underscoring the proficiency of its every ingredient, singular and collective. The only unfamiliar name in the band's starting lineup is baritone saxophonist Jack Schwartz. Could that have been the great Jack Nimitz, forced contractually to record under an assumed name? Terry no doubt knows.

Although many of the songs on the album are fairly familiar, Holman contributed a pair of original compositions ("Bright Eyes," "No Heat") and Gibbs one ("It Might as Well Be Swing"). Paich arranged "Getting Sentimental," "Softly as in a Morning Sunrise" and Sy Oliver's "Opus One," Cohn "Moonglow," "Prelude to a Kiss" and Duke Ellington's "Cottontail," Flory "Back Bay Shuffle" and "Flying Home," Brookmeyer the Benny Goodman staples "Don't Be That Way" and "Let's Dance." Needless to say, every chart is splendid— as are The Lost Tapes, which sound as fresh and exciting as when they were recorded some sixty-five years ago. When summing up, the phrase "better late than never" springs to mind. That the tapes are no longer lost is a gift to everyone who admires and appreciates big-band jazz at its zenith; that Terry Gibbs is still alive and able to revisit them with us is a bonus beyond measure. An unequivocal five stars, and even more if that were possible.

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