Hi all, and Happy New Year to be spent with great music.
I've been away for some time, but reading Tom Moon's book "1,000 Recordings To Hear Before You Die", a comment raised a question I thought might be of interest here. Tom is a music critic, contributor to multiple publications, and experienced as a professional musician. His book covers jazz, rock, classical, opera, blues, world music and whatever else you might think of. I found his comments on many recommended recordings I am familiar with to be very insightful.
But one really jumped out at me. Included in his list is "Take Ten" with Paul Desmond and Jim Hall.. In that review he references "Take Five" as one of the most important jazz records of all time. But what surprised me was his statement that album "suffers from a fatal flaw. Brubeck's piano playing." He goes on to say, "The esteemed leader is revealed as something of a musical clod . . ."
Now as someone who has enjoyed various Brubeck albums for decades I was amazed by that opinion. I do remember back in the '60s that Brubeck was put down by some jazz fans as being "too commercial", I suppose because of his sales and concert success. But I do't remember him ever being disparaged to this degree.
I say this because I find Moon's other reviews to be so well considered and revealing. So surprising to say the least.
