- Getz’s superb 1962 release finally arrives on the site with outstanding Double Plus (A++) stereo sound or BETTER from start to finish – and the vinyl plays about as quietly as any vintage Verve ever does
- Speakers Corner produced an unimpressive remaster on Heavy Vinyl years ago, and there are probably plenty of newer pressings that have come out since then, but none of them can begin to compete with the All Analog sound of this very pressing
- 4 stars: “Fresh from the sudden success of Jazz Samba and “Desafinado,” Stan Getz asked the 28-year-old, strikingly gifted Gary McFarland to arrange a bossa nova album for big band as a follow-up. Getz is always his debonair, wistful, freely-floating self, completely at home in the Brazilian idiom that he’d adopted only a few months before.”
This vintage Verve stereo pressing has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern records rarely even BEGIN to reproduce. Folks, that sound is gone and it sure isn’t showing signs of coming back. If you love hearing INTO a recording, actually being able to “see” the performers, and feeling as if you are sitting in the studio with the band, this is the record for you. It’s what vintage all analog recordings are known for — this sound.
If you exclusively play modern repressings of vintage recordings, I can say without fear of contradiction that you have never heard this kind of sound on vinyl. Old records have it — not often, and certainly not always — but maybe one out of a hundred new records do, and those are some pretty long odds.
What the best sides of Big Band Bossa Nova have to offer is not hard to hear:
- Transparency and resolution, critical to hearing into the three-dimensional space of the studio
- The biggest, most immediate staging in the largest acoustic space
- The most Tubey Magic, without which you have almost nothing. CDs give you clean and clear. Only the best vintage vinyl pressings offer the kind of Tubey Magic that was on the tapes in 1962
- Tight, note-like, rich, full-bodied bass, with the correct amount of weight down low
- Natural tonality in the midrange — with all the instruments having the correct timbre
No doubt there’s more but we hope that should do for now. Playing the record is the only way to hear all of the qualities we discuss above, and playing the best pressings against a pile of other copies under rigorously controlled conditions is the only way to find a pressing that sounds as good as this one does.
Copies with rich lower mids and nice extension up top did the best in our shootout, assuming they weren’t veiled or smeary of course. So many things can go wrong on a record! We know, we’ve heard them all.
Top end extension is critical to the sound of the best copies. Lots of old records (and new ones) have no real top end; consequently, the studio or stage will be missing much of its natural air and space, and instruments will lack their full complement of harmonic information.
Tube smear is common to most vintage pressings and this is no exception. The copies that tend to do the best in a shootout will have the least (or none), yet are full-bodied, tubey and rich.
What We’re Listening For on Big Band Bossa Nova
- Energy for starters. What could be more important than the life of the music?
- The Big Sound comes next — wall to wall, lots of depth, huge space, three-dimensionality, all that sort of thing.
- Then transient information — fast, clear, sharp attacks, not the smear and thickness common to most LPs.
- Tight, note-like bass with clear fingering — which ties in with good transient information, as well as the issue of frequency extension further down.
- Next: transparency — the quality that allows you to hear deep into the soundfield, showing you the space and air around all the players.
- Extend the top and bottom and voila, you have The Real Thing — an honest to goodness Hot Stamper.
TRACK LISTING
Side One
Manha De Carnival
Balanço No Samba
Melancolico
Entre Amigos
Side Two
Chega De Saudade
Noite Triste
Samba De Uma Nota So
Bim Bom
AMG 4 Star Review
Fresh from the sudden success of Jazz Samba and “Desafinado,” Stan Getz asked the 28-year-old, strikingly gifted Gary McFarland to arrange a bossa nova album for big band as a follow-up. Getz is always his debonair, wistful, freely-floating self, completely at home in the Brazilian idiom that he’d adopted only a few months before.
McFarland usually keeps things nice and spare (although “One Note Samba” is uncharacteristically cluttered and a bit too discordant for the material), letting his pungent voicings stab the air now and then, while allowing the soloists all the room they want within the confines of producer Creed Taylor’s tight timings.
Four of the eight songs are by McFarland (none of which would become standards), and Getz makes relaxed impressions with “Manha de Carnival” and “Chega de Saudade.” Jim Hall takes the role of acoustic guitarist from Charlie Byrd with his usual fluidity, and Hank Jones ruminates in a boppish way on piano.
This album also charted quite respectably (number 13) in the first flush of the bossa nova boom.