Wynton Kelly Trio (Wes Montgomery) _Four On Six

Personnel: Wes Montgomery (guitar); Wynton Kelly (piano); Paul Chambers (bass); Jimmy Cobb (drums).

Recorded live at the Half Note, New York, New York and Van Gelder Studios, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey in June and September 1965.

Personnel: Wes Montgomery (guitar); Wynton Kelly (piano); Paul Chambers (bass instrument); Jimmy Cobb (drums).

Recording information: Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey; 1965.

This album is the live equivalent of the INCREDIBLE GUITAR album--Wes Montgomery cooking with a seasoned and communicative piano trio on a set of jazz compositions, standards, and original material. INCREDIBLE GUITAR has Tommy Flanagan, Percy Heath, and Albert Heath; SMOKIN' has the Wynton Kelly trio, with Paul Chambers on bass, and Jimmy Cobb on drums. Not only had the same trio served as one of Miles Davis' great rhythm sections, but Kelly was considered by many to be the most gifted accompanist of his time.

Miles Davis's "No Blues" is in fact an utterly relentless blues, with Montgomery nailing each single-note, octave, or block-chord phrase with passionate conviction. Bassist Sam Jones's "Unit 7" is another uptempo blues. "Four on Six," which debuted on INCREDIBLE GUITAR, gets an edited version of the head and a slightly faster treatment overall. Kelly takes the lead on the first ballad, "If You Could See Me Now," Montgomery on the second, framing the melody to "What's New" in octaves over Cobb's late-night brushes. The excellent sound quality and almost complete lack of audience noise throughout makes SMOKIN' feel like eavesdropping of the best kind.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Wynton
• Kelly
• Trio
• Wes
• Montgomery
• Four
• On
• Six

[Parvenu333]

Why do people feel the need to use superlatives when referring to musicians? I find that *ranking* musicians is a very shallow practice. Everyone works toward making music better in every generation. There is no quantitative measurement of skill or contribution when it comes to music.

Perhaps one could say that Wes and Django are your favorite jazz guitarists of all time instead of placing them in an objective spectrum that doesn't exist.

[jmsbk12345]

This is REAL music ~ sublime. Wes along with Django are the two greatest jazz guitarists of all time.

[therunningpiano]

@LikeWiseLikeYou just because he gave us some extra information doesn't mean he should go screw himself...

[LikeWiseLikeYou]

@GeorgiaBoy1961 Cool dude. Way to know wayyy, wayyy too much about Wes Montgomery. Go screw yourself dude. Seriously.

[GeorgiaBoy1961]

@LikeWiseLikeYou: No less a player than George Benson, himself a giant of jazz, has tried to duplicate Wes' unique thumb playing style, but not quite gotten there. Wes had an anatomically-unique thumb, with a corn or callus extending beyond his nail, which allowed him to do fluent up-strokes as well as downstrokes. It is very tough to do upstrokes cleanly without hitting your thumbnail, with a conventionally structured thumb. Of course, there was more to Wes' genius than his thumb...

[GeorgiaBoy1961]

@LikeWiseLikeYou: Wes always complained of not being able to play fast with his thumb, but he managed just fine; I never heard him play a mistake or miss a chord change. I played thumb-style for years on my jazz guitar, and it is - trust me - a bear to master. Wes made it seem effortless. His articulation always reminds me of a great trumpet player, like Clifford Brown. So few guitarists have that articulation and phrasing... but Wes did.

No one has ever duplicated his sound completely.

[GeorgiaBoy1961]

@1fastem1: This version is fantastic, no question... but have you heard his versions live from his European tour, or from the 1965 LP recorded at the Half Note? This is a studio rendition, not live; Wes preferred the latter... and felt more relaxed and at home on stage than in the studio. Wynton kelly's group, most famous for backing Miles Davis and John Coltrane, never sounded better to me than with Wes.

[GeorgiaBoy1961]

@Parvenu333: In the strictest sense, you are correct... there's no "objective" measure of greatness. However, as one who has listened to jazz and the jazz greats all my life (now fifty years), as well as played the music, "I know it (genius) when I hear it." As far as I am concerned, if Wes doesn't want to make you use superlatives, you'd better check your pulse. Have you considered that maybe you don't really like jazz, because this is the height of the art - and not only according to me.

[ejloo]

just love the riff from 6:10 to 6:20

[Bigsp06]

Ahhhhhhh a great moment in Jazz !!!!!! one of the best live recording cd of all times !!!!

[MultiSagitta]

Killed it. Just beautiful. I'm actually headbanding to this right now, those drums a freaking powerful. The whole band is just amazing.

[gilouseb]

What a rythm section!