Classical Music

BILL EVANS FOR LOVERS

Limited 180gm vinyl LP pressing. Acoustic Sounds Series reissue. Mastered by Ryan K. Smith at Sterling Sound From Original Analog Tapes. A classic big-band album and one of the first-ever releases on the Impulse! Label, this 1961 recording features a superb line-up including Jimmy Knepper on trombone, Ron Carter on bass and a fiery Elvin Jones on drums. Verve's Acoustic Sounds Series features transfers from analog tapes and remastered 180-gram vinyl in deluxe gatefold packaging.

There's scarcely a more towering figure in modern jazz than Bill Evans. His relaxed, emotional style would prove influential to generations of pianists who would follow him. On Trio '65, Evans is joined by bassist Chuck Israels and drummer Larry Bunker. It includes "If You Could See Me Now," Johnny Carisi's "Israel," and the heart-wrenching "Who Can I Turn To?" Verve Acoustic Sounds Series features transfers from analog tapes and remastered on 180-gram vinyl in deluxe gatefold packaging.

Bill Evans' first trio album for Verve, Trio `64, marked a reunion with drummer Paul Motian and Evans' only recorded work with bassist Gary Peacock. The album matches up with Evans' finest trio sessions, with his shimmering piano lines dancing between Peacock's sharp bass lines and Motian's usual sublime work on the drums. Verve Acoustic Sounds Series features transfers from analog tapes and remastered on 180-gram vinyl in deluxe gatefold packaging.

Vinyl LP pressing. A classic big-band album and one of the first-ever releases on the Impulse! Label, this 1961 recording features a superb line-up including Jimmy Knepper on trombone, Ron Carter on bass and a fiery Elvin Jones on drums.

Vinyl LP pressing. Recorded at three different studio sessions on February 6 and 9, and May 20, 1963, Evans recorded the album using the then-controversial method of overdubbing three different yet corresponding piano tracks for each song. It's an interesting combination of counterpointed lines and chords that Evans employs, with differing tempos and shadings that complement rather than contrast. Additionally, the usage of angular dialect � la Thelonious Monk and the witty discourse he can conjure with his own styles thicken and broaden the horizons of the usually spare harmonic inventions the pianist expresses on his own.

ALONE

Undercurrent is a 1962 album by jazz pianist Bill Evans and jazz guitarist Jim Hall. They would collaborate again in 1966 for the follow-up album Intermodulation. In his November 26, 1962 review for Down Beat magazine jazz critic Pete Welding states: "This collaboration between Evans and Hall has resulted in some of the most beautiful, thoroughly ingratiating music it has been my pleasure to hear..." The front cover image for Undercurrent is Toni Frissell's photograph "Weeki Wachee Spring, Florida". The album was originally released on United Artists, then reissued by Solid State in 1968. More recently, the album was reissued on EMI/Blue Note (in fact, both Blue Note and United Artists Records have been owned for a long time by EMI). The original LP and the first CD reissue featured a cropped, blue-tinted version, overlaid with the title and the Blue Note logo in white; but for the most recent (24-bit remastered) CD reissue, the image has been restored to it's original black-and-white coloration and size, without lettering.

2019 collection. In celebration of it's 10-year anniversary, Resonance is launching a series of compilations culled from it's vast catalog highlighting both living artists as well as jazz greats of the past. In celebration of it's 10-year anniversary, Resonance is launching a series of compilations culled from it's vast catalog highlighting both living artists as well as jazz greats of the past. Smile With Your Heart focuses on the jazz icon Bill Evans and includes material from his four album releases on Resonance Records.

Great 1962 album from the great jazz pianist.

Bill Evans is widely considered to be one of the greatest jazz pianists of all time. Evans' use of impressionist harmony, inventive interpretation of traditional jazz repertoire, block chords, and trademark rhythmically independent, "singing" melodic lines continue to resonate today. Born in Plainfield, New Jersey on 16 August 1929, Evans was classically trained and studied at Southeastern Louisiana University. In 1955 he moved to New York, where he worked with bandleader and theorist George Russell. In 1958, Evans joined Miles Davis' sextet, where he was to have a profound influence. In 1959, the band, then immersed in modal jazz, recorded Kind of Blue, the best-selling jazz album of all time. In late 1959, Evans left the Miles Davis band and began his career as a leader with Scott LaFaro and Paul Motian, a group now regarded as a seminal modern jazz trio. In 1961, ten days after recording the highly acclaimed Sunday at the Village Vanguard and Waltz for Debby, LaFaro died in a car accident. After months of seclusion, Evans re-emerged with a new trio, featuring bassist Chuck Israels. Despite his success, Evans suffered personal loss and struggled with drug abuse. Both his girlfriend Elaine and his brother Harry committed suicide, and he was a long time user of heroin. Many of his compositions have become standards and have been played and recorded by many artists. Evans was honored with 31 Grammy nominations and seven awards, and was inducted in the Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame. This compilation contains Evans' first 12 albums as leader covering the years 1956 - when he recorded and released his debut record New Jazz Conceptions featuring the original version of his most covered track 'Waltz For Debby' - through to his seminal Empathy album in 1962. Generally considered in jazz circles as the period in which Evans' star shone brightest and the era of his finest work, this 6CD set is as close to the perfect Bill Evans collection as is currently available.

(4-LP set) Ranked time after time as one of the best live jazz recording sessions in history, and yielding two of Evans' most classic albums (Waltz for Debby, Sunday at the Village Vanguard), The Complete Village Vanguard Recordings, 1961 represents the pinnacle of spontaneous musical communication: three men breathing as one on a tiny bandstand. This box set is the ultimate collectable item for any jazz fan. Pressed on 180 gram vinyl, this four-LP set comes with a 12-page booklet, complete with new liner notes by reissue producer Bill Belmont, as well as the original liner notes by the producer of the original recordings, Orrin Keepnews. Reproductions of session notes and photographer Steve Schapiro's proof sheets from the performances add vintage context to the packaging. Also included in the box is a stunning metallic and black poster of the famous cover - Evans, in profile, deep in concentration at his piano.

I WILL SAY GOODBYE

Limited 180gm audiophile vinyl LP pressing in deluxe gatefold packaging. The album, recorded in 1958 and originally released via World Pacific, by Gil Evans - one of the most innovative arrangers in jazz. Evans' orchestra on this session is packed with a superb set of players, including Cannonball Adderley Art Blakey, Paul Chambers and Johnny Coles. Sourced from a previously unknown analog stereo master, the incredible session comes in the highest fidelity on this Tone Poet LP. Blue Note Records' Tone Poet Audiophile Vinyl Reissue Series is produced by Joe Harley and features all-analog, mastered-from-the-original-master-tape.

Bill Evans's return to full activity in 1962 came almost a year after his celebrated trio recordings at the Village Vanguard. Just ten days after that classic "live" session, bassist Scott LaFaro had died in a highway accident. Evans, deeply shaken, eventually reformed his trio with the same drummer (Paul Motian) and Chuck Israels on bass. Their first visit to a studio was for a dual purpose: To make an all-ballad-tempo album, Moonbeams, and this "normal" set at the same time. It was producer Orrin Keepnews's thought that recording eight slow numbers in a row might prove unduly enervating; accordingly, the total two-album repertoire was interspersed over three days of recording and the net result was two excellent additions to the Evans catalog. With Chuck Israels, Paul Motian. Tracks: How My Heart Sings, I Should Care, in Your Own Sweet Way (take 1), Walking Up, Summertime, 34 Skidoo, Ev'rything I Love, Show-Type Tune.

SOLO SESSIONS 2

TIME REMEMBERED

The legendary last recording of Evans' brilliant trio (with Paul Motian and Scott LaFaro, who died days after this was taped at the Village Vanguard). Invigorating freedom and deep emotion meet and cast a powerful spell; this reissue adds alternate takes of Waltz for Debby; Detour Ahead, and My Romance plus other bonus material!

2008 24 bit remaster from the original tapes. Album also features Scott Lafaro and Paul Motian.

UK reissue. The original Bill Evans Trio, featuring Bill on piano, Scott LaFaro on bass and Paul Motian on drums, was on the verge of greatness when tragedy struck. In July 1961 LaFaro was killed in a car accident, an event that took an enormous emotional toll on Evans, who withdrew from all work for nearly a year as he struggled to come to terms with the loss of his musical counterpart. When he eventually reconvened in the studio in May 1962 with Chuck Israels as a replacement bassist, it was to record MOON BEAMS, something of a ballad collection. It has been said that there was a certain irony in recording such a collection; the material is so natural for Bill Evans, particularly with his trademark impressionistic sound collage style, yet he had never sounded quite so assertive on a recording. It was almost as though that with the loss of LaFaro and an obvious counterpoint within the group, Evans now had to lead the trio on his own. One thing Bill Evans had done ever since he departed Miles Davis' group in order to form his own trio was choose superb material, and MOON BEAMS is no exception.

The 1961 engagement of Bill Evans, Scott LaFaro and Paul Motian at the Village Vanguard is widely considered to be one of the most historic in jazz. This 3-CD set presents all five sets the trio performed in their original order. First time available in the U.S.!

EVERYBODY DIGS BILL EVANS

Limited 180gm vinyl LP repressing of this 1962 album including one bonus track. Direct Metal Mastering. Wax Time.

Vinyl LP pressing. Live archive release. On A Monday Evening is an unreleased (and never bootlegged!) 1976 concert recording of The Bill Evans Trio, featuring Eddie Gomez and Eliot Zigmund, captured live at Madison, WI's Union Theater. The 12-track album offers both contemporary compositions from that era, as well as longstanding signature tunes of Evans', and includes new liner notes by Grammy Award-winning jazz historian Ashley Kahn, with commentary by Gomez and Zigmund. A jazz legend, Evans' use of impressionist harmony, inventive interpretation of traditional jazz repertoire, block chords, and trademark rhythmically independent, "singing" melodic lines continue to influence jazz pianists today.

PORTRAIT IN JAZZ

WALTZ FOR DEBBY

Vinyl LP pressing. This 1963 LP marked the last album Bill Evans made for his first label, Riverside, and was the second of two live recordings which Evans did for the label (the other resulted in the iconic Village Vanguard LPs). But above all, these two nights at Shelly Manne's club in Hollywood marked the only recording by Evans' excellent but short-term third trio, featuring Chuck Israels on bass and LA drummer Larry Bunker. The trio performs a selection of standards with a melodic and sensitive touch. Bill Evans was an American jazz pianist and composer who mostly worked in a trio setting. Evans' use of impressionist harmony, inventive interpretation of traditional jazz repertoire, block chords, and trademark rhythmically independent, "singing" melodic lines continue to influence jazz pianists today.

Limited 180gm colored vinyl LP pressing. Includes bonus tracks.

Live archive release. On A Monday Evening is an unreleased (and never bootlegged!) 1976 concert recording of The Bill Evans Trio, featuring Eddie Gomez and Eliot Zigmund, captured live at Madison, WI's Union Theater. The 12-track album offers both contemporary compositions from that era, as well as longstanding signature tunes of Evans', and includes new liner notes by Grammy Award-winning jazz historian Ashley Kahn, with commentary by Gomez and Zigmund. A jazz legend, Evans' use of impressionist harmony, inventive interpretation of traditional jazz repertoire, block chords, and trademark rhythmically independent, "singing" melodic lines continue to influence jazz pianists today.