SUITE POUR VIOLON

Now besieged with requests for classical/jazz "suites" for himself and big-time classical performers, Claude Bolling took up violinist Pinchas Zukerman's commission, and out came another attractive confection that allows a classical cat to play quasi-jazzman for a day. This time, Bolling chooses mostly classical dance forms for his eight movements, still inserting mostly mainstream jazz segments (and a few vintage ones) around and under his soloist without getting him involved. Although he isn't asked to play jazz, Zukerman's warm, Romantic-era-grounded virtuosity doesn't betray even a hint of feeling for it; that makes Bolling's close-knit merger even more remarkable.