Kele 2042 (2019)

Nat King Cole - Hittin’ The Ramp: The Early Years, 1936-1943 (2019) {7CD Box Set Resonance Records HCD 2042}
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© 1936-43, 2019 Resonance Records | HCD 2042
Jazz / Swing / Vocal Jazz / Jump Blues / Early Pop

By any measure, Resonance's 2019 box Hittin' the Ramp: The Early Years (1936-1943) is a monumental achievement in musical preservation. Over the course of seven CDs (or 10 LPs), Hittin' the Ramp chronicles the earliest recordings of Nat King Cole, rounding up every known track from the days prior to his time at Capitol Records. Those records for Capitol – sessions that found him slowly transitioning from a swinging jazz pianist to smooth pop crooner – were what brought Cole lasting fame, but the sides on Hittin' the Ramp lie at the foundation of his music.

The album title is the programme in this meeting of remarkable artists brought together to interpret traditional music of Greece, Turkey, Lebanon and Armenia, and to play original songs by Anatolian saz player Cihan Türkoğlu and lyricist Agathi Dimitroukas. In the spirit of the project, the new songs also bridge traditions and idioms and emphasize the potential of shared expression. Legendary Greek singer Maria Farantouri excels in this music beyond the borders, shaped also with the active participation of producer Manfred Eicher. German cellist Anja Lechner here draws on a knowledge of traditional folk forms gained partly through playing music of Armenian-Greek philosopher composer Gurdjieff. Armenian kanon (zither) player Meri Vardanyan has previously appeared on ECM as a member of the Gurdjieff Folk Instruments Ensemble. Ney player and ethnomusicologist Christos Barbas, from Thessaloniki, has played everything from music of the baroque to ragas. Percussionist İzzet Kızıl grew up in Eastern Turkey in an environment dominated by Sufi rhythms and has worked in many transcultural collaborations with artists from Natacha Atlas to Theodossi Spazzov, along the way evolving new approaches to traditional percussion. Beyond The Borders was recorded at Sierra Studios, Athens, in June 2017.

Founded and directed by the Franco-Hungarian conductor Bruno Kele-Baujard, the Ensemble Zene has made a specialty of daring and off-the-beaten path programs. Its evocative name - "zene" is the Hungarian word for "music" - inclines it towards the Magyar-speaking repertoire, and it is therefore quite natural that it devotes its second recording to the a cappella works of Bartók, Kodály and Ligeti, whose centenary is being celebrated in 2023.

Dakota Staton was a jazz and R&B singer very much in the mould of Sarah Vaughan and Dinah Washington, whose style was sultry and sophisticated but who was extrovert and funky enough to share an R&B stage with the likes of Fats Domino and Big Joe Turner. She paid her dues on the jazz club circuit before signing to Capitol and released a number of singles and claimed Down Beat magazine's Most Promising Newcomer award before recording her No. 4 hit album The Late, Late Show in 1957. This great-value 55-track 2-CD set comprises all her recordings released as singles from her debut in 1955, along with all the tracks from her first four albums The Late, Late Show, In The Night, Dynamic and Crazy He Calls Me. It features performances with some noted musicians and arrangers, including Nelson Riddle, George Shearing, Harry Sweets Edison, Jonah Jones, Hank Jones, Van Alexander, Toots Thielemans and Al McKibbon. It's a comprehensive presentation of her studio work during the first and probably most significant era in her career, and a great showcase for the talent of a noted vocal stylist.

Between 1970 and 1976, James Taylor released six albums with Warner Bros. Records that became the foundation for his unparalleled career that includes five Grammy® Awards, induction into the Songwriters and Rock and Roll Halls of Fame, and more than 100 million records sold worldwide.