Monty Alexander The Montreaux Years

On this, their umpteenth album collaboration since the scatologically titled 1974 LP Rass!, Monty Alexander and Ernest Ranglin fill their own good air with some gems from their country’s late ’60s to late ’70s pop-music canon. Recorded live in the studio with a minimum of bells and whistles, Rocksteady is emblematic of the pioneer spirit that propelled Jamaican recordings into the international spotlight three decades ago.

Pianist Monty Alexander's "Ivory And Steel" group combines together bop-based jazz with Jamaican calypsoes and West Indian rhythms. On this quite enjoyable set, Alexander utilizes both Othello and Len "Boogsie" Sharpe on steel drums, either Marshall Wood or Bernard Montgomery on bass, drummer Marvin "Smitty" Smith and the hand drums of Robert Thomas Jr. Alexander contributed four of the rhythmic originals which are joined by some Jamaican folk songs (including "Sly Mangoose"), Joni Mitchell's "Big Yellow Taxi" and a couple of obscurities. The accessible results are often memorable.

Not every musician can pull off a program in front of an audience that ranges through a wide variety of jazz styles, but Monty Alexander does so, even within the opener, "On Green Dolphin Street." Starting this familiar standard in a bop mode, he detours into boogie-woogie until guitarist Ernest Ranglin takes over. His lovely improvised introduction to "Emily" gives way to a much slower than typical arrangement, which emphasizes the beauty of Henry Mancini's original conception, though with a few changes incorporated by the leader…

This 1971 recording signals the beginning of Jamaican pianist Monty Alexander’s fruitful relationship with MPS, lasting over a decade and encompassing some dozen albums. Originally touted as heir to Oscar Peterson’s crown, Alexander is famous for his virtuoso melding of jazz, the sounds of the Caribbean and blues. The classic Dave Brubeck Quartet’s bassist Eugene Wright, calypso percussionist Montego Joe, and ace drummer Duffy Jackson round out the quartet.

This 1971 recording signals the beginning of Jamaican pianist Monty Alexander’s fruitful relationship with MPS, lasting over a decade and encompassing some dozen albums. Originally touted as heir to Oscar Peterson’s crown, Alexander is famous for his virtuoso melding of jazz, the sounds of the Caribbean and blues. The classic Dave Brubeck Quartet’s bassist Eugene Wright, calypso percussionist Montego Joe, and ace drummer Duffy Jackson round out the quartet.

The album range from pop standards like Kurt Weill’s "Mack the Kinife" and Nat Cole’s "Straighten Up and Fly Right" to soul classics like Rev. Al Green’s "Love and Happiness" and Marvin Gaye’s "Sexual Healing". Speaking of "sex", Alexander lays down the funk on an extended "soul/yard meeting" of James Brown’s "Sex Machine". Speaking of special guests, in addition to the younger Cole, another famous son, John Pizzarelli, takes his turn at the mike for a Jamaican-tinged zephyr through Johnny Mercer’s "Summer Wind", and Kevin Mahogany does the honors for the Ray Charles classic "Hallelujah I Love Her So". That is not to say that this is strictly a standards and soul album, however. In tribute to his early cowboy heroes, Alexander opens the set with Cole Porter’s jaunty "Don’t Fence Me In", and in honor to the country he is now proud to call home, he closes with a triumphant build into "Battle Hymn of the Republic".

Jamaican-born pianist Monty Alexander is a sophisticated, prolific performer with an urbane, swinging style informed by the bop tradition, as well as the reggae and Caribbean folk he grew up with. He is in top form in this 1974 studio session made for MPS, joined by guitarist Ernest Ranglin, bassist Eberhard Weber, and drummer Kenny Clare.

Monty Alexander's career was beginning to take off at the time of this 1971 club date at the Monticello in Rochester, NY. Accompanied by Dave Brubeck's former bassist, Eugene Wright, and veteran drummer Bobby Durham, who was recording extensively with Oscar Peterson, the young pianist kicks off the set with an ambitious, quote-filled rendition of a great standard "It Could Happen to You"…

"Perception" is 1974's album by American (born in Jamaica) pianist / composer Monty Alexander, who started as a young prodigy and later on recorded many albums for the German MPS (Musik Produktion Schwarzwald) label in the 1970s and early 1980s.

Monty Alexander follows up his tribute to Tony Bennett with an homage to another classic jazz singer, Nat King Cole. Also recorded in New York City at St. Peter's Episcopal Church with the same trio of Chicagoans Lorin Cohen on bass and drummer George Fludas, the veteran pianist seems more in his element with this artist's repertoire, one that sharply defined his own sound and thinking about popular jazz.