Nat King Cole Trio The Macgregor Yea

Lester Young's significance in jazz is not hard to gauge. His playing influenced almost every saxophonist that came after him. On this release, we hear Young teamed up with two other jazz legends, drummer Buddy Rich and Nat "King" Cole on piano. Following 10 tracks by this unique trio, we are treated to four additional tunes as performed by a sextet led by Young. The trio portion of this album is especially lush and intriguing, featuring wonderful renditions of Young's original, "Back to the Land," Gershwin's "The Man I Love," and a duet version of the gorgeous ballad, "Peg O' My Heart" (Rich had gone out to get something to eat). Cole's intimate piano style wonderfully complements Young's light, airy tone and unorthodox phrasing, and Rich, known for a flashy approach, plays quite sensitively here, using brushes on most tunes…

Nat King Cole could charm most listeners by simply singing a few lines from the phone book. His delivery is so intoxicating that even less-than-stellar material doesn't cause so much as a blink of the eye. This is true with Classics' collection of some of his 1947-1949 cuts, where hardly a classic standard or hit is in sight. What one does get, though, is a generous dose of Nat Cole and the trio's slow-riffin' best . While ranging from the ballad perfection of "How Lonely Can You Get" and "Lost April" to svelte blues sides like "My Mother Told Me," Cole, guitarist Irving Ashby, and bassist Johnny Miller show how they perfected the piano trio template forged by the singer's first group with guitarist Oscar Moore and bassist Wesley Prince…