Samara Joy, Guess Who I Saw Today, feat. Gerald Clayton, Verve - track of the week

Track of the week is a just released duo version of Guess Who I Saw Today new from singer Samara Joy and pianist Gerald Clayon. Bronx singer Joy's Linger Awhile catapulted the American into a new league of her own having made a splash in 2021 …

Published: 13 Mar 2023. Updated: 12 months.

Track of the week is a just released duo version of Guess Who I Saw Today new from singer Samara Joy and pianist Gerald Clayon.

Bronx singer Joy's Linger Awhile catapulted the American into a new league of her own having made a splash in 2021 when she was on Whirlwind.

We reckoned then and see her still as the first highly retro singer of the classic calibre of Cécile McLorin Salvant and Jazzmeia Horn to come along in a while emerging from the US scene to connect with international audiences. In terms of style think a Dianne Reeves with a hearty dash of Sarah Vaughan within the recipe of Joyousness recalibrated for the 2020s. The song itself is an Elisse Boyd and Murray Grand number rendered à-la-Nancy Wilson on Something Wonderful (Capitol, 1960).

Samara Joy, photo: detail from the Linger Awhile cover

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Samara Joy, photo: detail from the Linger Awhile cover

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Jeremy Pelt, The Art of Intimacy Vol. 2 His Muse, High Note ****

You know what to expect you might think with Jeremy Pelt. Certainly state of the art 21st century hard bop from the trumpeter as guaranteed. And yet you never step in the same river twice, the philosopher said, when still more considerations are …

Published: 13 Mar 2023. Updated: 12 months.

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You know what to expect you might think with Jeremy Pelt.

Certainly state of the art 21st century hard bop from the trumpeter as guaranteed.

And yet you never step in the same river twice, the philosopher said, when still more considerations are thought about.

So what lifts or doesn't beyond above expectations of supreme excellence and idiomatic exactitude in the Hubbardian mould here? Vol. 1 in this series came out in 2020 and had pianist icon George Cables and bassist's bassist Peter Washington on it.

This time it is far more expansive. Trumpet avatar Pelt (born 1976 in Los Angeles), pianist Victor Gould smouldering in a contrastive context on Lakecia Benjamin 2023 release tour de force Phoenix particularly 'New Mornings,' the Mwandishi great bassist Buster Williams and also from the Mwandishi era - one of Herbie Hancock's greatest ever bands - drummer Billy Hart. Brazilian guitarist Chico Pinheiro is on 'Two For The Road.'

More lush this time strings are an element arranged and conducted by expat Irishman in New York David O'Rourke.

There is no sense of drift. But when the arrangements are at their lushest they don't work as well as when the beat gets a chance to emerge more. And that is when Williams shows his tonal class by mining the deepest vibrations to cut through to all listeners out there and our collective soul on vastly swung romper 'Blues in Sophistication' and then all is well in the world.

An album that includes notably a version of Henry Mancini's 'A Slow Hot Wind' that proves superb and where the arrangement works better. As 'Lujon' the composition was introduced on Mr Lucky Goes Latin [RCA Victor, 1961] when without words. Otherwise when with the Norman Gimbel words sung rendered 'A Slow Hot Wind' (often thought of in titular terms as one and the same thing avec ou sans paroles regardless). Choice, classic, versions include the great singer Johnny Hartman who magically interpreted the song on The Voice That Is.

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Jeremy Pelt, photo: High Note publicity shot