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Stan Getz in Stockholm

Here is Getz in Stockholm with a generic sounding rhythm section of Norwegians, playing a set of standards like Indiana, Everything Happens to Me, Jeepers Creepers, Over the Rainbow. Getz has two things: a wonderful sound, and an ability to improvise with great imagination and organization, telling a story. As long as he has those two things, I'll listen to him all day (though I am not a big fan of bossa nova generally so I prefer him when he's not doing that.)

I was mentioning to my grad class that the set of familiar topoi like ubi sunt, lacrimae rerum, carpe diem, beatus ille, ars longa vita breve, are like a kind of shared language for European poetry for many centuries. They are commonplaces in the good sense of the word. The standard songs are kind of like that. If you can breathe new life into them, I'll never tire of them.

I'm grading papers, which means two things: I need music on to keep me going, and I need to interrupt myself so as not to go mad. The result: many posts today in the 300 jazz album series.