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Product Description
PolyGram's Bechet sampler on CD catches him at the start of the final triumphant decade of his life, when he became a transplanted Parisian hero, and indeed, he sounds positively ebullient in a series of trad jazz sessions with various European groups. But this CD is something of a cheat because nine of the 23 tracks don't include Bechet at all; hence the "Sidney Bechet and Friends" disclaimer. The vast majority of the numbers in which Bechet does play come from some 1949 sessions with the French Band and the Feetwarmers (whose drummer is the bop expatriate Kenny Clarke); on all of these, Bechet's pungent, heavily vibrating soprano tone dominates the landscape. Two more tracks from 1951 find him occasionally piercing through the workaday, though lively Dutch Swing College Band in Hilversum. Then Bechet gives way to a succession of Parisian ensembles respectively led by Claude Luter, Jimmy Archey and Michel Attenoux; the first is lame contrapuntal New Orleans Dixieland, the second more polished and alive in the Chicago style, while the third finds the leader definitely emulating Bechet's tone. While this disc is an informative study of the influence that Bechet had upon French trad bands, it is hardly a first choice for someone who wants to experience Bechet and only Bechet. ~ Richard S. Ginell
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