Search - Milt Hinton, Dick Hyman, Bob Wilber :: Summit Reunion 1992

Cruisin' with the Soprano Summit and Friends

Bomojaz | South Central PA, USA | 05/11/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"
Do people still go on jazz cruises, I wonder? There was a time in the '90s when they were pretty popular, and this recording was made aboard one (on the S.S. Norway) in October 1992. Soprano Summit automatically means Bob Wilber and Kenny Davern, and they are indeed present. Davern had long ago packed his soprano away and was playing only clarinet, but Wilber still played both instruments (mostly soprano) and brought along an alto sax for this trip as well. His alto playing is especially good on MY BLUE HEAVEN; I don't know who did the arrangement of this tune for this performance, but it's a particularly good one. Bob and Kenny both play clarinet on Hoagy Carmichael's NEW ORLEANS, and their low register opening statements are delightfully gorgeous. Flip Phillips (ts) is added on the last three titles, and MY MOTHER'S EYES gets an unusually jaunty treatment, which is excellent. Most of the tunes take on a theme statement into a round of solos for everyone and back to the theme again format, which can get tiring after a while, but the musicianship is of such a high quality that the listener's interest never flags. Dick Hyman (p) Bucky Pizzarelli (g) Milt Hinton (b) and Bobby Rosengarden (d) round out the group. It's a very relaxed and pleasant CD, just the sort of thing you might expect on a cruise. Nice!"