The Individualism of Gil Evans

The Individualism of Gil Evans
Studio album by
ReleasedSeptember 1964[1]
RecordedSeptember 1963, April 6, May 25, July 9 & October 29, 1964
GenreJazz
Length32:29 (original LP)
67:51 (CD reissue)
LabelVerve
ProducerCreed Taylor
Gil Evans chronology
Into the Hot
(1962)
The Individualism of Gil Evans
(1964)
Blues in Orbit
(1971)

The Individualism of Gil Evans is an album by pianist, conductor, arranger and composer Gil Evans originally released on the Verve label in 1964. It features Evans' big band arrangements of five original compositions (two cowritten with Miles Davis) and compositions by Kurt Weill, Bob Dorough, John Lewis and Willie Dixon.

The original LP release consisted of tracks 2–5. Tracks 1 and 6–9 were added to the 1988 CD version of the album.[2]

Tracks 1 (as "Barracuda", or "General Assembly"*), 8, and 9 (in a 9:37 edited version) first appeared on LP in 1974 as part of Verve's "Previously Unreleased Recordings" series. That album also contained two quartet pieces, "Blues In Orbit" (or "Cheryl"*) and "Isabel" (or "The Underdog"*), which are not available on CD.

In the UK, the original album was issued by Verve for the first time in 1974 but as a double LP, with different cover art. It included the tracks from "Previously Unreleased Recordings", giving some alternative titles (*) to those on the US release.

Reception

[edit]

The Allmusic review by Scott Yanow awarded the album 4 stars stating "Highly recommended to Gil Evans fans; it is a pity he did not record more during this era".[3] Gil Evans was nominated for a Grammy Award for the album, for Best Instrumental Jazz Performance – Large Group or Soloist With Large Group (losing to Laurindo Almeida, for Guitar from Ipanema).[4]

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic[3]
The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings[5]

Track listing

[edit]
  1. "Time of the Barracudas" (Miles Davis, Gil Evans) – 7:26
  2. "The Barbara Song" (Bertolt Brecht, Kurt Weill) – 9:59
  3. "Las Vegas Tango" – 6:35
  4. "Flute Song/Hotel Me (Miles Davis, Gil Evans) – 12:29
  5. "El Toreador" – 3:26
  6. "Proclamation" – 3:55
  7. "Nothing Like You" (Bob Dorough, Fran Landesman) – 2:36
  8. "Concorde" (John Lewis) – 7:39
  9. "Spoonful" (Willie Dixon) – 13:46
All songs written by Gil Evans, except as indicated.

The original LP release consisted of tracks 2–5.

Collective personnel

[edit]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ "Billboard". September 12, 1964.
  2. ^ Allmusic
  3. ^ a b Yanow, S. Allmusic Review accessed July 5, 2011
  4. ^ "Grammy Awards 1985". Awards & Shows. Retrieved July 27, 2018.
  5. ^ Cook, Richard; Morton, Brian (2008). The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings (9th ed.). Penguin. p. 462. ISBN 978-0-141-03401-0.