Stan Getz/Charlie Byrd: Jazz Samba (Verve Acoustic Sounds series) [VERVE]

Why you'll love it

This Verve Acoustic Sounds series edition is a 180g pressing from the original analog tapes in a gatefold jacket. Jazz Samba went to No. 1 on the Billboard pop albums chart, and "Desafinado" won Getz a Grammy for Best Jazz Performance.

This edition

• Verve Acoustic Sounds series
• 180g vinyl
• Mastered from the original analog tapes
• Gatefold jacket

About the album

It started with a stack of records in a suitcase. Guitarist Charlie Byrd came home from a 1961 State Department tour of South America with bossa nova albums by João Gilberto and Antonio Carlos Jobim, played them for Stan Getz, and the two decided to make an album of the music on the spot.

Getting the rhythm right took longer. Byrd rehearsed a band in Washington, D.C., with his brother Gene Byrd, bassist Keter Betts and two drummers, Buddy Deppenschmidt and Bill Reichenbach, to nail the samba feel. Producer Creed Taylor and Getz arrived on February 13, 1962, and they cut the album in Pierce Hall at All Souls Unitarian Church, chosen for its warm acoustics. Jobim's "Desafinado" and "Samba de Uma Nota Só" sit beside Byrd's own "Samba Dees Days," a breezy "O Pato" and the gentle "Samba Triste," with Getz's tenor floating over everything. Olga Albizu painted the cover.

It kicked off a full-blown bossa nova craze, and Getz went on to "The Girl from Ipanema" with the Gilbertos. A church hall in Washington is an unlikely place for a dance fever to start, but the acoustics were excellent.

Also at Kops: more Stan Getz on vinyl · browse Classic Jazz

Tracklist

Listen

On Verve, a reissue of the 1962 album.