Vince Guaraldi Trio: Peanuts Portraits [CRAFT]

Why you'll love it

This Craft LP is the collection's first time on vinyl, with eight of its tracks making their vinyl debut. It rounds up Guaraldi's themes for the Peanuts gang, from "Linus and Lucy" to "Peppermint Patty" and "Joe Cool."

This edition

• Eight tracks on vinyl for the first time

About the album

Every Peanuts character has a personality you could spot from across a playground, and Vince Guaraldi gave most of them a tune to match. Peanuts Portraits brings those themes together in one place, compiled by Bill Belmont for Craft to mark 70 years of Charles M. Schulz's strip.

"Linus and Lucy" bookends the record, that bouncing left hand and singalong melody that has soundtracked a great many happy dances since the 1960s. "Sally's Blues" ambles, "Blue Charlie Brown" shrugs in that very Charlie Brown way, and "Frieda (With the Naturally Curly Hair)" and "Schroeder" turn up in alternate takes, the latter a fitting nod to the strip's resident Beethoven devotee. "The Masked Marvel" goes to Snoopy's caped alter ego, and Guaraldi steps up to the mic himself for "Joe Cool." It's breezy, melodic trio jazz, light on its feet and quietly sophisticated underneath.

Kids hear cartoons and grown-ups hear a first-rate West Coast pianist at play, and both are right. It makes a natural companion to A Charlie Brown Christmas, and it lets you play Guaraldi in July without the neighbours asking questions.

Also at Kops: more Vince Guaraldi Trio on vinyl · browse Classic Jazz

Tracklist

Listen

On Craft Recordings (cat# CR00339), the 2020 compilation.