Big and meaty big band charts reminiscent of Billy Mays’ days with Sinatra are served up by arranger, conductor, composer and vibes man Ray Brown as he leads his 20 piece big band through a two disc set that covers everything from originals to standards to even some Christmas tunes. Talk about variety!
The first disc is comprised of confident and bright section work by the brass and reeds on pieces like “How About You” , with some hip piano work provided by Eddie Mendenhall on the slinky “Blues For Two Ks”. A fun “The City Medley” is like a musical tour bus, touring through tunes from “Chicago” to “San Francisco” and, of course, “New York”. Some nice bopping sax work by Mary Fettig and Charlie McCarthy digs in deep on a hard driving “The Fugue/Airegin”. Hold on tight!
The second discs has a clever samba’d read of “ It Might As Well Be Spring”, with Brown himself hammering away on the easy swing of “Stella By Starlight” , with John Gove’s trombone nice and velvety for “If I Should Lose You”. For the Christmas cheer, the horns are gracefully elegiac on “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas”, and Don Becks piano taps into Vince Guaraldi on a warm “Christmas Time Is Here.” Most tasty is an obscure “A Christmas Love Song” that deserves a second and third listen, , with the sax section doing some tricky work on the sleigh ride of “Jingle Bells”. This is a collection of charts that charm-check it out.