Complete Gramercy Five Sessions

by Artie Shaw

Product Description:

Personnel includes: Artie Shaw (clarinet); Billy Butterfield, Roy Eldridge (trumpet); Dodo Mamarosa (keyboards); Jud DeNaut (bass).

Almost all the great big bands of the Swing Era had a small "band-within-the-band." Tommy Dorsey had The Clambake Seven, Benny Goodman had his trio (or quartet) and Duke Ellington and his orchestra members had various small groupings. This gave the bandleader and certain band members a little variety and chances to try different things away from the constraints of dance-oriented big bands. Artie Shaw's outfit was The Gramercy Five, which had a slightly unusual instrumental line-up: the leader's clarinet, electric guitar, bass, drums, trumpet, and harpsichord (occasionally piano, too). The sound was elegant yet swinging, with a more freewheeling and wry feeling in the solos. The Five could indulge in Ellingtonian voicings ("Summit Ridge Drive"), Dixieland/New Orleans-style solos ("Special Delivery Stomp"), bluesy melodies and traces of that strange new music that would be known as bebop. The band's sly humor is evident in some of the song titles: "The Gentle Grifter," "When The Quail Come Back To San Quentin." Shaw's Gramercy Five featured some musicians who went on to jazz legendhood: trumpeter Roy Eldridge, pianist Dodo Mamarosa (who went on to play with Charlie Parker and Gene Ammons), and the wonderfully versatile guitarist Barney Kessel (who went on to play with Sonny Rollins, Julie London, and the Beach Boys). COMPLETE is small-band swing at its finest.