The veteran vibraharpist Charlie Shoemake writes in response to yesterday’s John Williams item:
I bought the John Williams 10′ inch LP while in high school. (Stephen F. Austin in Houston). I still have it today and it’s in excellent condition. I play it every once in awhile. I also bought during the same period the big Stan Getz at The Shrine Auditorium double recording with John Williams and Bob Brookmeyer. Over the ensuing years someone lifted that one from me but I got it back years later on CD.
Stan Getz at The Shrine, originally a fancy two-LP boxed set, is reissued as a single CD. “Feather Merchant,” the piece that opened the live concert recording on LP, closes the CD. It begins with four blues choruses by Williams in which he manages to be elliptical and allusive while at the same time rumbling boisterously in the basement of the piano. It’s a balancing act that I never tire of hearing.