Given that a busty babe is leaning into the left side of the piano keyboard on the cover, we'd almost expect Lou Levy to focus mostly on the lighter notes on the right – but instead, he really opens up with some great deep notes on the cover, and takes the album far past anything you might expect! Levy's a really subtle player, one who never overstates his obvious ear for modern tones and musical elements – but he's really got a way of bringing them into his music in ways you wouldn't expect – either in the way he shapes a note on the mellower cuts, or comes up with a groove on the more lively ones. There's none of the flowery sounds you might expect from the "baby grand" title – and instead, Lou is in very comfortable territory – working in trio format with the great Max Bennett on bass, and drummer Gus Johnson – on titles that include "Little Girl", "Undecided", "The Gypsy", "Sunday Kind Of Love", "I've Found A New Baby", and "You Don't Know What Love Is". LP, Vinyl record album

Pat Martino in one of his greatest settings – live, in front of the kind of an audience where he could really open up! The set's a great marker of the growth that Pat experienced as the 70s approached – taking all the lessons he'd learned from his years gigging it up in the soul jazz underground, and using them to forge a more expansive, more cosmic approach to jazz. The tracks on the set are all quite long – with backing by a trio that features electric piano from Ron Thomas, and an overall sound that's exploratory, but never too out or trippy. Titles include "Special Door", "The Great Stream", and an excellent reading of "Sunny". LP, Vinyl record album

We love Oscar Peterson with strings – a setting he never got to use that often, given the popularity of his famous trio recordings! When Oscar gets set up with strings, he seems to play even more freely than with a combo – let loose from rhythm a bit more than before, and instead focusing strongly on melody – which often comes off with a warmly lyrical feel. This album's a rare entry into the Peterson strings category – a great 50s date with Russ Garcia backing Oscar up – giving the album just the right mix of mellow and modern to match Peterson's magical work on the keys! In a way, the album's a link between two different styles of 50s jazz – some of the warmer string-laden work of the piano mainstream, and some of the sharper sounds of the Verve modern approach to the style – served up here by Oscar in ways that bring both modes together perfectly, with just the right dash of both. Titles include "Laura" and "Tenderly" – both tracks you'd have to have on an album like this – plus "Black Coffee", "Ruby", "Stella By Starlight", "A Sunday Kind Of Love", and "I Thought About You". LP, Vinyl record album

Seminal material from Cecil Taylor – an explosive album that was one of the first to show the world just how much his style had evolved since the late 50s! When Taylor first showed up on the scene, he was already a pianist that was going farther out than just about anyone – but by the time of this 1962 performance in Copenhagen, he'd really taken off – working in these massive flurries of keyboard intensity that were unlike anything anyone had ever heard before – the full-blown Taylor aesthetic that's endured for decades, set up perfectly here in a trio with some brilliantly bracing alto sax by Jimmy Lyons, and equally free work on drums by Sunny Murray! All tracks are long, and titles include "Trance", "Call", "Lena", and "D Trad That's What". LP, Vinyl record album

A very early date as a leader by McCoy Tyner – cut at a time when he was making big waves in the John Coltrane Quartet, but also sounding plenty darn great on his own! The group here's a trio – with Coltrane associates Art Davis on bass and Elvin Jones on drums – and the warm familiarity of the players is clear from the very first notes of the set. There's a lighter, more lyrical – and possibly more sentimental – style going on here – one that echoes piano work of earlier generations, but which also shows plenty of signs of the growing modalism in Tyner's lines – especially on the striking original tracks "Sunset", "Effendi", "Inception", and "Blues For Gwen". LP, Vinyl record album

A wonderful album from the great Cedar Walton trio that featured Sam Jones on bass and Billy Higgins on drums – a really beautiful group of musicians who completely transformed the sound of the piano trio in the 70s! The group played together often in the 70s, and they've never sounded better than on an album like this – freely soulful and dancing, with Walton in firm command of his talents – sometimes coming on with the strength of his early 60s material, but always opening up with a more exploratory vibe too. Walton worked often in this mode for the decades that followed this set – but this Japanese album is almost the start of that great legacy, and still one of the best from this group! Titles include "Con Alma", "Suite Sunday", "Suntory Blues", and "Fantasy In D". LP, Vinyl record album

One of the most stripped-down albums from legendary jazz harpist Dorothy Ashby – and one of her earliest records too! The set's got Dorothy right out front in a trio setting – working with bassist Herman Wright and drummer John Tooley – in a wonderfully jazzy take on the sound of the harp – an instrument used here in a way that's never flowery, or linked to classical modes at all – but instead in a very unique space that's somewhere between jazz bass and guitar – as Ashby plucks these hip notes with a very soulful vibe! The album's got a special Chess/Argo sort of vibe – one that really opens up Ashby's Detroit roots. Dorothy wrote two originals for the set – "John R" and "Booze" – and other titles include "Lonely Melody", "Django", "Gloomy Sunday", and "Lil Darlin". LP, Vinyl record album

What happens when Art Farmer and Phil Woods get together? Some pretty magical music – and a set that's quite different than most of their other 60s recordings! The session is a special date – put together by Clarke-Boland Band impresario Gigi Campi – with Farmer's flugelhorn and Woods' alto backed by a very cool French rhythm trio – which features Martial Solal on piano, Henri Texier on bass, and Daniel Humair on the drums! The group's a bit more modern than some of Art's usual combos, which makes for really surprising results, and often a much harder sound – one that matches the growing intensity of Woods during this part in his career. The tracks are long and openly grooving – and titles include "Blue Bossa", "Watch What Happens", "Blue Lights", "Sunrise Sunset", and "The Day After". LP, Vinyl record album

Straight trio grooving from Takehiro Honda – but pretty darn great work nonetheless! The album's a nice bridge between the harder, more rhythmic pulse of his early soul jazz sessions, and the later, freer sound of his more lyrical trio sides – and the whole album shows Honda opening up with a new sense of freedom, really taking off on the keys of the piano, while still keeping a nicely understated groove going at the bottom. The rest of the trio includes Yoshio Suzuki on bass and Kan Murakami on drums – and titles include "Sunny", "I Love You", "Autumn Leaves", "Willow Weep For Me", and "Here's That Rainy Day". LP, Vinyl record album

A great meeting of two generations of jazz – and one that really blows the top off some of Dexter Gordon's other European sessions of the time! The setting here is definitely one that's more a Gordon-based date – long tracks with rhythm backing from a trio with Kenny Drew on piano, Niels Henning Orsted Pedersen on bass, and Alex Riel on drums. But unlike some of the other long-blown Gordon-heavy albums for the stretch, the presence of Jackie McLean really brings in a new sort of fire – the kind of soaring, soulful energy he brought to his own records in these immediate post-Blue Note years – almost a Coltrane influence, and a sense of spiritualism that really comes through on some of his solo moments – even in this relatively straight setting. Titles include Gordon's "All Clean", Sahib Shihab's "Rue De La Harpe", Drew's "Sunset", and a nice take of "On The Trail". LP, Vinyl record album

Pure genius from Oscar Peterson – one of his finest moments ever! The record is very different than most of Oscar's over-recorded trio format ones – and features Claus Ogerman crafting some impeccable backings of lofty strings and compressed horns, creating a pillow of air that takes Oscar's piano to the sky and beyond, floating into realms never dreamed of on other LPs! The set sparkles with a strident MPS easy groove – completely sublime, with a perfectness that we'd ascribe to a rare few albums, such as the similar-grooving Jobim album Wave, also helped out tremendously by Ogerman. Titles include "Dreamsville", "Sally's Tomato", "Sunny", "Wave", "Wandering", and "Ode To Billy Joe". LP, Vinyl record album

A beautiful meeting of two mid-century musical talents – the piano of Oscar Peterson and the arrangements of Nelson Riddle – a surprisingly wonderful pairing, heard here on a rare set for Verve! Peterson never recorded with strings nearly as much as he did with a trio, but almost all of his dates in the format are wonderful – and this album may well be one of the best! Riddle's nicely restrained here – using that new sense of space he was finding in the 60s, and moving a bit away from more sentimental modes of the 50s, into some laidback jazzy charts that are really great. Peterson's piano steps through the arrangements wonderfully – never trying to dominate, and instead really going with the flow that Riddle provides. There's a mature sound to this record that really points the way towards some of the later Verve and CTI orchestrations of the 60s – proof that Riddle could have a huge influence on styles to come – and titles include "Judy", "My Ship", "Nightingale", "A Sleeping Bee", "Goodbye", "Portrait Of Jenny", "Come Sunday", "Round Midnight", and "My Foolish Heart". LP, Vinyl record album

A New York performance by the legendary pianist Yosuke Yamashita, but one that burns every bit as strongly as his famous albums from Japan – thanks in part to some really incredible work from Akira Sakata on alto and clarinet! There's few folks who could ever hope to match the Cecil Taylor-like energy of Yamashita on the piano, but Sakata always seems to rise to the challenge wonderfully – and with the drums of Shota Koyama along for the ride, the trio must have left the New York audience with their jaws on the floor – especially as most of the US had not been able to get access to Yosuke's records at the time. The set features three very long tracks – "Rabbit Dance", "Mina's Second Theme", and "Sunayama". LP, Vinyl record album

Early work by Albert Ayler, recorded live in 1964 at the Cellar Cafe in New York, but not issued by ESP until years later, after his untimely early death. The performance is a trio outing – with Ayler's tenor alongside the bass of Gary Peacock and drums of Sunny Murray – all freely skirting around each other's space on the date, in a way that allows Ayler to take the bold lead with his sharp-toned solos, but which also allows for free interplay between the bass and percussion. Ayler's tone and wide swaths of sound are simply amazing – and titles include two variations on "Ghosts", plus "Spirits", "Prophecy", and "Wizard". LP, Vinyl record album