Rendezvous With Kenton - Stan Kenton

 

Two Shades Of Autumn

Rendezvous With Kenton

Stan Kenton

Back cover photo by Ken Whitmore

Recorded in October, 1957

Capitol Records T932

Personnel: 

Leader and Piano - Stan Kenton

Trumpets - Sam Noto, Phil Gilbert, Lee Katzman, Billy Catalano and Ed Leddy

Saxophones - Lennie Niehaus (Alto), Bill Robinson (Alto), Bill Perkins (Tenor), Wayne Dunstan (Tenor), and Steve Perlow (Baritone)

Trombones - Kent Larsen, Jim Amlotte, Don Reed, Archie Le Coque and Kenny Shroyer (Bass)

Drums - Jerry McKenzi

Bass - Red Kelly

From the back cover: The Stan Kenton band first blazed into musical prominence on Memorial Day, 1941, at the Rendezvous Ballroom in Balboa, California. Since then, Stand has traveled the high-road of musical success, winning spectacular acclaim all along the way. And now, that long road has brought him back to the Rendezvous and a home-base under his personal management - back to the sand and stars and the ocean murmur of Balboa.

More than sentiment prompted this memorable homecoming, Kenton, for his next album, wanted to find a recording area with a good natural big-hall sound. The Rendezvous was it, supplying just the right acoustics for the mood and manner of his contemporary jazz style. And in keeping with Stan's ambition to activate a vital new dancing spot on the West Coast, the Rendezvous again seemed the answer.

This album is an exciting preview of the kind of music that will be rolling out of Balboa in the months to come. It's the happy result of an "on location" recording date that saw Capitol's top engineers trucking up to the Rendezvous with tons of equipment, working with a fever and finesse matched only by the musicians themselves. On hand were all of the components of the first Kenton success – the fine, wide sound of the hall, stellar sidemen, and, of course, Stan himself.

The songs, all ballad standards except for two originals, have never been recorded by Stan previously, Joe Coccia, a brilliant new Kenton discovery, wrote Desiderata and Two Shades Of Autumn, and arranged all the other numbers. They are swingy and stimulating, blending the forthright buoyancy of the early Kenton hits with the adventurous jazz idioms which Stan has conceived, developed and refined during the seventeen years since his Balboa debut.

With The Wind And The Rain In Your Hair

Memories Of You

These Things You Left Me

Two Shades Of Autumn

They Didn't Believe Me

Walkin' By The River

High On A Windy Hill

Love Letters

I Get Along Without You Very well

Desiderata

This Is No Laughing Matter

I See Your Face Before Me