Nat King Cole & Les Paul - Jazz at the Philharmonic - Body & Soul (2001) [Remastered]

When Norman Granz chose the Jazz musicians for the first of what became a series of concerts at the Philharmonic Hall in Los Angeles, little could he imagine that within a few years, two of them would become major stars - in the 'Pop', not Jazz idiom and neither could the latent stars themselves, whose names were Nat 'King' Cole and Les Paul. The year was 1944, the Second World War was raging, Los Angeles was a busy, busy town and it's illustrious 'suburb' Hollywood was even busier. Of course, the musicians were top class, there were Nat Cole on piano, plus Johnny Miller from his trio on bass and Lee Young, Lester's brother and a sometime accompanist of Cole on drums. J.J. Johnson, Illinois Jacquet, Jack McVea and Shorty Sherock were all schooled in the 'Big Bands', Red Callender (swopping on bass) was a well respected free-lance, which leaves Les Paul. His career as a Country singer/guitarist 'Rhubarb Red' was not entirely over, but around Los Angeles he was known as a classy session man and leader of an innovative Jazz trio. No comment is necessary on the actual music, other than everyone involved was really involved and all got their fair share to shine in the solo spots. As 'live' recording was not an easy operation in 1944, the sound holds up remarkably well. It had not been Granz's intention to record the concert but a producer with Armed Forces Network radio service (possibly the same unit Less Paul was then working for during his war service) asked permission to do so. Captured here on Jasmine is that first concert, with all concerned playing their hearts out. On a technical note, previous re-issues of this material have sought to weld together parts 1 & 2 of "Blues" with unsatisfactory results, a slight gap in changing the recordings discs of the period makes this impossible. Jasmine has chosen to rapidly fade out Part 1 then rapidly fade in Part 2, resulting in the smallest loss of the scintillating interplay going on between Cole's piano and Paul's guitar at that part of the number.