David S
Well-Known Member
Ok, I admit that when I first bought the album Rise, I was intrigued by two things: the tune Aranjuez and the credits, which noted "clappers".
Aranjuez has always been one of my favourite tunes of Mr Alpert's solo work, even to this day. I was reminded of it in listening to the Milos Karadaglic recording of the full Concierto de Aranjuez with the London Philharmonic with Yannick Nezet-Seguin (music director of my hometown Philadelphia Orchestra) conducting. It's terrific and I highly recommend it.
Of course, it brought me back to Mr. Alpert's version, which I've played a few times in the past few days. I used to think (before I got educated, lol) that everyone was ripping off Mr Alpert... I still love the version on Rise. In many ways, it's my favourite track on the "record", eclipsing Rise, in no small reason because of those "clappers"... When I saw Mr. Alpert at his performance at Lincoln Center a few years ago, sitting at the tables literally in front of him and band (still don't know how I fell into those seats), I kept thinking that with his current small band, it would be interesting to hear a different take on Aranjuez, or even Rise (and I still think Save the Sunlight would be an excellent addition to their current repertoire). A slower take, perhaps... Hee pllayed a snippet of Rise that kind of hinted at what I had been thinking but didn't take it to fruition. I won't be able to see him on his current upcoming performances - I won't be in the cities they are scheduled to be in and they're not scheduled to be in the DFW area, where I reside now - so I hope he and his coterie think about this and try it out.
I used to quip to friends that an ambition of mine was to be a "clapper" in a Herb Alpert tune. (If Mr. Alpert's folks read this blog, consider this my application henceforth and I can provide my resume ). It wasn't until I saw some of the video for the Rise album that I really realized what that credit meant, and frankly, I think it's as cool as his cool trumpet sound.
All best, David
Aranjuez has always been one of my favourite tunes of Mr Alpert's solo work, even to this day. I was reminded of it in listening to the Milos Karadaglic recording of the full Concierto de Aranjuez with the London Philharmonic with Yannick Nezet-Seguin (music director of my hometown Philadelphia Orchestra) conducting. It's terrific and I highly recommend it.
Of course, it brought me back to Mr. Alpert's version, which I've played a few times in the past few days. I used to think (before I got educated, lol) that everyone was ripping off Mr Alpert... I still love the version on Rise. In many ways, it's my favourite track on the "record", eclipsing Rise, in no small reason because of those "clappers"... When I saw Mr. Alpert at his performance at Lincoln Center a few years ago, sitting at the tables literally in front of him and band (still don't know how I fell into those seats), I kept thinking that with his current small band, it would be interesting to hear a different take on Aranjuez, or even Rise (and I still think Save the Sunlight would be an excellent addition to their current repertoire). A slower take, perhaps... Hee pllayed a snippet of Rise that kind of hinted at what I had been thinking but didn't take it to fruition. I won't be able to see him on his current upcoming performances - I won't be in the cities they are scheduled to be in and they're not scheduled to be in the DFW area, where I reside now - so I hope he and his coterie think about this and try it out.
I used to quip to friends that an ambition of mine was to be a "clapper" in a Herb Alpert tune. (If Mr. Alpert's folks read this blog, consider this my application henceforth and I can provide my resume ). It wasn't until I saw some of the video for the Rise album that I really realized what that credit meant, and frankly, I think it's as cool as his cool trumpet sound.
All best, David