Stan Getz, Bill Evans – Stan Getz & Bill Evans

When, in early May, 1964, tenor saxophonist Stan Getz and pianist-composer Bill Evans finally got together for what would be their only studio encounter, one might well have expected that they would produce something quite different from the bracing music in. Getz and Evans were, after Miles Davis (Evans' former leader and a onetime Getz colleague), the great romantic improvisers of the post-War era. Instead of a session that suggested Wordsworth and Coleridge exchanging verses by the fire, Getz and Evans made out like a couple of Whitmans. With the exception of the ballad "But Beautiful", which is just that and more, the prevailing mood is celebratory.