Bill Evans - Santa Claus Is Coming To Town (1964).

William John Evans (August 16, 1929 – September 15, 1980), best known as Bill Evans, was an American jazz pianist and composer who mostly played in jazz trios. Evans’s use of impressionist harmony, inventive interpretation of traditional jazz repertoire, block chords, and trademark rhythmically independent, “singing“ melodic lines continue to influence jazz pianists today. _______________________________________________________________________________________________ Gary Peacock (born May 12, 1935, in Burley, Idaho - September 4, 2020) is an American jazz double-bassist. After military service in Germany, in the early sixties, he worked on the west coast with Barney Kessel, Bud Shank, Paul Bley and Art Pepper, then moved to New York. He worked there with Bley, the Bill Evans Trio (with Paul Motian), and Albert Ayler’s trio with Sunny Murray. There were also some live dates with Miles Davis, as a temporary substitute for Ron Carter. Peacock spent time in Japan in the late 1960s, abandoning music temporarily and studying Zen philosophy. After returning to the United States in 1972, he studied Biology at the University of Washington in Seattle and taught music theory at Cornish College of the Arts from 1976 to 1983. In 1983, he joined Keith Jarrett’s “Standards Trio“ with Jack DeJohnette (the three musicians had previously recorded Tales of Another in 1977 for ECM Records, under Peacock’s leadership). Among the trio’s albums are Standards, Vol. 1 and Standards, Vol. 2 and Standards Live. With the breakup of the “Standards Trio“ in 2014, Peacock decided to continue his career as the leader of his own piano trio, with Marc Copland on piano and Joey Baron on drums. His 80th birthday year (2015) saw him touring worldwide with this trio to support their ECM release. _______________________________________________________________________________________________ Stephen Paul Motian (March 25, 1931 – November 22, 2011) was an American jazz drummer, percussionist, and composer. Motian played an important role in freeing jazz drummers from strict time-keeping duties. He first came to prominence in the late 1950s in the piano trio of Bill Evans, and later was a regular in pianist Keith Jarrett’s band for about a decade (c. 1967–1976). Motian began his career as a bandleader in the early 1970s. Perhaps his two most notable groups were a longstanding trio of guitarist Bill Frisell and saxophonist Joe Lovano, and the Electric Bebop Band which featured the drummer working mostly with younger musicians doing interpretations of bebop standards. _______________________________________________________________________________________________ Tracklist: Claus Is Coming to Town (J. Fred Coots / Haven Gillespie) _______________________________________________________________________________________________ Personnel: Evans – piano Peacock - double bass Motian – drums. _______________________________________________________________________________________________ Genre:Jazz/Post Bop Recorded: December 18, 1963 Released:1964 Label: Verve Records - V6-8578 Producer – Creed Taylor Sleeve Notes – Jack Maher Engineer [Director Of Engineering] – Val Valentin Engineer [Recording Engineer] – Bob Simpson Painting [Cover Painting] – Olga Albizu Design – Acy R. Lehman.
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