This outstanding performance from 1972 is previously unreleased and features virtuoso pianist Oscar Peterson with one of the most distinctive sounds in jazz at that time, tenor saxophonist Ben Webster. Double vinyl in gatefold, numbered edition, limited to 1.000 copies!
Ben Webster’s playing, tough and tender in equal measures, originally came to the fore in Duke Ellington’s orchestra of the 1930s and 40s. Oscar Peterson’s career began after this period but really took off under the wing of impresario Norman Granz when he developed a reputation as perhaps the most technically accomplished and melodically inventive
pianists of that time. Webster and Peterson would later cross paths on many occasions, either as members of Granz’s Jazz at the Philharmonic troupe or on a number of outstanding recording sessions for the Verve label.
Despite this reunion at Hannover being of later vintage, it’s Webster’s time with Ellington that is accentuated in the repertoire. Five of the tunes performed that night relate to the maestro including, for example, “Cotton Tail”, “Perdido” and “In a Mellow Tone”. Also featured are two ballads highlighting the saxophonist’s softer and sometimes lightly whispered sound together with harder swinging tracks penned by Webster himself.