Billboard : 04/15/1957
Spotlight on… selection

Gillespie‘s tour on behalf of the State Department was a howling success musically as well as politically, and in this follow-up to his “World Statesman” package, he more than ably proves it. It’s a wild and wooly affair from start to finish, with an almost unbelievable sound and rapport between musicians. The School Days track is a joy and will undoubtedly earn wide DJ air time. Great cover art shows Dizzy in Grecian costume. A must package.

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Cashbox : 11/02/1957

The disk is representative of the Gillespie jazz concert in Athens during his State Department sponsored jazz tour of the Middle East in 1956. The package runs a refreshing, upswing course (one exception: Yesterdays), with Gillespie’s trumpet in good humored style, and an excellent ork pitching in delightful arrangements. Rousing jazz session.

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High Fidelity
John S. Wilson : December, 1957

There’s a good display of the scope of Gillespie‘s band here – novelty (School Days), blues Cool Breeze, Hey Pete), ballad (Yesterdays), Afro-Cuban (Tin Tin Deo), bop classic (Groovin’ High), a classical invasion (Annie’s Dance). This band has a free-wheeling ensemble swing that the usually more highly regarded Basie band lacks at present. The soloists on this disc – notably Gillespie, trombonist Frank Rehak, and alto saxophonist Phil Woods – have richer individual voices than any of Basie’s men. The high point is a well-developed version of Yesterdays, on which a warm, singing Woods emerges brilliantly from the Parker forest.

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San Francisco Chronicle
Ralph J. Gleason : 10/20/1957

Another excellent new Verve release is Dizzy in Greece, the second volume in the series devoted to the Dizzy Gillespie big band which toured the Middle East last year. This LP was recorded in part by the same band that made the tour and in part by the band Gillespie brought to San Francisco in which there had been some personnel changes.

Two of Gillespie’s more informal vocal efforts, Hey Pete and School Days, are included as is Benny Golson‘s lovely original Stablemates and Ernie Wilkins‘ Groovin’ for Nat. Phil Woods has some exciting alto sax solos, as do Frank Rehak, Melba Liston and others but it is really Gillespie who steals the show, as he does in person. He is unquestionably the trumpet virtuoso of modern jazz, without peer. And I personally find him to be the most versatile of all modern jazz men, bursting with ideas and creative fire at all times.

This album is quite well recorded (not as good as the Basie, but good) and the performances are uniformly excellent. The cover, which shows Gillespie in Greek costume, is worth the price by itself.

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Down Beat : 11/28/1957
Don Gold : 4 stars

The title of this LP seems to be justification for use of the cover photo, of Gillespie in Greek garb, since there is no evidence that an audience is present for this concert performance, in Greece or anywhere else. In characteristic fashion, Verve’s facilities do not include someone to jot down personnel. And Marshall Stearns’ notes, while somewhat descriptive, do not note when these sides were recorded. He does note, however, that two of the tracks were recorded at a later session.

At any rate, one can recognize Dizzy’s playing. In technique, in conception, in wit, he remains a giant. He is the epitome of creative jazz, as far as I’m concerned, and his work here glows with warmth and excitement. It is a particular delight to hear him on Breeze and High, recreating the past without succumbing to it. He is a constantly growing musician.

The other soloists are not of Dizzy’s stature, but few contemporary jazzmen are. And inspired by him, they play dramatically. There are valid moments from Mitchell, Morgan, Woods, and Kelly, to name a few, that make this LP worth owning and hearing often.

The band itself does not encompass the precise section work of other bands, but there is an incomparable drive inherent in its work. The charts, for the most part, are fascinating, reflecting the best efforts of some of jazz’ best writers. Ernie Wilkins‘ Groovin’ for Nat fits this band perfectly. Quincy Jones‘ Pete, is a fluid blues. And School Days, now a satire on rock ‘n’ roll, continues to be enjoyable, from Dizzy’s vocal to Mitchell’s impersonation of Jacquet at his worst.

There are flaws here, in a few of the solos and the section work, but this is the most vibrant band I’ve heard in too long a time. If it is forced to disband for lack of bookings, as some predict, it will be a major loss to jazz.

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Liner Notes by Marshall W. Stearns

This is the second album (the first was World Statesman) of the music that piled up friends and momentum as it swung through the Middle East on the first State Department tour in jazz history. Once more, the power of jazz as a world-wide force for goodwill was documented to the hilt and, shortly thereafter, jazzband tours became a fixed part of government policy.

As the trek progressed, the men – and the one woman – in the band achieved new stature as musicians and as diplomats. Musically, you could hear the band developing with new tunes, nearly arranged and played with new fire. Pushed by a formidable big band, Gillespie rose to breathless heights while the musicians, in turn, responded with their inspired best. As the combinational pyramided skyward, the audiences added fuel to the flames as they were caught up in the fire of creation.

Off the bandstand, the musicians were swinging, too. They fraternized freely – in contrast to the Russian groups on tour – without making a show of it. In Abadan, clarinetist Jimmy Powell met a local cat who had been blowing the same frayed reed for a year. “I laid a couple of new reeds on him,” Powell recalls, “and he almost cried.” In Dacca, Gillespie noted a threadbare sub-assistant backstage, bought him a new outfit – at no great expense – and earned a lifelong fan. In Ankara, the band chipped in to buy a cigarette case for Muvvfak Falay, Turkey’s leading trumpeter, who decided on the spot to come to the United States to study jazz.

The band reached its peak, musically and diplomatically, in Athens where it out-rocked the rock-throwing Greek students. John “Dizzy” Gillespie and his ambassadors of jazz arrived just after the riots of May, 1956, and anti-American feeling was intense. Right or wrong, the Greeks felt that the United States should help them take Cyprus back from the British. Newspapers were asking why the Americans were sending jazzbands instead of guns. And the opening concert was staged for the same students who threw rocks at the windows of the United States Information Service.

It was a tense moment and the students jeered as the band started to play. Then silence. And then, a complete and riotous switch – the roar of approval drowned out the big band; hats, jackets, and whatnot were tossed at the ceiling; and even the local gendarmes danced in the aisles. Between numbers, Gillespie miraculously kept the kids under control. After the concert, they carried him out on their shoulder, chanting “Dizzy, Dizzy, Dizzy” stalling traffic for a half hour and a dozen blocks. This music spelled out the happy, friendly, and generous side of American life with explosive force and, incidentally, siphoned off a Niagara of excess energy.

In this second album, the concert begins with the novelty Hey Pete, a Quincy Jones arrangement of the blues which features Walter Davis, Billy Mitchell, and the omnipotent Gillespie while the band swings lightly and remorselessly beneath them. Yesterdays, arranged by Howie Kravitz, is a vehicle for the forthright power and clean conception of altoist Phil Woods, while Frank Rehak and Gillespie add a counter comment to a fine ballad. Tin Tin Deo, composed by Chano Pozo and arranged by Dizzy in Greece, is an Afro-Cuban mood piece which carries a haunting melodic phrase between widely-voiced harmonies. Marty Flax plays the baritone.

Ernie Wilkins‘ Groovin’ For Nat (Hentoff, that is) sets up an easy swinging background for Dizzy’s descent from the stratosphere to the good musical earth – a Gillespie trademark – while Billy Mitchell and Walter Davis share the solo honors. Annie’s Dance was arranged by Melba Liston, with an assist from Grieg, using the band as a many-voiced instrument with improvised additions by Persip, Mitchell, and Gillespie. This is the number that regularly broke the ice at dinner dances.

Tadd Dameron‘s Cool Breeze opens the “B” side – another blues – with solos by Frank Rehak, Billy Mitchell, and Gillespie. As the background builds, Dizzy paces himself through a series of dynamic changes until Charlie Persip drums out the coda.

As for School Days, this tune originated as a gag and developed into a satire on rock and roll. Persip pounds the off-beat and Mitchell honks, but when this rhythmic juggernaut got rolling even the hipsters were scared. (Two titles, That’s All, composed by Pete Anson, and Stable Mates, composed by Benny Golson, were recorded at a slightly later session; the first features trumpeter Lee Morgan, tenorist Billy Mitchell, and pianist Wynton Kelly; the second features tenorist Benny Golson and Dizzy.) The bop flag-waver, Groovin’ High, arranged by A.K. Salim, is a vehicle for the improvisations of altoist Phil Woods followed by Gillespie. By the way, the title means Dizzy Gillespie.