Billboard : 07/16/1955
Score of 82

This is Shorty Rogers first album for Atlantic – and the first in which he uses his own night club band, rather than a studio-assembled crew. There’s Jimmy Giuffre on clarinet, Pete Jolly on piano, Curtis Counce on bass and Shelly Manne on drums. Rogers’ trumpet and his performance with his men are fine expressions of the inspired jazz being practiced on the West Coast. It swings, and it has wit. Jazz buffs will also like the lucid liner notes by Nesuhi Ertegun. The tunes include two Rogers originals, Martians Go Home and Oh Play That Thing.

—–

Cashbox : 08/13/1955

Shorty Rogers was considered quite an addition to the Atlantic organization when he was signed to the indie. Many rate Rogers the leader of the West Coast jazz school and his sales potential with the followers of his particular type of jazz is very strong. Rogers records here with his original group consisting of, in addition to his trumpet, Jimmy Giuffre, clarinet, tenor sax and baritone sax; Pete Jolly, piano; Curtis Counce, bass; Shelly Manne, drums. The group, constantly swinging, is experimenting at all times, as solos are picked up and passed with amazing dexterity. It is obviously a group that has been playing together for some time and one in which each artist recognizes even the faintest nuance in his teammates’ performances and is ever ready to respond to a new adventure.

—–

Chicago Tribune
Fred Reynolds : 11/05/1955

Here is a modern jazz album of fine quality. In fact, it is the best Shorty Rogers to date, and Rogers has put out some good ones. With him on this superb quality LP are Jimmy Giuffre, clarinet, tenor sax, and baritone sax; Pete Jolly, piano; Curtis Counce, bass, and Shelly Manne, drums.

There are two standards – Isn’t It Romantic and My Heart Stood Still – and six originals, of which Martians Go Home is particularly delightful. It seems to me that the five musicians were all quite relaxed for this session, and most inventive, too, which may account for the splendid espirit de west coast that you get from the record, that has an intimate, in-person sound about it.

I have little doubt that this is Mr. Rogers at his swinging best, and that’s very good indeed.

—–

Saturday Review 
Whitney Balliett : 08/13/1955

An exciting and, in many ways, perfect jazz record that has none of Rogers‘ recent tendency toward kisses-in-the-breeze jazz, and that is by all odds his best date yet. The group, which has been working together for almost a year – and shows beautifully in its Swiss-watch interplay – includes Pete Jolly, Curtis Counce, Shelley Manne, and Jimmy Giuffre. All are in superb form, with Jolly, a two-handed, many-noted pianist, especially striking. Six originals and two standards.

—–

Down Beat : 08/24/1955
Jack Tracy : 5 stars

Atlantic Records’ entry into the jazz field is an auspicious one this month. With Shorty, they resorted to the simple, yet previously unthought-of expedient of waxing Rogers and the group with which he works regularly in L.A. – Jimmy Giuffre, clarinet, tenor, and baritone; Pete Jolly, piano; Curtis Counce, bass, and Shelly Manne, drums.

And it turns out to be a joy to hear. Shorty plays much more distinctive trumpet when he’s with a small group, for some reason, and Giuffre is a gas on clarinet (note particularly Martians Go Home, which also is recommended as the title of the year).

Jolly is going to be a highly ranked pianist one day, and the work Manne has done in the last three years has caused me to completely change the opinion I had of his work at that time.

Perhaps Nesuhi Ertegun’s album notes best explain what goes on here: “You can hear Shorty for the first time without changes or additions of personnel. It’s evident at once that these five musicians have worked together for a long time and are thoroughly accustomed to each others’ styles. There exists in this group an instinctive affinity and rapport that can never be duplicated by a band assembled just for a recording session.”

For the group spirit, for Shorty’s strong horn, for Giuffre’s great reed work, for Shelly’s swing – all the stars.

—–

Liner Notes by Nesuhi Ertegun

Who said West Coast jazz doesn’t swing?

It has become terribly fashionable, of late, to make learned distinctions between jazz of the East and West, as if the two never meet, to paraphrase a time-honored platitude. Either clearly stated or vaguely implied, the theory current in vogue goes as follows: East Coast jazz is really more emotional, more driving, closer to “real jazz,” whatever that may be. West Coast jazz, we are told on the other hand, takes us into a rarefied atmosphere of intellectual games, is more cerebral, more abstract; it is supposed to be too concerned with harmonic complexities, and to show too many traces of the influence of the modern classical composers; sometimes it is even, God forbid, atonal. West Coast jazz is accused of lacking the pulse and passion of jazz; jazz is lost in the shuffle, so it goes, while the ivory-tower composers of the Hollywood hills are searching for artificial forms and designing their clever collages with bits of Bartók and Berg and Schoenberg and Stravinsky.

I would be the last one to deny the existence of an important and significant experimental jazz movement in the West. It’s here, it’s growing, and I am all for it. That the West Coast jazz composers are keenly aware of the great modern writers (just as the East Coast and Midwestern and Swedish jazz composers are), there’s absolutely no doubt about it; but does this mean, as we are led to believe, that the West Coast school has turned its back to “real jazz?” For an answer to this strange accusation, I suggest you listen to this album.

There’s more to West Coast jazz than experimentation for its own sake. Furthermore, those among the Coast jazz writers-performers who have something to say, say it in their own language, and their vocabulary doesn’t copy that of certain classical composers; there is an assimilation of new techniques combined with an ever-present use of the jazz tradition, and what comes out my be startlingly new and radically different, may be a success sometimes and sometimes a failure, but in the end it is jazz, and it only makes sense when played by jazz musicians.

In a series of albums now being planned, Atlantic intends to illustrate various aspects of the experimental school, because I have a feeling something of real and lasting importance is about to emerge from the Hollywood jazz workshops. Something, perhaps, which will form the basis for a new approach to music in general, and may be recognized in much later times as the beginning of a new era in music. This thought is advanced only as a possibility; but if the possibility exists, and I feel it does, the experimentalists should be encouraged, and their works should be brought to the attention of interested listeners.

But the important point, which I think this album illustrates admirably, is that West Coast jazz is not limited to the experimental approach only. The serious charge has been made in several quarters that because of their fascination with new systems and alien theories (alien to jazz, that is), the modernists of the Pacific Coast have forgotten what jazz is, and that both in their writing and their playing, the “essence” of jazz becomes so diluted that you couldn’t find it under a microscope. A parallel charge states that the fervor and excitement and deep emotional content are all gone, and jazz in the West has degenerated into “introspective” or “precious” meanderings. “It’s too cool,” say the disturbed critics, using one of the most ambiguous and misunderstood terms of our present vocabulary. This album, which includes in its personnel several of the most significant names of the West Coast school, proves very conclusively, I think, that contact with the essence of jazz has not been lost.

On the contrary, I know of few examples, in recent years, of such joy and skill and improvisation, of so much vigor and directness of expression, so much freedom and imagination and fun. It is difficult to conceive of musicians more at home in the climate of jazz than the members of this quintet. Jimmy Giuffre with his lovely, Prez-inspired sounds on clarinet and his logical lines on saxophone; the brilliant, busy, two-handed energy of Pete Jolly on piano; the steadiness and agility of Curtis Counce on bass; the incredible, still-growing virtuosity of Shelly Manne on drums; and Shorty‘s beautifully constructed, lightly swinging trumpet solos are all in the purest jazz tradition.

Shorty Rogers, of course, is the leader of the West Coast jazz school, both through the influence of his writing and playing, and because he actively teaches, counting among his students Jack Montrose, Bob Cooper, Bud Shank and many more. In fact, when you go to visit Shorty, you often have to wait until there’s a break between periods of instruction. But if you expect to find a dry and dogmatic theoretician, you’ll be vastly disappointed. His serious dedication to music manifests itself in everything he does, but never with pedantic arrogance; his writing and his playing constantly betray the wit and humor of his temperament. Whether he is composing, or practicing his instrument, or trying out one Fluegel Horn after another to find one that will stay in tune (one of his current projects), or teaching, or studying Stravinsky scores at his piano, he always gives the impression of a man who is having a great time and wouldn’t dream of doing any of this if he didn’t enjoy it tremendously.

Shorty has made many records for many companies with big groups and small groups, but strangely enough, never with his own band the way it regularly appears in Hollywood night clubs. On his first Long Play for Atlantic (several more are in preparation), you can hear Shorty Rogers and his Giants for the first time without changes or additions of personnel. It’s evident at once that these five musicians have worked together for a long time and are thoroughly accustomed to each others’ styles. There exists in this group an instinctive affinity and rapport that can never be duplicated by a band assembled just for a recording session. It is customary for such bands, by the way, to be called All-Star bands; this happens to be a real All-Star band, although it’s Shorty’s regular group.

It’s easily understandable that a group working steadily together achieves a high degree of unity and cohesion; in the case of the Giants, such a unity by no means eliminates the element of surprise, the sudden outburst of an unexpected idea that adds so much to the pleasures of jazz listening. Here, these “surprises” are answered and developed almost instinctively by musicians who are quick to respond to each other. Listen, for instance, to Shorty’s last break on Not Really the Blues, immediately restated by Shelly Manne’s drums.

We tried in the recording studio to get a sound for the band that would be as close as possible to its sound in clubs. If that was our object, you might wonder why the recordings weren’t made in a club. The fact is that most clubs have horrible acoustics, at least for recording purposes; also, I’ve never been one to dig crowd noises during a musical performance.

I think these recordings reflect the “in-person” sound of the group rather faithfully, under somewhat idealized conditions. By this I mean that the piano part has more clarity than you’ll hear in most clubs, and the bass line is easier to follow. Otherwise, we tried not to change the natural relation of the different instruments, in order to keep an accurate perspective of different volumes and shadings. We liked the sound of the band, and tried to capture it, not “improve” it. The main mike was the new Austrian AKG C-12 condenser microphone, which has an unusually high faithful response.

Martians Go Home and Oh Play That Thing, both Rogers originals, show once more the indebtedness of modern jazz to Count Basie. On Martians, after Curtis Counce’s bass solo, the drum break you hear is made by Shelly with a half-dollar coin he spins on his tom-tom. Michele’s Meditation is one of the very few ballads Shorty has ever composed; Trickleydidlier is typical Rogers, written with verve, humor and interesting lines. The two standards, Isn’t It Romantic and My Heart Stood Still, are taken apart and put together again with the wonderful imagination of great improvisors. Johnny Mandel‘s uptempo Not Really the Blues, neglected since it was written for Woody Herman‘s big band, closes one side; the other side ends with really the blues, That’s What I’m Talkin’ ‘Bout (notice the 6-bar breaks in the chase choruses instead of the usual four), which marks the end of each set during the band’s personal appearances.