Michel Legrand - After the Rain (Pablo, 1982)

 This post is by Dan

Michel Legrand (p); Gene Bertoncini (g); Joe Wilder (tr, flhn); Zoot Sims (ts, ss); Phil Woods (as, cl); Ron Carter (b); Grady Tate (d)

Recorded May 28, 1982

It would be easy to underestimate Michel Legrand's jazz credentials, given his tremendous success as a film writer and arranger. Albums such as Broadway is My Beat (Phillips, 1962) seemed to signal a turn away from jazz for the young French prodigy who had scored a major jazz triumph just a few years earlier with Legrand Jazz (Columbia, 1958). He went on to record hundreds of albums under his own name and made contributions to many others until his death in 2019.

Sometimes simplicity is the secret of artistic success. After the Rain assembled a small group of premier jazzmen in a New York studio as Legrand was making his way back to France from Los Angeles. Both Phil Woods and Joe Wilder had played on the Legrand Jazz sessions, alongside the likes of Miles Davis, John Coltrane, and Bill Evans. There was no advance preparation or rehearsal, and none was needed. Legrand provided simple arrangements of his own compositions, some well-known and others obscure. Of the songs selected, only one, "Pieces of Dreams," had previously been a jazz hit -- for Stanley Turrentine on his album of the same title (Fantasy, 1974). The relative unfamiliarity of the material keeps the listener, as well as the performers, from merely re-creating a "jazz version" of familiar pop material. 

The players clearly respond to the opportunity and produce a delightful jazz album. Woods and Zoot Sims make the most of their pairing, never competing or dueling each other but rather responding to each other's phrases as in a warm conversation. Wilder's elegant trumpet passages are neatly inserted right where they belong. And Gene Bertoncini's guitar adds color and contrast to the leader's piano. Woods provides the elegant closing touch on "Martina," soloing on clarinet. 

I have to agree with Nat Shapiro's summary in the liner notes: "In all, a record which is straight-ahead, melody-oriented, unpretentious and very pretty."