Revinylized!

Of all the albums in the Grateful Dead catalog, American Beauty is the one with the widest appeal. Its proto-Americana tunes are neither antique nor modern; instead, they are timeless. The album's sound is clean and lean, up to modern snuff even more than a half-century after its original release in November 1970.

The tunes seem to roll like a Sunday drive on a country road, in and out of dark hollows and up and down hills. Three of its 10 songs have become folk-rock standards: "Friend of the Devil," "Sugar Magnolia," and "Truckin'."

Ow Ow Ow, Ow Ow Whaow, Ow Ow Ow...Wha-aa-ow. That simple G-minor melody, supposedly inspired by Beethoven's Fifth Symphony (or perhaps Brazilian composer Carlos Lyra) and played with the tone of a Fender Stratocaster doubled by a Hammond B3 organ, is unquestionably the most famous rock-guitar riff. The apotheosis of 1970s hard-rock, the ubiquitous "Smoke on the Water" is also the unlikely story of the song's creation and the high-water mark of long-running UK rock band Deep Purple.

In the late 1960s and the early years of the next decade, tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson, like many of his contemporaries, was listening to such albums as Miles Davis's Filles de Kilimanjaro and Miles in the Sky and pondering what it meant for his music. During this period, for better or worse, the rhythms and aggressive approach of rock music, including the use of electric rather than acoustic instruments, were mixing with jazz and giving birth to fusion. In hindsight, it seems inevitable that these two vital genres, both of which prize improvisation—be it on electric guitar or tenor saxophone—should become each other's major influence. Jazz fusion based in jazz (Mahavishnu Orchestra, Tony Williams Lifetime, Return to Forever), and jazz rock based in rock (Chicago, Blood Sweat & Tears, Soft Machine), evolved into major genres in the 1970s. From these tendrils, jazz pop, jazz funk, M-Base, and even smooth jazz have continued to spread.

Given his seemingly endless stream of ideas, virtuoso instrumentalism, and considerable wealth of recordings, Keith Jarrett is a creative universe unto himself. He began his recording career on Atlantic Records and recorded for several labels, including Impulse!, along the way, but it was on Manfred Eicher's label ECM that he first broke through to worldwide fame in 1973, with the 3-LP set Keith Jarrett, Solo Concerts: Bremen/Lausanne. Considering its landmark status, it's fitting that the album is among the first releases in ECM's new Luminessence vinyl series, reissued in its original triple-vinyl form.

In Jan Swafford's excellent 2020 Mozart biography The Reign of Love, he intimately weaves the composer's life story with the music he created. Along the way, he confirms a legendary scene. Played to the hilt in Amadeus, Milos Forman's 1984 film adaptation of Peter Shaffer's play, the then-reigning Hapsburg monarch, Joseph II, rushes backstage after the premiere of Mozart's first operatic blockbuster, The Abduction from the Seraglio, and opines, "Too beautiful for our [Viennese] ears, my dear Mozart, and monstrous many notes." Sassy by nature or perhaps just stung by the implied criticism, Mozart supposedly replied, "Exactly as many as necessary, Your Majesty."

That quote rings in my head each time I listen to Bruce Springsteen's still-astonishing 1973 debut album, Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J., which has just turned 50 and been reissued in Mobile Fidelity's Ultradisc One-Step series.

Saturday, August 18, 1962, was quite a day in music. In England, Ringo Starr made his first appearance as a full member of the Beatles, at a Horticultural Society dance at Port Sunlight, Merseyside. In Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, two jazz giants met in a recording studio for the first time. Duke Ellington showed up with a streamlined, potent ensemble: Johnny Hodges, Harry Carney, Ray Nance, Lawrence Brown, Aaron Bell, and Sam Woodyard. Then tenor sax legend Coleman Hawkins arrived.

Ellington and Hawkins had never recorded together, so there was an atmosphere of energy and something grand and long overdue. Producer Bob Thiele and engineer Rudy Van Gelder stayed out of the way and let the music unfold while making sure not to miss anything. The result was a spectacular, loose, joyous, perfectly played album: Duke Ellington Meets Coleman Hawkins (Impulse! Records, AS-26, A-26 in mono).

Why is John Coltrane's A Love Supreme still so resonant nearly 60 years after it was recorded? Much to its credit, it's short (just over 30 minutes) and to the point. If you're going to raise a prayer of gratitude to a higher power and layer spiritual meaning onto music, best not belabor the point. In the case of A Love Supreme, that kind of brevity also extended to the recording process. The album was tracked in one day—December 9, 1964—by Rudy Van Gelder in his studio in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey; Van Gelder also mixed the album. A composed (rather than purely improvised) four-part suite ("Acknowledgement," "Resolution," "Pursuance/Part 4," and "Psalm"), it exudes a certain hypnotic aura. It draws the listener in with an entrancing spirituality, its fealty to love and a higher power. Finally, the incisive, same-page playing of bassist Jimmy Garrison, drummer Elvin Jones, and pianist McCoy Tyner is almost supernatural.