Ben Webster/Stan Tracey: Soho Nights Vol 2 – review

When Stan Tracey was the house pianist at Ronnie Scott's in the 1960s, he creatively accompanied most of American jazz's biggest stars, including saxophonists Dexter Gordon, Stan Getz, Sonny Rollins and the former Duke Ellington Orchestra legend Ben Webster, whose monumentally powerful sound, sly timing and teeming imagination are heard with Tracey's trio on this December 1964 live show. Webster swerves, hoots, brays and booms his way through a mid-tempo opener on the swing standby C Jam Blues, with Tracey's splashy treble chording, stealthy trots, jangling, double-tempo playing and unlovely grace providing the wayward alternative voice he sustains throughout the set. Webster blurs and smudges notes together like a palette-knife painting on Night in Tunisia, and his legendarily beautiful ballad tone is sublime on Chelsea Bridge and Over the Rainbow. A fast Cotton Tail has Webster operating in his usual uptempo mode, scattering gruff, short figures and smokers'-cough growls across the pulse, and Tracey plays a flying, chord-banging solo as if he's anxious to catch the last bus. The album represents a scalding performance from both of them, and Tracey's bass-and-drums partners Rick Laird and Jackie Dougan keep things unobtrusively tight.