Kenny Burrell - God Bless The Child (1971/2013) [Official Digital Download 24bit/192kHz]

Kenneth Earl Burrell is an American jazz guitarist mostly known for his work on the Blue Note label. He has cited jazz guitarists Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt as influences, along with blues guitarists T-Bone Walker and Muddy Waters. Furthermore, Jimi Hendrix has cited Burrel as an influence. "God Bless The Child" is his 1971's album for CTI label. This is Burrell at his level best as a player to be sure, but also as a composer and as a bandleader. Magnificent.

Kenny Burrell's guitaristry is well-documented in his years with Oscar Peterson and on his first dates as a leader on the Blue Note label, but God Bless the Child, his only date for CTI in 1971, is an under-heard masterpiece in his catalog. Burrell's band for the set includes bassist Ron Carter, percussionist Ray Barretto, Richard Wyands on piano, flutist Hubert Laws, trumpeter Freddie Hubbard, and drummer Billy Cobham. CTI's house arranger, Don Sebesky, assembled and conducted the strings in a manner that stands strangely and beautifully apart from his other work on the label. Sebesky understood Burrell's understated approach to playing guitar. Burrell didn't belong with the fusioneers, but he could groove better than any of them. Sebesky built a moody, atmospheric soundscape behind him, one that was as impressionistic as it was illuminating of a player who could dig in and chop it up – as he does on his own composition "Love Is the Answer" and "Do What You Gotta Do" – and stroke it smooth and mellow as on the title track, the truly sublime "Be Yourself," and Thad Jones' "A Child Is Born." The Legacy CD remaster also includes the only three outtakes from the session, an alternate of the Jones tune, and two brief but gorgeous solos on "Ballad of the Sad Young Men" and on Kurt Weill's "Lost in the Stars." This is Burrell at his level best as a player to be sure, but also as a composer and as a bandleader. Magnificent.

Tracklist:

01 - Be Yourself
02 - Love Is The Answer
03 - Do What You Gotta Do
04 - A Child Is Born
05 - God Bless The Child

Produced by Creed Taylor. Engineered by Rudy Van Gelder. Conducted & Arranged by Don Sebesky.
Recorded on April 28 and May 11 & 25, 1971 at Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey.

Musicians:
Kenny Burrell - electric guitar
Freddie Hubbard - trumpet
Hubert Laws - flute
Richard Wyands - piano, electric piano
Hugh Lawson - electric piano
Ron Carter - bass
Billy Cobham - drums
Ray Barretto - percussion
Airto Moreira - percussion
Seymour Barab, Charles McCracken, George Ricci, Lucien Schmit, Alan Shulman - cello


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