Duke Jordan - Flight To Denmark

SteepleChase - LP

Denmark, 1974 ("Scandinavian" Pressing)

Jazz / Post Bop / Cool Jazz

Huge favourite, one of the greatest jazz trio album I've ever heard, and one of the very few "classic" jazz albums I'll never get tired of. Up there with Kenny Barron's Landscape or Bill Evans's You Must Believe In Spring. Essential.

I'm begging for more of this! Perfect moody piano-led jazz trio music. Jazz music that never looses itself in boring choruses. I'm probably talking about jazz music for people who aren't jazz heads at all, or, like me, divorced jazz long ago. Unfortunately such music rarely crosses my path these days. Whenever it does though, I know it will stay with me forever. And most of the time, these jazz LP's are not even some of those ridiculously expensive Blue Note records. 

It's hard to say what makes Duke Jordan's Flight To Denmark such a perfect jazz trio LP. It's always something very subtle, just like with, say, 1980's orthodox indie rock records. The right notes, played at the right time, I guess. The effortless playing of musicians mastering their instrument. And also, in the case of Flight To Denmark, a perfect tracklist: some of my favourite jazz standards, a combination of those heart-melting ballads ("Everything Happens To Me", "Here's That Rainy Day") and the always slightly odd "On Green Dolphin Street" or Jordan's own "No Problem".  

It would be slightly unfair to label "Flight To Denmark" as perfect winter music - it's pretty timeless -  but it's also true that the songs hiding behind this forest covered in snow do sets the mood for armchairs by the fireplace. It sure is music for warm interiors. I have owned a few copies of this record - the Danish first pressing and a Japanese one - and this "Scandanavia" pressing might the best sounding of them all. (VG+/VG+ superficial mark on Side A that doesn't affect the play)