Bossa Nova (Exciting Jazz Samba Rhythms) Shorty Rogers & His Giants

• 1 Samba Do Lorinho (Lorito's Samba) 02:05
• 2 Chega De Saudade (No More Sadness) 02:15
• 3 Samba Triste (Melancholy Samba) 02:53
• 4 Samba De Uma Nota So (One Note Samba) 02:53
• 5 Pao De Assucar (Sugar Loaf) 05:00
• 6 Didi (Bonus Track) 02:26
• 7 Samba Do Empashgi (Empashgi's Samba) 04:02
• 8 O Amor E A Rosa (Love Is a Rose) 03:01
• 9 So Voce (Only You) 02:29
• 10 Chora Tua Tristeza (Cry Your Sadness) 03:20
• 11 So Um Amor (Only One Love) 01:46
• 12 O Menino Desce O Morro (Little Boy Brown) 02:23
• 13 Sam And The Lady (Bonus Track) 03:07
• Total Runtime 37:40

Info for Bossa Nova (Exciting Jazz Samba Rhythms)

This is swingin’ West Coast jazz at its best. A highly recommended jazz album for those of you who care to explore artists out of the jazz mainstream.

A real standout from the great Shorty Rogers -- and a smoking set that has him turning his many talents towards the world of bossa nova! By the time of this set, Shorty was as great an arranger as he was a trumpeter -- really one of the go-to guys around LA for hipper soundtracks and vocal dates -- and he really shows off his skills on a set of lively arrangements that pop and sparkle a lot more than other American bossa jazz outings of this nature! The set features lots of acoustic guitar and percussion -- and bold trumpet and flugelhorn solos by Shorty.

"Bossa Nova must have appeared fresh at the time—it was recorded in 1962, a year before the Brazilian music craze—but now seems buried in a pack of like-minded albums. Rogers did have the presence of mind to recruit a guitarist and a few percussionists to give the music an authentic flavor, and the music is earnestly played. However, bossa nova works best with a less rambunctious approach. Rogers never seemed capable of approaching anything delicately, and he overwhelms the melodies with brassy riffs. Not bad, but when you’re tempted to reach for a big band or a bossa nova record, Bossa Nova won’t come to mind in either case". (Dave Rickert, AMG). On Allmusic, Scott Yanow noted: "The emphasis is on ensembles with occasional statements from Rogers but surprisingly little happens. The overall results are pleasant but a bit of a disappointment"

Shorty Rogers, flugelhorn, arranger, conductor
Joe Burnett, trumpet
Ollie Mitchell, trumpet
Paul Horn, alto saxophone, flute
Bud Shank, alto saxophone, flute
Richard Leith, trombone
Kenneth Shroyer, trombone
Pete Jolly, piano
Joe Mondragon, bass
Laurindo Almeida, guitar
Larry Bunker, vibraphone
Milt Holland, drums
Shelly Manne, drums
Emil Richards, percussion
Chico Guerrero, percussion

Digitally remastered

Shorty Rogers
One of the leading figures of West Coast jazz, Shorty Rogers' decision to stop performing and switch to full-time studio work in 1962 marked the end of its golden era. Rogers played with a number of big bands in the late 1940s, and began to attract attention as an arranger while working with Woody Herman. Stan Kenton then hired him away from Herman and Rogers' compositions and arrangements for Kenton made him as much of a star as any of Kenton's soloists. Rogers left Kenton and pulled together a small group that included Art Pepper, Shelley Manne, Jimmy Giuffre, and Hampton Hawes to record Modern Sounds for Capitol. Rogers' tight and innovative arrangements on this recording are considered by many to be as influential as Gil Evans' for Miles Davis' small group on Birth of the Cool.

Rogers formed a small group he called the Giants and recorded a series of albums for RCA, including The Cool and the Crazy and Shorty Courts the Count. Marlon Brando wanted Rogers to provide the soundtrack for his movie, The Wild One, but the studio refused, hiring Leith Stevens to provide most of the score. Rogers was featured on screen, though, in Frank Sinatra's The Man With the Golden Arm, leading the jazz group Sinatra's character played with. Rogers also worked with Perez Prado on a concept album titled Voodoo Suite.

Rogers was a dramatic character but a thoroughly professional musician, and he moved to the financial security of writing for television and movies when the West Coast jazz scene began to fade in the early 1960s. He was a prolific contributor to television and to a lesser extent films through the 1980s. Among the series he scored or wrote incidental music for were "The Partridge Family," "The Mod Squad," "The Rookies," "Starsky and Hutch," and "The Love Boat." His tune "Chelsea Memorandum" shows up in the midst of Lalo Schifrin's cuts on the second "Mission: Impossible" soundtrack album. He also composed and conducted the music for a number of the innovative UPA cartoons featuring the work of Theodore Geissel (Dr. Seuss) and Stan Freberg.

During this period, Rogers continued to work occasionally on pop and jazz recordings, but primarily as an arranger. He and Claus Ogerman split arranging duties on Mel Torme's 1962 hit album, "Coming Home, Baby." Late in the 1960s, he was responsible for one of those assimilation-via-train wreck creations that incredibly strange music fans love, Bobby Bryant's "The Jazz Excursion into 'Hair'". He pops up as arranger in a variety of places, from Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass' Christmas album to Bud Shank's mellow album of Lovin' Spoonful covers for Liberty to Frances Faye's now sounds album, "Go Go Go." One of his ignominious credits is the arrangement for Wayne Newton's cover of "These Boots are Made for Walking."

In the early 1980s, he returned to performing, eventually forming a combo with West Coast legend Bud Shank on alto sax and releasing a number of CDs. Rogers fell ill in the early 1990s and died during KLON's West Coast Jazz festival in 1994.

This album contains no booklet.