S'Wonderful: 4 Giants Of Swing
The giants in question are violinist Joe Venuti, guitarist and former Texas Playboy Eldon Shamblin, steel guitarist Curley Chalker, and mandolinist Jethro Burns. The music is mostly George Gershwin and Duke Ellington. Despite the country music experience of Shamblin, Burns, and Chalker (and the usual country setting of steel and mandolin), the group holds to a strict jazz aesthetic, with sophisticated, polished improvisation. Recorded in 1977, this blowing session balances refined elegance with blazing ferocity. Chalker coaxes some amazing, unique sounds from his pedal steel (especially on the ballads) while Burns and Shamblin, usually lumped in the country bag, show their amazing facility with the jazz idiom. Of course, Venuti's jazz credibility was never in question.--Marc Greilsamer