Personnel:
Eric Dolphy (as, fl), Dennis Budimir (g), Nathan Gershman, Fred Katz (cello), Wyatt Ruther, Ralph Pena (b), Chico Hamilton (d), String Orchestra (9 violins, 3 violas, 3 cellos)
Reference: FSRCD 522
Bar code: 8427328605229
Chico Hamilton, a musician of extraordinary vision and understanding, knew the risks that small jazz bands take when they enter the so-called classical realms. So he licked the problem largely by selecting his men and materials with extreme caution and rare perspicacity. In the special talents of guitarist Dennis Budimir and cellist Nathan Gershman, the leader added two individual and skilled voices, one jazz-slanted and one classically oriented, but both highly flexible. And in Eric Dolphy, he acquired a remarkable instrumentalist whose command of horns and musical language ranged from Hodges to Parker. Dolphy was particularly outstanding in this third version of Hamiltons quintet. He thoroughly understood the disparate concepts of pitch and tone that frequently stand in the way of those who would deal with both jazz and legitimate techniques. This set is, in essence, a summation of the evolution Chico Hamiltons quintet had gone through before it reached the end of its time as a working group.
