The legendary Art Farmer Quartet this week, in a broadcast concert from Austria on May 23, 1974.
As Farmer’s reputation grew, he expanded from bebop into more experimental forms through working with composers such as George Russell and Teddy Charles. He went on to join Gerry Mulligan’s quartet and, with Benny Golson, to co-found the Jazztet. Continuing to develop his own sound, Farmer switched from trumpet to the warmer flugelhorn in the early 1960s, and he helped to establish the flugelhorn as a soloist’s instrument in jazz. He settled in Europe in 1968 and continued to tour internationally until his death. Farmer recorded more than 50 albums under his own name, a dozen with the Jazztet, and dozens more with other leaders. His playing is known for its individuality – most noticeably, its lyricism, warmth of tone and sensitivity.
From the early 1990s, Farmer had a second house in New York and divided his time between Vienna and there. He had regular gigs with Clifford Jordan at the Sweet Basil Jazz Club and, later, with Ran Blake and Jerome Richardson at the Village Vanguard, both in New York. Farmer was awarded the Austrian Gold Medal of Merit in 1994. In the same year, a concert in honor of his achievements was held at the Alice Tully Hall in New York. Farmer also recorded extensively as a leader throughout his later career, including some pieces of classical music with US and European orchestras. Farmer’s level of playing even towards the end of his career was noted in a review by Scott Yanow of one of his last recordings, Silk Road, from 1996: “the warm-toned and swinging Farmer is consistently the main star, and at age 68 he proves to still be in his prime”. In 1999 Farmer was selected as a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master. A few months later, on October 4, Farmer died of a heart attack at home in Manhattan, aged 71.
The audience is appreciative, the announcer is Austrian and breathless and the recording is showing its age in places. But it’s a good concert by an outstanding musician, and you can’t go too far wrong with that.
Goes great with Sunday.
