Night Beat

1.Aretha Franklin - Save Me
2.Ray Charles - Lonely Avenue
3.Sam Cooke - Chain Gang*
4.Them - It's all over now baby blue
5.The Beatles - All my loving
6.The Isley Brothers - This old heart of mine (is weak for you)
7.Four Tops - Without the one you love (life is not worthwhile)
8.Brenda Holloway - When I'm gone**
9.Louis Armstrong - West end blues
10.Ella & Louis - Love is here to stay
11.Charlie Parker Septet-Yardbird Suite
12.Dizzy Gillespie - Manteca
13.Gilberto Sextet - Good Lovin'***
14.Stan Getz - Menina Flor
15.Art Tatum - Hands across the table****
16.Helen Merrill - Don't explain

*A great version of this can be found on his live album.

** An under appreciated and overlooked motown artist, she had the face, the voice and the songs but any success she did achieve in her solo career failed to gain any lasting momentum, also all her best tracks were hits for other people. 'Every little bit hurts' (1964) & 'Hurt a little every day' (1966) are two great examples of the song being worthy of her pristine vocal.

*** A much covered track, i think R&B group 'The Olympics' who released the first version in 1965 did it best, their version is so joyous and has a great dancing latin rhythm. The Rascals version went to #1 a year later and has a quite incredible guitar sound.

**** This piece is taken from the first instalment in Tatum's 'Group Masterpieces' series, a series which ran up eight volumes, the last of which was completed a few months before he died. A master of every jazz style, he possessed peerless technique and boundless imagination, Tatum did not record any original compositions of note instead he preferred to rework and reinterpret the standards of the day, following the basic fomula of the piece and then varying it to infinitesimal degrees.

Many critics didn't like Tatum throughout his career, probably because they didn't understand him, the common observation was that he played too many notes to the point where listeners would find it exhausting after a while, the fact that Tatum was always bursting with great ideas didn't seem to register with them. Art Tatum raised the standards of musicianship in jazz to what must seem today like an unattainable level.

Of the series I would recommend volumes 1, 6 and 8 as starting points but they all have something to recommend them.