John Coltrane Quartet - Ballads (1962/2020)

Seeking to offer definitive audiophile grade versions of some of the most historic and best jazz records ever recorded, Verve Label Group and Universal Music Enterprises' new audiophile Acoustic Sounds vinyl reissue series utilizes the skills of top mastering engineers and the unsurpassed production craft of Quality Record Pressings. All titles are mastered from the original analog tapes, pressed on 180-gram vinyl and packaged by Stoughton Printing Co. in high-quality gatefold sleeves with tip-on jackets. The releases are supervised by Chad Kassem, CEO of Acoustic Sounds, the world's largest source for audiophile recordings.
John Coltrane's immortal Impulse! records, A Love Supreme (1964) and Ballads (1963) both have drawn rave reviews since their original release. A.B. Spellman, former administrator for the National Endowment for the Arts, once described Ballads as "some of the most sensitive, heartfelt music that any lover ever sang on a horn." Put simply, most guys don't play the saxophone like John Coltrane.
The intense passionate Coltrane interpretation of standards such as "All Or Nothing At All," "What's New," "It's Easy To Remember" and the Sinatra classic "Nancy (With The Laughing Face)" are the essence of Ballads. When asked why attempt such an undertaking, Coltrane replied "Variety."
While it may have been a short detour by Trane before he exploded off into the nether regions of jazz music a few years later, it is still a fantastic document of one of the premier jazz groups of the 1960s.

Tracklist:

01. Say It (Over and Over Again) (Loesser-McHugh) - 4:20
02. You Don't Know What Love Is (Raye-DePaul) - 5:15
03. Too Young to Go Steady (Adamson-McHugh) - 4:24
04. All or Nothing at All (Lawrence-Altman) - 3:36
05. I Wish I Knew (Warren-Gordon) - 4:53
06. What's New (Haggart-Burke) - 3:46
07. It's Easy to Remember (Hart-Rodgers) - 2:49
08. Nancy (With the Laughing Face) (Van Heusen-Silvers) - 3:13

John Coltrane - tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone
McCoy Tyner - piano
Jimmy Garrison - bass
Elvin Jones - drums

Recorded at the Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ on November 13 (#1-5), September 18, 1962 (#6,8), December 21, 1961 (#7).
Mastered by Ryan Smith.