Don Grusin – The Hang (Jazz/DVD-Video + CD)
Picture: B-
Sound: B Extras: C-
Concert: B
There’s noting like an all-star get-together to get the
music going, and that includes music in the Jazz genre. Don Grusin has assembled a pretty solid line-up
for The Hang, a diverse and effective concert directed by Music Video
veteran Randee St. Nicholas. About two
dozen remarkable performers deliver 14 strong numbers, including Patti Austin,
Dave Grusin, Lee Ritenour, Ernie Watts, and co-producer Don Grusin. The tracks are:
1)
Let’s Not Talk About It
2)
Makossa Beat
3)
She Could Be Mine
4)
Wait For Me (Patti Austin - lead vocal)
5)
La Dama de la Ciudad
(introductory song from El Floridita)
6)
El Floridita
7)
Number 8
8)
Woman
9)
The Chaser
10) Fresh Air
11) Catwalk
12) Road Town
13) Oo – Whee the Carnival
14) She Feels Good
I had never heard of many of these artists and will leave
it to the viewer and listener to discover them for themselves. Jazz fans should be particularly happy that
such a project even happened, but note this was done independently, showing
once again the kind of trouble the record labels are finding themselves
in. Not that Jazz gets the kind of
attention it should form the majors, but this is just not something we see
every day and the majors seem more and more clueless on how to make something
this good happen.
The anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image was recently
taped and looks good, with St. Nicholas bringing his years of experience to the
program, showing off all the artists to best effect. The problem is that the DVD case never notes
that it is anamorphic or widescreen, which will make it loose sales. Fans and home theater owners cannot get
enough of such material, so hopefully they’ll be able to get that sleeve
amended or use some informative stickers.
The sound was recorded very well and the better the playback format, the
more detail you get. The CD offers the
usual 44.1kHz/16 Bit PCM 2.0 Stereo which is good, if not stellar, unless you
have HDCD decoding. The CD copy we have
does not credit it as such, but our HDCD decoder was set off by the disc. The DVD-Video offers the choice between
detailed Dolby Digital 5.1 AC-3 sound and a strong PCM 48kHz/24 Bit PCM 2.0
Stereo that nudges past the CD as well.
The Dolby is preferred for its relative detail and clarity, but it is
too bad Sovereign did not offer DTS or DTS 96/24, because this is very high
quality. A DVD-Audio will also be
issued, which we hope to cover, where the MLP sound should turn out to offer
the best mix(es) of all. The few extras
include an art map of figures with the names of each performer next to
them. When their figure is clicked onto,
you get brief biographical information.
There are also some text notes on the concert itself. The extras may be light, but this is (again)
the kind of material people with home theaters are looking for.
The result, especially with the best playback, is not just
a concert, but an experience, something most concerts on home video seem to
miss the point of. This is a new high
for St. Nicholas, whose videos for Whitney Houston among others have always
been considered the especially good-looking high-class particularly seen in
R&B genre clips. This is one of the
year’s pleasant surprises and you can get even more information about it at the
website www.sovereignartists.com
for full details, though it was down when we recently checked by the end of the
first quarter of 2008. The title is
still for sale out there, including a version we never received in the DVD-Audio
format.
- Nicholas Sheffo
