Forgotten Esquires - 3...
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Forgotten Esquire recordings - 3..........Victor Feldman...
The story of Victor Feldman is widely known - the child prodigy who by the mid 1950s was arguably, aged 21, Britain's premier jazzman. His subsequent emigration to the USA to work in the film and record studios took him out of most UK jazz fans area of interest.
He was a talented vibes player, pianist, composer and arranger. From 1948 until early 1955 he recorded for Esquire in a series of different settings as sideman and leader. The list of vinyl that has never been re-released on CD is staggering and includes many dates with Ronnie Scott's Quintet and nine piece Orchestra and a studio dates with Spike Robinson and Tommy Pollard's Down Beat Five.
I am concentrating here on the sessions where he was the leader that mostly include our best jazz pianist of the time - Tommy Pollard...
Esquire were reluctant to issue LP records of Victor and he made only two 10" LPs in his time with them - within a month of each other in 1955. One was a multi recording effort where Victor played vibes, piano and drums and Lennie Bush supplied the bass. The other was with Kenny Graham.
During 1954 Victor began recording in a quartet and trio format and at the end of 1954 began a series of records as The Victor Feldman Modern Jazz Quartet. These included Tommy Pollard on piano, and contain some of Pollard's finest playing which were almost the pianists last recordings although there were a few to come on the Tempo label a few months later. There were also tracks by a quintet and septet that included Jimmy Deuchar and Derek Humble. In the 1970s a compilation LP was issued on the Esquire Treasure Chest series.
The original vinyl for all of these records is very hard to find although every now and again one pops up on Ebay.

Victor Feldman discography...

None of them has ever been released on CD which is a pity becuse although Victor's later 1955 work for the Tempo label is available there is very little of Tommy Pollard on CD. These recordings are coming up for sixty years old now and are surely due a re-issue...
Some of us have transferred our own, worn LPs and EPs to CD, and while these are OK it would be marvellous to have them professionally restored...

Experiment in Time with Kenny Graham

This page was last updated during January, 2014
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