AUDIO: My One and Only Love

Concise in the way that albums could be before there were 80-minute CDs to fill, JC and JH clocks in at a pithy 31 minutes; there is no fat to be trimmed here. Each song is a memorable tune, from Irving Berlin's "They Say it's Wonderful" to Billy Strayhorn's "Lush Life" to "My One and Only Love" (penned by Mellin-Wood, not Sting, as the first twenty search results on Yahoo! would have you believe). Even a slightly less ubiquitous song, like Gallop-DeRose's "Autumn Serenade", seems perfectly part of Coltrane and Hartman's program.

Most ballads are love songs. The album wisely avoids leaning too heavily on either side of the love song equation (found love vs. lost love); rather, the program is a mixture of happy and sad songs, making this a record that will speak to those who turn to it when in either mood. Torch song collections can be fun, but too many bereft lyrics can rub salt in the wounds. Conversely, too many chipper ditties can make a recent break-up seem tragic by comparison.

At the time, Hartman and Coltrane might also have seemed like a pairing of opposites. In 1963, Coltrane was moving further and further from straight-ahead jazz into the avant-garde areas of free improvisation. Already his live performances were stretching the boundaries of what mainstream audiences considered jazz at the time. Although he had spent the late 1950s playing with Bop legends like Miles Davis and Thelonious Monk, and had even cut a record the previous year with conservative elder statesman Duke Ellington, Coltrane was at this point quickly becoming associated with the avant-garde.

Hartman, on the other hand, had not made many records since the mid 1950s. Considered a big band baritone who had chosen the only available recourse of singing with small groups in the early bop days, he was looked at as something of a throwback by the 1960s. By making this record, both were throwing down a gauntlet. Coletrane was reaffirming his connection to the central jazz tradition and to his lyrical ballad style of playing, oft neglected of late in favor of "sheets of sound". Hartman, on the other hand, was making a bid for relevancy in the 1960s -- making sure that singing a song without fireworks or pageantry (or scatting) still had resonance at a time when hard bop and free jazz were the buzzwords.

Hartman makes his intentions clear from the very first track. Pianist McCoy Tyner lets out a splashy introduction, almost racing out of the gate with arpeggios and runs. Hartman takes up a leisurely tempo from his vocal entrance, instantly cooling things down with a sinuous legato. When Coltrane enters, playing a countermelody, he also takes things slowly, connecting each note in way that mirrors Hartman's phrasing. Even when Trane takes a solo, he reigns his impulses to overly adorn the melody, and sticks close to the head, something one doesn't see on many of his records from that era.

The album's second cut is a Cahn-Chaplin song entitled "Dedicated to You". In an unusual formal device, Hartman sings the first verse and Coletrane's tenor sax "sings" the second. One of the things that stands out in Coltrane's playing is the way in which he modifies his tone to one of extreme delicacy, to better suit both playing along with Hartman's velvety baritone and the songs themselves. This time, it is Trane's adornments that inspire Hartman to add a few embellishments of his own to the melody when he once again takes over the tune.

On "My One and Only Love", roles are swapped: Coltrane plays the first verse and Hartman joins for the second. Here the baritone is at his most sepulchral, letting out a low G like a foghorn in the rubato coda. If I had to pick a perfect reading of this song, this would be it (sorry, Sting).

Hartman's playing with tempo extends into the verse of the next song, Billy Strayhorn's "Lush Life". He approaches the verse flexibly, speeding up and slowing down, savoring particular words with held notes. This is in stark contrast to the inexorability of the rhythm in the chorus. Coltrane's solo, for once, allows the lyrics' pathos to imbue his playing with an emotive edge. Hartman returns once again to tempo rubato, with some attractive vocal turns and a lovely held high note, in the song's last chorus.

It's hard to top the mid-album one-two punch of "Only Love" and "Lush Life". Wisely, Trane and Hartman don't try to, but instead turn in attractive readings of "You are Too Beautiful" and "Autumn Serenade" that allow the record a long denouement. The sensitivity of the supporting players -- Tyner, bassist Jimmy Garrison, and drummer Elvin Jones -- deserves mention. Tyner doesn't take many solos here (the one he gets on "You are Too Beautiful" is memorable), but his imaginative comping and tasty fills ably support the soloists. Jones is one of the most powerful drummers in jazz history, but here he shines in a subdued role, and Garrison also allows himself to explore intricacies within the format's contained dynamic spectrum.

Fortunately, John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman has remained a favorite and, as such, is readily available. In fact, you can often find it on sale at record and book stores. Some will find the notion of an entire album of slow to mid-tempo songs less than ideal -- and ordinarily, I would agree -- but this collection works. You will only wish that it offered another 31 minutes of ballads.

-- Christian Carey