The Cootie Williams Orchestra & the Luis Russell Orchestra - The Big Bands at the Savoy, Vol. 1

In 1999 Storyville dredged up an album's worth of vintage radio broadcasts from the Savoy Ballroom, "The home of happy feet, ?way up in Harlem" as the announcer says. The first nine tracks, recorded on February 12 1945, feature either the fifteen-piece Cootie Williams Orchestra or a scaled down version of the band in the form of a sextet including up-and-coming saxophonists Charlie Parker and Sam "The Man" Taylor. By this time Bud Powell had left the Williams Orchestra and had been replaced by pianist Arnold Jarvis. Read More