Larry Young - In Paris: The ORTF Recordings

Resonance Records, in partnership with the National Audiovisual Institute (INA) of France, is pleased to announce the release of Larry Young In Paris/The ORTF Recordings. Featuring groundbreaking performances by the ingenious organist and pianist, these studio and live recordings from 1964 and 1965 made for French radio and never before issued on record.

Producer Zev Feldman notes, "It's particularly exciting because none of this music has ever been heard before except on its initial broadcast in France five decades ago. I think that's something to celebrate and a call for us all — as we often do with the archival recordings we at Resonance Records uncover — to revisit and discuss this legendary artist's legacy." Musicians featured on these recordings include trumpet legend Woody Shaw, tenor saxophonist and bandleader Nathan Davis and drummer Billy Brooks.

An international cast of supporting players — pianist Jack Diéval, tenor saxophonist Jean-Claude Fohrenbach and bassist Jacques B. Hess; Italian drummer Franco Manzecchi, Jamaican trumpet player Sonny Grey and Guadaloupean percussionist Jacky Bamboo — round out the personnel.

This album marks the first new release of Larry Young music in 38 years. This project came about in 2012 when Feldman traveled to France to explore the ORTF (Office of French Radio and Television) archives (the media vaults overseen by the French National Audiovisual Institute (INA) in the hope of finding undiscovered treasures, which he suspected he might find there. Feldman asked INA executives about specific artists and was stunned to learn that the vaults contained recordings documenting some of the greatest American jazz musicians who lived in — or visited — Paris in the 1960s, including Larry Young.

Resonance Records presents in this album tapes that had been sitting idly in the vaults for nearly 50 years, scrupulously maintained by INA. Resonance Records has packaged the two-CD version of this album with a 68-page book of essays by Feldman, legendary guitarist John McLaughlin, associate producer/ jazz scholar/INA executive Pascal Rozat, associate producers John Koenig, Larry Young III and Woody Shaw III; and illuminating interviews with Davis (conducted by executive producer Michael Cuscuna), organists Dr. Lonnie Smith and John Medeski (of Medeski, Martin & Wood), bassist/producer Bill Laswell and French broadcasting legend André Francis.

The historic package also contains many rare, previously unpublished images from the archives of INA and photographers Francis Wolff and Jean-Pierre Leloir.

Track Listing

Disc One: Trane of Thought (6:46) Talkin’ About JC (14:53) Mean To Me (4:12) La Valse Grise (16:09) Discothèque (10:43)

Disc Two: Luny Tune (4:36) Beyond All Limits (7:36) Black Nile (13:59) Zoltan (20:31) Larry’s Blues (6:13)