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Rating: It was 1993, or maybe 1992, when, while wandering in a record store that's still open today (it's just moved a few hundred meters), I bought a cassette titled: "Jazz Club". I bought it because it had loads of CLASSICS, like Minnie the Moocher, Autumn Leaves (in a stunning version by Ahmad Jamal), Summertime, and many others including My Funny Valentine...
In 1975, Chet Baker and Gerry Mulligan held a concert at the Carnegie Hall in New York, a temple of both light and ...heavy music. It's not about that concert that I'm about to talk to you (I mean, who knows who ever heard it?) but about a single track that was performed at that concert. It’s the famous My Funny Valentine, a 1937 song that originated as a show-tune, meaning it's a piece from a musical, thus not intended as a standalone work or a track from an album.
Then, years later, when the song was reinterpreted by Chet Baker, Miles Davis, and Frank Sinatra, it became extremely famous and, to this day, "My Funny Valentine" has been performed by about 600 artists and appears on about 1,300 albums!
The version I propose is purely instrumental and it's just a freaking masterpiece of Christ. Really, I said it before in another review, I don't understand a thing about music to the extent that I’m not a musician so I can't tell you if Tizio is great or if Caio is a bluff, but I believe I have an excellent musical ear and an uncommon sensitivity for music, therefore, if RIBALDO tells you that this piece is one of the many proofs of the existence of God, or at least of something DIVINE, well, that’s it, he’s inventing nothing, he’s not exaggerating. And then just read the names of the performers to understand we’re talking about really strong people.
So, with the excuse (but it's also true) that I don’t know how to talk about music, I can already close this review/Christmas gift. Well yes, this is a real Christmas gift. Who knows how many users don't know the track or at least have NEVER listened to THIS version. Lucky you who now have something really cool to listen to.
Anyway, this piece is so beautiful, moving, masterful, and TOTAL (sorry but at some point even adjectives run out) that it should be listened to in solitude, preferably after 11 PM, late at night, preferably when you are a bit down and feel half sad but also wise. You know that feeling? A winter piece for cognac and a lit fireplace (oh, so many issues) ...well yes, as it’s said, an atmospheric piece but beautiful beautiful beautiful.
This is one of the pieces of my life, there might be a maximum of ten and this is one of them.
Enjoy listening
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