RUDY SMITH
QUARTET - STILL AROUND
S&P
Records (LP) – DENMARK 1984
The album Still Around is the first record Rudy Smith made under his own name, and
it is considered a classic and one of his best. In the long history of Pan
music, both in Trinidad and internationally, this is one of the very few albums
to feature Pan as the leading voice in a pure jazz setting.
His group the Modern Sound Quintet played disco/reggae/jazz fusion, changing
their name to the Modern Sound
Corporation in the late 1970s. After extensive touring throughout Europe,
they broke up in 1980. Rudy Smith
moved to Denmark in 1983, where he decided to return to the music he loved,
jazz and be-bop, forming the Rudy Smith
Quartet. The group included Ole
Mathiessen (piano), Niels Præstholm
(bass) and a South African drummer, Gilbert
Matthews. There is an international inspiration for the music on the 1984
album Still Around, featuring an Asian element, mixed with a dash of
European, as well as American jazz. Rudy Smith is referred to as the jazz king
of steel pans, and in Denmark as the father of the steel pan.
RUDY SMITH QUARTET - STILL AROUND
TRACKS
1. Blues L Armoise
2. Ursia (Soprano sax: “Pe We”)
3. Elise
4. Blues
For Bradick
5. Be Bach
6. Still
Around
7. El Vito (acoustic guitar: Costa Apetrea)
Produced by s & p records
Recorded at montezuma recording ab, stockholm,
march 28-29, 1984.
Mixed at montezuma studio by r.s.q.