Revinylization

As one of the first live albums to be recorded in the hallowed space that is New York City's Village Vanguard, Sonny Rollins's A Night at the Village Vanguard (recorded November 3, 1957, released in 1958) set the template, proving that recording in the odd, triangular club could not only work but could also produce distinctive, satisfying sound. Soon after the recording of the Rollins album, Bill Evans and John Coltrane added live Vanguard albums to their recording catalogs.

Now reissued by Blue Note Records as part of its Tone Poet Series, this three-LP edition, which comes from a different source than previous releases, is that rare audiophile reissue where the sonic differences are immediately audible.

"On all the previous reissues of the album, everything had been done from the 15ips [inches per second] tapes. They were assembled into three different albums. It's also what the Japanese used when they put them out," Tone Poet producer Joe Harley told me in a recent interview. "For years though, I'd seen that picture of Alfred and Rudy tableside" at the Vanguard. He's referring to Blue Note Founder Alfred Lion and, of course, famed audio engineer Rudy Van Gelder. "And in that photo, I would see this Ampex 601 [tape recorder] and think that's interesting, because it only goes to 7.5ips. It doesn't do 15. I thought that maybe that was a secondary deck. I didn't know."

For the past decade, Harley and partner Ron Rombach have had in their possession the mono 15ips tapes, intending to use them for a Music Matters LP reissue that never happened. But the sight of the Ampex recorder in the photo by famed BN photographer Francis Wolff led Harley to the logical conclusion that bringing a larger, pro-recording deck down the stairs into the basement club would have been nearly impossible.

"I didn't know about the other source until I asked the tape vault guy [at BN] about the tapes," Harley continued, "and he said, "you know, there are these other ones that are 7.5ips, but they've never been checked out. He sent me pictures of them"—the photos are reproduced in the booklet of the new Tone Poet release—"and it hit me. Wait a minute, I get it. Rudy went back and transferred the 7.5ips tapes to 15ips, because that's what his studio was set up for. And those are the masters that everyone has used ever since.

"You can tell by looking at the tapes that these are the masters he recorded. They were in spectacular shape, because they had not been played. When we put them up, [mastering engineer] Kevin Gray and I kind of looked at each other like, 'Holy shit!' It's blindingly obvious. You can hear the improved quality plain as day, because you're a generation closer."

One of the most popular bebop records ever made, A Night at the Village Vanguard has been reissued umpteen times in various formats including a 1975 two-LP release, More From the Vanguard. A Classic Records 200gm LP was released in 2007. This new UME/Blue Note reissue was pressed on 180gm vinyl at RTI and is housed in a beautiful glossy Stoughton jacket that includes a booklet with essays by Nate Chinen, Bob Blumenthal, and a new interview with Rollins by Blue Note president Don Was.

The sound of this new set is infinitely better than any preexisting reissue and is arguably a step up in sonics even from the original pressings. Sharper detail, increased punchiness, better spacing, and a much more present sound image make this superior. Even drummer Elvin Jones's audible grunting and gnashing, always the set's most charming detail, has more clarity. The Tone Poet reissue contains all the usable selections from the three recorded shows. Rollins shared the bill with singer Anita O'Day and changed rhythm sections between sets, with Donald Bailey and Pete La Roca playing in the afternoon and Wilbur Ware and Elvin Jones taking over for the two evening sets.

"It's [all the recorded tracks] except two takes from the afternoon show that were too messed up to use," Harley says. "In one, the tape ran out about a quarter of the way through, so that's no good. And a mike clearly became unplugged in the other, and no one would want to hear that."

Considering that this was the first notable album recorded live in the Vanguard, what did Rudy's microphone set look like that afternoon and evening? "I would imagine real simple," Harley concludes. "A mike on Sonny, a mike on Wilbur or Donald Bailey, and I'm gonna guess two mikes on Elvin. One [of those mikes] was a bit problematic. It overloads when Elvin really starts bashing on the crash cymbal. You can hear it overloading, but I seriously doubt that Rudy could hear that, because he was sitting right there. He was probably getting half-direct sound that makes it very hard to monitor properly. And look at his headphones, what are they? They didn't have hi-fi headphones in 1957. Koss didn't exist. Those are Air Force surplus headphones!"