Jazz Impressions of Black Orpheus Vince Guaraldi Trio

Here is Vince Guaraldi’s breakthrough album – musically, commercially, in every which way. After numerous records as a leader or sideman, for the first time a recognizable Guaraldi piano style emerges, with whimsical phrasing all his own, a madly swinging right hand and occasional boogie-influenced left hand, and a distinctive, throat-catching, melodic improvisational gift. The first half of the program is taken up by cover versions of tunes from the score for the film Black Orpheus, recorded just as bossa nova was taking hold in America.

These are genuinely jazz-oriented impressions in a mainstream boppish manner, with only a breath of samba in the opening minute of “Samba de Orpheus”; an edited version of this haunting song was issued as a single. But DJs soon began flipping the single over to play the B-side, a wistful, unforgettably catchy Guaraldi tune called “Cast Your Fate to the Wind”. The tune became a surprise hit. The whole album evokes the ambience of San Francisco’s jazz life in the 1960s as few others do – and such is this record’s appeal that even non-jazz and non-Latin music people have been grooving to this music ever since it came out.

Richard S. Ginell, AllMusic