Alec Wilder - The 1938-47 Octets

This 2CD collection chronicles the music of Alec Wilder (1907-1980) who was one of the genuine mavericks of American Popular Music and also modern classical music. It includes recordings by the Alec Wilder Octet whose thirty 78 sides, recorded between 1938 and 1947, constituted one of the earliest sustained attempts to fuse jazz with classical music.

Wilder's mind seemed a veritable melting pot of jazz and classical forms. By the mid 1930s it was the rhythmic jazz forms that took his attention and, moving to New York, he mixed freely with many of the emerging talents of the day. By chance he met and collaborated with Mitch Miller, a leading oboeist, and the result was a batch of very curious vignettes comprised of woodwinds, bass, drums and harpsichord recorded for Columbia Records in 1938-9. The Octet recordings received quite a bit of interest if not exactly large sales as they were neither jazz nor classical but hovered in a musical no man's land. Much of the interest was aroused by the curious titles such as Neurotic Goldfish and The House Detective Registers.

Personnel: Eddie Powell (clarinet, flute), Mitch Miller (oboe, Cor anglais), Jimmy Carroll (clarinet), Toots Mondello (bass clarinet), Harold Goltzer (bassoon), Walter Gross (harpsichord), Frank Carroll (bass), Gary Gillis (drums) and others