Jimmy Smith – Cat (LP, Universal)

Vinyl LP repressing of this album from the Jazz icon. If you know someone who says they don t get Jimmy Smith just play them this album. It is consummate Hammond B3 playing with the added vibrancy of Lalo Schifrin s arrangements for big band. Basin Street Blues eschews 1960 s sophistication while the appropriately super cool Delon s Blues is dedicated to the French actor Alain Delon who Smith had befriended while on tour in Europe in 1963. Reviewers upon both the album s release and since have been somewhat patronizing in accusing Smith of being too commercial as though this is some kind of crime and if he were a real jazz artist he would avoid such a thing. This is a joyful fabulous album that probably got more people listening to jazz than many of it s contemporaries.