Ben Webster - Gentle Ben

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Analogue Productions Ultra Tape reel-to-reel reissues!

Twelve masterpiece titles, each a 15 ips, ¼-inch 2-track (½ track) analog tape copy

Sourced from original master tapes

Transferred using ATR-modified Ampex Tape Machine with flux magnetic heads

Custom slipcase cover - highest quality tape reissue!

From Acoustic Sounds, Inc., the world leader in audiophile music sales, comes the highest quality analog reel-to-reel tape album reissues — Analogue Productions Ultra Tape!

Twelve masterpiece titles are featured in this new reissue series, each a 15 ips, ¼-inch analog tape copy (IEC equalization) sourced from a copy of the original analog master tape. Transferred real-time, using an ATR-modified Ampex Tape Machine with flux magnetic heads. Custom slipcase cover. The first two titles — Janis Ian's Breaking Silence and Ben Webster's Gentle Ben are releasing before 2016 ends.

Gentle Ben was made 10 months before Ben Webster's death in 1972. Webster, who had left the United States in 1965 to settle in Europe — first in Copenhagen and then in Amsterdam — was visiting fellow musician and friend Tete Montoliu in Barcelona. Webster and pianist Montoliu went back a ways, having played together regularly in Webster's Copenhagen days. In fact, Montoliu cited Webster and Don Byas as his two chief musical influences. Webster and Montoliu understood each other deeply, and their comfort with on another is palpable in this recording. Their accompaniment of one another is seamless. On board with these two is Montoliu's regular working trio-mates, Eric Peter on bass and Peer Wyboris on drums.

There's no shortage of Webster's trademark breathy, fat tenor tone here. In fact, given the sparse arrangement, that rich, humid, giant sax blooms like on few other recordings. Highlights include "Ben's Blues," "Sweet Georgia Brown," "The Man I Love" and "Don't Blame Me."

Each Ultra Tape reissue copy is priced at $450. The entire series is available by subscription.

The remaining titles include: Rickie Lee Jones' It's like This / Hugh Masekela's Hope / Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances (the famous Turnabout recording) / Fritz Reiner and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's Scheherazade (RCA Living Stereo) / Fritz Reiner and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's Pines of Rome and Fountains of Rome (RCA Living Stereo) / Leopold Stokowski's Rhapsodies (RCA Living Stereo) / René Leibowitz and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra The Power of The Orchestra (RCA Living Stereo) / Fritz Reiner and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's Lieutenant Kije and Stravinksy's Song of the Nightingale (RCA Living Stereo) / Abel /Steinberg — Beethoven Violin Sonata (Wilson Audio) / and Lowell Graham's Winds of War & Peace (Wilson Audio).

See all of the Ultra Tape reel-to-reel editions here.

1. Ben's Blues

2. The Man I Love

3. My Nephew Bent

4. How Long This Has Been Going On

5. Sweet Georgia Brown

6. Don't Blame Me

7. Did You Call

8. Barcelona Shout

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