“And Johnny Hartman--a man that I’d had stuck up in my mind somewhere--I just felt something about him, you know, I don’t know what it was. And I liked his sound, I thought there was something there I had to hear, you know, so I looked him up...” -- John Coltrane, 1966
On March 7, 1963 Impulse! Records released John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman, a set of 6 exquisitely-wrought ballads, rendered by both Coltrane and Hartman with a consistent clarity and simplicity of line. It was the only time Coltrane worked with a vocalist, and the project stands as one of the greatest jazz albums ever released.
Joe Manis and Siri Vik pay tribute to this masterpiece, backed by pianist Randy Porter, drummer Todd Strait, and bassist Tyler Abbott, in an evening that will be filled out by an earlier, exceptionally-fine 1963 Coltrane release, Ballads which, like John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman, treated a set of 8 classic songs straight, with less embellishment than was Coltrane's approach up to that point in his career. It should be an evening of unusual and extraordinarily beautiful Coltrane at its best.