At the end of 1967, Dave Brubeck disbanded his famous quartet. Ever since 1958, when the group’s line-up stabilised around Brubeck (piano), Paul Desmond (alto saxophone), Eugene Wright (bass) and Joe Morello (drums), the ‘classic’ Dave Brubeck Quartet had been an essential part of the modern jazz landscape. Brubeck’s 1959 album Time Out, in which he presented the first versions of ‘Blue Rondo à la Turk’ and ‘Take Five’, took instrumental jazz to the pop charts for the first time since the 1930s, when the likes of Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw had been the pop stars of their day. Brubeck disbanded the group because quitting while he was ahead seemed sensible, but also because he wanted to devote his creative energies to writing choral and orchestral music.
fiat aspiration,…