Contrafact Mania: 'Pop + Jazz = Swing,' 1962

A fascinating album arranged by Benny Golson, with Bill Evans, Wayne Shorter, Eric Dolphy and others

Yesterday, I posted on how Cole Porter made it easier for bebop musicians to use the chord changes of American songbook standards as a basis for newly improvised melodies—songs that today we call contrafacts. This morning, I received an email from the great James Farber, the Grammy-winning recording engineer, who recommended an album I actually didn’t know (yes, JazzWax fans, it happens).