May 8th – King Pleasure – Parker’s Mood

Charlie Parker recorded Parker’s Mood in 1948 and King Pleasure added words five years later.  When Parker died in 1955 the elegiac lyric seemed almost unbearably prescient. The vocalese is a jazz singers’s touchstone and Mark Murphy, Eddie Jefferson and, more recently, Anita Wardell have all recorded sterling versions.  Here is the original.

 

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