Which Stanley Clarke album for DB?

[Rob MacKillop]

Is there a Big Stan album devoted to the DB? If not, which album has the most DB on it? 

[itu]

https://jazztimes.com/reviews/albums/stanley-clarke-standards/ 

[Rob MacKillop]

Thanks, itu. Sounds interesting. 

[snorkie635]

Great album. Listen to it all the time.

[itu]

@Rob MacKillop check also Tom Kennedy - Just Play! His recordings include standards. This particular record is played with a double bass. In others (Basses Loaded, points of view...) there's electric, too. 

 

I think Brian Bromberg has some standards played with a double bass, although he is more known because of his electric (and piccolo) work. 

[Rob MacKillop]

Thanks, itu. So much to explore! 

[NickA]

"Jazz in the garden".  Stan Clark trio.  Lots of Hiromi but Stan on double bass throughout.

 

He's one of the greatest double bass players of our time...gets lost beneath his funky slappy alembic antics.

 

 

 

[Hellzero]

52 minutes ago, NickA said:

"Jazz in the garden".  Stan Clark trio.  Lots of Hiromi but Stan on double bass throughout.

 

He's one of the greatest double bass players of our time...gets lost beneath his funky slappy alembic antics.

Yeah, I forgot this excellent album, I'll listen to it later, after the 3 CDs I've just received...

[Hellzero]

On 19/10/2025 at 19:55, itu said:

https://jazztimes.com/reviews/albums/stanley-clarke-standards/ 

Saw him live with Jean-Luc Ponty and Al di Meola in an a fully acoustic gig, so Stanley Clarke on double bass all concert long, something like 30 years ago, and it ended up with speed race on School Days.

 

Amazing how fast he coud play this tune on double bass ... using the chords for the main riff.

 

Edited yesterday at 10:08 by Hellzero
Bloody spelling

[Rob MacKillop]

Yes, I recognise what he did for the electric bass, but like he said he played it as a toy. On the acoustic upright…something else! 

[Hellzero]

Beware that the album called The Stanley Clarke Band (on the right) is often referred on the Internet as him playing acoustic double bass, but he's only playing electric bass on this one.

 

The only one where he's playing acoustic double bass is Jazz in the Garden (on the left).

 

That said both albums are worth listening to.

 

[jazzyvee]

For pure double bass try ' The Griffith Park Collection' it's a superb album. 

 

[Rob MacKillop]

Thanks, folks. 

[Passinwind]

On 18/10/2025 at 12:07, Rob MacKillop said:

Is there a Big Stan album devoted to the DB? If not, which album has the most DB on it? 

I've seen no mention of perhaps the most obvious choice, albeit not under SC's name: Light As A Feather, by the original Return To Forever lineup.

[Hellzero]

5 minutes ago, Passinwind said:

I've seen no mention of perhaps the most obvious choice, albeit not under SC's name: Light As A Feather, by the original Return To Forever lineup.

It was so obvious that I think we all forgot that one...

 

Thanks for the reminder. 👍🏻👌🏻

[NickA]

Light as a feather .. have it on cassette tape, played to extinction in the mid 80s.  That and Hejira my gateways into Jazz from prog.

[Beer of the Bass]

20 hours ago, Passinwind said:

I've seen no mention of perhaps the most obvious choice, albeit not under SC's name: Light As A Feather, by the original Return To Forever lineup.

 

I *almost* posted about it, but then I thought it was surely the one album that anyone talking about his double bass playing would already know. It's a great one, he's all over the bass and it certainly changed the whole business of latin jazz bass playing, but the focus of the group setting steers away from some of the excesses he might go for on solo albums.