Bob Dorough – The Devil's Best Tunes

Known most famously for an educational ode to multiplication (Three Is A Magic Number), The Devil’s Best Tunes gathers together work spanning Bob Dorough’s more serious work from 1954-58 for the first time. Although little-known outside of jazz circles, Dorough’s vocalese style – uncannily soft and lilting – marked him out as a performer in New York’s fertile fifties jazz scene; so much so that Miles Davis (among many others) recruited him for vocal duties on the swansong of his 1976 album Sorcerer.
 
Combined with that distinctive voice, Dorough’s clinical timing and skittish piano style ensure that the compilation will be of more than mere historical interest to scat and bebop fans. It covers solo material from his 1956 debut Devil May Care, along with a selection of tracks with the Sam Most quartet, on which Most’s flute and saxophone provide a startling counterpoint to the vocals. Thoughtful selections ensure that The Devil’s Best Tunes stands as a long-overdue reminder of an innovator whose offbeat style, perhaps, accounts for his neglect in recent decades.