The George Shearing Quintet with String Choir “Velvet Carpet”

Of all the Shearing Quintet records that are steeped in the classic “Shearing Sound” and glide through the easy listening Æther like a celestial steamship—this one, “with String Choir,” might be the easiest, the smoothest, and the most undeniable. It’s another one that I’m pretty sure my parents owned—and played regularly, incessantly—and so became ingrained in my mind as sure as Kool-Aid and Tareyton TV ads—and blankets me with no less comfortable vibes than Velveeta-style macaroni and cheese. For me anyway, one of the most classic George Shearing album covers (hard to say that, when so many are equally as good, but this is up there). There is a beautiful woman in the foreground, lying stretched out on her stomach on what we must imagine to be the “velvet carpet”—it’s red, and extends back so far you’ve got to assume it’s a ballroom with a nautical name in a luxury hotel. Her head is leaning on her folded hands—and she’s looking back, and to the left, as if in anticipation of… I don’t know… the vacuum cleaner? Red hair, lips, and nails, a gold lamé gown with thin straps, and some kind of heavy-looking expensive necklace. She’s in focus, but little of the red carpet is, and the two crystal chandeliers above are blurred to near abstraction—one looks like a UFO. Well, not really… but if you squint your eyes… but then it comes into focus. Scratch that.

A lot of words on the back cover—three separate descriptions of the record—I guess this is back when people would read things longer than three words—like three separate descriptions of the record! First a short one, including the phrase, “plush velvet carpet.” Next, a bit that says this is the first Shearing record with springs—cellos, violas, and violins—that “yields music as smooth and polished as old mahogany, as fresh as a meadow in spring.” And then a general overview of George Shearing, how his music is many things to many people—the best example being: “his urbane piano seems to emanate from a penthouse terrace high against an awesome city skyline.” See, they did use the word awesome back in 1956—just absent the stoner inflection.

Of course, I have an intricate system set up that requires two pristine copies of this album and two turntables—one for each side—so that I can play the ten songs on continuous repeat to give me a seamless hours-and-hours soundtrack of just-this-record—while entertaining with cocktails and dimmed lights, because, yes, this is the ultimate make-out record—in my, or anyone else’s, collection. No, I don’t. I mean, I don’t have that set-up—just one scratchy album. It wouldn’t take much to engineer that scenario, though—save for the make-out partner—but still, a far cry from my $1.98 system. Even so, nothing ever sounded better. I don’t even know all the songs, but they meld together like an elegant, rolling, enchilada, into the wee small hours (or my take on the wee small hours, currently… 10 p.m.). “No Moon at All,” “’Round Midnight” (a fine version), “All of Me,” “Dancing on the Ceiling,” “September Song,”—among my favorites of my favorites. My favorite on the record is “Autumn Leaves”—but I’d have to go back to music school to be able to describe soberly what he’s doing with the piano on that one. It’s probably my favorite version of “Autumn Leaves” I’ve yet heard, or likely will—stretching from this endless evening… to the end of my favorite, yet, all-too-brief, life.

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