Paul Smith (jazz piano)

Paul Smith was a superior West Coast bop pianist who worked with the biggest names in jazz (most famously, Smith is a staple on Ella Fitzgerald's Verve albums). Sadly, the majority of his solo releases are long out-of-print, so anything with his name on it is a major find. On this 1960 set, Smith and his quartet (which includes a mystery guitarist) tackle songs from the stage version of The Sound of Music. Though Smith was always a tasteful player, he was also an experimenter who wasn't afraid to take wildly different approaches.