Tenor saxophonist Pete Christlieb's 1978 album
Apogee is an unusual Jazz album. Firstly, it's a great, mainstream acoustic Jazz record from a time not exactly associated with that kind of music - loud Jazz-Rock fusion, stuffed with electric instruments, and not always especially tasteful, was more the norm - and it was released on a major label no less. Secondly, it was produced by Walter Becker and Donald Fagen of Steely Dan fame, Jazz-lovers both. The fact that Becker and Fagen got this released by Warner Brothers in 1978 had a lot to do, no doubt, with their clout at the label then. It's worth noting that Christlieb had previously played on Steely Dan's Aja - just one feature of his successful career as a studio musician (with James Brown, Tom Waits, Bobby "Blue" Bland, etc. and also as a longstanding fixture of the Saturday Night Live band).
Christlieb's co-leader on the set was Warne Marsh, a tenor-playing veteran of the Lennie Tristano cool school (Tristano was a remarkable musician, and is very much worth checking out in his own right), which makes this album something of a "two-tenor battle" in the grand tradition.
Two brilliant, under-acknowledged saxophonists with complementary styles, spurring each other on to marvelous heights of invention; some great, distinctive arrangements; a wide range of material, including a Kern/Mercer show-tune, plus material from Charlie Parker, Lennie Tristano, and Becker/Fagen; a very supportive band featuring Lou Levy on piano... Apogee is a winner, and well worth picking up.
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