Ray Charles - Live In France 1961 (2011)

Posted By: peotuvave

Date: June 25, 2012

Lost for 50 years, these newly discovered concerts, featuring an hour and 45 minutes of performances, were filmed at the 1961 Antibes Jazz Festival in France and show Ray Charles in his prime period with the original Raeletts and his most legendary band (including David "Fathead" Newman and Hank Crawford.) These first concerts he ever gave in Europe, opened the door for Ray Charles to become one of the most revered international stars America has ever produced. The original 16mm films have been newly transferred and digitally restored and remastered, capturing Ray Charles at the peak of his powers, the very essence of "genius".

Additional Information

Review : Ray Charles was an American music icon. He scored hits on the R&B, pop, jazz and even country music charts. There are a number of DVDs of Charles live performances, but this new release is - in my opinion - the best. And, though 50 years old, it is being released on home video for the first time.

If you've read my other reviews over the years, you know that I'm a huge fan of any video release produced bt Reelin' in the Years Production. They've never let me down whether it was their Motown or Stax documentaries, their superb "Jazz Icons" and "British Invasion" sets or the sole release on there "Folk Icons" series: "Pete Seeger in Concert", The team of David Peck, Phil Galloway, Tom Gulotta and Steve Scoville search Europe television archives for film footage of music performances that the (mostly) government-owned networks have preserved. And, because the performances are on film, not videotape (easily erased and reused by US television networks) they have survived.

Charles was at the peak of his career in 1961, He was leaving Atlantic Records and starting at ABC Paramount - and, between the labels, had 10 albums released that year. A French music promoter booked Charles for his Antibes Jazz Festival (which also featured Lambert, Hendricks & Ross, Count Basie and Les McCann, among others). The musical performances were filmed (as well as separate audio recordings in real time) and edited into "compilation" shows for broadcast. No complete, sequenced, video of Charles performances was ever aired.

The RITY team went back to the original "set list" for the four nights that Charles performed and "recreated" the concerts. Using footage of the audience as "connectors" for the individual songs, the programs are seamless. And the quality of the prints used is superb.

The two main concerts presented on the 111-minute DVD are from July 18 and July 22, 1961. Each starts off with an instrumental jazz number or two (James Moody's "the Story" or Horace Silver's "Doodlin'") - after all this is a jazz festival. Charles plies the ivories with ease. For this tour he brought a smaller eight-piece band with the amazing tenor sax player, David "Fathead" Newman getting lots of solos on both sax as well as flute (on an arrangement of Charles' classic "Georgia on my Mind"" that was new to me). Another big name in jazz - alto sax man Hank Crawford - is in the band too. "Georgia" covers Charles' pop repertoire an d "One Mint Julep" straddles the jazz/R&B mode. Then it's on to the all-out performance of "What'd I Say" with Raelettes doing call-and-response with Charles. Because it was filmed over consecutive nights, there are repeated songs. "Georgia", "the Story", and "What'd I Say" are repeated - the latter, three times. But Charles makes it a bit different each time and the songs hold up.

As with other RITY productions, there is a nice 16 page booklet of informative liner notes - by Rob Bowman - and photos. And all this is offered at a mid-range price point.

Whether you are long time Charles fan - or only know him from his "pop" and "R&B" years, you will find these performances a revelation. He was at his prime and we owe a big debt to French TV (and to the RITY team) for preserving the footage and making it available 50 years after it was captured on film.

Tracklist:

July 18, 1961:

1) Opening / Antibes
2) The Story
3) Doodlin'
4) One Mint Julep
5) Let The Good Times Roll
6) Georgia On My Mind
7) Sticks And Stones
8) Hallelujah, I Love Her So
9) What'd I Say

July 22, 1961:
10) Hornful Soul
11) Let The Good Times Roll
12) Georgia On My Mind
13) My Bonnie
14) With You On My Mind
15) Ruby
16) Tell The Truth
17) I Wonder
18) Sticks And Stones
19) I Believe To My Soul
20) What'd I Say
21) Credits / I Wonder

Mediainfo

Video
ID : 1
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile : High@L3.1
Format settings, CABAC : Yes
Format settings, ReFrames : 9 frames
Codec ID : V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC
Duration : 1h 27mn
Bit rate : 2 482 Kbps
Width : 716 pixels
Height : 480 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 4:3
Original display aspect ratio : 4:3
Frame rate mode : Variable / Variable
Frame rate : 29.970 fps
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.241
Stream size : 1.53 GiB (90%)
Writing library : x264 core 120
Encoding settings : cabac=1 / ref=9 / deblock=1:-2:-2 / analyse=0x3:0x133 / me=umh / subme=9 / psy=1 / psy_rd=1.00:0.00 / mixed_ref=1 / me_range=24 / chroma_me=1 / trellis=2 / 8x8dct=1 / cqm=0 / deadzone=21,11 / fast_pskip=0 / chroma_qp_offset=-2 / threads=6 / sliced_threads=0 / nr=0 / decimate=1 / interlaced=0 / bluray_compat=0 / constrained_intra=0 / bframes=6 / b_pyramid=2 / b_adapt=2 / b_bias=0 / direct=3 / weightb=1 / open_gop=0 / weightp=2 / keyint=300 / keyint_min=30 / scenecut=40 / intra_refresh=0 / rc_lookahead=50 / rc=crf / mbtree=1 / crf=18.5 / qcomp=0.60 / qpmin=3 / qpmax=69 / qpstep=4 / ip_ratio=1.40 / aq=1:1.20
Language : English
Default : Yes
Forced : No
Color primaries : BT.601-6 525, BT.1358 525, BT.1700 NTSC, SMPTE 170M
Transfer characteristics : BT.709-5, BT.1361
Matrix coefficients : BT.601-6 525, BT.1358 525, BT.1700 NTSC, SMPTE 170M

Audio
ID : 2
Format : AC-3
Format/Info : Audio Coding 3
Mode extension : CM (complete main)
Format settings, Endianness : Big
Codec ID : A_AC3
Duration : 1h 27mn
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 224 Kbps
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Channel positions : Front: L R
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Bit depth : 16 bits
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 141 MiB (8%)
Language : English
Default : Yes
Forced : No

Menu
00:00:00.000 : July 18, 1961: Opening / Antibes
00:00:55.667 : July 18, 1961: The Story
00:05:47.234 : July 18, 1961: Doodlin'
00:12:44.334 : July 18, 1961: One Mint Julep
00:15:59.401 : July 18, 1961: Let The Good Times Roll
00:18:45.269 : July 18, 1961: Georgia On My Mind
00:23:59.302 : July 18, 1961: Sticks and Stones
00:27:34.802 : July 18, 1961: Hallelujah, I Love Her So
00:30:41.536 : July 18, 1961: What'd I Say
00:35:59.836 : July 22, 1961: Hornful Soul
00:41:22.236 : July 22, 1961: Let The Good Times Roll
00:44:19.336 : July 22, 1961: Georgia On My Mind
00:49:17.237 : July 22, 1961: My Bonnie
00:52:46.737 : July 22, 1961: With You On My Mind
00:57:28.770 : July 22, 1961: Ruby
01:03:31.037 : July 22, 1961: Tell The Truth
01:07:27.938 : July 22, 1961: I Wonder
01:11:03.872 : July 22, 1961: Sticks and Stones
01:15:00.905 : July 22, 1961: I Believe To My Soul
01:19:00.972 : July 22, 1961: What'd I Say
01:24:19.940 : Credits

Screeshots

Thanks to the original releaser

Download:

Filepost

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5