Jacques Loussier, André Hodeir, André Previn, Claude Bolling - La Naissance Du Crossover, 1958-1962 (2020)

Lying between classical music and jazz, “crossover” is a hybrid that went down in the history of 20th century music as a genre of its own. Giving birth in turn to jazz fusion, the crossover genre culminated in the Seventies, notably with the release of Claude Bolling’s “Suite for flute” with Jean-Pierre Rampal (FA443), a record that sold enough to guarantee its 10-year stay in the charts of American magazine “Billboard”. This anthology prepared by Jean-Baptiste Mersiol takes us back to the experiments of crossover’s greatest pioneers, namely Jacques Loussier, André Hodeir, André Prévin and Claude Bolling. Beginning in the late Fifties, they were the first to bridge the divide between Europe’s written music and America’s jazz improvisations. Patrick FRÉMEAUX