Joe Zawinul - 'Zawinul'

Joe Zawinul was one of the most well regarded jazz pianists/keyboardists in the history of the Jazz.  He was one of the masterminds behind Weather Report and played on classic albums by Miles Davis and Cannonball Adderley.

This album is not as well known among his discography, but it deserves to be.  The music is atmospheric and dreamy, with pretty melodies driving most of the songs.  

Joe calls this album:

"Music for two electric pianos, flute, trumpet, soprano saxophone, two contra basses and percussion."

Some people consider this the real first Weather Report album, as two other Weather Report founding members, Wayne Shorter and Miroslav Vitous are on this recording.  Conceptually, and sonically, they have a point.  It is also the link between Weather Report and Miles Davis' keyboard-laden experiments on the album 'In a Silent Way', the song "In a Silent Way" is redone here, in the more complex form in which Joe envisioned it.

With two keyboardists, Joe and Herbie Hancock, the album’s foundation is laid.  Their work is complemented by spacey sound effects created using an Echoplex tape delay effects unit and a ring modulator, which is a sound-sculpting tool.

In the liner notes (included in the freeload), Miles Davis contributes a brief, but generous tribute to Joe:

Zawinul is extending the thoughts that we've both had for years.
And probably the thoughts that most so-called now musicians have not vet been able to express.

P.S. Dig the two drummers and Herbie with the echoplex-and the clear funky black soprano sound—and the setting that Woody has to play in. All these musicians are set up. Joe sets up the musicians so that they have to play like they do, in order to fit the music like they do. In order to fit this music you have to be "Cliché Free.
In order to wnte this type of music, you have to be free inside of yourself and be Josef Zawinul with two beige kids, a black wife, two pianos, from Vienna, a Cancer and "Cliché Free."

Track 1 "Doctor Honoris Causa". 
"Dedicated to Herbie Hancock for his Honorary Doctorate at Grinnel University in Des Moines, Iowa."

 Track 2 "In a Silent Way" which is very different here than the version on the Miles Davis album.  
"Impressions of Joe Zawinul's as a shepherd boy in Austria."

Track 3 "His Last Journey"
"A tone poem reminiscent of his grandfather's funeral on a cold winter day in an Austrian mountain village."
  
Track 4 "Double Image" is a different version of the song that was originally recorded for Miles' 'Bitches Brew', it went unreleased until "The Complete Bitches Brew Sessions" released in 1998.
"A concept of what man thinks he is as opposed to what he really is."

Track 5 "Arrival in New York"
"Joe Zawinul's first impression of New York when he arrived here as a boy on a ship from France."

Joe Zawinul – acoustic and electric piano
Herbie Hancock – electric piano
Hubert Laws – flute
Woody Shaw – trumpet
Wayne Shorter – soprano saxophone
Miroslav Vitouš, Walter Booker – bass 
Jack DeJohnette, Billy Hart, David Lee, and Joe Chambers – percussion 

For the freeload, tell us what the weather was like today, where you live.