Dr. Clare Fischer – Keyboards, composer, arranger Brent Fischer – Producer, arranger, all Percussion instruments, bass Peter Erskine – drums on love’s Walk, starbright, out of the blue, nuages and 49 Mike Shapiro – drums on tema do boneco de Palha, cascade of the seven Waterfalls, Millbrae Walk, and carnaval / a Felicidade / samba de orpheu medley Denise Donatelli – Vocals on out of the blue John Proulx – Vocals on out of the blue recorded, edited and mixed by Matthew Brownlie and Brent Fischer Album notes: It’s an amazing experience when, unexpectedly, a wish suddenly comes true. if it happens repeatedly, then that’s just plain good luck. and so it began years ago when i started archiving the written music library of my father, dr. Clare Fischer. i had hoped to find buried treasure in the stacks—material previously not seen or heard by others—that could be added to his public output. it has been one great find after another and it’s still happening! Getting most of the music he wanted to perform himself recorded, as opposed to leaving some for others to play, took right up until the end of his life. as with his final concerts, when he was recording, there was an absolute joy of spontaneity. throughout his life, he felt that emotional content was always strongest during the first or second take so we always recorded that way, even if it meant minuscule imperfections were kept for the greater good of a heartfelt performance. i continue that practice today. During the process of recording his original material, i almost lost sight of another important aspect of my dad’s brilliance: his ability to re-develop the compositions of others into unmistakably personal statements that had the qualities of a new work while still retaining the character of the piece as it was known. i’m proud to present here a compendium of previously unreleased original material, different settings for some originals plus arrangements of great american, latin and european standards. The latest surprise came while in the middle of a busy schedule wrapping up this and a few other albums; Pluto and it’s largest moon charon came into view—out of the blue. i had to stop and look, filled with childhood memories of peeking through my dad’s telescope at celestial bodies, always yearning for more detail. We shared our fascination with astronomy for decades, constantly delighting at new images sent from telescopes or spacecraft. We hope you’ll explore these new recordings with that same sense of joy. The title for Love’s Walk came about from the morning walks my dad took with his wife donna. they were so happy together. i think it shows in this trio rendition of what had previously been a solo piano piece on his album Introspectivo. Tema do Boneco de Palha (theme of the Straw Doll) is a vibrant Brazilian piece made famous in 1963 by guitarist Rosinha de Valença. We didn’t know that when we recorded it, only that the song had long been in my dad’s memory, probably from hearing it while in south america in the 1960’s. special thanks to Franklin de Flauta and Andrea Ernest in rio for identifying this masterpiece. My dad’s love for spontaneously conjoining multiple works is evident next in his solo piano medley of When you Wish upon a Star and Someday My Prince Will Come. note how the layers of development relate the two songs together in a unified theme. The song Starbright goes way back beyond its first appearance as a duo recording on the album of the same name. Written when my dad was a young man, he felt it was too adventurous and left it on the shelves for years until a gifted student asked to hear some of his early works. i was a teenager at the time and when we heard him play that song, we convinced him to record it. it is here in quartet form as we have played it live. Those who know our recent orchestral album Music for Strings, Percussion and the Rest will recognize this solo piano version of two for the road as being based on dad’s symphonic version. it starts out almost literally as a piano reduction of the orchestra score but then develops beyond that as it modulates. When my dad first heard Azymuth play Cascade of the Seven Waterfalls he was enchanted by it. We have played it many times over the years and i’m glad the last time was in a recording studio. About 10 years ago i found an untitled manuscript and asked dad to play the tune. We both liked it so much, he gave it the title out of the Blue. this is another adventurous piece and I thank Denise Donatelli and John Proulx for bringing to life my vision to have it sung because the double melody lends itself so well to a vocal duo. Dad used to take walks in the Millbrae area north of San Francisco whenever he’d visit or work with Cal Tjader. the song Millbrae Walk first appeared on the album Tjaderama made shortly after Cal’s death and in five part harmony on the Clare Fischer clarinet choir album A Family Affair. the version here is a more percussive setting in two part harmony as originally conceived. this, Starbright and out of the blue are some of my favorite Clare Fischer tunes. Reflect on the genius of Clare Fischer at the piano as you listen to his rendition of Amor em Paz. he could always make even the slowest tempo full of interesting interaction and intense emotion. Although we have a great version of Squatty Roo on the Clare Fischer clarinet choir album On a Turquoise Cloud, the one here is completely improvised by father and son playing together. i used to stand behind dad on stage watching his hands, listening and after decades of playing together, it meant that I could usually guess the general direction he was going next and be “inside his mind” to keep up with him no matter what he did. Another standard he used to love playing extremely slowly for maximum emotional content was Nuages. at this tempo, every note of the melody becomes an opportunity for exploration and development. Yet another unexpected bonus when assembling the tracks for this album was finding an unmarked and unreleased recording from what sounds like the early 1960's. dad would later develop this song into Novelho by adding a bridge and then asking me to arrange it for the clarinet choir. if you know that song, you’ll get a chance to hear the seed idea here, a great line in and of itself, with some classic free form improvisation. There are many who have been honored by Clare Fischer writing a song for them when their lives ended too soon. this goes way back to Piece for scotty (Scott laFaro) on the first ever clare Fischer album and more recently, great jazz writer Francis Paudras. 49 was titled for the age at which my father’s good friend, musician Larry Ford, died. Finally, we close with another spontaneous medley, this time of great Brazilian standards Carnaval, A Felicidade and Samba de Orpheu. Clare Fischer was one of the first musicians to bring Brazilian music to America more than 50 years ago so it’s fitting that he have the last word on it here. I want to personally thank all of the superlative artists for lending their unique talents to this album and you, the listener, for deciding to own a physical work of art from clare Fischer instead of settling for the low resolution digital version without proper credits. I’m eagerly looking forward to showing you more new Fischer material when it appears out of the blue! —Brent Fischer