Cast Your Fate to the Wind: Jazz Impressions of Black Orpheus

Personnel: Vince Guaraldi (piano); Monte Budwig (bass); Colin Bailey (drums).
Recorded at Station KQED, San Francisco, California in 1961-62. Originally released on Fantasy (8089). Includes liner notes by Ralph J. Gleason.
Today he's best known to most people as the man behind the classic PEANUTS music, but long before he jammed with Charlie Brown, Vince Guaraldi was making jazz inroads with his piano trio. As its title implies, JAZZ IMPRESSIONS OF BLACK ORPHEUS was Guaraldi's take on the groundbreaking Jobim score for the BLACK ORPHEUS film. While most of the album finds the prescient Guaraldi getting in on the ground floor of the U.S. bossa nova craze (though his take on these tunes doesn't feel particularly Brazilian), the key song here is in fact a Guaraldi original, "Cast Your Fate to the Wind." With its simple harmonic progression and strong, sunny melody, this unassuming jazz tune somehow made its way to the top of the 1962 pop charts, a rare moment of true jazz crossover.