Farmer's Blueprint Before the Jazztet
The seeds of the Jazztet heard here, two years before Golson and Farmer changed modern jazz.
Modern Art was recorded in 1958 as Art Farmer was setting up the pieces for what would become his most celebrated work. The session brought together a tight ensemble: Farmer's trumpet cutting through cleanly, Bill Evans at the piano bringing harmonic sophistication without showiness, and a rhythm section locked in and responsive. What strikes you immediately is how purposeful it all sounds—not a wasted note, not a moment of noodling. Farmer wasn't interested in proving anything; he was interested in playing well with people who understood what he was after.
The album works as a kind of preview of the Jazztet, the partnership with Benny Golson that would arrive two years later and become genuinely important to modern jazz. You can hear the sensibility already in place here: the emphasis on craft over flash, the preference for melody and shape over technical display, the refusal to mistake busyness for depth. Evans was particularly sharp on these tracks, contributing arrangements and comping that shaped how the horn lines sat in the mix. The Penguin Guide to Jazz later called it "one of Farmer's most successful records of the period," and a 1958 DownBeat review gave it five stars.
This isn't Farmer at his absolute peak—that comes with the Jazztet records—but it's essential context for understanding how he got there. Modern Art shows a musician already in full command of his voice, working with collaborators who matched his sense of proportion. It's the album to hear if you want to know where one of jazz's most understated and durable partnerships began.
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