As a musical-sponged youth, I started my life-long love affair with Jazz by way of MJQ, Kenny Burrell and Stan Getz. It wasn't until a few years later that I discovered The Three Sounds based on a hunch from a guy in a record store who saw me eyeing their Blue Note album Here We Come and told me in no uncertain terms that if I liked MJQ I would love these guys.

He was right. Ironically, Here We Come came out the same year as the milestone collaboration between The Three Sounds and Stanley Turrentine and Blue Hour. So I discovered them at the right time.

Since Blue Hour has been getting a lot of play the past couple of months via my buddy Mike Finnegan, I thought I would post a track from that slightly earlier album as a way of keeping the introduction going if you aren't already familiar with them. Tonight it's Summertime - the Gershwin standard, but done in inimitable Three Sounds style. The Masters of understatement, the essence of cool brilliance.

Strangely, almost all their albums are either out of print in the states or only available in Japan, at least according to my last check at Amazon.com. They are, as far as I can tell, available as downloads though. In any case, try and check them out if you can and pick up what's available.

You can never have too much mellow. Not these days anyway.