Double Play!

{{Use mdy dates|date=June 2025}}

{{Infobox album

| name = Double Play!

| type = studio

| artist = Russ Freeman and André Previn

| cover = Doubleplay_cdcover.PNG

| alt =

| released = 1957

| recorded = April 30 and May 11, 1957

| venue =

| studio = Contemporary's Studio, Los Angeles

| genre = Jazz

| length = 41:50

| label = Contemporary

| producer = Lester Koenig

| chronology = André Previn

| prev_title = My Fair Lady

| prev_year = 1956

| next_title = Pal Joey

| next_year = 1957

}}

{{Music ratings

| rev1 = AllMusic

| rev1Score = {{rating|4|5}}

| rev2 = The Penguin Guide to Jazz

| rev2Score = {{rating|3|4}}{{cite book |last1=Cook |first1=Richard |authorlink1=Richard Cook (journalist) |last2=Morton |first2=Brian |authorlink2=Brian Morton (Scottish writer) |title=The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings |year=2008 |edition=9th |publisher=Penguin |isbn=978-0-141-03401-0 |page=1180 }}}}

Double Play! is a 1957 jazz album featuring pianists Russ Freeman and André Previn.[http://www.allmusic.com/album/double-play-mw0000095044 AllMusic]

It was recorded and released in 1957 on the Contemporary label, and re-released in 1993 in the Original Jazz Classics series.

Together with drummer Shelly Manne, the album, as its title suggests, includes eight baseball-themed original compositions by Freeman and Previn along with the standard "Take Me Out to the Ball Game". (The rather risque-by-1950s-standards album cover features a model wearing a Hollywood Stars cap.) The album was advertised at the time as the first time that two pianists recorded "modern jazz" together.

The Penguin Guide to Jazz suggested that the album was the best of Previn's early releases, being "the most uncomplicatedly jazz-driven".

Track listing

  1. "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" (Jack Norworth, Albert Von Tilzer)
  2. "Who's on First?" (Previn) - 3:37
  3. "Called on Account of Rain" (Previn) - 5:11
  4. "In the Cellar Blues" (Previn, Freeman) - 5:01
  5. "Batter Up" (Freeman) - 3:58
  6. "Double Play" (Freeman) - 4:58
  7. "Safe at Home" (Freeman) - 6:03
  8. "Fungo" (Freeman) - 5:42
  9. "Strike Out the Band" (Previn) - 4:12

Track 1-5 recorded on April 30, 1957; tracks 6-9 on May 11, 1957

Personnel

References