condition (records/cover): NM / EX+

Gatefold sleeve.

Two LPs covering the Savoy sessions from the forties, which is to say Lester Young across the years when everything was changing around him and inside him. The war and his catastrophic treatment in the army sit in the middle of this material, and listeners have argued ever since about whether the later playing represents decline or simply a different and sadder conception. Hearing it collected in sequence makes the case for the second: the tone thickens, the phrases shorten, the vibrato widens, and what emerges is a musician playing considerably closer to the bone.

Savoy double LP, gatefold with notes. Complete, chronological, and the best way to actually follow what happened.