Polka Dots and Moonbeams (Wes Montgomery’s version)

Wes Montgomery (electric guitar), Tommy Flanagan (piano), Percy Heath (bass) and Albert Heath (drums). From the album The Incredible Jazz Guitar of Wes Montgomery (1960).

This is a popular song composed by Jimmy Van Heusen and lyrics by Johnny Burker released in 1940 that was Frank Sinatra’s first hit with Tommy Dorsey’s big band and has become a jazz standard. Sinatra is sincere in pronouncing the words and avoids his irony characteristic of mid and late career.

The majestic melody has genuine moments of greatness and the economy of the means employed doesn’t detract from the emotional power of the tune. It has also been sung by Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan and Cassandra Wilson, but most of the jazz renditions come from instrumentalists such as Bill Evans, Elmo Hope, Blue Mitchell, Gerry Mulligan, Lester Young and Dexter Gordon among others.

After a concise introduction by Flanagan, Montgomery exposes the main melody twice, which is very romantic, at slow tempo. Then he plays the bridge as a declaration of love and closes the theme with the main melody in a freer version. He makes his solo with carefully chosen and melancholy phrases. Flanagan follows him, who delights in playing the notes slowly and creating an intimate and welcoming atmosphere, and the group reexposes the theme adding some variations at the end.