Stan Getz recorded more than 100 albums during his career, but when asked to name his favourite, he didn’t choose Getz/Gilberto. He didn’t choose Jazz Samba or Sweet Rain either.
He chose Focus.
Released in 1962, Focus remains one of the most unusual albums in Getz’s catalogue and one of the boldest collaborations between a jazz soloist and a classical-style string orchestra. It also arrived under extraordinary circumstances. Halfway through the recording process, Getz’s mother died unexpectedly, forcing the sessions to stop before he had recorded a single note.
When he eventually returned to the studio, he was faced with a challenge unlike almost anything attempted in jazz before.
An Album Without Standards
The project began with arranger and composer Eddie Sauter.
Sauter had already established himself as one of the most imaginative writers in American music, having written for Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw before becoming one of the key arrangers for the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra. His writing often ignored the conventions of big band arranging, favouring long melodic lines, unusual harmonies and orchestral colours that owed as much to twentieth-century classical music as to swing.
Stan Getz admired that originality.
Rather than asking Sauter to arrange familiar standards, Getz commissioned him to write an entirely new suite of music. The only request was that Sauter should compose exactly what he wanted to hear.
The resulting score was unlike anything either musician had recorded before.
Instead of providing conventional chord progressions for improvisation, Sauter wrote independent orchestral pieces for strings. Getz would become another voice inside the music rather than a featured soloist performing over an accompaniment.
Tragedy Interrupted the Sessions
Recording began in July 1961.
On 13 July, the day before the first session, Getz’s mother Goldie died suddenly after suffering a stroke.
Unable to record, Getz withdrew from the sessions. While he observed the Jewish tradition of shiva, Sauter’s orchestra continued recording the score without him. Four of the album’s pieces were completed with no tenor saxophone at all.
Biographer Dave Gelly later wrote that Getz spent those days in a “drunken stupor”, overwhelmed by grief.
Two weeks later he returned to the studio.
What awaited him was one of the most demanding recording situations of his career.
An Extraordinary Musical Challenge
Normally, jazz improvisation depends on interaction.
A soloist listens to the rhythm section, responds to the harmony and reacts to the other musicians in real time. None of those familiar reference points existed during the Focus sessions.
The orchestral parts had already been recorded.
Wearing headphones, Getz listened to completed performances while recording his tenor saxophone separately. There was no rhythm section to lock into and no conventional chord sequence guiding each phrase. Instead, he had to invent melodies that flowed naturally through Sauter’s already-finished orchestral writing.
Perhaps most remarkably, much of the album was recorded in complete takes.
The precision required is astonishing. Getz had to judge not only melody and harmony, but also pacing, breathing and emotional shape across extended compositions that he had not played with live.
Dave Gelly later summed up the achievement in a single sentence:
“If anything qualifies Stan Getz for the title of genius, it’s what he achieved on July 28th, 1961.”
What Does Focus Sound Like?
Listeners expecting another cool jazz quartet album are often surprised.
The string writing rarely behaves like a traditional backing orchestra. Instead, it moves independently, sometimes creating tension with Getz’s improvisation rather than supporting it directly. The result feels almost conversational, with the saxophone weaving through the orchestral textures rather than sitting above them.
Throughout the album, Getz’s famously lyrical tone remains immediately recognisable. His sound is warm, restrained and remarkably vocal, qualities that allow him to sing through Sauter’s intricate arrangements without ever sounding forced.
Tracks such as “I’m Late, I’m Late” and “Night Rider” reveal just how adventurous the project was. Rather than chasing technical display, Getz builds long melodic arcs that gradually become part of the orchestral landscape.
It is jazz, but it is also something more difficult to categorise.
Reception and Legacy
Focus received strong reviews on its release, although it was never likely to become a commercial success. Its abstract structure and lack of familiar standards placed it well outside mainstream jazz, while its extended orchestral writing also distinguished it from the cool jazz recordings for which Getz had become known.
Over time, however, its reputation has steadily grown.
Many critics now regard it as one of the finest examples of third stream-inspired jazz, demonstrating how improvisation and orchestral composition can coexist without either compromising the other. It has also become one of the defining achievements of Eddie Sauter’s career as a composer.
For Getz himself, the album held particular significance.
Despite the enormous commercial success he would later achieve through bossa nova, he repeatedly described Focus as his favourite recording.
It was also effectively impossible to recreate in concert. The album was never performed live in its original form, leaving the studio recording as the only complete document of this remarkable collaboration.
Stan Getz’s Favourite Recording
Stan Getz would go on to make some of the most successful records in jazz history.
Within two years of Focus, he had recorded Getz/Gilberto. “The Girl from Ipanema” became an international hit, and Getz found a level of commercial success few jazz musicians have ever experienced.
Yet he never stopped returning to Focus.
When asked which of his recordings meant the most to him, he consistently named this album. It wasn’t because it sold the most records or reached the biggest audience. It was because it demanded something unique of him as a musician.
The circumstances could hardly have been more difficult. After returning from the death of his mother, Getz had to improvise complete performances over string arrangements that had already been recorded, creating melodic lines that sounded as though they had always belonged there.
Focus never became his best-selling album. It was never performed live. But it remained the recording that Stan Getz himself valued above all the others.
For an artist who made more than a hundred albums over four decades, that says a great deal.
