Stan Getz and Charlie Byrd recorded Jazz Samba in 1962. The album helped bring Brazilian bossa nova to a broad American jazz audience.
Getz played tenor saxophone and Byrd played guitar on the recording. The sessions took place after Byrd returned from a State Department tour of Brazil and introduced Getz to the country’s new bossa nova style. The musicians adapted Brazilian songs and rhythms for a small jazz ensemble, creating a relaxed sound that contrasted with the more forceful attack of hard bop.
Jazz Samba includes “Desafinado,” which became a major hit and an international jazz standard. The album’s commercial success helped establish bossa nova as a major influence in American popular music during the early 1960s.
The record is often confused with Getz/Gilberto, the 1963 collaboration with João Gilberto and Antônio Carlos Jobim. Getz/Gilberto became even more commercially famous, but Jazz Samba came first and specifically credits Getz and Byrd as its principal performers.