Another previously unknown live recording to rival last year's Top Of The Gate release on Resonance, only this time from near the end of Morell's tenure – to be precise, a month after the 1972 interview printed in Jazzwise 167 and a week before the video session adding altoist Herb Geller. A key difference from the Resonance album is in the atmosphere of the performance, namely two sets at Groningen's municipal theatre as opposed to a nightclub, and the audience applause sounds quite formal. The trio nevertheless digs in with typical repertoire for the period, and the recorded sound is excellent.

As to the two public-domain reissues, New Jazz Conceptions was previously reviewed in Jazzwise 134 with exactly the same running-order, artwork, notes etc, when it was on the 52nd Street label (I didn't know Andorra was that big). Evans's first trio album with Kotick and Motian is still a revelation, and was done mere months after his record debut with George Russell. It's augmented here by the alternate take of the slow blues ‘No Cover, No Minimum’, and by the only tracks that Evans contributed to two separate mid-1950s LPs by guitarists Dick Garcia and Joe Puma – the notes add vibist Eddie Costa for the latter but he's not on these items.

Only three tracks from Conceptions are duplicated by Frémeaux, who also have four from Everybody Digs, two from the originally unissued early-1959 session and five from the great Portrait In Jazz. That makes less than half of the double-CD, the remainder of which usefully illustrates his Jazzwise interview, including not only the aforementioned debut on ‘Concerto For Billy The Kid’ and ‘All About Rosie’ and Russell's first ‘Stratusphunk’ (with Hal McKusick), but also selections from New York N.Y. and Jazz In The Space Age, the latter showing Evans in an improvised duet with Paul Bley. But there's also much wider coverage of Bill's sideman sessions, with a track each from Art Farmer, Chet Baker, Portrait Of Cannonball (‘Nardis’) and two from Miles (‘Fran-Dance’ in the longer Newport version, and of course ‘Blue In Green’).

Coming after the first two Russell tracks, which contain two of the most energetic Evans solos ever, these all have a rather laid-back feel – but that's probably why the pianist was hired on such occasions. The compiler's net could have been thrown even wider, since there's nothing for instance with Tony Scott, and it's more of a pity that the inferior take of ‘Autumn Leaves’ (from Portrait In Jazz) has been used. If this sends listeners back to the original albums, perhaps that's all to the good but, for those still catching up with why the early Evans was both powerful and influential, here is a good place to start.