In 1962
Benny Goodman had a historic visit to the Soviet Union, touring with a big band full of young all-stars. After the orchestra returned to the U.S., tenor saxophonist
Al Cohn (who had not made the trip but did write some of
Goodman's charts) put together an album (also released by Colpix) using many of the sidemen and paying tribute to the event. Strangely enough none of the six numbers are
Cohn originals and he does not play on the record although he arranged all of the music. Of the six songs, "Mission to Moscow," "Let's Dance" and "Russian Lullaby" were part of
Goodman's repertoire. Altoist
Phil Woods effectively doubles on clarinet and other soloists include tenor saxophonist
Zoot Sims, trumpeter
Marky Markowitz and trombonist
Willie Dennis. An interesting set of modern swing but this LP has been unfortunately long out-of-print.