This Modern World (album)


This Modern World is an album by pianist and bandleader Stan Kenton featuring performances of compositions by Robert Graettinger recorded between 1951 and 1953 and originally released as a 10-inch LP on Capitol as well as a set of three 7 inch 45 rpm singles.

Critical reception

The Allmusic review by Richard S. Ginell calls it "the most complex, atonal, uncompromising, potentially alienating music that even the iconoclastic Stan Kenton band ever played" and said "This Modern World moves even further away from jazz into abstract contemporary classical music... A jazz pulse occasionally surfaces but more often instruments drift in atonal clusters past each other in differing meters or blast dissonant fanfares, creating a feeling of unease as they converse quizzically".

Track listing

All compositions by Robert Graettinger.
  1. "A Horn" - 4:04
  2. "Some Saxophones" - 3:13
  3. "A Cello" - 4:59
  4. "A Thought" - 4:52
  5. "A Trumpet" - 4:46
  6. "An Orchestra" - 4:03