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by colomon 1245 days ago
He wrote the lyrics for that entire album (Vocalese) and sings on it too -- one of the solos on "Airegin", and a scat solo somewhere else (maybe the Night in Tunisia thing, been a while since I listened).

He also wrote the lyrics for their versions of "Birdland" and "Four Brothers", and maybe four of the tracks on Swing, and probably a bunch of other stuff I'm not thinking of.
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colomon 1245 days ago
I was wrong about "Another Night in Tunisia" -- the solo Jon sings starting around 1:40 actually has lyrics. I think the melody scatting for most of the rest of the song is actually Bobby McFerrin.

Oh, there we go, the scat solo starting at 2:30 in "Ray's Rockhouse" is Jon.

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colomon 1244 days ago
Weirdly enough, if I cam to believe Discogs got the liner notes faithfully, they're not crediting Jon with singing a solo on "Airegin". I'm still 99% certain Jon sings the last solo in that song. (Interestingly, singing lyrics over his own scat solo from the original Lambert, Hendricks & Ross recording of "Airegin".) For sure it sounds like him, no one other than Manhattan Transfer is credited with vocals on that track, and when they recorded it live they don't even attempt to sing it, replacing it with a sax solo.
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AlbertCory 1244 days ago
I just listened to that again. I don't have a good enough feel for what he sounds like vs. the guys in the group.

He does get a credit for vocals and lyrics in Discogs, but they don't say which track:

https://www.discogs.com/master/97226-The-Manhattan-Transfer-...

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AlbertCory 1245 days ago
It's certainly been a while since I looked at the CD for Vocalese.
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