Scott Hamilton on Ballads

[JSngry]

The exact quote from Duke is: "If it sounds good, it's good music, and if it doesn't, then it is the other kind." Link to Music is My Mistress here--the context is an interviewer asking him his opinion of "young's people's music", i.e. rock/pop.)

Actually, that was one of Duke's stock quotes, iirc. He had a million of 'em.

And also iirc, the "interviewer" in MIMM was actually Duke himself.

[JSngry]

...Among the no longer young Swing Kids per se, though (including SH, who again seems to half-fallen into the "movement" aspect of the thing au natural), I hear a lot of guys who seems to me to present some of the surface aspects of their models as though that were enough. If so, doing that alongside the implicit (and sometimes explicit) moral-aesthetic claims to "rightness" that their music makes or that is made for their music, kind of pisses me off...

Well, yeah, but otoh, I doubt that too many people who are really into this stuff to the exclusion of anything else are really thinking about it this hard.

Whether or not they should be is another thing, but it kinda begs the question - if all you're looking for is a good time, and somebody gives it to you in a way that satisfies you, isn't it sort of a victimless crime?

I mean, I know for a fact that Dan digs Percy France hard, but is the average "Scott Hamilton Fan" really aware enough of what the difference is to even think about it, much less think at length about it? Nah...

Bottom line for all concerned in this scene, I think, is that it's about entertainment & craft, two venerable qualities of no small importance to Life In General. As far as that goes, they do it well enough to keep each other happy, and they, unlike the Marailisians (no BN, I'm not referring to you specifically) tend to leave the rest of us alone. I know a few people who have a few Scott Hamilton albums who've never even heard of too much of anybody else, nor do they really care to. It's "lifestyle music" to them, and hey, good for them about that.

This is one case where "live and let live" has a happy ending for all concerned, at least in my experience. Would that is was always such.

[Dan Gould]

Larry, I'd like to include in my Hamilton compilation some examples of his recordings in all styles, not just the ballads that formed the basis of our disagreement. From your comments it sounds as though Hamilton received his evaluation some time ago and you've seen no reason to revisit that cubbyhole. No reason why you should, life is short as they say, but I'm hardly the only one who feels that Scott has developed his own conception, "become his own man" as the old saying went, and it might be interesting if you take a moment to hear him.

[Larry Kart]

...Among the no longer young Swing Kids per se, though (including SH, who again seems to half-fallen into the "movement" aspect of the thing au natural), I hear a lot of guys who seems to me to present some of the surface aspects of their models as though that were enough. If so, doing that alongside the implicit (and sometimes explicit) moral-aesthetic claims to "rightness" that their music makes or that is made for their music, kind of pisses me off...

Well, yeah, but otoh, I doubt that too many people who are really into this stuff to the exclusion of anything else are really thinking about it this hard.

Whether or not they should be is another thing, but it kinda begs the question - if all you're looking for is a good time, and somebody gives it to you in a way that satisfies you, isn't it sort of a victimless crime?

I mean, I know for a fact that Dan digs Percy France hard, but is the average "Scott Hamilton Fan" really aware enough of what the difference is to even think about it, much less think at length about it? Nah...

Bottom line for all concerned in this scene, I think, is that it's about entertainment & craft, two venerable qualities of no small importance to Life In General. As far as that goes, they do it well enough to keep each other happy, and they, unlike the Marailisians (no BN, I'm not referring to you specifically) tend to leave the rest of us alone. I know a few people who have a few Scott Hamilton albums who've never even heard of too much of anybody else, nor do they really care to. It's "lifestyle music" to them, and hey, good for them about that.

This is one case where "live and let live" has a happy ending for all concerned, at least in my experience. Would that is was always such.

You're right -- it's not usually about "thinking about it this hard," but a lot of stuff that people kind of just do has ideological roots (sorry about that) that are virtually forgotten in one sense but are still very active in others -- perhaps more effectively active because the roots are forgotten. About Percy France or Hal Singer etc., a key question to me is, if the typical SH fan encounters some PF, HS, etc. would he hear much difference? And if he did, what would he make of it? "Live and let live"? Hell, I'm as mean as a snake.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Me back in the present now:

So "mainsteam" thinking (and beginning in the mid'70s the Swing Kids thing) is in part based on the idea (entertained by some but not all of its players and probably by more of this music's audience) that, as I said above, "bop, and modern jazz in general, was something of an artistic wrong turn" -- "wrong" in part because some of it was felt to be alienatingly hectic, angry, or just ugly (remember Coltrane and Dolphy being labled "anti-jazz"?), and/or needlessly complex, and devoid of attractive, recognizable, warm human/humane values; and wrong as well in practical commercial terms, in that jazz once was a popular music and now much of it figuratively was turning its back on any chance to connect with its surviving former audience and any new audience of similar size to boot.

As Allen Lowe might say: "What about Percy France? Any gigs here for Hal Singer?"

This is very interesting. I wasn't aware that there was this feeling around in the late seventies. The idea that jazz was then turning its back on its audience, existing or potential, is quite extraordinary, since in that period hundreds of jazz LPs made the pop or R&B charts. Even Sonny Criss had a hit album! But of course, these hit albums were mostly disco, as was Sonny's, or fusion, and I can readily understand why that group of people wouldn't have been interested in that stuff (and much of it really is junk, by anybody's standards).

But setting all that music aside with no further comment, if this bunch of audience was looking for musicians who could and did play their music the way this audience wanted it played, there was a whole raft of mucsicians who fitted - yes, Percy and Hal, but also

Plas Johnson

Kenny Burrell

Al Grey

Illinois Jacquet

Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis

Jimmy Forrest

Milt Buckner

Billy Mitchell

Wild Bill Davis

Red Holloway

Houston Person

Willis Jackson

Eddie Chamblee

Arnett Cobb

Harry Edison

Rhoda Scott

Teddy Edwards

Junior Mance

Tiny Grimes

Ray Bryant

Lionel Hampton

Benny Carter

Johnny Lytle

Lou Bennett

Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson

Slide Hampton

Norman Simmons

Bill Doggett

Blue Mitchell

Bobby Forrester

Ronnie Cuber

(Oh, and there were a few around who could play that way, but were making money making disco albums - Stanley Turrentine is a case in point.)

Now the big problem is, most of those guys had been around for a while, some of them a very long while. Only the last two made their debut albums as leaders in the late seventies.

Of that list, only Plas and Kenny recorded for Concord in the late seventies. A very large proportion of them had to go to Europe to find a record company willing to put out their material - thank heavens for Black & Blue and Barclay. Norman Simmons made a number of DIY jobs.

So, if there was an audience - and I have to assume that was the audience Carl Jefferson thought he could tap into - why didn't it latch on to most of these guys? Why wasn't Concord rampaging through the US and Europe trying to pick up these musicians? I think Jim Sangrey nailed it when he mentioned Scott Henderson's "dirty little secret" - only it wasn't a secret in the cases of most of the musicians I've listed; they'd all done time - valuable time, as far as I'm concerned - in R&B. Indeed, some were great names in R&B, while others had contributed classic solos to R&B hits. (And should I point out that only two of them were white? - but Cuber had long hair at the time; don't know about Forrester's hair.)

So, although this audience may have SAID that it wanted music such as you've described, Larry, one's forced to conclude, since they didn't in fact want so much of the really quite significant amount that was available, that they really wanted something else but didn't want to come right out and say so. Would such an attitude give conflicting signals to the musicians who were hired? I dunno. Someone else would have to answer that.

MG

[JSngry]

About Percy France or Hal Singer etc., a key question to me is, if the typical SH fan encounters some PF, HS, etc. would he hear much difference? And if he did, what would he make of it? "Live and let live"? Hell, I'm as mean as a snake.

Yeah, dude, you're a veritable punk ass bitch!

But seriously, based on my experience, they'd only hear a difference in that Hamilton would likely seem more directly understandable, and therefore "better" to them.

Now, if these were people about whom I might think that "if only they knew about/heard XYZ, I know they'd dig it", then yeah, I might get upset or something. But from experience, that's almost always just not the case. It's not a case of them digging this because they don't know any different, it's a case of them digging this because there's this...direct, A-to-B-Nothing-In-Between connection that is not at all unlike one sees in Pop Music, which might well in fact be what this is.

There's a guy around here, 60-something car salesman, part-time jazz DJ, hardcore Concord fan. He "gets" this stuff in a way that I don't even claim to begin to understand, and has from the git-go - this is his music. Is there any way that this guy is ever gonna "come over to our side"? Short of head trauma causing a loss of identity, I doubt it. Then there's the younger fans - they want "a sound", period, don't care where it comes from, and ain't looking to expand. "History" is so not what they're about. This stuff meets their lifestyle needs, they're happy, and good for them about that.

You ever meet the type person for whom 50s "cool" was the shit? They didn't go for before & they didn't go for after. Didn't know, didn't want to know, wouldn't have a clue even if they tried (or wanted to). Wgole 'nother world, that one is, and this appears to me to be somewhat the same.

Aside from that, though, Dan's right, Hamilton has evolved/deepened as a player. I still get the above-mentioned "pop" vibe out of him vis-a-vis "serious jazz", but as somebody who's always dug the concept of pop anything on its own terms, I feel that he's serious about what he does relative to who he does it for and why he does it. I've more than once found myself digging him on the radio, not as a "heavy listening experience", but somebody whose swing & tone feel good while driving along on my way from place to place. Considering how much of what I hear on jazz radio (this is all more recent stuff, say from the last 4-5 years) makes me violently vulgar, that's an endorsement, believe me.

[Larry Kart]

Me back in the present now:

So "mainsteam" thinking (and beginning in the mid'70s the Swing Kids thing) is in part based on the idea (entertained by some but not all of its players and probably by more of this music's audience) that, as I said above, "bop, and modern jazz in general, was something of an artistic wrong turn" -- "wrong" in part because some of it was felt to be alienatingly hectic, angry, or just ugly (remember Coltrane and Dolphy being labled "anti-jazz"?), and/or needlessly complex, and devoid of attractive, recognizable, warm human/humane values; and wrong as well in practical commercial terms, in that jazz once was a popular music and now much of it figuratively was turning its back on any chance to connect with its surviving former audience and any new audience of similar size to boot.

As Allen Lowe might say: "What about Percy France? Any gigs here for Hal Singer?"

This is very interesting. I wasn't aware that there was this feeling around in the late seventies. The idea that jazz was then turning its back on its audience, existing or potential, is quite extraordinary, since in that period hundreds of jazz LPs made the pop or R&B charts. Even Sonny Criss had a hit album! But of course, these hit albums were mostly disco, as was Sonny's, or fusion, and I can readily understand why that group of people wouldn't have been interested in that stuff (and much of it really is junk, by anybody's standards).

But setting all that music aside with no further comment, if this bunch of audience was looking for musicians who could and did play their music the way this audience wanted it played, there was a whole raft of mucsicians who fitted - yes, Percy and Hal, but also

Plas Johnson

Kenny Burrell

Al Grey

Illinois Jacquet

Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis

Jimmy Forrest

Milt Buckner

Billy Mitchell

Wild Bill Davis

Red Holloway

Houston Person

Willis Jackson

Eddie Chamblee

Arnett Cobb

Harry Edison

Rhoda Scott

Teddy Edwards

Junior Mance

Tiny Grimes

Ray Bryant

Lionel Hampton

Benny Carter

Johnny Lytle

Lou Bennett

Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson

Slide Hampton

Norman Simmons

Bill Doggett

Blue Mitchell

Bobby Forrester

Ronnie Cuber

(Oh, and there were a few around who could play that way, but were making money making disco albums - Stanley Turrentine is a case in point.)

Now the big problem is, most of those guys had been around for a while, some of them a very long while. Only the last two made their debut albums as leaders in the late seventies.

Of that list, only Plas and Kenny recorded for Concord in the late seventies. A very large proportion of them had to go to Europe to find a record company willing to put out their material - thank heavens for Black & Blue and Barclay. Norman Simmons made a number of DIY jobs.

So, if there was an audience - and I have to assume that was the audience Carl Jefferson thought he could tap into - why didn't it latch on to most of these guys? Why wasn't Concord rampaging through the US and Europe trying to pick up these musicians? I think Jim Sangrey nailed it when he mentioned Scott Henderson's "dirty little secret" - only it wasn't a secret in the cases of most of the musicians I've listed; they'd all done time - valuable time, as far as I'm concerned - in R&B. Indeed, some were great names in R&B, while others had contributed classic solos to R&B hits. (And should I point out that only two of them were white? - but Cuber had long hair at the time; don't know about Forrester's hair.)

So, although this audience may have SAID that it wanted music such as you've described, Larry, one's forced to conclude, since they didn't in fact want so much of the really quite significant amount that was available, that they really wanted something else but didn't want to come right out and say so. Would such an attitude give conflicting signals to the musicians who were hired? I dunno. Someone else would have to answer that.

MG

I think you're onto something here, MG. In particular, as you suggest in the last paragraph, what they wanted above all perhaps was for the music of their fondly remembered past to return in the guise of a young generation of players, to believe that the audience's past was or might be the wave of the future (or maybe, pace JSngry, they didn't consciously think it out like that but felt some sense of satisfaction about the Swing Kids thing that ran along those lines). About the racial component, I'm pretty sure that all of the Swing Kids were white, but I recall that the lineups at the Dick Gibson jazz parties, which preceded and fed into the Swing Kids thing, usually were racially mixed. On the other hand, I wouldn't be surprised if some of the black musicians at those Gibson parties were a tad creeped out by the country-club nature of much of the audience.

[JSngry]

Life moves ahead irrevocably, people less so. There's always gonna be retro-something, and no matter what, it all comes down to it being entertainment uber alles. Looking at it as anything else - pro or con - is so much "wishful thinking. On the relatively rare occasions where it successfully becomes anything else, odds are quite good that it ain't gonna be "popular", because that's introducing an extra layer of....something that the people who want to hear it ain't gonna get.

Usually.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

I think you're onto something here, MG. In particular, as you suggest in the last paragraph, what they wanted above all perhaps was for the music of their fondly remembered past to return in the guise of a young generation of players, to believe that the audience's past was or might be the wave of the future (or maybe, pace JSngry, they didn't consciously think it out like that but felt some sense of satisfaction about the Swing Kids thing that ran along those lines). About the racial component, I'm pretty sure that all of the Swing Kids were white, but I recall that the lineups at the Dick Gibson jazz parties, which preceded and fed into the Swing Kids thing, usually were racially mixed. On the other hand, I wouldn't be surprised if some of the black musicians at those Gibson parties were a tad creeped out by the country-club nature of much of the audience.

Did any of them have long hair? (After all, this WAS the seventies.) The musicians, I mean, not the country club types.

MG

[JSngry]

Or to put it another way - did the Big Bands Ever Come Back?

Well, yeah, but not like that.

But does that prevent there from still being big bands of all sorts willing to go out there and provide product? Hell no. And some of them are actually enjoyable - for what they are, on their own terms, and, unless you really really need it, for the amount of time it takes to get what it is they're giving, which ain't too terribly long.

[Larry Kart]

Life moves ahead irrevocably, people less so. There's always gonna be retro-something, and no matter what, it all comes down to it being entertainment uber alles. Looking at it as anything else - pro or con - is so much "wishful thinking. On the relatively rare occasions where it successfully becomes anything else, odds are quite good that it ain't gonna be "popular", because that's introducing an extra layer of....something that the people who want to hear it ain't gonna get.

Usually.

About "...entertainment uber alles. Looking at it as anything else - pro or con - is so much 'wishful' thinking," I demur and offer an example, the beginning of Robert Pinsky's witty long poem, "An Explanation of America":

A country is the things it wants to see.

If so, some part of me, though I do not,

Must want to see these things -- as if to say

"I want to see the calf with two heads suckle

I want to see the image of a woman

in rapid sequence of transparencies

projected on a flat bright surface, conveying

the full illusion and effect of motion

in vast varying scale, with varying focus

swallow the image of her partner's penis..." etc.

Even more to the point, though I don't have the book at hand and can't quote from this part, Pinsky goes on to recall a time when he was in rural England and visited a county fair, where he saw a group of people -- men and women of all ages, maybe some childen were there too -- eagerly paying money to go see something. Advancing through the crowd, Pinsky discovers what's up: In a muddy pit, somewhat deeper and bigger than a grave, a naked woman lies on her back. Then rats are introduced to the pit and proceed to scuttle back and forth over her body as she remains as impassive as possible, while the assembled audience raptly continues to watch. As I recall, Pinsky speculates that while he could imagine some Americans arranging such a event for their own private "amusement," he could not imagine a public American social gathering in which this was, as it clearly was in this part of rural England, a form of show business. But to speculate that this might have some wider meaning is wishful thinking? One hell of a gig, though.

[JSngry]

Well, for one thing, it shows that the potential demand for cable in rural England is probably gonna be pretty low....

[JSngry]

I'm not saying that there's no "wider meaning". There's always wider meaning. I'm just saying that what there is (or isn't) springs from the locus of entertainment.

[Larry Kart]

I'm not saying that there's no "wider meaning". There's always wider meaning. I'm just saying that what there is (or isn't) springs from the locus of entertainment.

OK -- I agree completely. But that's not what I thought you were saying before.

BTW, I remember how much fun it was at the Nuremberg Rally:

Leni, and Adolf, and me

Bundled in back of the 'Benz

Arbeit sure does macht frei

'Specially when you're among friends

Thank you -- I'll be here all week.

[Guest bluenote82]

I will say the thing that irritates me most about Hamilton isn't what he plays so much, but he doesn't play with that many other woodwind or brass instruments. I know he's played with a trombonist and a trumpter a few times, but he should really focus on a bigger musical picture. It's fine if he wants to play that kind of jazz all the time, but I would also like to hear some original compositions from him.

[Tom Storer]

You know, I lived through the late 70's/early 80's too, and the "Swing Kids" thing for me was barely a blip on the horizon. And I was a hard-core young jazz fan. Wynton and that first batch of neocons was hot, David Murray and Chico Freeman were hot; Miles was still hot although he had been out of circulation for years. Ornette and Prime Time were hot. Dexter Gordon, Johnny Griffin--hot! Comebacks! Tommy Flanagan etc. rediscovered (remember that double-album, "I Remember Bebop"?)

Meanwhile, Concord was putting out Mel Torme and George Shearing and Scott Hamilton and Gene Harris and who knows who else. I was vaguely aware of it, but I didn't pay much attention, nor did any of the twenty-something or even thirty-something jazz fans I knew. Certainly it seemed a lot more marginal to "the jazz scene" than the Pablo catalog, let alone the trendy stuff.

Obviously there was a whole slice of life I was unaware of, as concerns both the "Swing Kids" and their audience.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

About the racial component, I'm pretty sure that all of the Swing Kids were white, but I recall that the lineups at the Dick Gibson jazz parties, which preceded and fed into the Swing Kids thing, usually were racially mixed. On the other hand, I wouldn't be surprised if some of the black musicians at those Gibson parties were a tad creeped out by the country-club nature of much of the audience.

Thinking about this as I went to bed last night, I wondered whether those country club types were the same group (though perhaps not the same individuals) who filled the SS Norway for those Floating Jazz Festivals starting in the nineties, which were frequently recorded by Chiaroscuro.

Because if it is essentially the same group, by then they were clearly happy to listen to the likes of Nat Adderley, Al Grey, Red Holloway, Junior Mance, Benny Golson etc.

MG

[Larry Kart]

You know, I lived through the late 70's/early 80's too, and the "Swing Kids" thing for me was barely a blip on the horizon. And I was a hard-core young jazz fan. Wynton and that first batch of neocons was hot, David Murray and Chico Freeman were hot; Miles was still hot although he had been out of circulation for years. Ornette and Prime Time were hot. Dexter Gordon, Johnny Griffin--hot! Comebacks! Tommy Flanagan etc. rediscovered (remember that double-album, "I Remember Bebop"?)

Meanwhile, Concord was putting out Mel Torme and George Shearing and Scott Hamilton and Gene Harris and who knows who else. I was vaguely aware of it, but I didn't pay much attention, nor did any of the twenty-something or even thirty-something jazz fans I knew. Certainly it seemed a lot more marginal to "the jazz scene" than the Pablo catalog, let alone the trendy stuff.

Obviously there was a whole slice of life I was unaware of, as concerns both the "Swing Kids" and their audience.

About the racial component, I'm pretty sure that all of the Swing Kids were white, but I recall that the lineups at the Dick Gibson jazz parties, which preceded and fed into the Swing Kids thing, usually were racially mixed. On the other hand, I wouldn't be surprised if some of the black musicians at those Gibson parties were a tad creeped out by the country-club nature of much of the audience.

Thinking about this as I went to bed last night, I wondered whether those country club types were the same group (though perhaps not the same individuals) who filled the SS Norway for those Floating Jazz Festivals starting in the nineties, which were frequently recorded by Chiaroscuro.

Because if it is essentially the same group, by then they were clearly happy to listen to the likes of Nat Adderley, Al Grey, Red Holloway, Junior Mance, Benny Golson etc.

MG

I think that this was in part because some of the people who played a role in booking the SS Norway things were older be-bop oriented guys. like Joe Segal of the Jazz Showcase. And any audience that liked the Gibson Jazz Party lineups and the Swing Kids players but then turned its back on the players you mentioned would have to be pretty aggressively stupid to do so.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

You know, I lived through the late 70's/early 80's too, and the "Swing Kids" thing for me was barely a blip on the horizon. And I was a hard-core young jazz fan. Wynton and that first batch of neocons was hot, David Murray and Chico Freeman were hot; Miles was still hot although he had been out of circulation for years. Ornette and Prime Time were hot. Dexter Gordon, Johnny Griffin--hot! Comebacks! Tommy Flanagan etc. rediscovered (remember that double-album, "I Remember Bebop"?)

Meanwhile, Concord was putting out Mel Torme and George Shearing and Scott Hamilton and Gene Harris and who knows who else. I was vaguely aware of it, but I didn't pay much attention, nor did any of the twenty-something or even thirty-something jazz fans I knew. Certainly it seemed a lot more marginal to "the jazz scene" than the Pablo catalog, let alone the trendy stuff.

Obviously there was a whole slice of life I was unaware of, as concerns both the "Swing Kids" and their audience.

About the racial component, I'm pretty sure that all of the Swing Kids were white, but I recall that the lineups at the Dick Gibson jazz parties, which preceded and fed into the Swing Kids thing, usually were racially mixed. On the other hand, I wouldn't be surprised if some of the black musicians at those Gibson parties were a tad creeped out by the country-club nature of much of the audience.

Thinking about this as I went to bed last night, I wondered whether those country club types were the same group (though perhaps not the same individuals) who filled the SS Norway for those Floating Jazz Festivals starting in the nineties, which were frequently recorded by Chiaroscuro.

Because if it is essentially the same group, by then they were clearly happy to listen to the likes of Nat Adderley, Al Grey, Red Holloway, Junior Mance, Benny Golson etc.

MG

I think that this was in part because some of the people who played a role in booking the SS Norway things were older be-bop oriented guys. like Joe Segal of the Jazz Showcase. And any audience that liked the Gibson Jazz Party lineups and the Swing Kids players but then turned its back on the players you mentioned would have to be pretty aggressively stupid to do so.

Ah! Well, yes I agree. And my collection of Floating Jazz festival albums would not exist but for Joe Segal & Co, so I'm grateful.

Of course, people CAN be agressively stupid - there's no law against it

MG

[Peter Friedman]

A point that strikes me as coming through in much of this discussion is that the listeners who enjoy the playing of Scott Hamilton, and others in the so-called Concord Jazz realm, tend to not listen to those who play in very different styles. While I suppose that may be true for some, there are a significant number of serious jazz listeners for whom it is very common to listen to James P. Johnson,Coleman Hawkins, Bird, Johnny Griffin, Lee Morgan, Scott Hamilton, Junior Mance, Ruby Braff, Jackie Mclean and Howard Alden (to pick just some examples) all in the same day.

Personally, I like Scott Hamilton's playing very much, and also listen to just about all the other musicians referred to in this thread. Someone earlier stated that Scott's playing had significantly matured over the years.

That is a view that I hold.

[Guest bluenote82]

Scott's maturity is very evident in his work. When you listen to "Plays Ballads" and then go listen to "Nocturnes and Serenades" there's a quite a bit of difference in his delivery, the way he attacks the notes, his phrases are more thoughtful.

Edited February 26, 2008 by bluenote82

[Chuck Nessa]

Scott's maturity is very evident in his work. When you listen to "Plays Ballads" and then go listen to "Nocturnes and Serenades" there's a quite a bit of difference in his delievery, the way he attacks the notes, his phrases are more thoughtful.

Try spellcheck you dickhead!

[John Tapscott]

I will say the thing that irritates me most about Hamilton isn't what he plays so much, but he doesn't play with that many other woodwind or brass instruments. I know he's played with a trombonist and a trumpter a few times, but he should really focus on a bigger musical picture. It's fine if he wants to play that kind of jazz all the time, but I would also like to hear some original compositions from him.

There are many Scott Hamilton CD's I enjoy (Jazz Signatures is one that comes immediately to mind, as do Radio City and Red Door, and the one with Gene Harris.) I can't recall that he's made a poor CD though a couple have seemed a bit indifferent (Live in London). I agree with the point that it would be good to hear him as a soloist in some different settings, perhaps as the main soloist in a mini-big band or at least with two or three other horns. One good Hamilton Cd that comes to mind is "Groovin' High" with Spike Robinson and Ken Pepowski as front-line partners. I do think Scott often sounds inspired by the presence of another horn soloist. I have heard that Scott does not read music, which may account for the lack of these types of recordings and perhaps for the fact that he doesn't write much original material. (OTOH, I sometimes take it with a grain of salt when I read that a certain jazz musician doesn't read music. It was rumored that Art Pepper didn't read music. Yeah right, that's why he was able to play tough charts in bands like Stan Kenton, Shorty Rogers, Don Ellis and Buddy Rich).

Edited February 26, 2008 by John Tapscott

[Aggie87]

Scott's maturity is very evident in his work. When you listen to "Plays Ballads" and then go listen to "Nocturnes and Serenades" there's a quite a bit of difference in his delievery, the way he attacks the notes, his phrases are more thoughtful.

Try spellcheck you dickhead!

I laughed, I cried, then I laughed alot more.

[thomastreichler]

I will say the thing that irritates me most about Hamilton isn't what he plays so much, but he doesn't play with that many other woodwind or brass instruments. I know he's played with a trombonist and a trumpter a few times, but he should really focus on a bigger musical picture. It's fine if he wants to play that kind of jazz all the time, but I would also like to hear some original compositions from him.

There are many Scott Hamilton CD's I enjoy (Jazz Signatures is one that comes immediately to mind, as do Radio City and Red Door, and the one with Gene Harris.) I can't recall that he's made a poor CD though a couple have seemed a bit indifferent (Live in London). I agree with the point that it would be good to hear him as a soloist in some different settings, perhaps as the main soloist in a mini-big band or at least with two or three other horns. One good Hamilton Cd that comes to mind is "Groovin' High" with Spike Robinson and Ken Pepowski as front-line partners. I do think Scott often sounds inspired by the presence of another horn soloist. I have heard that Scott does not read music, which may account for the lack of these types of recordings and perhaps for the fact that he doesn't write much original material. (OTOH, I sometimes take it with a grain of salt when I read that a certain jazz musician doesn't read music. It was rumored that Art Pepper didn't read music. Yeah right, that's why he was able to play tough charts in bands like Stan Kenton, Shorty Rogers, Don Ellis and Buddy Rich).

Early in his career Scott Hamilton did a couple of recordings with other horns (few of them are available on cd). The following come to mind:

"Back To Back" 1978, "Scott's Buddy" 1980, both with Buddy Tate

"Scoot Hamilton And Warren Vaché With Scott's Band In New York" 1978

"Skyscrapers" 1979, nice session with a line-up of Warren Vaché, George Masso, Hamilton, Harold Ashby and Joe Temperley and arrangements by Buck Clayton, Nat Pierce and George Masso, worth to be released on cd

"Bob Wilber And The Scott Hamilton Quartet" 1977

two albums with the Concord Super Band: "In Tokyo" and "Concord Super Band 2"

"Tour De Force" 1981 with Al Cohn and Buddy Tate

Several albums with Ruby Braff: "First", "Sailboat In he Moonlight", "Ruby Braff And His New England Songhounds Vol. 1 & Vol. 2"

"Ow!", "Take 8" 1987 with the Concord Jazz All Stars (W. Vaché, Dan Barrett, Red Holloway, Dave McKenna et al)

"Sound Investment" 1987, with Flip Philips

Zoot Sims "It Had To Be You" 1984 on Gemini

and finally there is his recent collaboration with Harry Allen on "Heavy Juice" 2004