77 replies to this topic

[ghost of miles]

According to the new issue of Downbeat, Blue Note's got a 1969 concert date of Freddie's on the way this spring. Band includes Roland Hanna on piano, Ron Carter on bass, and Louis Hayes on drums.

Edited by ghost of miles, 10 March 2009 - 10:07 PM.

[Free For All]

It's 2/3 of the Hub of Hubbard rhythm section(Carter in for Richard Davis)- excellent! Sounds like a good one!

[chewy]

is this true BN archival material a la Mozambique, or is it just something they prostituted


ps- now playing: Gerald Wilson: "Orchestra of the 80s"!!!

[ghost of miles]

is this true BN archival material a la Mozambique, or is it just something they prostituted

DB article states, "Producer Michael Cuscuna said that he unearthed the tapes last year..." but that's pretty much it. My first inclination was to be surprised if BN was doing much on-location concert recording in Europe circa 1969, but more knowledgeable sources here might be able to offer different speculation or insights... Mobley's THE FLIP was recorded in Paris by Jacques Yves Barral in July of 1969 and produced by Francis Wolff--so maybe this is a BN-commissioned recording?

Edited by ghost of miles, 10 March 2009 - 10:16 PM.

[BFrank]

Sounds intriguing, for sure. Hope there's something to it.

[jay2b2]

From the Lord discography:

Freddie Hubbard (tp) Sir Roland Hanna (p) Ron Carter (b) Louis Hayes (d)
Concerts, Germany, December 1969
Body and soul Blue Note BST89905
Without a song (unissued)
Hub-tones -
Spacetrack -

BST89905 was "Jazz Wave Ltd. On Tour."

[Rooster_Ties]

Yup, that's gotta be it.

Just dug out my BN discography (2001 edition), and there it is on page 235, just as jay2b2's typed up for us (thanks!).

So, I guess that makes this an actual BN project, from the very beginning (i.e. non-prostituted).


Gack! - what a cover...

Edited by Rooster_Ties, 10 March 2009 - 11:16 PM.

[clifford_thornton]

Will the reissue include the other material from that set or constitute only Freddie Hubbard? It might be worth it if only Hubbard but the remainder barely registers a tug...

[chewy]

if it has anything to do with The Flip, im all over it

[sidewinder]

Will the reissue include the other material from that set or constitute only Freddie Hubbard? It might be worth it if only Hubbard but the remainder barely registers a tug...

My guess would be the Hubbard material only. The rest of 'Jazz Wave' includes material by Thad & Mel, Kenny Burrell, Jimmy McGriff and Jeremy Steig - a bit of a hotch-potch. The original sound wasn't the greatest either but I'll check the LPs later today to re-aquaint with the Hubbard performance. I personally thought the Thad & Mel performance on this one was the best.

Edited by sidewinder, 11 March 2009 - 01:28 AM.

[Free For All]

Will the reissue include the other material from that set or constitute only Freddie Hubbard? It might be worth it if only Hubbard but the remainder barely registers a tug...

My guess would be the Hubbard material only. The rest of 'Jazz Wave' includes material by Thad & Mel, Kenny Burrell, Jimmy McGriff and Jeremy Steig - a bit of a hotch-potch. The original sound wasn't the greatest either but I'll check the LPs later today to re-aquaint with the Hubbard performance. I personally thought the Thad & Mel performance on this one was the best.

What tunes comprised the Thad & Mel portion?

"hotch-potch" = "hodge-podge" over here. Go figure!

[sidewinder]

"hotch-potch" = "hodge-podge" over here. Go figure!

Some 17th-Century colonial must have got his/her words screwed up when they stepped on shore in Virginia


Thad & Mel's band are do 'Don't Get Sassy' on side 1 of this 2LP set and they join up with Steig, Hubbard, McGriff and Burrell on Thad's 'Once Around' on side 4.

The set is titled 'Volume 1' but I would guess poor sales precluded Vols 2 onwards back in the day. It's a Sonny Lester production by the way so the original intention may have been to issue it on Solid State.

Edited by sidewinder, 11 March 2009 - 03:29 AM.

[BillF]

Thad & Mel's band are do 'Don't Get Sassy' on side 1 of this 2LP set and they join up with Steig, Hubbard, McGriff and Burrell on Thad's 'Once Around' on side 4.

That collection of names rings a bell. I saw a package at the Free Trade Hall, Manchester in the late 70s that included the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orch, Freddie Hubbard, Richard Williams, Jimmy McGriff and Jeremy Steig - no Kenny Burrell, though! I don't remember the year, just the month - November - as fog at Manchester Airport had separated the band from their uniforms and charts, so it was jamming in informal dress. What date do you have for the recordings? Were they taped live at a concert somewhere?

Edited by BillF, 11 March 2009 - 04:07 AM.

[sidewinder]

as fog at Manchester Airport

In these times of global financial catastrophe, some things never change !

Yes Bill, it would have been the same tour. The sleeve note mentions that the tour was produced and directed by Sonny Lester (hence the line-up of Solid State artists of the time) - recorded in Germany (just says 1969, no firm date - although mention of fog would seem to pin point it at Feb/March/April) and that the concert tour covered 10 days and spanned Italy, England, France and Denmark as well as Germany. Nice one ! (although it's a real shame that Thad & Mel's band arrangements went AWOL for this visit. A jam on some of their charts of the time e.g. 'Balanced Scales = Justice' would have been a challenge and a half).

This 2LP set was bought from the upstairs top shelf (and rarely perused) racks of latter-day Mole Jazz in Kings Cross for £1 - absolutely covered in 30 years of dust and crud but once cleaned up it sounded fine. I sneezed non-stop for about a week though.

Edited by sidewinder, 11 March 2009 - 03:56 AM.

[sidewinder]

Wasn't 'Without A Song' also one of the tracks on Freddie's 'The Hub Of Hubbard' recorded for MPS/SABA around this time (along with Eddie Daniels)?

[david weiss]

Just finished writing the liner notes to this last week....
Me and Freddie listened to this together numerous times last year and he picked all the tracks (and I'm pretty sure it's the order he wanted as well)
It's killing stuff. The material is taken from three concerts that were recorded during this tour (Jazz Wave on tour with all the other groups mentioned above). Freddie also recorded Hub of Hubbard during this tour (Richard Davis and Eddie Daniels are borrowed from the Thad and Mel band, I guess Ron Carter didn't want to do it) and the Richard Davis record. Below are the credits. There is some more material but not much. He did 35 minute sets, three tunes a set.



FREDDIE HUBBARD – WITHOUT A SONG

Live In Europe 1969


FREDDIE HUBBARD, trumpet; ROLAND HANNA, piano;

RON CARTER, bass; LOUIS HAYES, drums.



1. Without A Song – 11:05 (Eliscu-Rose-Youmans)

2. The Things We Did Last Summer 11:23 (S. Cahn-J. Styne)

3. A Night In Tunisia 10:36 (D. Gillespie-F. Paparelli)

4. Blues By Five 9:47 (Red Garland)

5. Body And Soul 10:08 (Green-Heyman-Sour)

6. Space Track 12:07 (Freddie Hubbard)

7. Hub-tones 4:38 (Freddie Hubbard)





Original recordings produced by Sonny Lester

Produced for release by Michael Cuscuna

Original remote recordings by Malcolm Addey

Tracks 2-4 recorded at Colston Hall, Bristol, England on December 14, 1969

Tracks 1 & 7 recorded at Royal Festival Hall, London, England on December 13, 1969

Track 5 & 6 recorded in Germany in early December 1969 and remixed at A & R Studios, New York City in 1970

Remixed and mastered using 24 bit technology by Malcolm Addey at the Malcolm Addey Studio, New York City in 2008.



“Body And Soul” was previously issued on Jazz Wave (Blue Note BST 89905) in 1970. All other selections are issued here for the first time.

Edited by david weiss, 11 March 2009 - 04:04 AM.

[sidewinder]

Thanks for the details David and looking forward to both reading your notes on this and hearing the music. Remixed and mastered by the maestro, Malcolm Addey too. Splendid !

'The Things We Did Last Summer' was also a stand-out track on 'Hub of Hubbard' with Freddie on flugel horn - it will be fascinating to hear this alternative version.

[JSngry]

"Industry sources" tell me that Freddie got his money for this release in advance, before he died, in order to defray medical expenses, and that there are also plans to, if possible, "overpress" so tha tFreddie's widow will get a much-needed publishing royalty upfront.

In other words, this ain't no cheap exploitation release.

As for the rest of the Jazz Wave Ltd. concerts, that's something I had asked Cuscun about a long time ago, specificiallyto find out if there was more of Joe Henderson playing w/Thad & MEl (the one released cut is smokin', as they say...). He said then that there were money issues on that tour, and no small amount of bad feelings towards Sonny Lester as a result, so probably no further issue of JWL material.

But here we are. Time changes things sometimes,

[Dan Gould]

Excellent news - but a small part of me was hoping this would be a commercial release of the Hubbard - Junior Cook - Cedar Walton group of a couple years later.

[david weiss]

"Industry sources" tell me that Freddie got his money for this release in advance, before he died, in order to defray medical expenses, and that there are also plans to, if possible, "overpress" so tha tFreddie's widow will get a much-needed publishing royalty upfront.

In other words, this ain't no cheap exploitation release.

As for the rest of the Jazz Wave Ltd. concerts, that's something I had asked Cuscun about a long time ago, specificiallyto find out if there was more of Joe Henderson playing w/Thad & MEl (the one released cut is smokin', as they say...). He said then that there were money issues on that tour, and no small amount of bad feelings towards Sonny Lester as a result, so probably no further issue of JWL material.

But here we are. Time changes things sometimes,

Sorry, but this isn't really correct. The release of this has been in the works for a while, over a year.
Freddie and I listened to these recordings last January (2008) while we were working on our last CD together (we were doing post production stuff in LA and we played this stuff in the car to and from the studio every day, he loved it). The takes were chosen and mixed over the Summer I believe and Freddie asked for some changes to be made in the order after he received the first master. This was all done way before he had his heart attack. He was paid for the relase of this of course and in advance which is the norm for this and it had nothing to do with medical expenses as he wasn't hospitalized yet.
Now the overpress thing, that would be nice and this hasn't been mentioned to me so I can't say for sure.
I think I know who your source is and I personally took a lot of the information I used to get from him with a grain of salt....
Forgot Henderson was on the Thad and Mel stuff. That would make it well worth investigating and as you said time does change things...... perhaps another call is in order

[king ubu]

This is great news!


And a note on this one:

As for the rest of the Jazz Wave Ltd. concerts, that's something I had asked Cuscun about a long time ago, specificiallyto find out if there was more of Joe Henderson playing w/Thad & MEl (the one released cut is smokin', as they say...). He said then that there were money issues on that tour, and no small amount of bad feelings towards Sonny Lester as a result, so probably no further issue of JWL material.

certainly you're aware of this smokin' live disc featuring Henderson:



an excellent disc, all 'round!

[mikeweil]

I'm not that much of a Hubbard fan, but always thought the two MPS LPs to be excellent (and I'm glad I still have them) and wished for that Jazz Wave tour material to be released on CD in a more complete form. I will buy this one.

Edited by mikeweil, 11 March 2009 - 02:30 PM.

[andybleaden]

cool colston hall in bristol ..that was near where I grew up..i might have to nab this one as I have not bought any jazz for a while

Edited by andybleaden, 11 March 2009 - 08:46 AM.

[Clunky]

Now the overpress thing, that would be nice and this hasn't been mentioned to me so I can't say for sure.

I'll be up for this release for sure, but what is overpress ?

[fasstrack]

Granted any excuse for previously unreleased good music is a good one for the listener/fan/player. Having said this, interesting timing, ain't it? Freddie hadn't recorded for Blue Note for years. I can hear the wheels turning over there and naturally they were holding out for just such a sad (not to them, evidently) occasion.

They would never exploit a world-class artist like this with the body still warm anywhere else in the jazz-loving world but here. That's a fact

Seems death is a good career move.

[clifford_thornton]

That seems heavy-handed.

...........


And I really have a "thing" for trumpet-and-rhythm combos. I look quite forward to this. And will keep an eye out for the Thad-Mel-Henderson disc, thanks Ubu.

[jazzbo]

Especially since David Weiss above states that the release has been long-planned.

[JSngry]

"Industry sources" tell me that Freddie got his money for this release in advance, before he died, in order to defray medical expenses, and that there are also plans to, if possible, "overpress" so tha tFreddie's widow will get a much-needed publishing royalty upfront.

In other words, this ain't no cheap exploitation release.

As for the rest of the Jazz Wave Ltd. concerts, that's something I had asked Cuscun about a long time ago, specificiallyto find out if there was more of Joe Henderson playing w/Thad & MEl (the one released cut is smokin', as they say...). He said then that there were money issues on that tour, and no small amount of bad feelings towards Sonny Lester as a result, so probably no further issue of JWL material.

But here we are. Time changes things sometimes,

Sorry, but this isn't really correct. The release of this has been in the works for a while, over a year.
Freddie and I listened to these recordings last January (2008) while we were working on our last CD together (we were doing post production stuff in LA and we played this stuff in the car to and from the studio every day, he loved it). The takes were chosen and mixed over the Summer I believe and Freddie asked for some changes to be made in the order after he received the first master. This was all done way before he had his heart attack. He was paid for the relase of this of course and in advance which is the norm for this and it had nothing to do with medical expenses as he wasn't hospitalized yet.
Now the overpress thing, that would be nice and this hasn't been mentioned to me so I can't say for sure.
I think I know who your source is and I personally took a lot of the information I used to get from him with a grain of salt....
Forgot Henderson was on the Thad and Mel stuff. That would make it well worth investigating and as you said time does change things...... perhaps another call is in order

I'll take your word on all this, David.

Edited by JSngry, 11 March 2009 - 09:21 PM.

[JSngry]

This is great news!


And a note on this one:

As for the rest of the Jazz Wave Ltd. concerts, that's something I had asked Cuscun about a long time ago, specificiallyto find out if there was more of Joe Henderson playing w/Thad & MEl (the one released cut is smokin', as they say...). He said then that there were money issues on that tour, and no small amount of bad feelings towards Sonny Lester as a result, so probably no further issue of JWL material.

certainly you're aware of this smokin' live disc featuring Henderson:



an excellent disc, all 'round!

Certainly and indeed, but for my taste, Joe's contribution to the JWL is far superior than what he does on that one.

[sidewinder]

cool colston hall in bristol ..

Saw Woody Herman there in about 1978. I wonder if 'Free' was in the band?