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Gerald Wilson Guarachi-Guara


Mark Stryker

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Can everybody tell I'm writing about Gerald Wilson at the moment?

Today's mystery has to do with the Afro-Cuban piece called "Guarachi-Guaro." Tom Lord's discography says Wilson's band recorded this in 1947  on Excelsior 542 with the title spelled "Guarchi" (Parts 1 and 2). However, in the Chronological Classics series devoted to Wilson, the CD1946-54 shows this having been recorded in 1949 -- I'm going by the back cover, which I can see online. I don't have the CD itself to see if there's more specific discography notes insides.

So, which is correct? And who wrote the song itself?

More fodder: Dizzy Gillespie  famously recorded the same arrangement for Victor in December 1948 and had been playing it since the fall of that year. It's always spoken of as a chart that that Wilson wrote for Dizzy. The label credits Dizzy with the composition and Gerald with the arrangement. Is the melody Dizzy's or is it a traditional song that was "adapted." Or is it Gerald's. The dates matter. If indeed Wilson wrote the chart in 1947, then that's REALLY early Afro-Cuban jazz --contemporary with even preceding the recordings of  "Manteca" and "Cubana be/Cubano bop," which were done in December 1947.

One more intriguing note: Wilson's recording includes both flute and oboe. Who in the band would have been playing those woodwinds in that era? The great Bill Green -- a pioneering black studio musician  played both instruments and he worked a lot with Wilson later (he's on Big Band Modern in 1954 and appears in the later bands on Pacific Jazz). But Green is not listed in discographies that I've seen as playing with Wilson in the '40s.

Thanks as always for the research assistance or informed speculation.

 

 

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This is what's "inside" the booklet: ;)

29176549ww.jpg

 

Not sure if this provides any additional info vs what you have and know, but maybe an expert on Excelsor matrix numbers can shed some light on the likely recording date?

And as for the flute, considering ths line-up I'd vote for Buddy Collette, of course. ;)

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Thanks. Lord has this entire session and those four sides as 1947. I tried digging into the matrix numbers  via online discographies and ended up with no good info but a pretty reasonable headache.

Hmm, thinking more about this: Wilson rather famously shut down his first band in 1947 because he wanted to study more. A 1949 recording date doesn't make sense in the context of that timeline -- yet it does make sense viz other factors like the Afro-Cuban angle.

Speaking of headaches ...

Edited by Mark Stryker
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More: Entry for Buddy Collette in first edition of "Encyclopedia of Jazz" says he played with Gerald Wilson 1949-50. Supports the later date -- though this book is by no means infallible, but it was the players themselves I believe who filled out questionnaires with career detaiks for inclusion.

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17 hours ago, Mark Stryker said:

Thanks. Lord has this entire session and those four sides as 1947. I tried digging into the matrix numbers  via online discographies and ended up with no good info but a pretty reasonable headache.

Hmm, thinking more about this: Wilson rather famously shut down his first band in 1947 because he wanted to study more. A 1949 recording date doesn't make sense in the context of that timeline -- yet it does make sense viz other factors like the Afro-Cuban angle.

Speaking of headaches ...

The correct title of the tune is Guarachi Guaro - it was one of the last, maybe the very last piece that Chano Pozo wrote, probably in collaboration with Dizzy Gillespie like his other contributions to the band book. The chronological list of Pozo's compositions in the booklet to the 3 disc documentary on Tumbao, "El tambor de Cuba", dates it to 1948, alongside Tin Tin Deo.The latter was recorded by James Moody for Blue Note on October 25, 1948. Pozo did not live to do do a studio recording of Guarachi Guaro with Gillespie as he was killed on December 2, 1948; his successor Sabu Martinez played on the Victor session on December 29, 1948.  

The likely opportunity for Wilson to meet the Gillespie band and and hand them the sheet music was their Californian tour in July, 1948. It was a Gene Norman produced event, I do not know when the first recordings of the Pasadena Concert were released, but anyway, Guarachi Guaro was not among them. The earlest known recording of the tune is from a Royal Roost broadcast made October 2, 1948. In the credits to Gillespie's complete Victor recordings the arrangement is credited to Wilson, the tune to Gillespie alone, which is incorrect; Dizzy copyrighted the tune (you can't pay a dead man any royalties). Insiders always knew it was Chano's tune.  Other recordingsof it from later October and November broadcasts are still unissued. From these facts and the few discographical data I find about Excelsior releases I find 1949 a plausible date. 

The difficult Cuban Spanish pronounciation caused many misspellings, up to Guacha Guaro and even Wachi Waro - try to transcribe it from the vocals on the Gillespie record ...

Edited by mikeweil
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What Anatol Schenker writes in the liner to Chronological Classics CD 1444, "Gerald Wilson & his Orchestra 1946-1954" confirms my assumption:

"After Wilson broke up his band he carried out his intention of studying by joining Count Basie's big band for a while in 1948, as well as with regular appearances backing Dizzy Gillespie the following year. Playing with and learning from Gillespie audibly inspired the scores recorded in 1949 with another outstanding collection of seasoned West Coast studio musicians."

So Wison wrote his chart on Guarachi Guaro while with Gillespie in 1948/49. That Pozo was not co-credited for the tune was not a smart move by Dizzy, who knew that Chano had a sister in Cuba and a brother Chino in the USA who could have benefitted from the royalties. After Cal Tjader made the tune a hit in 1954 that must have been a considerable sum .... There is none of all this in Dizzy's autobiography - Wilson is only mentioned in passing (as a trombonist!), and his account of Chano's death is inaccurate (see the Tumbao box set for proper documentation).

Edited by mikeweil
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On 12.5.2017 at 6:43 PM, Big Beat Steve said:

29176549ww.jpg

BTW - there is an uncredited bongo player heard on S'Mada and Guarachi Guaro - they way he plays shows he is not a Cuban but some jazz drummer trying to pick up some things - for someone like me who studied Cuban percussion it is always hard  to listen to these ramblings. Dizzy had a young but sufficiently experienced Cuban conguero in Sabu Martinez. There are noticeable differences between both versions - Wilsons's later version is expanded and has oboe/flute duets showing he listened to the Machito orchestra (it recorded several tracks with an oboe lead). 

Edited by mikeweil
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