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Oscar Pettiford Nonet | Big Band | Sextet 1955 - 1958


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I'm still awaiting my copy as it was omitted accidently from my last order from Catalonia. I was hoping for some new Lucky Thompson but as I understand it , there are just arrangements rather than his playing . None the less a very interesting sounding release .

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On 19.5.2017 at 3:12 AM, Chuck Nessa said:

Have not had time to listen but the book is up to usual Uptown standards.

Hm .... somehow I feel they have gone the way of bloating things up a bit by adding too many pictures and stuff. Not critisizing the quality liner notes, mind me.

Also, at least the copies we get over here seem to have lesser quality paper used, and on top of that bootklets aren't always really cut and stapled in right angles (like, front half and back half don't really match), and with this OP set, the booklet is half a centimeter too small and bumps around inside the case.

Really weird, and really not what I expect from Uptown. And I'm mentioning this now because, alas, the OP set is the worst so far in this respect (I think I still miss one or two from the past years, but mostly have the recent releases).

But hey, most important is the music, and from my first impression, it's really good! And it's cool to have more by this band, there's not enough OP and there's never enough JR Monterose (though I found his Uptown a slight disappointment, measured by my probably exalted expectations).

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Working my way through Disc One. Band and charts (both very good and individual) are familiar from Pettiford's ABC-Paramount albums and other recordings of his. Sound is pretty good for airshots. So far, I'm struck by how much freer Gryce sounds than he does on his studio recordings of the time, and also how hip and aggressive Osie Johnson is, contrary to my impression of his IMO rather titty-boom playing on many of those RCA dates he was on. Before I looked at the personnel, I felt sure that the drummer on the nonet tracks that begin Disc One must be Shadow Wilson. Art Farmer is in very good form (e.g. on "Speculation") -- so lucid. Nice snatches of JR Monterose, though I'm surprised that the scholarly Noel Cohen refers to him in the notes as J.R. Monterose. His given name was Frank Anthony Monterose Jr. -- the "JR" stands for "Junior."

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7 hours ago, Larry Kart said:

and also how hip and aggressive Osie Johnson is, contrary to my impression of his IMO rather titty-boom playing on many of those RCA dates he was on.

Aren't you belittling Osie Johnson a bit excessively there? IMO it cannot have been a conicidence that he got booked on so many dates in that period - no doubt because he was appreciated as a supportive drummer who "fed" the soloists and got a solid swing going. On dates that certainly were no "moldy fig" dates throughout. A flashy show-off "bomb thrower" doing his own thing along the lines of "hey I can solo too whenever I want to" apparently wasn't called for (this attitude might be described as "interaction" by some but it can fast turn into working "against" the solists or horn front line in those places where it simply isn't called for). I've listened to quite a few recordings with Osie Johnson from that period and always found his presence (along with the other "usual suspects" in the rhythm section) as a sure bet for some fine, no-frills swinging groove. No mean achievement IMO.

Edited by Big Beat Steve
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Yes, "titty-boom" is what Pres said he wanted from his drummers. What Osie does on many of those RCA dates fits that phrase in another way; it's a tippy-toe, more or less circular in feel way of drumming (the polite ride cymbal beat sounds  like "titty") , with a fair number of dumpy, even at times IMO rather square, tom-tom punctuations (the "boom"). Again, more or less circular and/or enclosed in feel, not linear or leaning forwards -- almost at times as though Johnson were playing a club date or backing a lounge act. Certainly not Blakey-esque, which wouldn't have fit those musical situations of course, but also far from Kenny Clarke-like, which would have fit them quite well. In fact, when the aforementioned swing-to-bop Shadow Wilson shows up on some of those early neo-Basie RCA small group dates, it seems to me that there's a significant difference in style and degree of propulsion. In any case, my point above was that Osie Johnson on these Pettiford performances sounds like quite another drummer from the one on all those RCA dates -- loose, boldly aggressive. linear in feel, and often swinging darn hard.

I've always assumed by the way that in addition to drumming abilities/style per se, Johnson got all those studio gigs during that demanding maybe three-or-more-dates-per-24 hours era because a) he was highly reliable in every respect, especially in terms of always showing up on time and in condition to play; b) he was a good reader and had a compositional mind himself, important if in-studio adjustments needed to be made; c) he was a very compatible guy on a personal level -- witness the bond he formed with the three other members of what was virtually the house rhythm section of the NYC studio scene of that time: Hank Jones, Mil Hinton, and Barry Galbraith.

BTW, Re: what Big Beat Steve said above about Osie Johnson's playing on all those neo-Basie dates, just imagine what they would have sounded like if the drummer had been the superb and no-less stylistically compatible Gus Johnson, who certainly was no 'show-off "bomb thrower." 

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3 hours ago, bigbandrecord said:

  How much of this is Big Band ?

48 tracks, all but the first five are big band. And even the nonet sounds rather big-bandish.

P.S. Dig the announcements of what else jazz-wise is going to be broadcast live on these major radio networks (NBC and CBS) in the upcoming weeks. Lots of everything -- from Blakey to the Maynard Ferguson big band to Bobby Hackett's sextet to Sarah Vaughan and all stops in between. 

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7 hours ago, JSngry said:

Have I mentioned that I have played with Osie Johnson innumerable times, on countless occasions?

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I think you might have been better off with this one:

https://www.discogs.com/Don-Abney-Jimmy-Raney-Oscar-Pettiford-Kenny-Clarke-Jazz-Rhythm-Records-Music-Minus-One-Alto-Sax-Vol-/release/9479287

Or the one below that -- with Hank Jones, Chuck Wayne, George Duvivier, and Charlie Persip.

R-9479287-1481302650-2917.jpeg.jpg

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I have all three of those, as well as a few other MMOs of equal vintage. For whatever reason, our high school band department had them. So yeah, I borrowed them and have yet to return them.

FWIW, I could read the melodies, they came on lead sheets for C (bass and treble clefs, iirc), Bb, & Eb instruments, but didn't know shit about chords, And the MMO lead sheets had ALL the chords of a song, not just the standard lead sheet chords, they had the chords the cats on the record were actually playing. So, my young sense of harmony came about by learning to make the ear hit the right notes and THEN figuring how how that matched up to what the printed chords were. Our band director knew all this shit already, but he wasn't about to give it to u, he was just gonna let us figure it out as best as we could, or couldn't. Cost me years off my development, but gave me years on my "esthetic"

Those MMO records area ll pretty tame, but there's at least one tune on each where everybody gets a chorus. So you could learn from that too. I recently found Vol. 4 in a Hal-Price, now look who's on here? https://www.discogs.com/Music-Minus-One-Volume-4-A-Rhythm-Background-Record-For-Any-Musician-Or-Vocalist/release/4361948

 

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5 hours ago, AllenLowe said:

I need to pick this up, have an LP with only some of it. I am a big admirer of Gryce's arranging, and I assume he did a lot of the writing here? Also, I would assume Dick Katz is on piano on a lot of this?

Hank Jones on piano on 2 broadcasts

Dick Katz on 3 of the broadcasts.

Hod O'Brian on 2 of the broadcasts.

Unknown piano on 1 broadcast.

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I'm still looking for one track OP played with Eddie Costa, "Taking a Chance On Love", although I doubt it's on this compilation.

I know it's on OP's LP, "Discoveries", but that has only been released on vinyl, and it's both hard to find, and very expensive, considering I just want ONE track.

I've heard it was an extra track from the "Winner's Circle" LP, which I finally found.

It would be ideal if someone put that out on CD with the extra Costa/Pettiford track, because the sound on the LP is terrible.

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6 hours ago, AllenLowe said:

I need to pick this up, have an LP with only some of it. I am a big admirer of Gryce's arranging, and I assume he did a lot of the writing here? Also, I would assume Dick Katz is on piano on a lot of this?

Gryce arranged 15 tracks; however, quite a few are different takes from different nights of the same pieces -- e.g. four takes of "Nica's Tempo," four of "Smoke Signal." I haven't found this to be annoyingly repetitous, others may disagree.

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Although the notes list most of the band as "unknown" for the first set on disc 2 the announcers (who are in some studio, not in the club) claim that Art Farmer and Jimmy Cleveland are playing.  Could Art be the unknown trumpet soloist on Falcon's lair? 

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Listening to this today. It's fun, and in many ways seems quaint by today's standards, not just some of the arrangements, but the whole broadcast presentation. One the whole, I like it much more than the studio equivalents of the same material. Have not looked at the details yet, who played lead trumpet on the first selections?

Also, happy as hell to hear a bit of the Monitor Beacon at the end of one broadcast. I use that as the ringtone on my phone.

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