Andre Francis 1925-2019

[brownie]

French radio producer André Francis died Tuesday in his sleep.

His voice appears on dozens of recordings including Miles Davis-Tadd Dameron in Paris in 1949.

[ghost of miles]

5 hours ago, brownie said:

French radio producer André Francis died Tuesday in his sleep.

His voice appears on dozens of recordings including Miles Davis-Tadd Dameron in Paris in 1949.

Is this him, at the beginning of this audio clip?

 

[sidewinder]

Didn’t he also do the spoken intro to ‘Miles at Antibes’?   More familiar with that - RIP.

Edited February 14, 2019 by sidewinder

[brownie]

That's André Francis too...

He aslso appears on the récent French Swing CD Thelonious Monk Paris 1954 where he extracts à couplé of words from Monk .

He also introduced the live recording of Coltrane's Love Supreme at the Antibes festival.

 

[sidewinder]

Ah yes, I recall hearing him on that Coltrane Antibes recording. I think also on that Hutcherson/Land recording at Antibes too.

[Big Beat Steve]

9 hours ago, brownie said:

That's André Francis too...

He aslso appears on the récent French Swing CD Thelonious Monk Paris 1954 where he extracts à couplé of words from Monk .

He also introduced the live recording of Coltrane's Love Supreme at the Antibes festival.

 

So that's him too introducing the Swedish group (that made such a hit there) at the 1949 festival (as released on Dragon)?  (Those Swedish names were a handful to handle for the announcer, it seems... ) Listening to both live recordings in a row provides an even better impression of the entire concert. (Edit: Listening to the recordings now. I am not sure if it is Francais or Maurice Cullaz - see below - who introduced the group. There is a second speaker who does an "outro" at the end of "All The Things You Are" but who is who of the two?)

14 hours ago, ghost of miles said:

Is this him, at the beginning of this audio clip?

 

Quote from the liner notes: "Such was the curiosity and eagerness with which this concert was attended that the (unknown) announcer in charge got carried away by the general excitement and grew so lyrical he had to be interrupted by another one who stuck more closely to the facts." That "other one" was Maurice Cullaz so Francis must have been the lyrical one?

Poor Barney ... not entitled to having his first name mentioned ... Puzzling at first but apparently a sign of the times. For some reason it was not unknown in France at that time not to mention the first name of a musician when stating line-ups/band personnel. Something that you often notice when reading early post-war issues of Jazz Hot but this does read decidedly odd today. As if this was influenced by football (soccer) match coverages? And reserved for the "lesser lights" (sidemen) in a group line-up?

Edited February 14, 2019 by Big Beat Steve