Michael Weiss

From someone who plays, lives and breathes this music, I highly recommend Karol Szymanowski's Masques, Metopes, Mazurkas, 3rd Piano Sonata, and Etudes, op. 33, among other works. Recordings by Marc Andre Hamelin on Hyperion and Pietr Andreszewski (Virgin Classics) AND Samuil Feinberg's sonatas, especially #2 through #9 (out of 12) Recorded (many exclusively) by Christophe Sirodeau, and Nikolaos Samaltanos on these two volumes In terms of harmonic, rhythmic and melodic complexity -- I used to say if Chopin is (for comparison purposes only!, the classical equivalent of) Bird, then Scriabin is Trane. Now I say if Scriabin is Bird, then Szymanowski and Feinberg are Trane. I also highly recommend Jenny Lin's "Preludes To a Revolution" on Hanssler

My favorite is Michael Rudy, Op. 62 through 74, on Calliope

H) Stick around for the next week's band at the Vanguard

Tonight at Carnegie Hall: St. Louis Symphony, David Robertson conducting Messiaen: Turangalila Symphonie

Thanks for the well wishes everybody! After six straight nights at the Vanguard with the big band, I thought Sunday would be a quiet evening dining out with the mrs. but was called back into service for another night, which was recorded live. Thanks Chris for the artwork! I'll have my quintet at Music Hall in Detroit, May 23-24. Maybe see you guys there?

The Captain Walter Dyett of his day. My school competed with Kashmere in the mid 70s in Brownwood, TX. A great opportunity to hear what a great HS band can sound like.

A Love Supreme (okay, it's not a song...)

I've got an original LP of the Riverside date - Lenny McBrowne and the Four Souls: Eastern Lights with liner notes by Chris Albertson

Howard said that he and Hank would often sit together in Slug's listening to different bands. Cedar recently told me about a night at Slugs he worked with KD and Hank, where because of some beef, Hank and KD refused to play together the whole night. Shifting the topic away from Hank for the moment ------ I played for most of last Friday night's benefit for George Cables, and started off playing with Louis Hayes, Rufus Reid and Sonny Fortune. On the break I was playing a number of Horace tunes for Louis (Blowing the Blues Away was my first jazz record) and Howard overheard me, so he told me this story: When Howard was out of the service he visited a friend who was rooming in Tony Williams' family's house. This was 1959, when Tony was 14. Howard accompanied Tony to a gig that Alan Dawson was on with the Neves brothers. Alan had Tony sit in on drums so Alan could play vibes. They played Horace's "Baghdad Blues" which must have just come out – dig the impact Horace's writing had at the time. Tony knew the tune inside out, setting up the hit on 4 on the fourth bar several measures ahead!

Last night, Howard Johnson was telling me that Duke Pearson was trying to discourage Hank from having the tuba double those wide interval bass lines.

Just saw Earl at a New Years day party - as in four days ago. He seemed totally fine. WTF?

Hi Valerie, Can you recall the tunes they played? I'm very curious. Wayne's arrangements of older tunes (Children of the Night, Serenata, Orbits, Angola, etc..) are as intricate, fleshed out and exciting as his new material.

Lou Donaldson and Conrad Herwig are both serious.

Griff told me their group added about seven new tunes to their repertoire each week. First Griff and Jaws would get the arrangements together by themselves then they'd rehearse with the rhythm section. Griff often had difficulty learning his notes from Jaws because they weren't notes - just sounds!

I practice a lot of classical music at home - Scriabin, Feinberg, Messiaen, Szymanowski, Alexandrov - all music with the kind of harmonies, melodies and rhythms a jazz musician can salivate over. But every time I've thought about arranging one of these pieces for my group, the idea doesn't sit well, kind of like heartburn; the original always sounds so much better in its own context. So it was with no small degree of satisfaction to finally be able to conceptualize an arrangement of a Roslavets prelude for my group (Largo, 1915) which we'll record next year. Here's a short sample (of the original) from here: I used to play a nice arrangement of Scriabin's prelude for left hand alone (Op. 9) with Art Farmer. I think it was arranged by Fritz Pauer.

Can't remember if this was posted before with Kenny Washington and Dennis Irwin October, 1985 The Angry Squire, NYC I have cassettes of this gig somewhere.

Kind of embarrassing that it took the Times 9 days after his death for the obit. I was wondering if it was going to come out at all.

Here's another:

The restaurant of our hotel in Venice was a favorite spot of Nono. It's kind of hard to make out but here's a photo of a score that was framed on the wall:

Tonight's the night. (apologies to Rod Stewart)

I played with Marchel in the early 70s while in high school, and since then, everytime I'd return to Dallas. We played several gigs together throughout the years, including a duo just six months ago. Had no idea he was even sick...WTF! Marchel was a beautiful straight up guy and a wonderful player. RIP

New Yorkers come by and say hello. This time around I'll have Paul Gill and Dennis Mackrel.

I'll be giving a composition workshop on Saturday at 4:00pm in the Sutton Place Suite: Get More Out of Your Tunes: Transform Your Songs Into Full-fledged Compositions Here's a link to the schedule: JazzImprov Live 2007

This looks like being the latest (from 1979) reissue, on vinyl: Can't trace a CD appearance! That's what I thought. What a shame. I use that record (along with solo Bud and solo Barry Harris on Riverside) as a primer for my piano students learning how to play solo without striding.

Was the 1956 solo Savoy ever released on CD?