Gheorghe

Thank you for your answer. Sorry to say, I don´t know his song "I´m Hip" and it seems I wasn´t so well informed about jazzy and humorous caberet-ish singers etc, since at that age I was completly into jazz pure and didn´t listen to anything else. Now being a bit older I can get fun out of contemporary german/austrian shlager like DJ Ötzi, Ben Zucker since my wife likes it very much and it´s the music we dance and make garden partys even if it´s only us two, thats the finest thing to enjoy live without always needin company... For my own interest and playing efforts it remained jazz, so the only association I had was that Miles album (anyway my wife bought it for me once for birthday ).

I think I know him only from one track he did with Miles, I think on "Quiet Nights" or so.... But......he died more than 3 years ago ?!

Mingus had so many different periods, I mean the early days of the workshop, the blues and gospel thing in the late 50´s early 60´s , then a period I don´t like so much when he played more piano and let somebody else play the bass, and then THE GREATEST BAND and greatest music. Everything after that became a disappointment, until 1975 with Adams and Pullen, and then Walrath Ricky Ford Bob Neloms.... So this album has the two very best bands that Mingus had.

Is it possible that Johnny O´Neal played with Blakey´s Jazzmessengers for a short time ? I think he was the pianist in summer 83, when I saw a Messenger Group with I think I remember Terence Blanchard, Donald Harrison, Jean Touissant, Johnny O´Neal and Lonnie Plaxico ? I remember that event because Dizzy sat in for "Wee", (but only scatting, no tp maybe due to contractual reasons). In the course of a ballad medley I think Johnny O´Neal played "Summertime", a very fine version. After that I haven´t seen him any more here in Austria.

Ich Dir auch. Interessant, Fischerkumpels hab ich jede Menge, Jazz .....einfach passive sind selten , viel schon gestorben. Die mit denen ich spiel, ja , aber weißt eh, covid und so.... nix mit spielen....

Max Roach Speak Brother Speak is fantastic. I bought it after first seeing Max Roach live. It had another cover than (AMERICA Label). The other two albums I don´t know, never heard the names....

Thanks, usually I have, I do that hobby (I´d say passion) since 50 years. My best combination was friends who shared BOTH interests (fishing and jazz) with me. One died, the other lost interest in both things. When I called him on his 60th Birthday to talk a bit about "the good old times" he stated that he left behind him everything that was intersting for him earlier...., well things happen, but in my case, if I´m stuck to a thing, I´m "hooked" for my whole life.

Oh I remember this. Somehow, Supersax was quite en vogue in 77/78 and so. But I must admit after the first listening I didn´t spin it much after that. But a good idea, I might save some of it on USP and listen in the car while driving to fishing, that´s some nice swinging stuff , maybe the rhythm section sounds a bit metronomic....

First I was more than puzzled when I saw a thread "Hutch RIP" since I thought I remember he died many years ago. I love Hutcherson very very much and of course have many of his and saw him live of course. This album I didn´t get, Amazon said its OOP when I wanted to buy it. But it seemed to have on it some members I saw with Hutch in that conception (maybe Herbie Lewis ? ) among others. I saw live an incredible Allstar quartet with McLean, Hutch, Herbie Lewis and Billy Higgins !!!!!!!!! What a shame they didn´t make an album, it would have been one of the greatests, since the concert was one of the greatests I ever saw....., I still have the music in my head how it was played....

I didn´t purchase it when it was for sale, since I had that fix that I only buy albums of a complete session, no "left-overs". I was even reluctant buying BN albums that were previously unissued or rejected, since they often disappointed me, like McLean´s "Tippin the Scales", like Freddie Redd´s unissued album with that blurry ensembles and weak trumpet and drums..., So I forgot about this. Later I considered buying it for the Tadd Dameron tracks, but rejected the idea after reading some reviews about it. Only, it would have been the last occasion of Dameron playing himself, before he became too ill to touch the keys of a piano....(see "Magic Touch")

Well what to say.....thank you ! "Like usual"........ nothing usual here. I´m not the youngest and not so hip to all the gimmicks on the PC, especially with pics, covers and so. But in change, I can tell very much about music and musicians. Now, with your help that I appreciate, I saw who´s playing and what they are playing. I could tell you what the titles of the songs mean in english, and some of the musicians I suggested and even got to know, are on this sampler. Marius Popp, Dan Mândrilă and first of all Johnny Răducanu.... something like a "father" of romanian jazz. He told us stories about Mingus, about Monk, Diz, whom he knew personally since they played in București in 1972, he wrote a book about his live (in romanian language) which I have or had. Female singer Aura Urzicianu later emigrated in Canada I think....., well I was not a too big fan of her, too much shooby dooby scattin´ .....

Thank you all for your great contributions on my thread. I´m so glad to read all this. And I´m glad that the "bumpin´" of a 14year old thread about Stitt could not slow down the action goin on here. Thank you for mentioning the video of McGhee-J.J.Johnson-Stitt-Bishop-Tommy Potter-Klook from the mid 60´s. I also have that. Sonny Stitt and J.J. and Klook are brilliant as ever, and it was a surprise for me that veteran bassist Tommy Potter played again, even doing a great solo. Howard McGhee doesn´t sound as fluid as he sounded in the bop era, he seems to have lost some of his chops. And Walter Bishop plays a completly other style than he did with Bird. It sounds more like Bobby Timmons I think. Here is an album from about the same time, maybe the same tour, but without J.J. (probably for contractual reasons): "Night Work".

I´ve heard about that ban on visiting Americans during that time, but never understood it. We European musicians anyway are or were first of all "students" of that beautiful American form of art, like let´s say here in Viena you see japanese girls runnin´ around with small and big fiddles to study the music of Beethoven and all that historic European stuff, though they are from another continent. So cuttin´ them out and exclude them from playing in a european country is really a heavy thing. Is this ´cause they were "jealous" ? But thanks God it didn´t last long. Later, UK was one of the best places to listen to good concerts, all them greats at Ronnie Scott´s , and music halls......, all the greats played in UK Who´s playing on the Romanian Jazz from the Electrecord Archives 66-78? I got to know some Romanian jazz musicians and saw a lot of them on Festivals in Sibiu and Costinești . One of the older was Johnny Răducanu, who also wrote a book about his live (în limba română -romanian language) , others was Mircea Tiberian, Marius Pop, Harry Tavitian with Corneliu Stroe (duo creativ) , the vocal jazz quartet from Sibiu (Nicolae Ionescu, who died in the 90´s and I knew him well), now the in western Europe living Nicolae Simion, and lots of others , but I haven´t heard that eastern european jazz lately ..... One of my favourite Joe Henderson records. About the time when I heard him first. I love it !

Sure a bunch of great musicians. Maybe if I would have lived around that time, I might have attended those JATP events just to see all those giants. But I am too young and was born in 1959, so when I started to listen to jazz, it was more in the chronological order from mid -fourties on. And 1955 for me is mostly Miles forming his quintet with Trane, Cliff Brown and all the upcoming BN-artists like Mobley, Blakey, Horace Silver, Lee Morgan, Sonny Rollins and all of them. Really Allstar Bands were very rare when I started in the 70´s. Giants of Jazz was finished, oh yeah, the one I really remind was VSOP quintet, that´s an all star unit I heard . This and "Four and More", some of my favourites

Yes, those were the days when you went through the neighbourhood and meet someone and he might ask "Did you hear about the new Sonny Rollins record" ?, wondering who will be the first to buy it. So strong !

One thing that made me sad somehow in his last year was the way how they almost made a parody of his old self. Dressed with too much strident colours like a paradise bird, wide trousers that made him look very very short, and that hair wave that made him look like a poodle. When he did Avery Fisher Hall in ´81 he still looked like the "old Miles"...... But the positive things were my memories especially in lat 1989 when they played the material from "Amandla", which is more jazzy stuff and more real music that before, when it was like music you listen on headphones . And there were better musicians, especially that japanese keyboard player Kei Akagi, very very fine, not like the keyboarders before, who stayed in the background and made only the sythy-soundes and pushed all them buttons and so.....

The first time I saw Sonny Stitt was on TV. During that time, our second TV program in Austria (ORF 2) sometimes had jazz and one evening their was a short film about Dizzy and it must have been in the 70´s since Dizzy already had replaced the acoustic bass with a Fender Bass, and he talked to the audience and said "now we´ll play something from the past, from the 40´s, when we played together with Bird....." and they started with a very fast "Wee". Dizzy brilliant as ever, and then there was that really old man, who played such a beautiful alto it was incredible. Being a teenie and still not knowing very very much about all the musicians, for a second I thought "is this Bird, was it only a rumour that he died?", but later from album covers I learned that it is Sonny Stitt. It´s interesting, Dizzy was born in 1917 and Stitt in 1924, but Stitt looked at least 10-15 years older. But what he played.......fantastic ! About the question, why I "don´t like behind the beat": Well, most musicians I love don´t play behind the beat, all the boppers, the hardboppers, Miles, Trane, Dolphy, Don Cherry..... I haven´t noticed much "behind the beat", but if you listen to Dexter, it became so much behind the beat it was only due to the excellent rhythm section that they somehow managed to keep it "together". I once heard a really fast "April" done by Dizzy and Dex at the White House 1978 where you can hear the contrast.....

Thank you all for your most interesting answers, Well, the thing is that during his lifetime I was a huge fan of Dexter, it just jumped on the Dexter hype that started with his comeback to the States. We were just a bunch of guys who went everywhere to see him live and buy all his current albums and the albums from the past. It was his sound, and that strange laidback playing that fascinated us, and last not least his personality, He even made us smile, when he was drunk, somehow he made a funny show out of it, even if it became funky in later years.... But now after years I´m a bit more critical and that ever creasing playing very much behind the beat somehow starts to get on my nerves. I have memories about a special event in early spring 1980 when we had that huge festival, 3 days starring Dexter, Max Roach, Sun Ra, McCoy Tyner, Sam Rivers, Chet Baker and many others at Tehnical University. Just one day before, Sonny Stitt played at an other venue "Porrhaus" with Fritz Pauer, Aladár Pege and Fritz Ozmec. So I heard Stitt first, and 3 days later Dexter who was scheduled on the third day of the festival. As some of you said, it was Dexter being himself, that he was meant to become more famous than Stitt. He was good for a hero story, a surviver, and being so tall and with that deep voice and slow speaking... It´s natural that Dexter was chosen for the film, and not Stitt. As you said, Stitt was a lonesome guy, who traveled lot as a single.

Yes, a wild life. But after his comeback he cut everything out, I thought. Didn´t smoke, didn´t drink, did health food and so on, that´s what I have read. He had changed his live after a mild stroke and after they found out that he has diabetes, no ? I read the book by Jo Gelber and it seems that he wasn´t hanging out anymore, Only in the hotel room or so....

just got a mail from amazon that the publishing is again delated , are they kiddin´ us ?

I think those rumors were allready in 1988 when he had a bout with pneumony, but Miles himself wrote in his biografy that it was some gossip paper that issued that story and in spring 1989 he made his best album after years, using a playing band again, and he was in very good form when he went on tour after that.....

Yes, maybe that was the reason. But about Sonny Stitt as a copycat, of course I have heard and read that stuff also, but Stitt had another sound and other phrasing, and on tenor he was definitly his own. I think, the tenor had become his main instrument anyway. And as early as 1949 on the first Prestige session with Bud he plays some of the best bop tenor of his generation. He is top on "Giants of Jazz" and all his albums for Muse are very exiting. Recently I have listened to his 70´s album "12" and I think there is more playing and more repertoir than Dexter did in all the years after his "comeback". That´s it, Dexter used his "charisma" more than the music. I was one of his biggest fans during lifetime, but listening over and over again I got to a more critical point.....

Late 70´s /early 80s

Recently I listened to some Muse recordings of Stitt. He really had it all. Such a great musician. I also saw him live. And...... I have been a live-long fan of Dexter Gordon and saw him live many many times, but now I see it in a more critical way. That constantly playing behind the beat and all. What was the reason that their was so much tam tam about Dexter, as a hero coming back to the States, while Stitt has lived their all his live and played some of the best tenor and alto. I saw Stitt in 1980 touring Europe as a single with local players and smaller halls, while Dexter had his own quartet and did the big gigs. Well, Stitt had "his cups" sometimes, but Dexter? I think he was always drunk. Did those who managed Dexter think that he would make a better "story", a better "legend" and better press photos than Stitt ? What are your opinions ?

I don´t have the DVD but I wondered why this was not the next CD release posthum by Warner Brothers. He was under contract with Warner Brothers, and after his death they released "Miles Around the World" and the other looking back in the past "Montreux with Quincy Jones" with all the Gil Evans stuff. Then, I still wondered how Miles managed to play a little on the old stuff like " Boplicity" and so on. Did Miles know that he would die soon ? I thought it was a stroke and such things happen suddenly, when you don´t expect them.....