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I wasn´t aware that he passed away 20 years ago, but it seems to mean something, that I was listening intensly to some of his great piano solos yesterday. Those Steeplechase "Dexter in Radioland" are wonderful and Tete Montoliu really stretches out on them. A fantastic pianist. Later I think I saw him with Joe Henderson and it was Tete who rescued that gig, while the rest of the rhythm section was not good. Tete just waved to the lousy bass player to lay out and did the bass line himself.

Mike Hennessey indeed was a great journalist and I associate him with all those great Americans in Europe, since he wrote about them. That was the great times, when all those heros visited Europe or even settled there for some time. The book about Klook is the best one, but I think I read a lot of other things, festival revues I think..... What exactly was his role at MPS ?

Thank you Rooster_Ties for sharing this wonderful memories. Yes of course John Gilmour and Marshall Allen. I just didn´t mention them in my previous posting cause I think they were the best known Arkestra members. Sure I saw and admired them, but then when I first heard the Arkestra, the biggest surprise for me was Ray and Tyson.

Thanks for the anecdote about the Chattanooga Concert. I think, Michael Ray and June Tyson where some of the most brilliant members of the Arkestra. I loved them both. Michael Ray was really a virtuose trumpetplayer and had it all, from swing to bop to free, he had it all. And June Tyson had such a beautiful voice. There are some of Sun Ra´s songs that have that strange otherworldly quality, they are simple, they are somehow happy and sad at the same time, you can snap your fingers to em, and those was the songs where I started to pay very much attention to June Tyson. One of my favourite Sun Ra records is "Unity" , but sad to say June Tyson is quite off the mike. And sometimes on records you hear her only in ensemble singing which is also good, but not enough. I really loved her voice and her approach to the Arkestra.

Thank you Niko for posting that article. That she refused to record/play Leonard Feather´s compositions, made me smile. I liked Leonards Liner Notes when I was a kid, because liner notes was the most information we in Europe could get about musicians. And his book "From Satchmo to Miles" with that famous Miles Davis interview.... But Leonard as a composer ? Had to think about that. And just two weeks ago when I listened to the whole Dizzy RCA recordings, all that hot big band stuff, Manteca and so on, there was one tune that didn´t really appeal to me andit is titled "Ole Man Re-Bop" or something like that . I thought why, all the other stuff is great, Good Bait, Ool ya koo, Woody´n You, everything, and this one I dont like and that I saw it was composed by Leonard Feather (smile). Well I don´t know his other compositions and I´m not really curious, but this tune sounds like if somebody has listend to bop and liked it and thinks he must try to write something "boppish" without really having the roots and the feelings for that music. And then I remembered this thread and thought "yeah Jutta, can understand you, same here, I wouldn´t like to perform that tune (smile). But about the Jazz Podium, I still think there was another article too, because I remember she told some things in her own words, she even told about the incident with Art Blakey and confessed that she had drunk to much, when Art finally asked her on stage to sit in on an ultra rapid tune. She confessed that she just sat there on the piano stool and smiled and wasn´t able to play. I´m sure Jutta could have made it if she wasn´t loaded. If I drink only beer my fingers slow down.

Helle Big Beat Steve ! The strange thing is I remember which year which was about until the early 80´s and remember things concerts I saw, articles I read in years like 1975,76,77,78 but if you ask me if it was in 88 or 91 or 98, I´m lost ....... But I remember that article very well and maybe it was in the late 80´s maybe .....or really maybe it was in the early 90´s . I had Jazz Podium subscribed but chancelled it somewhere in the 90´s maybe even in the late 90´s I don´t remember. The reason was their was too little interesting stuff for me. During the earlier years I´d seek festival reviews, articles about artists I knew and saw live, and later I didn´t know anymore who´s playing cause most of my heros were dead or retired. But I remember the article about Jutta Hipp was without a foto. And it seemed it was a younger woman who asked the questions. I also remember one statement of Jutta. She didn´t have a CD player and said she hates buttons and electronics. It reminded me of my late aunt, about the same generation....born 1924.... who had also lived in NY since the mid fifties in a small apartment only with two cats and didn´t like modern equipments and until herdeath it was just old fashioned letters, no mail, no nothing..... ;_)

Hello Big Beat Steve ! As you mentioned Hans Koller on another thread (Lucky Thompson), I remember I read a rare interview with Jutta Hipp in the late 80´s at Jazz Podium, where she was asked about her time with Hans Koller and she said she didn´t like to play with him, that she didn´t like his approach to jazz. Well her comments on Hans Koller were quite harsh and she described it a "cold music". As I told in my answer, I don´t want to make statements about a type of music that´s too hard to understand for me as being something that sound´s to me as western avantgarde music, I nevertheless can understand why Jutta Hipp didn´t like it. She was just a swinger and wanted to play bop, hard bop orientated stuff which she really did good and sounded good. Listening to the stuff I know from her (three BN albums, the one with Zoot and those two at Hickory House) I can understand very well, that she just wanted "to play" and not to figure out difficult written music......

Hello Big Beat STeve: even if it´s OT, but about Hans Koller I can´t say much. I´m sure and convinced that he was an exceptional artist, I wasn´t able to get into his music, which seemed to be very much written out stuff, serios western type music. He didn´t go much to those clubs where you´d drink and talk to the musicians and jam and the way how I was used to it. Heard him once in 1983 at a festival it was called "Master Quarted", two saxophones and two pianos, a quite unusual combination. Maybe I´m too dumb for that stuff, I like it with sax, piano, bass and drums , and that kind of music seemed to be very very hard listening, much more like 20th century experimental music. Once I met someone who had to audition for Hans Koller and had to show he can read the most complicate sheet music. So I think if someone played with Hans Koller he had to be a certain kind of classical trained musician. The "difficult" musicians I talk about , Lucky Thompson with Stan Tracey, in my case in Vienna Joe Newman with some locals, that´s somethin else, they´d play regular jazz tunes and if Joe Newman might call "Bye Bye Blackbird" which you can play without thinkin about chords or sheet and he starts lecturing the band, that´s uncomfortable. And maybe Lucky Thompson was the same.....

On a Misty Night is really one of Tadd´s most pretty tunes. Sonny Stitt seemed to like Tadd´s tunes, he also played "Our Delight" and played with Tadd at Birdland I think. Pharoah Sanders also recorded "On a Misty Night".

Yes, I remember once someone gave me that book Ronnie Scott wrote, a very very good book and I remember, if I remember right, that Lucky Thompson said to Stan Tracey "if you must play crap, play it low" or something like that. With all due respect to Lucky Thompson and I like his playing, one thing is significant: Very often those artists who where not necessarly in the forefront of the movement were the most difficult ones. In my hometown Vienna they had sometimes the Basie-trumpetist Joe Newman, a good swinging musician, but maybe not the most famous, but ......how he always lectured and teached his local sideman. It seems that after some gigs no local musician from Vienna wanted to play again with him......

How much time did Lucky Thompson spend in Paris ? I did know about his late fifties things in Paris. One LP that was on sale when I was young was that "Oscar Pettiford" Memorial Concert from Paris, october 1960 with Lucky Thompson Trio some tracks and Bud Powell Trio some tracks. On a club date they played a few tunes together. I´ve read once , I think Ronnie Scott wrote it, that Lucky Thompson was not an easy guy to work with. British pianists had difficulties working with some "difficult" tenorplayers. Lucky was one of them, the others was Brew Moore and Don Byas if I remember right.

Really interesting, two Mingus-orientated players, one Ornette Coleman orientated player and the allrounder Reggie Workman (though I remember I heard Workman mostly with drummers, Roach and Blakey. It´s really astonishing to read about the combination Adams/Pullen with Blackwell, especially since Richmond was still alive. Mentioning Ed Blackwell: Wasn´t 1984 also the year of that kind of Ornette Coleman acoustic revival (without Ornette) "Old and New Dreams"? I always found it interesting how former sideman kept acoustic groups, while their leaders had gotten tired of it (VSOP , an acoustic Miles Band without Miles , "Old and New Dreams" an acoustic Colemanband without Ornette ).....

As much as I love Bud and everything he played , though (as I mentioned above but didn´t have feedback) he did play a bit too much in the same key (F) in 1953 which even annoyed his greatest admirer Mingus, it´s almost a sacrilege to "cut out Mr. B." Maybe I wouldn´t say that if I haven´t heard the Mr. B stuff too, but as this is historical performances and never again it will happen that you can hear all those guys they wrote book about - during the course of one evening at Birdland, it might be great to hear it as a "whole thing"..........

One composition of Fritz Pauer that Art Farmer used to play was "Cherokee Sketches". Of course it´s based on Cherokee and played at an ultra fast tempo. IMHO Art Farmer was more comfortable at medium tempos. Fritz Pauer loved Monk and some of his tunes are based on Monkish style elements, like one tune I witnessed the first playing in public was "Spelunke" dedicated to a former jazz club in my hometown, which was great cause it was mostly musicians playin for musicians. Chet Baker performed there once with Karl Ratzer. I was a regular and used to play there when I was almost a kid. By the way it was the club where Fritz Pauer let me sit in. All this happened 40 years ago. It was just a great time, that special block near Vienna Food Market had jazz in the air. You could meet fellow dudes on street and check out a gig. "hey there, need a bass player next week, can you make it...." that´s how it was..... One composition of Fritz Pauer that Art Farmer used to play was "Cherokee Sketches". Of course it´s based on Cherokee and played at an ultra fast tempo. IMHO Art Farmer was more comfortable at medium tempos. Fritz Pauer loved Monk and some of his tunes are based on Monkish style elements, like one tune I witnessed the first playing in public was "Spelunke" dedicated to a former jazz club in my hometown, which was great cause it was mostly musicians playin for musicians. Chet Baker performed there once with Karl Ratzer. I was a regular and used to play there when I was almost a kid. By the way it was the club where Fritz Pauer let me sit in. All this happened 40 years ago. It was just a great time, that special block near Vienna Food Market had jazz in the air. You could meet fellow dudes on street and check out a gig. "hey there, need a bass player next week, can you make it...." that´s how it was.....

Denardo´s fine to me also. Yeah, I got those Impulse LPs when they where around (in the 70´s). Always liked the covers they made, still like to hold it in my hands. And the music is really advanced. The later BN´s from the same period they are much more conventional, maybe that´s what it was the BN slogan "it must schwing"(sic). Crisis with both Don Cherry and Dewey Redman, and Charlie Haden back on bass. A beautiful record. And the first tune on AT 12 always really moved me. Also the later version with a string quarted. String quartets usually is not my thing, but the way it´s arranged with the voices really moves me. It´s such a beautiful tune, something like hopless hope...... Lead´s me from Impulse to those Caravan of Dreams records. Got some of them, but only had heard once the "Opening at....", would like to see it reissued, IMHO the best of Prime Time, really something, and .....pardon for all who criticize his violin playin...., on that one "Compute" or how the tune is titled Ornette is really great on the fiddle. The way how even Miles seemed to praise Ornettes violin (other than his trumpet playing) "the violin is ok, you can get away with it playing some sounds, fillin in some sounds on some occasions....."

I heard the stuff from july 53 , sets alternating with Mr. B, who´s also really great on that, as usual. I love those live tracks and A.T´s drumming on it, discussed it once with Bichos (Marcel). On studio recordings you can´t hear him, but here his drummin is really a gas, and he does fantastic things on Un Poco Loco, and Budo. Bud is still very much in control of the keyboard, he had his "un" years in 1954, 1955 but later he returned to much fine playing. The only "downer" for me on all those 53 broadcasts is the very similar program on all of it. And most tunes are in the key of F. Even Mingus, one of Bud´s greatest admires had some critical remark about that, even if he exagerated it in his typical Mingus manner , as he said something that Bud could or would only play in the key of F. I think, the first broadcast from february 53 is the best, with rare live versions of "Tea for Two", "Bean ´n the Boys aka Burt covers Bud", and a wonderful "It could happen to you". And of course the stuff with Bird and Candido and the few with Diz (Woodyn You especially). But it seems, that after may 1953 it became a routine, those from september 53 sometimes sound like if Bud wasn´t really interested any more in what he was doin.

Just heard the record ! Great. Well I can understand what George Coleman says about Mike Stern, from his point of view, but I really liked Mike Stern, I heard him with Miles in the first period after his comeback. Mike Stern was the best, somehow people praised John Scofield much more , but I liked the sound of that first 1981 Miles sextet. I was astonished Mike Stern sounds exactly like on those 1981 Miles dates. Then, Miles would also do some straight ahead (Kix, Ursula), and thats how Mike Stern sounds here. I was a bit astonished to hear Ron Carter much more subdued than I used to hear him. Ron had that big amplified sound and very much glissando effects in his solos, when I heard him in the 70´s maybe 80´s. Here the sound of the bass is much more like someone from an earlier generation, not that big Ron Carter sound......

Thanks for the recommandation. Must have that. My wife ordered it for me for father´s day.

Oh yes, I have that record and love it. See, when I was young, Sun Ra was starting to mix his usual free-jazz big band program with some standards, starting with old Fletcher Henderson Arrangements, and it must have been because of that renewed interest in straight ahead acoustic stuff. So word spread that Sun Ra plays a mix of his intergalatic stuff with some really swinging old stuff, and that´s how I heard him first. And naturally we were running to the record stores to check out what Sun Ra records we might find and there was those two Horo Double LPs with very similar covers: The "New Step" as a rare combo recording just with John Gilmore, and the "Unity" with the whole band. So we young "newborn" Ra-Freaks (smile) bought those two albums. It was like if you listen to Mingus. You hear Mingus play some straight ahead starting thema and then out they go, and that´s how you "learn" about "far out" stuff, and same with Sun Ra. We all had to learn that there is more about jazz than just tappin your foot, but you need personalities like Sun Ra to reach that point.......

Fritz Pauer was fantastic, he was a master. I was blessed I heard him so much with all those great musicians. And he was such I great person to meet. I was still almost a kid, I think I was 18 when he let me sit in, that was a great honour for me....... Fritz Pauer was fantastic, he was a master. I was blessed I heard him so much with all those great musicians. And he was such I great person to meet. I was still almost a kid, I think I was 18 when he let me sit in, that was a great honour for me.......

I don´t think the Bud Griffin Duo was recorded in February 1960. I don´t even think Griffin was in Paris as early as 1960 and it sound´s much more like something done 4 years later (Idaho and Perdido). Strange that there are no recordings available of Bud playing on those tours " Birdland 56" and "Birdland 57".

Really sad news, he was a fantastic drummer. Saw him on several occasions, mostly with Diz. That great quartet Diz had with Rodney Jones, Benjamin Franclin Brown and Mickey Roker , a fantastic group.

I saw him live on several occasions from the late 70´s on. I´ll never forget how deeply impressed I was from the first time I saw him, it was at a strange place, a quite uggly hall called "Kongresshaus" which doesn´t exist anymore, I think there´s a food market now. That was the time when he had that fantastic quartet with Siegfried Kessler on piano, Bob Cunningham on bass and Clifford Jarvis on drums. They really cooked. The next time I think it was with Ken Werner, Santi Debriano and John Betsch. Also saw him in Trio Format without piano, but Mr. Shepp played a trio piece on piano too, I think it was a Monk Tune "Ask Me Now" and it sounded so much like Monk.

I think Duvivier was one of the most recorded bass players in the 50´s and very much active until his death. He is also on most of Bud Powell´s records from 1953 on. In july 1985 I was at the Hollabrunn Festival and Woody Herman was on schedule with an allstar band with Scott Hamilton, Buddy Tate and others, and George Duvivier should be the bass player and I was looking forward to finally see him live, but it was reported he is sick and some young bass player played instead of him. Later I found out Duvivier had died only a few days later.....

This might be the reason ! Berg and Moore were almost 20 years younger than Jordan and Coleman. So, the first collaborations between the Cedar Walton Trio with Tenorists was horn players from the same generation like him. Maybe they were more interesting in doing their own stuff . Berg and Moore were very young and highly talented and obviously willing to play Cedar Walton´s music. Poor Berg, when I saw him later with Miles, it was the most uninteresting chapter of Miles music, just a stage show with "Time after Time" and "Human Nature".... and Berg couldn´t do anything to help things make better. He would have been great with Miles in 1981 when the stuff still was rougher and more jazzy......