Gheorghe

Well yes. I also have the "Relaxin´at Camarillo" recordings, the BN session with both tenor players, the "Stealin´Apples" with Goodman and Fats. And of course not to forget the live recordings with much longer solos. There is the Dex-Wardell horn battles on those "Bopland" Sessions, very fine tenor playing, but the drums and bass is not up to the leader´s standards, I think there is another one with Dexter and Gray and Clark Terry playing "Move" live. Dig the Xanadu session I mentioned. The one with Art Farmer on trumpet. "Donna Lee" etc. . Very fine, with exception of the too metronomic drumming. There should be more patterns on drums. Nice legs ! I like the cover, for the legs , but also that kind of music might be nice.

I think Wardell Gray´s discography is quite thin, I have under his own name two Prestige albums. The only annoying thing is all those alternate takes on the earliest session. I further have what I think is a Xanadu live session with Art Farmer and Hampton Hawes, that´s fantastic playing, only I would have liked to hear another drummer than Shelly Manne.... The very very best Wardell Gray I ever heard is as a sideman on the Charlie Parker album "The Happy Bird". He plays very long and fantastic solos there on I think "Scrapple", on "Lullaby in Rhythm" and "April".

Monday afternoon blues ? So bad ? Maybe I´m one of the few persons who love Mondays. I love my job though it´s demanding, but can´t await to see on Monday what´s new, what kinda channenge will be, strange but it´s exactly that way in my case.

Born in Viena, but family line from România, Cluj-District, half Romanian, half Hungarian since in that area is also a minority of Hungarian. It seems that beneath a lot of Jewish blood this was my strongest descendance, since I had practically lived down there for a long time and a part of my day job needs Romanian language, family the same, so it happens I speak and read and write more in Romanian than in German, crazy but true.

Reading in English is great for me as long as it is album cover text or musical biography. For other materia my vocabulary is too limited, so most books from anglo-american authors I read in translated version. Here "Jocuri de putere" which means "Power Plays" written by Danielle Steel. We have ton´s of translated books on romanian books-online stores they are my favourite non jazz lectura. This is about a female director executiv and a male director executiv, and their different characters. The male is always braggin´ about his position and is a womanizer, the woman doesn´t want to share her success with the public....., very good insight into the business world.

Interesting choices on that collection. It seems that the first two tracks on CD 1 are from Verve, the rest of CD 1 and 2 is mostly Savoy tracks. But else than others I couldn´t enjoy so many alternative tracks and only short excerps. My "mother milk" was the "Savoy Mastertakes" double Album with all the Savoy recordings, but only the takes that were on record. The rest must be those Savoys titled "Bird Live at the Roost". I have a compilation of all the Roost tracks from 1948/49. I´m sure you agree that this is some of the very very best Bird, since it is live and not as short as the studio tracks and you hear Miles or KD on trumpet and Al Haig on piano, so it´s not like those Benedetti recordings where all the fellow musicians were cut out. The Metronome Stars I think that was for the Victor label, strange I have it on a Dizzy Gillespie compilation and again on a CD called "Bird and Lennie Tristano" . I must have this ! I have a Freddie Hubbard live at "Onkel Pö" in Hamburg from about the same time, I think it also has Billy Childs on piano, who is a fantastic keyboarder of the post Hancock period. I first heard him on J.J. Johnson - Nat Adderly from Yokohama 1977, and on other records from the late 70´s early 80´s. And Joe Henderson , Bobby Hutcherson, so this is a dream team, like one of those huge BN-revivals they did in Japonia , were they reunited leading stars from the BN-Era. I never heard about the bass player and the drummer, so I hope the drummer is tops, since that´s were things start for me.

okay, sure ! I didn´t think about the terminus "mid-century modernism". So......maybe I´m just too young, since I was barely born when the mid-century-modernism ended. So ..... being a product of the post 1968 generation maybe I take it "too serious" for people of the pre 1968 generation. Thank you so so much for opening me the eyes on that. I didn´t think about that aspect. My main-sources and personal encouragements in musical developement when I was just starting to become a musician were a handful of jazzmusicians like Fritz Pauer (p, born 1943), Allan Praskin (as, born 1948) and Karl Ratzer (g, born 1950), all of them can be found in wikipedia. So maybe there were exactly in the post "mid-century-modernism".

Those four Davis records with the first quintet: I also grew up with this, but the only available record here in the ear ly 70´s was "Steaming" (with another cover photo than the original). I think I spinned "Steaming" almost every day until I got "The Great Concert of Charles Mingus", which let me listen less to "Steaming". But that Quintet Style on Steaming was my very very basic of "jazz". I would have liked the other three , like "Workin´" as much as STeaming but didn´t know about there existence. Working has "Woody´n You" on it, right ? I dig the shout chorus at the end, it was inspired from Dizzy´s big band arrangement and sounds astonishing fine on that small group setting. I always close "Woody´n You" with that line. Wes Montgomery. I think I have two of them "Incredible " and "So Much Guitar", but as usual I don´t know from what country a pressing is. It´s Wes at it´s best and he was the first jazz guitarist I loved.

From what period is this ? I think I remember I saw Stan Getz in a quartet with Lou Levy on piano. I must have that somewhere. If I remember well and look at the personnel, it must be a Pablo recording. But all those Pablo records at that time had quite the same cover designs with some blue and some red, and rarely a photo. The encounter Diz , Milt and Ray is three key figures of the early bop days. But if I remember right from that record and other Pablo records Ray Brown´s bass often is much too loud in the mix. Monty Alexander was very much in demand in the 70´s, he was a favourite of Norman Granz and later on the Concord label I think. As a drum-lover I just might say I would have preferred a drummer more fitting to Diz, let´s say Mikey Roker or Albert Heath..... Is this the original recording of "Con Alma" ? I never heard that, I think they played it else than Diz played it later in the 60´s-80´s- Yes, on that short lived Electra Musician label from Bruce Lundvall there were some hiddn treasures where you wondered where that music had been so long time undiscovered. Bird with a fine orchestra, and I think exactly from the same period there was also a Bud trio set and Bud with the same orchestra, and they had a rare Cliff Brown-Max Roach doin "Daahoud" ....

I think it depends a lot on the personality of somebody and his aproach to the instrument or a listening audience. Sure I could play a 45 minutes solo set with ease and do solo standards with chord voicings that are not just the basic chords, but I just couldn´t feel well if it´s only background music. I don´t think so much about playing for myself. I play first for the musicians on the bandstand and for an audience that pays to hear those musicians. Sure some sets of solo piano can sharpen your technique and create some special approaches and chord renditions just for the things you need to know on your instrument. But........: Too much solo piano can impair your ability to listen to what fellow musicians are doing, in my case to get that constant inspiration from a topnotch drummer, bassist and hornplayers, that exitement that you get when those gentlemen lift up the bandstand so you hear something great and are right in. I

Great players. I love Roman Schwaller and had several occasions where I met him on jam sessions and hear him with his own formations. We are very glad to have him here in Viena.

So anyway you have some nice recordings from the fities until the mid seventies. That´s sure enough for someone who is not a Mingus enthusiastic. Mingus, I think, was not " everybody´s darling" even in jazz circles. In my case it was a bit unorthodox: Mingus was esential for all that I began to love in jazz, he was in any case the second record I had (my first was Miles´ "Steaming" and soon I had more Mingus records than Miles records. I was just mesmerized by what I heard. He was my guide to several styles. Via Jakie Byard and some Ellington tunes I learned about the pre bop styles, via Dolphy I got curious to hear how Bird maybe had sounded and how Ornette Coleman and his followers might sound....., He was for me "in the middle of it".

This was the Band Joachim Ernst Behrend described in his "Jazz Book" from the early 70´s, about Mingus´ comeback at Berlin. Before I read the book around the mid 70´s I had heard a lot of Mingus with Dolphy or earlier with Jackie McLean and others and had heard the two LPs for the French "America" Label from 1970. I must say the latter recordings disappointed me a bit since there since it sounded like routine, with very very little energy from Mingus and Richmond. The biggest surprise was Bobby Jones, who has a very emotional side in his playing. I was not so much impressed by the trumpet player. So, this band, good as it was, left a bit of a bittersweet impression for me. I missed a lot of stuff that I had loved so much when I first heard Mingus on record. Lou Levy was a great pianist !!

uh, hard to say, I always knew that MINGUS listened a lot to Ellington, but never considered who Ellington was listenin´ to. Hip as he must have been he listend to those who came after him. He was very much ahead of his time. He was very aware of Bird, Monk , Bud, Miles, Trane, Mingus , that was Duke.

I didn´t have that and don´t think I could be happy with it. I mean, as I did "sit in" for a tune because someone urged me to do it, but it would be unfair to to guy who has that hard job of having to be nice and quiet and just play in the background or taking requests. And it makes me unhappy to play if I don´t have interesting and fascinating guys I have the chance to play with. After some inactive years it was not easy for me to achieve this and have name jazzmusicians want to have me on piano. This was hard to get there, not from playing the instrument but from finding the courage to contact them , then sit in with them and then play a regular gig with them. I´m so busy to keep that thing goin´ on. But in the past, if some non jazz couples were visiting us at home and after dinner there was that inevitable "Gheo, play somethin´ for us".... and it was a torture, if you play a jazz standard, must figure out which one is simple enough that it might appeal to them, and after two of that kind they say: "Play a country tune", "Play a șlagăr", "Play a classical tune", and I don´t know no country tune , might know a shlager tune and might "finger" from ear that Bach tune that´s on "Bud on Bach" or one Chopin Prelude that I know from ear, And finanlly I learned to say "Look, I´m a jazz musician, I play jazz, that´s it". That´s like if you go to a șnițel -place or a sauerkraut place you don´t order chinese or italian or greek food.....

In my inactive years I went to a nice place, a bar on the second floor of an old little house called "L´Etage" where a piano player was trying to play simple jazz standards and nobody seemed to listen to him. During intermission I "praised his playing" (uh uh) and asked him innocently if I can play just one tune for my lady there and he aggreed and I did "When I Fall in Love" and that was the only time where the folks stopped talking, listened to the piano and applauded. Sure I never did that again, it´s not too kind to embarass a guy who got that job to play there. But I felt I´ll be ready again.

I also played that a few days on USB in the car. "April" is in a quite slow tempo for that tune. On live versions (with Bird at Birdland, with Mingus in France, and in trio at his comeback in NY) he plays it faster. I think the ballad interpretations on Side B are much stronger, very deep and with fantastic chord selections (especially "My Devotion" and I love "Burt Covers Bud" which actually is "Bean and the Boys" as well as "Woody´n You. "My Heart Stood Still" is also a very very interesting arrangement. A fine collection. I like most the live set. But on those sides at some private place there is one tune where someone sits at the drums who just can´t play. I think one short track has a very fine Buddy Rich on drums. I´m not necessarly a Buddy Rich fan, but that one is great.

oh, playing and nobody is paying attention, a nightmare. Once I really had to play a sax-piano duo - gig at some party for I don´t know what kind of business-people and not gettin´ applause, that´s the strangest thing, I never did such a thing again. Even in my "un-years" when we were forced to play weddings the people clapped hands ´cause we was good. But that was crazy. The money was cool, but the surroundings was terrible, that´s when I actually stopped it all and waited for better times......

It´s said that the "painting" on the cover of Ornette Coleman´s "Empty Foxhole" was done by Ornette Coleman himself.

Our live performance of "Cumbia" turned out very fine. I had got a percussion player added to the drummer. About the story: Mingus loved Italy and performed there often, in the same year he was involved in a discussion with a group of youngsters from the so called "Communist Party" where they said that concerts should be for free and Mingus snarled back "we play and you must pay". That´s what I remember what was written then. Anyway ....not to enter in politic matters, it´s easy to be a young communist in a democratic country where you didn´t have to live in a communist state, where the state controls who is allowed to perform and who not. Mingus was contacted by the italian filmmaker (I think his name was Daniel Senatore) . The "Todo Modo" never was performed live, but you can hear that the ideas of the a capella blowing (italian woodwinds added) stams from a short a capella "Love is a Dangerous Necessity" some years earlier. The different sections are swinging vehicles of a Blues in F with augmentit changes, and of "Peggy´s Blues Skylight", so there is nothing as special about it as on "Cumbia". The ending duet between Mingus on bowed bass and George Adams on alto flute was just something added after the session. Mingus was listening very very much to that record years later when he was paralized and praised George Adams for it, when Adams visited the ailing Mingus. Such a tragedy. Anyway, George Adams had left the band after that date and was replaced by Ricky Ford who is the saxophonist I saw in Mingus´ Band. Ricky Ford was very very good and could play everything from an old Hawk/Webster influenced swing tenor to avantgarde. But the records that were made with the core band + guests were quite overproduced and you rarley hear him. There is much more space for the guest players ("Three or Four Shades of the Blues" "Cumbia and Jazz Fusion", "Me myself and I" )........ Let me say that I might write much about Mingus, but he was my main source or guide to all that music, his death was a terrible blow for me and one of the rare occasions that made me cry.....

The second one is the one I have. Some tunes on it sound very strange, like one that is called "Night Sounds" or something like that. And that´s a very very strange and dissonant version of "Night in Tunisia". Thanks for your interesting remarks about "Cumbia". That suite-like composition has a special meaning to me since I heard it live before I heard it on record. I never thought about the thing you said that the different sections of it are not named or given movement titles. That whole list of movement titles is annoying on the other suite-like composition "Three or Four Shades of the Blues" where those section titles sometimes have dumb descriptions like the whole liner notes. Once I had to perform "Cumbia" on the request of the bass player I was playing with, shortly after the album had come out. I had to transcribe the parts (and I am the most lousy writer in the world), and had to give them sections "movement titles" so that we could rehearse the different movements. When there was the question who will sing that "Mama´s little baby" rap on that two beat feeling, they pointed at me because my voice would get closest to the voice on the record.

Thank you both ! About "original members" .....I came in later that´s why maybe I don´t know them.

Is it possible that Nat King Cole´s voice appeals more to women ? My wife like´s his voice, while I prefer Billy Eckstine (at least before he disbanded).

Strange, I don´t remember that nick. I think those whom I know from writing here all have been long time users who write almost every day. Well I remember one guy from Ex-Iugoslavia with the nick MMilorad or something like that, who had a Lester Young pic as avatar and I liked what he rote. But I haven´t read him for some years. Hope he´s doin well. It was no easy times for that neighbour country for many years, first some civil war when Miloșevici was their president, then some petrol embargou and things like that... But he was a real jazz expert and knew all the stuff.....

Great version of "You Stepped Out of a Dream" as I remember. I played that tune in a bossa rhythm on stage but like to cook on those changes also in a brisk straight ahead tempo like it is here. Many dudes here play the also on that chords based "Chick´s Tune".