Gheorghe

IMHO the best of Dexters CBS recordings, and one of the best acoustic jazz albums from the time of the renewed acoustic boom in the late 70´s. I don´t have that album, I think it was pretty fast OOP. But I like George Cables´ piano. I heard him do fantastic solos, like one special on "A Moment´s Notice" and his gimmick of playing some rubato piano on ballads and then get back into swing with the bass and drums comin´ in again.....really sharp. I heard George Cables also an a lot of other records with other artists. Saw him once with Diz, and his album "Four Seasons" with Bobby Hutcherson, Herbie Lewis and Philly J.J. is wonderful. Okay, I also liked Kirk Leightsey playing with Dex. I don´t know many other pianists who might have played with Dexter after his homecoming to N.Y., first it was Cables, then it was Leightsey. Only on one 1981 album "Gotham City" there is a completely different band, it´s more an all star thing with Blakey, Percy Heath, Cedar Walton and George Benson, also very fine. But this was no touring band. I don´t see nothing adventurous in it. Those two albums "Love Call" and "N.Y. is Now" are like "Free Jazz for Starters", I mean what he did for Impulse! was much more advanced. Here there are a lot of swinging passages and he uses Elvin Jones and Jimmy Garrison, who were in Trane´s band before he went "free" (replacing Jones with Rashid Ali). My favourite for all times here is "Garden of Souls" one of the most beautiful and moving compositions I ever heard.

I love the title tune. It´s a very simple tune you can play just from a single listening, it sticks in your head. Could be a suggestion for a gig..... This was my first Ornette Coleman album when I was a teenager. It was my first "so called free jazz" album, but I was very ready for it, since until then the stuff that had impressed me most was Eric Dolphy in Mingus´European Tour band". It´s easier to listen to, because it is not all with open metrum and atonal, so you have swing playing on "Good Old Days" and "Zig Zag" if I remember right, and fine trumpet and violin on the title tune and "Sound Gravitation". It was a milestone in my listening experiences.

I didn´t purchase that and was reluctant to buy some "remainders" from the BN vaults, since I´m not really a completist. Besides that I don´t know who is Fred Jackson and since I have not heard from other guys or mentors here that I´d have to listen to him, I may not have been aware of him. Tadd Dameron would be interesting, but I have read too many bad reviews, that the arrangements were a mess and so on. But it would have been the last time Tadd Dameron played himself on a record. I have a special liking for his comping and learned something from it, and his solos are nice miniatures. The only studio album from his last years (where he does not play) doesn´t really kill me. Somehow his tunes didn´t have that flair they had in his most creative period, the somehow had smoothed out. To hear Dameron compositions without himself playing I prefer to listen to the sides that Philly J.J. made with his "Dameronia" band....

I have not listened to the 4 classic "First Quintet" sessions for decades, but "Steamin´" was my very first Jazz LP in the early 70´s. Cookin´, Relaxin, and Workin where not easy to be found then. The "Steamin" I think was a Bellaphon reissue with another cover. those funny Verve covers. I think I saw this one with that yellow fish on it, but don´t know which of the 8 LP-Volumes it is. I got to listen to Bird with Strings for the intro of "April in Paris". Not that I like strings, but I need a good intro for "April in Paris" since it will be on a concert set list next thursday and I got to get some idea for good chords for a piano intro.

I this Siegfried Kessler on piano ? Such a great pianist, I saw him twice, with Archie Shepp, and once with Dee Dee Bridgewater and Jimmy Witherspoon. Is this Hamid Drake, great drummer.

Me to, though I doubt it would have happened. I´m not sure if Jaws would have been open for it, but at least in the hard swinging passages of his long compositions Jaws would have been an interesting voice. Mingus was ....I could say so.....my center of jazz understanding. At an age, where I just had heard only one jazz record (I think it was Davis´ "Milestones" from the late 50´s" , Mingus with the 1964 touring band really was my "guide". It was '"Parkeriana" that led me to search Bop´n Bird, it was the Jakie Byard stride section that let me listen to Fats Waller and Art Tatum, and it was Dolphy´s outbursts, that led me to listen to Free Jazz....., so it was "everything" for me and a living memory when I finally saw Mingus live....

That´s some interesting remark, really ! Eric Dolphy was the first alto saxophonist I ever heard, when I was in my early teens. And I loved him from first hearing. I mean I heard Dolphy before Bird, before Jackie McLean. I admired that musician so much that when my beard started to grow I let it grow like Dolphy had it. Looked terrible, but that´s how I was. And.....though a complete other style, I loved Jaws playing from the first moment. My first listening experience was the session where he plays in an allstar Birdland line up with Miles Davis. And shortly afterwards I saw Jaws life. though I don´t think there would have taken place a record with them both, I think the times was not ripe for that, but if Dolphy had lived longer, who knows.......

I don´t see a difference in my case. It depends on the key I´m playin´ in. I let the music tell my fingers what is to do. I had to think over what you said: Maybe my statement was a subiective one, since it´s me myself who thinks or thought that my hands is small. I look to the beautiful hands of my wife, who is 175cm (me is 187cm ) and her fingers is longer and thinner, and the long nails makes it even look longer. Those are really delicate fingers so that mine look somehow short and blunt in comparation. She has them "double limbs" or (how you say to it) and always say why can´t I also be blessed with such fingers, since I´m the piano player.

I also have quite small hands, well I can play decimes easily , but I think my hands are quite small for my length (1,87 meter). In any case I always played with flat fingers.

I love it. They really cookin´ here. So great drumming , and they greatest guys playin´ together. But it´s quite a pity that Woody Shaw does not play on all the tunes. That´s the kind of albums I like most. Live, good recorded drum set so I can hear them cymbals and tubs, very very fine and like if you are on stage or sittin´in the audience....

I don´t remember if I ever saw that album with that title. The title "Odjenar" I think was on the Prestige album "Lee Konitz-Miles Davis", a very very strange album which sounds quite experimental , more like chamber music I think.... I remember my wife had bought it for me, since she saw the names of the musicians and that I might not have it in that combination. But the Title Conception as I remember was on the Prestige Album "Dig", that extended session with Jackie McLean and Sonny Rollins .... it is Miles´ version of that tune, not the original AABA form with 12 bars in the A sections and 8 bars in the bridge and in Db. Miles does the A section, but in C, and it has a unusual form with a pedal point section in it. I usually play the regular AABA form of the tune in Db but out of curiosity once tried the Miles version and ok, you have to take care to keep the unsymmetrical form, but you get it..... Some strange things here. The title "Dig" actually was composed by Jackie Mc Lean (on the chords of Georgia Brown), and I like most the title "Out of Blue" (based on "Get Happy"), very nice to play.... I don´t remember if I ever saw that album with that title. The title "Odjenar" I think was on the Prestige album "Lee Konitz-Miles Davis", a very very strange album which sounds quite experimental , more like chamber music I think.... I remember my wife had bought it for me, since she saw the names of the musicians and that I might not have it in that combination. But the Title Conception as I remember was on the Prestige Album "Dig", that extended session with Jackie McLean and Sonny Rollins .... it is Miles´ version of that tune, not the original AABA form with 12 bars in the A sections and 8 bars in the bridge and in Db. Miles does the A section, but in C, and it has a unusual form with a pedal point section in it. I usually play the regular AABA form of the tune in Db but out of curiosity once tried the Miles version and ok, you have to take care to keep the unsymmetrical form, but you get it..... Some strange things here. The title "Dig" actually was composed by Jackie Mc Lean (on the chords of Georgia Brown), and I like most the title "Out of Blue" (based on "Get Happy"), very nice to play.... I don´t remember if I ever saw that album with that title. The title "Odjenar" I think was on the Prestige album "Lee Konitz-Miles Davis", a very very strange album which sounds quite experimental , more like chamber music I think.... I remember my wife had bought it for me, since she saw the names of the musicians and that I might not have it in that combination. But the Title Conception as I remember was on the Prestige Album "Dig", that extended session with Jackie McLean and Sonny Rollins .... it is Miles´ version of that tune, not the original AABA form with 12 bars in the A sections and 8 bars in the bridge and in Db. Miles does the A section, but in C, and it has a unusual form with a pedal point section in it. I usually play the regular AABA form of the tune in Db but out of curiosity once tried the Miles version and ok, you have to take care to keep the unsymmetrical form, but you get it..... Some strange things here. The title "Dig" actually was composed by Jackie Mc Lean (on the chords of Georgia Brown), and I like most the title "Out of Blue" (based on "Get Happy"), very nice to play....

Fine memory. I also loved "Filles de Kilimanjaro" which was like a "treasure" among us youngsters in the early 70´s . I would have been too young to see the band with Dave Holland and Chick Corea, the first band I saw was with Dave Liebman, Mtume, Al Foster etc. But I saw the DVD from the "Bootleg Series" "Lost Quintet" and maybe Chick was scared, as well as Dave Holland. They don´t look relaxed at all on that video. First I thought they intended to "out-Miles" Miles Davis in context with stage behaviour with them angry looks, not even noddin´to the audience when their names was announced. But the music was great. I saw Chick Corea only once , when he sat in with Miles on a tune at some festival gig in the 80s. I think the tune was "Speak!". Wonderful thing. Miles with Monk. And listen how great they sound on "Bemsha Swing", Miles plays that Monk tune with very much love and understanding of Monk´s style. Much more than let´s say "Well You Needn´t" on another record, where he plays the wrong bridge. But it is strange that the version of "Round Midnight" (again with other chords than Monk´s original chords) is played with the "first quintet" . This would have fitted more in the 4 Prestige records of the first quintet (Workin, Relaxin, Cookin, Steamin ). Two weeks ago we played a gig with a name alto saxophonist and when we made the set list and I asked "Round Midnite?" he said, okay, but only if you play the original Monk changes, I don´t want to hear the Miles Changes on it. Easy for me since I never did else but playing the original Monk changes on that tune....

Definitly the best Bird collection. Actually my first Bird on record was the Savoy Mastertakes. From Dial there was no exclusive record out then, they usually were mixed in different series, or later on Spotlite there was annoying that there was a lot of "alternative takes" . I think the Savoy and Dials were the essential Bird to learn the style and the tunes, and I was happy when I got this 3 CD collection.

Benny Golson played quite often at Jazzland. And I heard him somewhere with Curtis Fuller and a stellar rhythm section. My opinion is, he greatest achievments are his compositions, he is one of the great composers of jazz history, but I consider his role as a soloist not as big as his role as a composer. If I listen to his style, there is some of the sound influenced by Don Byas, but somehow I heard solos with a bit of lack of orientation. He also got a bit of Archie Shepp´s sound into his playing. I think I´m not the only one who likes his compositions better than his actual playing. And he kinda hosted his concerts like announcinc Curtis Fuller this way "look at my saxophone, it has so many keys, and look at his trombone and it has no keys on it...." uhm.... But after Art Farmer´s death he was very often seen at Jazzland.

When I thought that I am ready enough for Ornette Coleman (one of my very first listenig experiences in Jazz was the Mingus Group with Dolphy from 1964), "Shape of Jazz to come" was on my wishlist but not available. My first OC albums was "Empty Foxhole" on BN and "Crisis" on Impulse. When I finally found the "Shape of Jazz...." it sounded quite conservative to me, not like "Free Jazz"...... It is strange that Randy Weston besides his standard compositions "Little Niles" and "Hi-Fly" was not very much in evidence in disc collectios or performing schedules in my country in the early 70´s, 80´s. I saw his name first on the cover of the not so good "Mingus and Friends in Concert 1972" and from an interview with Valerie Vilmer. It seems that he was very much bound to north african culture then, more than the hard core scene of NY.

Some great legs here ! I have not heard much Barney Wilen besides the stuff in the fifties and sixties, when he was something like a boy wonder, playing with the greatests of the greats like Miles, Bud, Blakey, Monk. He could hold his own being around with such fast company, just fantastic. It seems that I had lost the traces after that. I have heard that he had a lot of personal problems later. This was cult in my early teens. Though it came out maybe in 1969 just before Bitches Brew, many of all those crounds who were crazy about the Miles of the 70´s had that LP or asked who has it. And not knowing what the title means and what language it is, most kids pronounced the album name in a dumb phonetic way. Too sad this is the only studio document of the "lost quintet" (when Herbie and Ron were replaced by Chick and Dave Holland).

Klaus Schulz was a very nice guy and did an interview with us somewhere in the early 90´s for "Jazz Podium" after a gig. Our "Jazzland" was founded in 1972 and still goes and I´m so glad about it. I was not so historically "educated" to know if the trad revival was THE revival or a revival of a revival. I don´t think the animositys between those two groups were so strong. It was just two different things. The guys who would go listen to Barrelhous Jazzbands or how they where named were not the same like those who would listen to modern jazz. And as you mentioned Brubeck.....that was also another separate group, mostly the intelectuals who were students in the 50´s and attracted by that kind of style. About dancing to jazz.....yeah we had a club called "Jazz Freddie" where they had really good acts (the first time I heard Griffin when I was still a boy), and in the after hours it turned out to be more dancing, I don´t know if they called it jive or boogie or foxtrot, it was "people of the night" who very often came after the regular live concert, and it became quite loud there. But those jive dancers or what they was was always couples. I think that act of "maraccas girls" could also be seen, but in other places. That sounds more like "urban alternative szene" , and the dancing at "Jazz Freddie" seemed to be more like a more rude suburban scene. But I didn´t notice all of that stuff around......, my goal was to be involved with the musicians and somehow I had blinders torwards the rest of the proceedings.....

When I was young I still remember there was quite a vivid trad jazz scene in Viena. There was bands that almost each month performed at "Jazzland", like the "Barrelhouse Jazzband", the "Red Hot Pots", the "Picadilly Onions" and so on. Well, they had a lot of fans from an older generation. Í´d say it was like a paralel-society. The Trad fans where one group of fans or musicians, and the "modernists" where another one. But I´m glad that they existed, since our wonderful "Jazzland" would not have survived for so long time if it had not covered the whole "market". I heard great musicians there from the genres I dug, like most of all the then brand new Dave Liebman, and be/hardbop legends like Art Farmer, James Moody, the wonderful Woody Shaw and all of then, and I have performed in that club and will do so further. All my love to that place and the people who run it. As I said, the trad clique was another society. They were more straight ahead people in private live, than many of us others were. My only encounter with one trad group was when somebody had urged me on stage to sit in with such a group for a few tunes. There was no animosity from my part, the leader, a very fat and white bearded banjo player called "Sweet Georgia Brown" and when my turn came, my idea was just to play my boppish stuff to interpolate it with them their stuff, like those friendly battles where let´s say Bird sat in with a trad group, or how they performed some old time tunes on that "Bands for Bonds" thing. "Sweet Georgia Brown" has nice changes, they were used by Jackie McLean on his tune "Dig aka Donna" , Bud played it once in the studio, Fats Navarro/Allan Eager played it ...., and I thought I was good, and some of the guys in that trad band who had a bit more open mind, smiled at me when I did my stuff. Anyway I tried to simpatizize with them by changing my own stuff into a more Teddy Wilson sounding stuff, with some stride in the left hand, but the more chromatic lines were to the complete dislike of that fat white bearded banjo playing leader who almost chased me from the stage and I think later in the evening when he got juiced he cursed me as a long haired arrogant kid who never had worked some real work in a factory or in construction or who knows what.....

Sorry no. I had hoped this. But it is possible that the mistery tune I ´m lookin´ for is from an earlier album, since I browsed thru all the tracks of "Mysterious Traveler" . It´s really strange, I found the track "Mr. Gone" since I remember this was a strange 4/4 straight ahead tune, but the track I want to find.... It is true that it is possible it could have been from an earlier album too, since Herwig also spinned older stuff. I remember he once spinned some tracks from "Blue Train" which I bought....., his hour of jazz saturday late evening was my main source of hearing all that music when I was underage for night clubs. (well I didn´t wait until I was 18)

Yes, that´s it. Quite short, but nice and especially so nice that Monk agreed to perform at that school.

I have "In Tune" where they sing together with the Oscar Peterson trio.

Great pic !

Great pics. That´s some places I have not been there, But traveling with train has been a part of my live here in Europe-Eastern Europe. For many years I had to travel each month about 1000 km crossing two borderlines to have at least 3,4 days with my family. I remember once two guys from California were doing that "adventure" of traveling east and it was completly unusual or unknown to them that they wake you up in the night for passport control and luggage control and nobody spoke English. They always asked me "what´s happenin´ now ???" I think I remember they wanted to visit the "Dracula Castle" 🤣

I like this much more than the many albums Lou made with Herman Foster or with organ. This is really a fine bop session, I remember I had bought this when I was in the States, and I had bought it before "Sidewinder" and like it much more than "Sidewinder". I saw J.C. Heard with Dizzy Gillespie in 1983, it was a fantastic concert, one of the best Diz I ever heard. They played a fantastic version of "Manteca" and "Round Midnight".....

Hello Friends. Yesterday I had a bit time and listened to some Weather Report tunes on youtube and it was so exhausting. I wrote down all the titles of the albums (with the exception of Black Market, which I discovered that I have myself !) . The Big Surprise was, that I recognized the swing tune "Mr. Gone", where the synthisizer plays the walking bass line. This was the second tune that was spinned after the "misterious tune" about which I have asked you ! But then I had to stop due to other commitments. So I suppose, that maybe my memories wrong and it was not in 1977 but in 1978. Well as a 1959 born you cannot know anymore, if a certain event was in 77 or 78. What I remember is, that the Radio DJ of "Jazz-Shop" spinned two tunes of Weather Report. One was "Mr Gone" and so maybe that slower piece with that sweet theme that constantly repeated might also be from "Mr Gone". And that could be logic, because that radio program concentrated on records that just had been published. Now, what more lyrical tune will be on "Mr Gone" ?