Gheorghe

I went to the Roman Schwaller quartet tuesday night. Roman Schwaller is one of the leading saxophonists here in Europe. He´s from Elvetia but lives in Viena. He recorded with name musicians like Johnny Griffin and hundrets of others and is a great composer and arranger also. The first time I had heard him was jammin with Sonny Stitt, when Roman still was very young and had played with the Viena Art Orchestra. He had a very talented young bassist from Serbia, my favourite Oliver Kent on piano and my favourite Mario Gonzi on drums. Interesting, they did a lot of Monk tunes that evening, like "Trinkle Tinkle" and so on. And an astonishing medium tempo swing version of "For Heaven´s Sake" which is usually done as a ballad, at least that´s how I had played it once. After the show Roman told me that he had heard Joe Lovano doing it that way. If I go to a show just for my pleasure for listening, I always sit as near to the drummer as possible, because I love to hear the drums loud and also feel it from the bottom....

The interesting thing is that the first "Walkin" I heard was one of the live versions of the "2nd Quintet" that means with Herbie, Ron, Tony, which I played over and over again when I was a kid. So when I bought a then available Prestige Double album of pre-first-quintet Davis recordings I was kinda puzzled that it´s such a relaxed medium tempo. Then, in my early youth I didn´t find it as exiting as the herbie-tony-ron-thing. As I said, that´s a generation thing..... The "second quintet" walkin´ seemed to be a hit of my generation, everybody hummed it and said it´s fast and strong. Once when I lived with my 10years elder sister she had called a craftman to fix something in the 1st floor and I was up in my room and had Davis second quintet, maybe just "Walkin" spinnin and as always during that time, very very loud. And later my sister came up and said "that craftman said "wow, great music you are spinnin´" I asked her "why didn´t you send him up ?"

Fantastic, I love Dave Liebman. When I was a teenager, Dave Liebman, after Johnny Griffin was the second great saxophonist I saw live and somehow, during that time it is not impossible I was even more impressed by what Dave had played. I think the Quest started around 1980, and I heard Lieb again shortly before he formed Quest, I think it was a pre-Quest formation with Terumaso Hino, John Scofield, Ron McLure and Adam Nussbaum, very fine. This could have been in the late seventies...... (the first occasion was the Lookout Farm stuff). last night, during intermission I had a discussion with a bass player whom I praised for his strong bass sound. We discussed Eddie Gomez also, the thing that some bass players around 1980 had their strings very down to get a guitar like sound, which was not a pure bass sound. Nowadays it seems bass players got back to their roots. The have strong hands and even if the bass speaker has a technical problem, you still hear ´em . Like Mingus said, you had to cut through a band, you had to have chops to produce a sound.

Side one with Red Garland on piano, yeah. There was another Bird album curiously issued on BN, from about the same time, but with a less interesting rhythm section, I think I gave it only one listening....

Those Affinity albums in the late 70´s, all with the same cover design. I think it was some live recordings, like I have George Coleman-Wynton Kelly at the "Left Bank" in Baltimore.....

Terumasa Hino.... he sometimes played cornet or pocket trumpet, right ? Some influences of Don Cherry if I remember. I heard him with a Dave Liebman Allstar Group featuring Adam Nussbaum on drums, Ron McLure on bass, John Scofield on guitar. I think it was in the late 70´s.

That reads like a dream team ! ten to Two blues......there was one album of Dusko that was titled "After Hours" and as much as I remember it had also a stellar band. But I had only two tunes taped on casetofon from radio, back then in 1977 or so. I wanted to buy the CD some years ago, but it´s for an astronomic price......., well I still think I have the music in mind, one of it might have be a blues, and one was "Those were the Days", I think that´s what I had on the casetofon.

Thank you ! I´ve just had a look at some of the links you both posted. In the older days those "Just the chords would have been enough , but it didn´t make me a better musician just only to know the chords, because for good comping I like to know the inside of the music. Many tunes I just had to hear them once or twice and can play them, others it´s good if I also see the music notes, if at least I had heard the song before. (I can read lead sheet best if I´ve already heard the tune and just want to check if my memorie´s right. You know: You are on stage and if a tune is called you can´t just say "well if someone has a lead sheet for me" or so. You got to know it, so the best way to not be embarrased on stage is to know as many tunes as possible. On the other hand, the little amount of experience at least made me a good listener. If it happens they call a tune I think I´ve heard somewhere but could not be sure if I know it excatly, I get into it just by listening careful and checking the right chords and it´s astonishing that sometimes those become the best results. Sure I can transcribe the chords into another key, but it´s annoying if you hear all the guys around the world play a tune in a certain jazz key and then you find lead sheet in another key or with too corny chords....

I had heard about that festival in Belgia I think there was a track of Bud with some local musicians, playing his eternal "I Remember Clifford" which appeared at almost each of his discs in his last 5 or 6 years. But this would be more for collectors. But I love that tune and once there was a little private jazz party at the place of a former jazz club owner, who had weekly "Jazz in the Living Room" for 15 Euro including drinks and a vegetables soup. That guy said to the musicians on stand he want´s to hear "I Remember Clifford" and they didn´t know it (???!). I was semi inactive at that time and jumped up to the piano and played it to the great pleasure of the guy who had that request. Really a deep tune, you can make so much out of it, working with different dynamics, to let it come out of the heart and soul....

So my memory´s right and it is "Lover Come Back to Me". I love that tune and often perform Hawk´s first class bop line on it "Bean ´n the Boys" at a brisk tempo. I´ll have to listen to that track eventually. For Bird and for Brew ! Maybe Ed Shaughnessy is not really my idea of a drummer for Bird´s music. I heard a lot of great Bird who sounds great in spite of some not adecvate drummer, but I can´t really enjoy it if it´s not Klook, Roach, Roy Haynes, Art Taylor etc. since I prefer to hear Bird in a perfect bop-context, even if the solos are shorter.

This is a rare ESP Disk album by the not too well known drummer James Zitro. It is a wonderful example of typical NY so called "Free Jazz" , recorded in 1967. I have a special affinity to this because it´s the first recording of one my prime musical inspirations here in Europe, the American in Europe Allan Praskin (as). This is 60´s avantgarde jazz at it´s best and all the musicians are great. Warren Gale (tp), Bert Wilson (ts) have great skills , the bass is superb and almost reaches the heights of inspiration of Henry Grimes. And the leader himself, drummer James Zitro is fascinating. It´s really a good recording sound, you really hear what the drummer plays, he is amazing. Allan Praskin already had his wonderful sound on as, the kind of alto sound I love most, as much as I like to listen to Jackie McLean or to Jimmy Lyons with Cecil Taylor. Pianist Michael Cohen is superb. That´s the way it should sound. Those are musicians, who know exactly what they do and where they are at. There should have been more.

Yes , that´s it.

Well the tuba is not really among the first five instruments I think about when picking up a band for a gig and wouldn´t be in further time, but I think I had heard some tuba in some Mingus workshops, maybe on the TownHall concert or another larger band , maybe "Let´s my Children hear music"......I think there was some tuba also on "Black Saint and Sinner Lady".

I think that my wife ordered this obscure CD for me as a birthday present. That´s why I won´t listen to tracks now, so that I may have a surprise then. If I remember there are a lot of musicians from the old days with Jackie McLean, Steve Grossman and so on. Anyway it´s strange that Miles who always cursed out his musical past and dissed former musical partners changed his mind. Anyway, also the "post late 80´s bands" sounded more interesting than what happened from 1984-1988. I think in 89/90 he had a great keyboard player from Japonia, it was Kei Akagi and he was more a pianist than a keyboarder, I mean he played like a pianist and did not only push all them buttons to make "musica from the conserva" . That band of young guys and new Miles at least returned to more "jazz" and I think they even cut out them stupid "Time after Times" and "Human Natures".....

I must look if I find the one Tony Scott solo I heard once. Is it possible that it was on some of all those Bird-Unissued Material. I didn´t really listen to much of the stuff, since very often it´s just from one nighters with musicians he was not used to, and sometimes very weak sound quality. Is it possible I heard a long track on some standard , it may be Indiana or Lover Come Back to me, a long track where there is a clarinet solo also ? Maybe that is Tony Scott. As usual with clarinet in that context, I don´t have much love for that instrument, it has a more piercing sound in the upper register, and a more "funny" sound in the lower register . Anyway I think there was such a booklet or something were Bird plays and then is a long squeaky sounding clarinet solo. P.S.: On the other hand, I feel better when it´s Dolphy´s or Maupin´s bass clarinet, that sounds much better to me than the traditional clarinet.

Hello Friends ! Sometimes I need sheet to check out if I remember the tunes and the chords correctly (as I never have sheet placed on piano when I play live). I had registered at sheetmusic but it sometimes disappoints me since you don´t find a tune or you find it in other keys than you might expect. (Like let´s say "It´s You or No One": Though I looked for C-instruments, the tune was in Eb, while usually it´s played just in a plain F at a very rapid tempo) . Or you find "piano music" that means with notation for both hands, which doesn´t help me at all since I only need lead sheet. Are there better sources for good lead sheet, I mean made for playing musicians ? Thanks in avans....

I think I heard this one some years ago. Sure the trumpet player has a lot of technique, but I think I remember he sounds a little nervous, too many notes, not really leaving space. A lot of Clifford Brown Followers did this. Donald Byrd not sooo much, Lee Morgan found his own style very early......, even if you play the fastest stuff you got to leave some space. I think I picked that up at some Metro Station where they had some jazz cds and I browsed thru them. It seemed to be a previously unissued session. The first tune I think had something to do with an animal farm, it had some animal sounds imitated by the horns. My wife heard it and says it is funny. I don´t remember the rest of it, only that it must have been one of the very last dates where Paul Chambers plays. He doesn´t sound as sure and strong like he used to be. I think he might have been very sick already and quite out of work, that´s how he sounds, exhausted, unsure, uncomfortable, and it also seems to be a cheaper bass. Me too: The 1947/48 stuff for Savoy and BN seems to be the best, and the live stuff from the Roost of course. The instrumentations, the solos, the compositions, and Tadd´s own nice little piano inputs, and as an arranger all the stuff he did for the Dizzy Bigband and the Billy Eckstine Big Band. I have the impression that later he slowed down and his compositions got more smooth, I don´t get the kick out of it, that I would get when playing "Our Delight" "Hot House" etc. The "Fountainbleau" is nice, but never really exited me. I like the "Mating Call" better. And the "Magic Touch" sounds more like a ghost band since Tadd obviously was very sick already and couldn´t play himself. And again a lot of the tunes are more a smooth easy listening.

What´s the title of this album ? I never saw it. Was it for Timeless ? I regret I didn´t see the Liberation Music Orchestra when they played in Hollabrunn near Vienna in 1985. It was a 3 days festival and due to other commitments I had to cut out sunday, the third and last day, so I missed the only occasions to see a late version of the "Modern Jazz Quartet", and the "Liberation".... I love it and bought it when I was 18. Such a great session with Griff + Davis´ musicians.... Around that time some older guy acquainted me with the music of Wes and I bought some of his albums, among them this one which is the most interesting....

I must admit I never bought the BN unrelease or rejected sessions or tracks too happily. The first CD pressings of the classic BN albums didn´t have so many alternative tracks and the Japanese CDs never had those " bonus tracks". Maybe I´m alone with that opinion, but for me there is much enough BN material that was considered worth for issuing when it was the time it was recorded. As for Kenny Dorham: I have his earlier BN albums with the original Messengers, the Afro Cuban album and the live album at Bohemia. The next album that really fascinates me is "Una Mas". I later bought the "Whistle Blow" from the early 60´s, but not because I wanted to buy it but it was in the last days of record shops and some guy showed it to me and I thought, ok Paul Chambers, Philly Joe Jones, why not. But it was too much like the typical hard bop albums of the 50´s , and the early 60´s already was the time for other movements, so after one listening I think it is somewhere...., while "Una Mas" with Joe Henderson and Tony Williams is of much more interest for me. So there is little chance I might hear an unreleased session, even more because I read a lot of comments here that it was not a good session with musicians not in best form, and to study their music I prefer to here them in a fine playing mood.....

It was a date in 1985, I think an album where Woody Shaw was accompanied by and Yugoslawien Quartet of ts, p,b,dr, and they were very good and so nice people, but when Woody rang the door he started to make fist movements against Max Bolleman and in the studio he said that Max Bolleman is an racist. He was completly unruly when it came about blowing into the mike, he just would blow into a dead mike. He threw his cigarette ends on the floor or stuck them on the ceiling and with him was a junkie woman, who threw all the toalet paper into the toalet and than watered the hole studio and thought it´s a joke..... and Max Bolleman says it was a miracle that music could be produced and it was mostly due to those nice albeit embarrassed men who played with him. I had seen Woody Shaw two years later at jazzland, and though he was not as irrascible, he caused enough trouble and left a lot of people in embarrasment....

Must be very interesting. Rouse is one of my favourite. It would be fine to hear this. Especially for hearing Monk´s music in a maybe more modern context where you hear the instruments, especially the drums and also the bass better than on the original BN record. The original BN-Monk records have such a terrible sound quality, I didn´t know that in the late 40´s right sound recording still was so low standard. It sounded like in a haze, and like you put a mike in front of an old gramofon and re-record it on audio caseta. I like to play Monk tunes my self and Epistrophy is a favourite of mine. It´s such a fine and logic construction of that tune. This was really Charlie Rouse´ last concert. I didn´t know he died so early, he really looks fine and healthy on that cover.

I like Brew Moore. I have some of him as a sideman with Maggie, with Machito and with Miles from the late 40´s - early 50´s, and then I think a double CD live on Steeplechase......., As a pianist I think it was a very comfortable thing to play with him.

oh them album covers of that time 😄 I only have the Miles and Horns. The Side One with Rollins is very fine and has immortalized the blues "Down", which he also played live at BL. Side II I think is that stuff with Cohn and Zoot, composed by Cohn, well it´s nice and "tasty", but maybe a bit to much like tunes for an old "show orchestra". But beautiful solos. Somehow "Peckin´ Time didn´t become a favourite. I had great expectations when I bought it in the States/FL in 1999, but I think it´s the drummer Charlie Persip, who is more a big band drummer I think. He also ruined the otherwise fantastic 1953 Mobley-Benny Green live set, where he plays a very old Gene Krupa styled drums with 4ths on the bass drum, so covering completly the bass lines......, it just goes "doof daff doof daff" all the time.

Yes that´s cool. I found it in a second had record store in the 70´s. I think it became a bit a model for me for playing solo myself. I love the way Monk plays stride, even on his own compositions like he did on his last album in London. I learned a lot about the use of the left hand from listening to Monk.

I have not heard about Tiny Parham. Timeless ? I had thought Timeless is a label of more modern jazz. But I know the "Chronological" since I bought one that is Fats Navarro with all his Savoy Records as I remember. But they are lousy, they sent me the right CD, but the cover was Jelly Roll Morton (?????!). I had my younger boy make me a paper of the original Navarro logo and I glued it over the Jelly Roll Morton cover. I was looking for other Chronologicals but it was mostly stuff I already had. I think I have one other with Eddie Lockjaw Davis, also Savoy sides.....