jeffcrom

Great topic. My favorite lineup is the 1960-64 band: Freddie Hubbard, Curtis Fuller, Wayne Shorter, Cedar Walton, and Jymie Merritt or Reggie Workman. Shorter really matured as a player and composer during this period, Hubbard was hot, and the band had a little bit of an edge that I like. I also have a (probably eccentric) fondness for the brief period in 1986-87 when Wallace Roney and Kenny Garrett were in the band at the same time. As far as I know, this group was only documented on the Delos album Feeling Good.

A good one. Lawrence Brown introduces the bouncy melody, and Bigard and Cootie are also given solo spots. The four-piece saxophone section is heavily featured, and they sound great. "Ducky Wucky" comes from the period when Ellington was leaving behind the older concept of structuring his music with contrasting themes. DW is all based on the theme that Brown plays at the beginning. Ellington provides all the variety the piece needs with his compositional skill in variation, tone colors, and simply knowing what soloist to call on. The "Dance" alternate title derives from the use of a short excerpt from "Ducky Wucky" as part of Ellington's "Symphony in Black," which serves as the soundtrack of the remarkable 1934 short film of the same name.

Duke Ellington - The Ellington Era (Columbia), record two.

Just for kicks, I played the oldest record I own today - "Just For Today" by Harry Macdonough. It's a sentimental Victor Herbert ballad, recorded in May, 1901 by a singer who was popular in the early days of the recording industry. The record is on the Victor Monarch label and was actually manufactured in 1901 - Victor changed their label style before the end of that year. It's not very exciting musically, but it's touching to hold and listen to a recording from 1901. This is what the label looks like, except for the song title and credits, of course:

Sexy Sadie Martha My Dear Dear Prudence

Yeah, the number of cassettes jumped out at me, and that effects the collection in some serious ways - almost all the Bix is cassette (or is that reel tape?), for instance. And while this collection covers a lot of the trad jazz bases, it reflects some of the owner's idiosyncratic tastes in ways that make it less attractive, in my opinion. I mean, more Firehouse Five Plus 2 and Dukes of Dixieland than Ellington? Really? This would be a great collection to browse through and pick out the gems from.

I'm an Al-nostic; I don't believe that it's possible to know if Allen really exists.

Gary Burton Quartet - Lofty Fake Anagram (RCA). Elements of this sound dated - mostly Larry Coryell's guitar style - but I still like this one.

Tony Bennett/The McPartlands and Friends Make Magnificent Music (Improv). Selections from a 1977 gig. The friends include Buddy Tate, Vic Dickenson, Herb Hall and Charlie Byrd. Marian McPartland plays a great "Softly As In a Morning Sunrise," and Bennett sings "While We're Young," a song that always gets to me, with composer Alec Wilder in the audience. Mal Waldron Quintet with Steve Lacy - One-Upmanship (Inner City). I bought this one over 30 years ago. Lacy's solo on "The Seagulls of Kristiansund" is stunning.

"The Tattooed Bride" is one of my very favorite Ellington pieces, and one of his best extended works, although it seems to be kind of under-appreciated. It was premiered at the November, 1948 Carnegie Hall concert and featured at many concert appearances over the next several years. Many of these concerts were recorded and eventually released; I've got three different live versions of the piece. The "official" studio recording was made in December, 1950, and appeared on the Masterpieces by Ellington album on Columbia. (If you have the 1953 Pasadena concert version, be warned that it begins about two minutes into the piece. Whether the tape was edited or Ellington actually played a shortened version, I don't know.) TTB is brilliantly put together, built around a four-note motif that appears in various guises throughout the 12-minute work. But it never sounds contrived or mechanical sounding - it all flows beautifully. Although it's a continuous, through-composed piece, it falls pretty naturally into three movements after the introduction: Intro Medium tempo Uptempo (minor key) Slow, changing to uptempo for the last couple of minutes. All of the melodies are built around the four-note motif - it's pretty easy to hear. Along the way are variations, contrapuntal passages, a trombone solo (Lawrence Brown through 1950; Britt Woodman later), and some gorgeous playing by Jimmy Hamilton, who is the featured soloist. This is one of those Ellington works that doesn't have a wasted note, where everything works just perfectly. At various times Ellington explained the title to his audiences. The up-and-down four-note motif represents the four strokes of the letter "W" with which the title character is tattooed. And Jimmy Hamilton's long held note at the end marks the point when the young man first finds out that his bride is tattooed.

George Adams/Don Pullen Quartet - Life Line (Timeless)

Junior Cook?

This is kind of a "throwaway" tune from the Concert in the Virgin Islands album; Ellington and/or Strayhorn probably knocked this out in half an hour. But it's still pretty good; I'd rather hear a throwaway Ellington piece than almost anyone else's music. Many of the titles on the Virgin Islands album are parodies of titles of then-current Broadway shows - "Barefoot in the Park," in this case. "Barefoot Stomper" is up-tempo, with a simple, riff-like melody played by the saxophone section. Which brings me to the saxophone section.... Johnny Hodges, Russell Procope, Jimmy Hamilton, Paul Gonsalves, Harry Carney. This is one of the greatest saxophone sections jazz has ever seen. It took awhile for all the pieces to fall into place. The section came together in 1950, when Gonsalves joined the band, but Hodges left soon afterwards. When Hodges returned in 1955, the section played together until late 1968, when Jimmy Hamilton left the band. Each of these men has a highly individual and instantly recognizable sound. When they play together, they blend wonderfully, but you can hear the individual colors that make up the total sonic picture. That's jazz, baby. And that blend was captured wonderfully on the Virgin Islands album. Paul Gonsalves has a long solo on "Barefoot," and his sound has never been recorded better.

Cecil Taylor - 2 Ts for a Lovely T (Codanza); disc 5.

I woke up this morning thinking about this piece. The Ben Webster solo is amazing, and the ensemble variations toward the end are great, but listen to the melody. It's riff-y sounding, but the first eight bars are through-composed. It's swinging, but boppish. The first note is kind of offbeat, literally and figuratively. It's an unusual note with which to begin a melody - it's the second scale degree; the ninth when looked at harmonically. Then, in the fifth bar, the melody lands on on the flat fifth - and that odd note is accented and is the longest note in the melody. It's a simple, yet brilliant melody.

Horace Silver - Doin' the Thing (BN mono)

Disc three of the Ellington Capitol. The biggest surprise is a version of "In the Mood" that I actually like.

Jimmy Smith - Plain Talk (BN stereo)

Yeah, I thought about comparing the trombone playing on those sides to some confirmed Albert Wynn recordings, but I was too lazy today. I might do that later this week. It's funny, though, how guesses made in the early days of jazz scholarship have taken on lives of their own.

Disc four today. I don't know who plays trombone on the August, 1927 sessions - "Big Boy Blues" through "Oh Papa Blues" - but it ain't Kid Ory. I don't care what the liner notes or Brian Rust say; it sounds nothing like Ory. Where are the "experts'" ears?

Amazon vendor, actually. But yeah, I'm a lucky guy.

Cleaned a bunch of the 78s I picked up yesterday. They included about half a dozen acoustic Victor Red Seals - Caruso, Kreisler, Mischa Elman; I won't list them individually, but I wanted to point out something kind of mind-blowing. Victor had a sliding price structure for their Red Seals (which were one-sided records), from $2.00 for a 10" record credited to a single artist up to $7.00 for a 12" record by an operatic sextet. The Caruso and company "Sextet from Lucia di Lammermoor" record that I found yesterday cost me a buck. In 1908, when it was issued, someone paid the current equivalent of $165.00 or so for that five minutes of music, according to several inflation calculators I found online. I hope this makes you feel better about springing for that next Mosaic set. Besides the Red Seals, I enjoyed: Paul Robeson - Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen/Swing Low, Sweet Chariot (Victor, 1926). Beautiful. Paul Whiteman - Ole Man River/Selections from Show Boat (Victor 12", 1928). Side one features Robeson again, and side two has twelve wonderful measures of Bix Beiderbecke. Jean Goldkette - I'm Gonna Meet My Sweetie Now (Victor, 1927). Side two is by Nat Shilkret's band, and isn't much, but the Goldkette side is pretty hot; it has more Bix, along with Frankie Trumbauer, Jimmy Dorsey, and Joe Venuti.

Roy Blount, Jr. - Hail, Hail, Euphoria! My homeboy Roy Blount is one of my favorite humor writers. This is his examination of The Marx Brothers' Duck Soup. The Amazon reviews are all over the place - some people don't like Blount's many digressions, but that's always been part of his style. And the digressions often contain the most interesting passages.

I could give a long, complicated response to this, but I'll just say, "Please don't."

Inspired by my visit to Ma Rainey's last home and grave today: Mother of the Blues (JSP); disc five. "They say that I do it; Ain't nobody caught me. Y'all got to prove it on me."