jazztrain

Happy Birthday to another clarinet fan, Garth!

I just read Sandke's book. Here's something from page 123 that speaks to the Marsalis/Crouch relationship: >>> Ironically, Marsalis's interest in jazz only began at age fourteen, even though his father was a professional jazz pianist. Marsalis biographer Leslie Gourse recounts that when Stanley Crouch first met the young trumpeter, "He [Crouch] was astounded at how great Wynton's prowess on the trumpet was and how little Wynton knew about the jazz tradition." Marsalis freely admits that as a teenager he was turned off by Dizzy Gillespie's "thin tone." He credits Crouch for being "one of the first people who made me understand the value of the historical perspective in jazz music and the fact that there's a philosophy behind any type of aesthetic statement." >>> On the other hand, on page 33, the following appears in reference to Crouch: >>> His musical views, on the other hand, have gone through a complete about-face. Crouch arrived in New York in 1975 as the drummer for, and roommate of, avant-garde saxophonist David Murray. From 1979 to 1988, when Crouch was a staff writer for The Village Voice, he was quick to use this pulpit to preach the virtues of new jazz in general and David Murray in particular (revealing a penchant for conflict of interest a la Hammond and Feather). But in the early 1980s he switched his allegiance to Wynton Marsalis and became a staunch advocate of more traditional forms of jazz, specifically those that exhibit "the blues" and "swing." It's more than a little ironic that an ex-avant-garde drummer has appointed himself the ultimate arbiter of who swings and who does not. >>>

The liner notes suggest that George Simon (I'm assuming that's the identity of "G.T.S.") was responsible for putting the date together. The following information from John Chilton's biography of Hawkins (The Song of the Hawk) suggests that Hawkins was unlikely to be the one who brought Freeman in "since he loved his playing so much." >>> The supreme individualism of each of the front-line soloists is apparent on every track, and the deep contrasts between the styles of Hawkins and freeman (relating to tonal differences, dissimilarity of phrasing and contrasting approaches to harmony) produce showers of interestingly patterned sparks as the two flinty veterans duel. In the issue of Down Beat that went on sale just before this session took place, Hawkins said some candid things about his rival. Having already identified Bud Freeman's playing on a recording of 'Perdido', he wnet on to say, 'Do I like that tenor style? Well, no, not exactly.' >>> Recently read somewhere that it was Hawk who insisted on the presence of Bud Freeman since he loved his playing so much?

Ernie Wilkins and Joe Thomas. Here's information from the liner notes: >>> One final plea from Cootie: "Don't just put us in the studio and tell everyone to blow -- please!" So Ernie Wilkins, who's written such swinging things for Basie, sketched five sets of opening and closing choruses, between which all the men could blow solos, and that experienced recording arranger, Joe Thomas, who has written for Cootie of late, worked out the backgrounds for the two numbers that spotlight Williams. >>>

Charles Tolliver. Mosaic Select.

Yikes! Another year already. The Jazz Train starts year 29 today. Same time, same place (see above). Today it's music recorded on this date (January 20) in years past. Music from 1927 to 1945 today.

Interesting. When I interviewed DeFranco many years ago, I asked him about other "modern" clarinetists. He brought up Schikdkraut himself in the course of the discussion.

Sad news to wake up to seven time zones from home. I had the pleasure of seeing Buddy several times over the years beginning in the late 1970s. He never failed to impress. I also remember him playing "Memories of You" (which Larry mentioned) as well as some other lesser known tunes that he liked, such as "This is All I Ask" and "Moon Song." I had the opportunity to interview him in the mid to late 1980s and asked him if there was some particular project that he wanted to pursue and he mentioned wanting to record some big band charts by Rob Pronk. Thankfully, that came to fruition with some memorable results. Many years ago Buddy opened the Regattabar (which still operates) in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He announced and started to play one of the etudes that he had recorded with Jim Gillis. About thirty seconds into the tune, a fire alarm went off and the room was cleared. When everyone returned, the group played something else. I never heard him play any of the etudes live thereafter. A few favorites that come to mind after the obvious fine series of work that he did for Norman Granz on various labels including his recording with Art Tatum include: the duo album with Dave McKenna, the album of etudes with Jim Gillis, the two albums that were released on Pablo (a later Granz connection, although I think they were recorded privately), and one on Progressive.

I was going to mention Bob Wilber (note spelling) as well. At the risk of this turning into just a list, it's worth noting that Budd Johnson played a nice soprano as well.

Yes, based on the notes.

Correct. I found some references that show 1986 as the issue date. Here's a review from the New York Times (see below). It's pretty clear that this is from a studio, not from the Village Vanguard. >>> HOME VIDEO: MOVIES; A Pillar of the Piano By JOHN S. WILSON Published: May 3, 1987 JAZZ: EARL HINES AND COLEMAN HAWKINS Earl Hines, Coleman Hawkins, George Tucker, Oliver Jackson. Produced by Stephen Schmidt. Directed by Karl Genus. Rhapsody Films. 28 minutes. $29.95. Filmed in an intimately lit studio setting, this 1965 session with two of the founding pillars of jazz is a superb display of the brilliance and individuality of Earl Hines (in photo) as a pianist and a somewhat saddening glimpse of Coleman Hawkins going into his decline (he died four years later). Fortunately the film is largely devoted to Hines, with George Tucker on bass and the elegant Oliver Jackson riding suavely on drums. Every time Hines's fingers touch the keys, rhythmic ideas in exquisite variations flow out - jauntily swaggering and bubbling with an effortless authority that only Hines seemed to possess. Hawkins emerges from the studio shadows to play on two tunes - one slow, one fast. They would be satisfactory for a less distinguished saxophonist, but it is sad to hear this great artist moving weakly across the surface of his solos. >>>

l p: There are two different Tom Lords. The Tom Lord whose discography we've been talking about is one; there's another one who was responsible for the Clarence Williams book that Storyville published in the mid 1970s. It's not clear which one helped with the Pumpkin release. My version of Lord does not show the Rhapsody release (or the film). Perhaps it shows up in a later edition.

OK. A bit more information. Information available for the Rhapsody vhs indicates that it was directed by Karl Genus. This matches the information from Meeker. The material on the Rhapsody vhs indicates that it consists of the following: Earl Hines Trio: But Not For Me Earl Hines Trio: I'm a Little Brown Bird Looking For a Blue Bird Earl Hines Trio + Coleman Hawkins: Just One More Chance Earl Hines Trio + Coleman Hawkins: Crazy Rhythm So, either the Rhapsody vhs does not include "Rifftide" or perhaps the quartet plays it, without identification, at the end of the film. I think I may have a copy of the vhs somewhere, but it's not easily accessible at the moment. Perhaps someone else has it and can check. Conclusions: The material on the Rhapsody vhs and the Pumpkin LP may be different. Your original post suggests that the Pumpkin material is from the Village Vanguard, while the description of the Rhapsody vhs material refers to a television studio. Your first post states that the version of "Crazy Rhythm" on the Pumpkin LP is an unedited version of what's on the Rhapsody vhs. Is this your observation or something from jazzdiscogs.com? l p: Our posts crossed. We seem to be reaching similar conclusions. The material on "The Grand Reunion" is different.

I checked Meeker's Jazz on Film database. It has the information pasted below for a 1965 made for television production with Earl Hines and Coleman Hawkins. If this is the material from which Rhapsody drew its release, then it's different from what Pumpkin issued. Note that Meeker lists one of the tunes as "One More Choice." This is almost certainly "One More Chance." >>> JAZZ: EARL HINES AND COLEMAN HAWKINS / Karl Genus [motion picture] Title JAZZ: EARL HINES AND COLEMAN HAWKINS [motion picture] Director Karl Genus Music Director and/or Conductor David Himmelstein Copyright Date 1965 Place of Publication/Creation USA Form motion picture Source Information from: "Jazz on the Screen" by David Meeker. Used with permission. Notes Made-for-TV programme or made-for-video/DVD release. Short film (under 30 minutes). Songs "But not for me" by Ira and George Gershwin; "I’m a little blackbird looking for a bluebird" by W. Grant Clarke, Roy Turk, George W. Meyer, Arthur Johnston; "Fine and dandy" by Paul James, Kay Swift; "One more choice"; "Crazy rhythm" by Irving Caesar, Joseph Meyer, Roger Wolfe Kahn. Personnel on Camera Earl Hines, piano, vocal; Coleman Hawkins, tenor sax; George Tucker, acoustic double bass; Oliver Jackson, drums. Just noticed that Meeker's information does not include "Rifftide." If "Rifftide" is on the Rhapsody release, then maybe there's still some other source. Or perhaps the information on www.jazzdiscogs is wrong.

My version of Lord does not show the Rhapsody vhs at all. I pasted the session information he shows.

Lord has it all from the same session. This is what my rather old (up to 2004) version of Lord shows: >>> Just one more chance [H3278-6] Coleman Hawkins Rifftide: Coleman Hawkins with the Earl Hines Trio: Coleman Hawkins (ts) Earl Hines (p) George Tucker (b) Oliver Jackson (d) "Village Vanguard", New York, March 1965 Crazy rhythm Pumpkin 105 Rosetta - Just one more chance - Rifftide - Indian summer - >>>

Still not sure how Bob Wilber surfaced in this thread. I get your point to some extent. Bob Wilber at various times has, to some extent, channeled Bechet on Soprano, Goodman on clarinet, Hodges on alto, and Hawkins on tenor. However, his pairing with Kenny Davern in Soprano Summit and the later Summit Reunion was pretty distinctive and original in its own way, and his recordings with The Six certainly went way beyond his "roots" or "starting point." But - you never saw a Duke Ellington Blindfold Test (at least not that I know of). When left to his own devices, Duke Ellington was not Alan Douglas or Bob Theile. Duke Ellington had neither time nor need to be Alan Douglas or Bob Thiele, being Duke Ellington was a full-time gig in itself, right? And, Clark Terry joined the band in 1951..hardly a young punk even then! But all of that aside - if you want to compare the jazz reality of Ellington's "later" years to those of Sonny's "later" years, let's line everybody up in a cemetery and see how much overlap there is. And then let's look at who's working where, how often, for how much, and with what kind of bands. Apples and oranges. Yeah, somebody who willingly sealed themselves off, so to speak, from anything past a certain evolutionary point in order to do whatever it was they had to do. Granted, Wilber's starting point came from all kinds of "outside" his own chronology, but it wasn't meant to go that far to make THAT point. It was just to say that everybody has the right to call it quits on where there "there" is, that that's not any kind of a "fault" in and of itself.

Portions of the book mentioned in my last post are available for review here: https://books.google.com/books?id=FYTpfp-wA5QC&pg=PR29&lpg=PR29&dq=doc,+the+story+of+a+birmingham+jazz+man&source=bl&ots=KDpG69btKh&sig=VI_tKOHUtuM7gwYyj5k10v6C_Xc&hl=en&sa=X&ei=DkuLVO2VIc3uoATx84LwBQ&ved=0CFYQ6AEwDTgK#v=onepage&q=doc%2C%20the%20story%20of%20a%20birmingham%20jazz%20man&f=false There's a photo on page 196 showing a small group including Joe Guy from sometime in the 1950s.

This link will lead you to some information on post-Holiday activities of Joe Guy: http://steeltoereview.com/2012/11/07/doc-the-story-of-a-birmingham-jazz-man-excerpt-by-frank-doc-adams-and-burgin-mathews/

Big Beat Steve, To put the tune length issue into some perspective, today is the 50th anniversary of the recording of "A Love Supreme." I've aired it in its entirety before (perhaps on some other significant anniversary), but it just won't fit today. I suspect others will be airing it today anyway. I agree with you regarding the personnel of big bands. I generally don't read the full personnel but will try to identify soloists. I always laugh when I hear someone referring to a recording "featuring" followed by the full personnel of a band or, even worse, everyone listed on the cover of a compilation album.

Hi David, I'll try to answer some of your questions from the perspective of (1) a programmer/presenter of a weekly show for almost 28 years on a non-commercial, all volunteer, station and (2) a radio listener. My "thing" as a presenter is, and always has been, themed programs. In the early years, the focus was usually on individual artists but this evolved due, in part, to digital rights management restrictions. In the last few years, the show has presented music recorded (in past years) on the date that the program airs. It keeps things interesting for me (and, I hope, for the listener), provides a themed structure, and allows for a wide variety of music. It takes a fair amount of time to find, preview, and select the music to air, and I only wish that I had more time available to play music, since the show is only 90 minutes. With all sorts of outlets available (Pandora, Sirius, etc.), I sometimes marvel that people listen to radio at all, but thankfully some do. My experience is that, with a few exceptions, you don't get a lot of feedback from listeners. If you have something good to give away, the phones will ring, but, otherwise, most people either aren't motivated to call or don't want to disturb you during the program. There are the occasional folks calling up with questions about what was played or providing thanks for having played something. The exceptions are a small number of fairly regular listeners who call to pass along priceless stories (for example, having seen someone perform years ago, having played with so and so, or even having been in jail with someone, etc.) or just check in to say hello. You can form real ongoing (albeit "remote") relationships or connections with people this way. You don't get that from a streaming service. Most affirming in terms of feedback in some respects are those who will actually send in money to the station during our once a year fundraiser. Regarding the issue of how much information to pass along, this can be a delicate balance. My view is that the music is the primary focus. Ultimately, the show is about the music, not about the presenter. However, I try to provide enough information to help the interested listener learn something along the way and to help put the music into some context without, I hope, getting overly pedantic. In addition to the usual leader and tune, I provide composers, recording date and location, original label, and, when possible, identify soloists via back announcing. I'll also pass along occasional anecdotes or personal observations. Much of the discographical information is also made available in real time via an on-line playlist which is also archived. I mostly listen to music on the radio while driving or occasionally at home from the web. I tend to listen to programs by colleagues from whom I can learn something. Otherwise, I have a collection at home that I can enjoy, explore, and revisit. I try to keep current with new music or discover older music via other radio programs and by reading posts here. I dislike shows that, perhaps under the direction of radio consultants, provide too little information. I really do want to know the soloists, not just the leader. I'm turned off by shows that are too formulaic or clearly based on a predetermined "playlist" or "rotation" selected by someone else. You know the shows. There's a vocal (usually a tune you've heard hundreds of times already like "My Funny Valentine", "Gee Baby, Ain't I Good to You", etc.) every third tune, and little information is provided about the music. These shows essentially provide "background music." in my mind, that's demeaning to the listener and does a disservice to the music. I continue to do the program to help share my passion for the music with others, to expose people to music that they might not hear elsewhere or otherwise, and to help pass along what I learned from others. Listening to jazz radio in my formative years was one of the ways that I learned. When I started to listen and collect, much less music was as readily available compared to today, and jazz radio was one of the few ways to hear music that was not otherwise available. I guess I'm trying to pay back that debt and help ensure that younger people may actually be exposed to musicians who otherwise tend to fall through the cracks. Jon Pollack host of "The Jazz Train" Tuesdays, 4-5:30 pm, eastern standard time (2100-2230 GMT) WMBR-FM, Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S.A. 88.1 fm with streaming and some archives at http://www.wmbr.org/

There were two Bechet albums in the old Victor Vintage series that had excellent sound. They were: Bechet of New Orleans (LPV-510) The Blue Bechet (LPV-535) Of course, these are not complete. In some cases, they used alternate takes that, as a result, I know better than the master takes that I obtained later.

Thanks for the replies. The Dec. 29 reference must be a typo.

The Blue Note Discography (original edition), the on-line Jazz Discography web site (jazzdisco), and an old edition of Lord all give December 9, 1961 as the recording date for this session. The LP provides no date. However, my copy of the Japanese CD (TOCJ-4105) gives the date as December 29, 1961. Is there any other support for a December 29 recording date or is this just a typo? Does anyone have the later Blue Note Discography or another CD issue of the album? Thanks in advance for any help.