Rooster_Ties

For easier, quick comparison…

It’s also on Vol 1 of the Woody/Louis-Hayes “On Tour” 2016 Highnote. https://www.discogs.com/release/19683304-Woody-Shaw-Louis-Hayes-The-Tour-Volume-One Isn’t it interesting how utterly unrecognizable Joyce’s version is?? I doubt I would have figured it out myself. The entire tune’s all there, but it sure is something else, I’ll say that.

No sampling tricks. Somebody we all love recorded this song, and had it in their book for at least a couple years (evidence the two live recordings I also have). If you heard the version we all know, you’d instantly recognize it. But it’s totally the same song. Joyce’s version isn’t all that different, but it under-emphasizes aspects of the tune that might trigger recognition. (Or the version we all know punches them up, is a better way of saying it.)

You (Jim), of all people, have heard this song (somewhere else). I guarantee it, 100%. I have 3 versions of this song on CD — and the autographs of two musicians who were part of the lineups of said recordings. You probably own one or two copies yourself, Jim. At least one.

Nobody anybody’s ever heard of, but fwiw, her initials are PS.

Joyce - “Sunbath”

Still hoping something of this band somehow surfaces… April? 1969: Woody Shaw-t; Tyrone Washington-ts; George Cables-p; Scotty Holt-b – Wollman Auditorium, Columbia University, NYC (February 24, 1969) [db 3/20/69 p.15] – Loeb Student Center, New York University, NYC (March 3, 1969) [db 3/20/69 p.15] – Fillmore East, NYC (March 9, 1969) [db 3/20/69 pp.14, 52] Black Bottom, Montreal, Canada (April? 1969) [Coda 6/69 p.34] Café La Boheme (early April-early May 1969) [Voice] [this is questionable considering the below activity]

Interesting! Did you play-with/know Bob Kenmotsu back in the 80’s any too? (Or any of the other players from this Shintaro Quintet album, for that matter?) And David, speaking on Don Moore, have you (or has anyone?) ever heard the rest of that short probably 30-minute set by Joe/Bobby/Elvin/Don-Moore? Beyond just this one track. Somewhere around here I posted all the details (only 3 tunes, iirc, but the titles are known). But does the entire performance circulate at all?

Ah, well, hey — then the Bill Barron can’t be too far behind!

https://modernmarketingjapan.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-ls-and-rs-of-japanese-and-eric.html?m=1

The liners indicate that this album was recorded in a low-budget studio that otherwise recorded mostly punk rock bands. That the piano was very much in tune was probably a small miracle! (I'm guessing it was an upright piano, but it doesn't particularly sound like it -- and I'd be curious what others here think.) Everyone played in the same room, probably with a fairly straightforward, minimal mic-setup too — resulting in a very "live" sounding studio date. The band rehearsed for one day (seeing the tunes for the first time), and then recorded over two days -- with no overdubs or editing (if the liners are to be believed). It's a real shame this group didn't record again. This is a 5-star album, in my book.

Yeah. I’m the same way about My Shining Hour — it either seems a bit more Evans-ish to me, or at least less Zeitlin-esque. Nothing entirely wrong with it, but (to my way of thinking), it doesn’t sparkle the way all the Zeitlin Columbia studio dates do. I’ve got an LP copy I found cheap, until I could get it on CD (hopefully expanded) — but when I finally heard it, it wasn’t all that motivated to bother to find it on CD.

https://fakebands.com/wiki/index.php?title=Buck_Hammer What other jazz fakes have there been?

Here’s a good recent article on Kenmotsu — and apparently it was his first 1992 leader-date, The Spark, that was on Asian Improv. https://www.berkeleyside.org/2019/07/11/blowing-the-blues-with-bob-kenmotsu

Sigh.

Promo piece about the Miles tribute album… No performance footage, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard Joe’s voice sounding more mellifluous… https://youtube.com/watch?v=7jGMxczR-kY And also, here’s a series of short interviews with musicians on a jazz cruise in 1982, including Joe. And another interview from ~1993…

This is probably the most informative article I can find online about this album, going a bit above and beyond the content of the liners. https://dereksmusicblog.com/2021/03/15/shintaro-quintet-evolution/amp/

Wow! That’s incredible, Allen. Hurrah, hurrah!!!

Ok, now THIS is the real deal… Footage of Bob Kenmotsu and Valery Ponomarev tearing it up at a jazz loft gig in 1987. This video is introduced by Fukushi Tainaka, the drummer on this very Shintaro Quartet album — because this was the loft he lived in back in the late 80’s. The footage starts a little after the 3:45 mark (I’m on my phone, or I’d more easily cue it up for you).

Well gosh golly, here’s the tenor-player, Bob Kenmotsu — with none other than our very own David Weiss, about 5 years ago…

https://www.discogs.com/master/736321-Buck-Hammer-The-Discovery-Of-Buck-Hammer

I know Zeitlin gets compared to Bill Evans a lot, but I find there's a bit more percussiveness in Denny's playing than Evans. Even the slower, more melancholy stuff seems to have a (slight) 'angularity' to his rhythmic approach. Maybe that's not a very descriptive term. Evans seems more snappy (even the slow stuff, in terms of his entrances after pauses or cadences) -- where Zeitlin seems a little colder and more cerebral (both things I rather like, mind you -- at least in some players) -- and I think(?) I do mean "colder" but NOT more "cool". Colder, as in more detached -- figuratively more detached, and perhaps literally too. Anyways, they don't hit me quite the same way -- even if there are a lot of similarities too (I'll admit). I wish Zeitlin had recorded more in the 60's, in these studio sessions -- they're all really great. This Select is a real gem.

OK, I just cracked open the new (cheap) BBE reissue, that I'd bought from Dusty to give to a friend (but now I'm thinking he may get my previous CD of this, which has everything in Japanese). BECAUSE, this new BBE reissue has all new English liners, including brief interview segments with several of the original players -- and an English translation of the original liners too. So, now I'm just reading that the leader -- the bass player, Shintaro Nakamura -- briefly played with Woody Shaw! And the very last tune "A Blind Man" was specifically inspired by Shaw's writing (according to the original liners) -- and the title references Shaw's (then) vision problems. Check out Shunzo Ohno's solo here at the 3:00 minute mark (I think I have this YouTube clip cued up to start right there). The first I ever heard from this album, was "A Blind Man" from the first volume of this J-Jazz compilation series -- but this track is the very same one as is on the Evolution album. I about dropped my teeth the first time I heard this track on the J-Jazz comp, thinking it was actually Woody Shaw. This should cue to a few seconds before his (Ohno's) solo at the 3-minute mark...

This used to only be available as a pricy Japanese import CD, but BBE recently put out a much, MUCH cheaper reissue that's available at Dusty for only $10. https://www.dustygroove.com/item/966458 (only $10!) https://www.discogs.com/release/8643274-Shintaro-Quintet-Evolution https://bbemusic.bandcamp.com/album/evolution Bass, Leader, Composer (all songs) – Shintaro Nakamura Drums – Fukushi Tainaka Piano – Jeff Jenkins Tenor Saxophone – Robert Kenmotsu (American, 3rd generation born of Japanese immigrants from the west coast, iirc) Trumpet – Shunzo Ohno Here's an upload of the entire 43-minute album. I've been enjoying this thing (the earlier reissue) for about 2 years, and now it's hard for me to hear the tunes and not think they're not all stone classics from 20 years earlier, every one of them. And as a plus, everyone sounds like they were recorded in the same room (the SQ doesn't have any of that overly-antiseptic quality -- in fact, occasionally one of the horns falls off-mic a time or two briefly, but that only adds to how nicely it all sounds, far as I'm concerned.) Shunzo Ohno is especially fantastic, sounding every bit as exciting as Woody Shaw throughout (to hell with trying to manage expectations). And the tenor player really shines too, imho. Hell, the whole band does. If you'd rather be able to access each of the tracks as separate YouTube uploads in a playlist, here's that... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KH0f5u8t8A&list=OLAK5uy_mM0N_N2LOV-8ISomq4fAYDPPoueswPJYc Carpe diem!