Larry Kart

If I had to pick one Art Pepper album, that would be it. "Besame Mucho" and "I Surrender Dear" especially.

Did you ever run across him?

The other day I picked up a copy of Braden's 1995 album "Organic," with Jack McDuff, Larry Goldings, Fathead Newman and others and was quite pleased by what I heard. (I'd heard some '90s Braden before, I think on Criss Cross, and found him to be adept but rather generic.) I see that he's recorded a good many albums over the years, some of them with a pop and/or populist slant (e.g. "Workin'" -- an album of Earth, Wind and Fire tunes), but one of the tracks on "Organic" is a Whitney Houston cover, "Savin' All My Love For You," and it stimulates Braden to some fine playing. As I said above, any thoughts/recommendations?

She sure had something:

Just discovered the music of the late Arlene Zallman. What a composer! I particularly recommend Variations on the Villanella Alma Che Fai , the PianoTrio, and Nightsongs. She doesn’t sound like anyone else, and what an ear. Dig how on Nightsongs she turns the duo of clarinet and flute into a kind of super clarinet at times. Also, even though the Variations on the Villanella begins quietly and lasts only about twelve minutes, its “reach” so to speak is very large, I think. http://web.wellesley.edu/PublicAffairs/Releases/2006/120406.html

John Gennari's "Blowin' Hot and Cool: Jazz and Its Critics" (U. of Chicago Press) is not without value, but when reading it one needs to have a fair amount of independent knowledge and a box of anti-bias pills close to hand. For example, Genarri's snotty, prosecuting-attorney characterization of the background of Martin Williams borders on the outrageous, and he also gets very fast and loose with the background of Dan Morgenstern. Gennari even makes me feel a bit sympathetic toward Leonard Feather!

Maybe his best “Body and Soul”? (Everything from that Playboy Jazz Fest performance is superb.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7B99WkEWR6U&spfreload=10 “Alphonse and Gaston,” with Cootie Williams, Rex Stewart, J.C. Higginbotham, Lawrence Brown, Coleman Hawkins, Bud Freeman, Hank Jones, Billy Bauer, Milt Hinton and Gus Johnson. Kudos to Higginbotham and Brown, who set the pace by going at it like a tiger and a lion.

Maybe his best “Body and Soul”? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7B99WkEWR6U&spfreload=10 “Alphonse and Gaston” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NP1Me5kUjG0&list=PLVf3DCj7n6Rnd0coVj9toIBsWVpLjLRTO&index=3&spfreload=10 Coote Williams, Rex Stewart, J.C. Higginbotham, Lawrence Brown, Coleman Hawkins, Bud Freeman, Hank Jones, Billy Bauer, Milt Hinton, Gus Johnson

Amazing music on that record from everyone. Got it at the time (I was a signed-up member of the Jazztone Society) and couldn't believe those serious chase choruses on "Alphonse and Gaston." Also, kudos to producer George T. Simon (or whoever had the idea) for the presence of Gus Johnson on drums and Billy Bauer on guitar.

My problem with "Deep in a Dream" was that author James Gavin was not a jazz person, and at times it showed (for example, IIRC, in a passage about Dick Twardzik he refers to Serge Chaloff and the young Twardzik -- not that there ever was an old Twardzik -- as roughly equivalent figures on the Boston scene, when Chaloff, when he returned to Boston, was a poll-winning veteran, while Twardzik, talented though he was, was just getting started). Further, again IIRC, Gavin pretty much promulgates the idea that Baker was murdered, when De Valk's book conclusively shows that Baker fell out of that window on his own hook. Also, when the subject of the the film "Let's Get Lost" comes up, the book turns into a weird sniping job on filmmaker/photographer Bruce Weber, this it seems on a gay-politics basis. Many of Weber's photos -- all those golden retrievers and naked young men jumping into and romping about in swimming pools -- are commonly felt to have a homoerotic theme, but Weber denies this and also denies that he himself is gay. Gavin, who is gay I believe, seems mortally pissed off by this; and I suppose he's entitled. But eventually I got the feeling that Gavin would have preferred to be writing a tell-all bio of Bruce Weber if there had been a market for such a book. I wished that De Valk's book had been longer, but it was sound on the facts and acute and detailed about the music -- in particular, he was quite clear that many of Baker's latter-day recordings were among his best work. Perhaps DeValk has or will come up with an expanded edition.

Thanks, Dan.

Dan -- From the Concord era, any thoughts about "Alley Cats?" Just listened to several tracks on Spotify and was impressed. That rhythm section is tight.

Love it, always have. Monk and Philly Joe!

FWIW, Miles recast/simplified the bridge of "Well You Needn't," just as he did the bridge of Benny Carter's "When Lights Are Low." For the most part, most people now play those pieces using Miles' simplifications. OTOH, in both cases, what Miles chose to do to those pieces was not malicious or thoughtless or some such; what he did just made those pieces more attractive for him to play on.

Having now heard all of it, I think Teddy Edwards' "It's All Right!" is a remarkable date. Everyone (Edwards, Jimmy Owens, Garnett Brown, Cedar Walton, Ben Tucker, Lenny McBrowne) is in fine form -- this may be Brown's best outing on record, he takes two absolutely hellacious solos; Walton's comping is inspired and his solo work sparkles. Tucker (nicely clear in the mix) is a rock, and Edwards' lyrical earthiness is ... well good-sized chunks of his solos here are just songs, if you know what I mean. And his writing and arranging -- listen to the soulful, somewhat Dameron-esque ballad "Afraid of Love" or the Ellingtonian (in quality as well as style) interlude on "Back Alley Blues." I feel very lucky to have been led to this one by this thread.

Teddy Edwards' "It's All Right" arrived yesterday. Listened to the first track, and so far it's excellent -- the band very together and obviously well-rehearsed. Only drawback is the work of engineer Richard Alderson -- that twangy piano (though not as twangy as on other dates that Alderson did) and not enough "air" around the band. Ralph Berton's liner notes, which begin with a tirade against "New Thing Nonmusical Music" a.k.a. "Free Form Epilepsy," refer amusingly to Alderson's "groovy, intimate recording studio." Berton also quotes Jimmy Owens as saying that it was "the happiest sound in New York."

Just read that part of "Underworld," Moms. Very impressive, both for DeLillo and Lenny. I'll probably have to revise my feeling about the former. But as strong and painful (if those are the right words) as the Missile Crisis Bruce routines DeLillo records are, I don't see why they should make me change my mind about Kael's view of who Bruce was (which is pretty much my own) or about the movie "Lenny" either.

"I believe Fosse originally wanted Cliff Gorman for the movie but who's Cliff Gorman?" A much better choice than Hoffman, whose unshakably putz-like, "Please, like me" persona distorted everything. I'll look for "Underworld," which I've not read, Delillo not being for me I decided way back when. In fact, "Underworld" may have been the book that formed that decision. In any case, I'll look.

My main problem with "Lenny" was the choice of Hoffman (I assume it was Fosse's, at least in part) to play Bruce, which virtually guaranteed that the real Lenny would not be in view. "All That Jazz" was quite something, as you say. BTW how does Kael misapprehend Lenny's career? I think she may be one of the very few who gets it right. Or are you among those who think of Bruce as a crusading civil libertarian?

Moms — You like Fosse’s “Lenny”? Oy vey! Like the proverbial stopped clock, the IMO usually wrong Pauline Kael could be right, and was she ever right about “Lenny.” In fact, Kael’s full review, linked to below, is the best appreciation of Lenny Bruce I’ve ever read, and I’m old enough to have seen Bruce in-person operating at full force in his heyday — albeit I was underage when I saw him at Mr. Kelly’s on Rush St. in 1959. It was like being the same room with a ticking time bomb. Lenny US (1974): Biography 112 min, Rated R, Black & White, Available on videocassette and laserdisc This earnest Bob Fosse film starring Dustin Hoffman is for those who want to believe that Lenny Bruce was a saintly gadfly who was martyred only because he lived before their time. Working from a weak script by Julian Barry, Fosse accepts the view that Bruce's motivating force was to cleanse society of hypocrisy, and, having swallowed that, he can only defuse Bruce's humor. So when you hear Hoffman doing Bruce's shticks you don't even feel like laughing. Despite the fluent editing and the close-in documentary techniques and the sophisticated graphics, the picture is a later version of the one-to-one correlation of an artist's life and his art which we used to get in movies about painters and songwriters. Hoffman makes a serious, honorable try, but his Lenny is a nice boy. Lenny Bruce was uncompromisingly not nice; the movie turns a teasing, seductive hipster into a putz. As Honey, Valerie Perrine does a dazzling strip and gives an affecting, if limited, performance. With Gary Morton, Jan Miner, and Stanley Beck. United Artists. Full review: https://books.google.com/books?id=tkShTL84MrcC&pg=PT789&lpg=PT789&dq=pauline+kael+on+lenny&source=bl&ots=3vKVZDubQX&sig=Hpu2nAbpNl9DlNQhiUWJkTkGDjo&hl=en&sa=X&ei=43zaVLn9EoWfgwS0toTwAQ&ved=0CDEQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=pauline%20kael%20on%20lenny&f=false OTOH, based on (deliberately) limited experience on my part, I agree with you about Dylan. I ran into him when he stopped by the U. of Chicago in 1960 or '61, this when he was still Bob Zimmerman, and felt that while he obviously had significant though somewhat ectoplasmic organizational gifts as a musician -- the talented U. of C. guys he played with on his visit there all sounded better than usual when he was around -- there also was something namelessly creepy about him. Then, just by chance, I caught what may have been his breakthrough gig at Gerde's Folk City in NY -- maybe a year or so later? It was fairly clear IIRC that he well might be going somewhere fast, but the aura of nameless creepiness had grown considerably.

Some of Jacobs' work, beginning with the Shorty Petterstein interview. The obtuse broadcaster asking the questions is played by Woodrow Leafer: ​Sholem Stein interview. Here, Jacobs is the interviewer and the professor is Leafer. Many years ago I played the Stein interview for an old Navy friend of my father’s who actually was an anthropology professor at Notre Dame. Soon tears of laughter were running down his cheeks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKKkRdY0dpc&spfreload=10

BTW, I notice an error in the Pacific Jazz discography. The spacey comedy album listed below (a longtime favorite of mine) lists “Shorty Petterstein” and Alan Watts in the personnel. “Petterstein” is not a real person but a character created and portrayed by Henry Jacobs: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Jacobs Jacbs was connected to Zen popularizer Alan Watts, but the other person who appears on the album is not Watts but San Francisco radio personality Woodrow Leafer. BTW, Jacobs is also responsible for the two non-Lenny Bruce tracks — “Shorty Petterstein interview” and “Interview with Dr. Sholem Stein” — on Bruce’s first Fantasy album “Interviews of Our Time” (1958). At least one would-be authoritative fellow writing about Bruce stepped on his dick by attributing those two tracks to Bruce and drawing erroneous conclusions therefrom. Bruce and Jacobs’ senses of humor, etc. were quite different; in particular, Jacobs’ so cool as to be almost comatose jazz musician Shorty Petterstein bore little relationship to the nervous junkie jazz musician in Bruce’s Lawrence Welk routine. Shorty Petterstein Shorty Petterstein, Alan Watts (spoken word) released 1958 ST-2022 A History Of Jazz World Pacific X-652, WPM-412 ST-2023 Origin Of Jazz Terms - "Do You Want A Little Lovin'?" World Pacific WPM-412 Chess (The New 3-Dimensional Variety) - Rock 'N' Roll Interview With Jump Calkenburger - George's Mother (The Classic Psychopath) - Guitar For Sale World Pacific WPM-412, DJ-2 Telephone Therapy (Another Service Of Your Telephone) World Pacific WPM-412 Drums In The Typewriter (Woodrow Leafer) - "A Visit To My Best Girl" - Mental Blockages - I Couldn't Remember The Words - Breaking The Habit (An Easy Way) - "Quiet, Children" - Childhood Traumas - Self Analysis - A Frank Admission - It's No Laughing Matter - * World Pacific WPM-412, WP-1274 The Wide Weird World Of Shorty Petterstein - More Interviews Of Our Time * World Pacific DJ-2 Various Artists - Disc Jockey Edition: A Taste Of The Best From World Pacific * World Pacific X-652 Shorty Petterstein - A History Of Jazz / Origin Of Jazz Terms

Here she be: http://www.jazzdisco.org/pacific-jazz-records/

Realizing that that jazzdisco.org page might obviously has a few holes in it, not sure if those first two PJ sessions were "abortive" or not? Maybe demo/singles sessions? I don't know. But let's say that Edwards/Bock was never meant to be, star-crossed lovers, whatever, what to make of Booker 'n' Brass then? That's one of those things I never have figured out in terms of how did THAT record get made like THAT? Found Back To Avalon a bit of a letdown myself, also, but, you know, not everything goes well all the time, much less superbly. Jazzdisco.org is in my experience the best such site on the planet. As for those two Edwards small-ensemble sessions being "abortive" or whatever, I don't know either, but IIRC Bock had a history of bringing musicians into the studio and then coming out with just a few tracks -- thus in part those several PJ semi-thematic compilation albums where the products of two- or three-tune sessions would appear together. For instance, I have (or had) a PJ Broadway show tunes album "Jazz Swings Broadway" with three or so tracks each by IIRC Stu Williamson, Russ Freeman, Shelly Manne, and Cooper-Shank from sessions that AFAIK yielded nothing else that was ever released. A complete label discography for Pacific Jazz probably would reveal the pattern. Interestingly, as you probably know, "Booker n Brass" was recorded in NYC and was arranged and conducted by none other than Teddy Edwards. I doubt that Bock was in the studio, though he is listed as having produced Ervin's previous PJ album "Structurally Sound."

Groove Funk Soul (Atlantic 1324) was recorded on July 18, 1958. As you can see from Edwards’ discography: http://www.jazzdisco.org/teddy-edwards/discography/ there were several abortive Edwards dates for Pacific Jazz in May 1958 that produced a few tracks that appeared on PJ anthologies before the first half of Edwards first PJ album “Sunset Eyes,” was recorded on March 21, 1960; the second half of the album, with Castro, Vinnegar, and Higgins, was recorded Aug. 16, 1960. In between, on May 2, 1960, Edwards recorded the PJ album “It’s About Time” with Les McCann. Edwards first Contemporary album, “Teddy’s Ready!” was recorded with Castro, Vinnegar, and Higgins, the day after the second half of the “Sunset Eyes” album, on Aug. 17, 1960. Is there any backstory here? I’ve heard that PJ’s Dick Bock could be a quirky guy in the studio — he certainly was notorious for editing pieces with a free, and often inept, hand (see Bill Perkins Cadence interview on this subject) and/or playing other dire tricks in the post-recording process (e.g. adding Larry Bunker’s dubbed-in drums to Jim Hall’s drum-less “Jazz Guitar” album). Could those two initial Pacific Jazz Edwards-led small ensemble dates have been abortive because Bock got pushy about how things should go, and Edwards either came back at him in kind or withdrew, and/or Bock just pulled the plug? Don’t have Edwards’ Contemporary octet date “Back to Avalon” anymore, but FWIW my memory is that it was a damp squib for the most part.