fasstrack

What was the name of the Art Farmer Quintet recording with Jordan and Fred Hersch? They played The Smile of the Snake (Donald Brown), Santana (Fritz Pauer), and some Strayhorn. It's a beautiful recording. Just think of the blend of that front line.

Yes, with Fred Hersch. It's called Songs We Know.

There's a video out there of a Mingus performance---sorry, don't remember where or when. Clifford Jordan, Dolphy, Jaki Byard were on it. Don't remember the trumpet player. Johnny Coles? Anyway Mingus is purposely throwing rocks in the soloists' paths, playing little rhythmic games, etc., making it hard to play ---and encouraging Danny Richmond to do so too. Dolphy just breezes through it like a walk in the park. Clifford Jordan, though, looks utterly disgusted in one close-up---head down, looking like he'd rather be anywhere else. Looks like he aged about 20 years. Oh, the trials of Mingus sidemen....

These Are My Roots was already mentioned. I like it b/c it was a little off the beaten track with Leadbelly tunes (it was traditional blues-themed) and a bigger group sometimes. Weird choice for banjo: Chuck Wayne. Then there's Remembering Me-Me, also with a larger ensemble and featuring on one tune Chris Anderson---on Fender Rhodes!

I was the one who said that. Maybe I went a little far, but it was out of admiration for his talent---and frustration that after a certain point he never seemed to care to grow (beyond the single-string thing, for one thing). Great sound, swing, and lyricism though---more than most people will achieve.

Clifford Jordan has been gone 20 years now, and I hardly hear his name mentioned these days. Talk about overlooked masters.... I had an opportunity to play with him once, by a fluke. Wish it were more. So let's call this a tribute thread. Favorite recordings? Stories? Give testimony.....

Prescient words..

Ha! 'They say he's searching. I think he should search for a saxophone teacher'...

Chris Potter's recording debut, far as I know, was with Red Rodney (c.a. 1990). He may have been as young as 19. It was the one where Bob Beldon updated some bebop charts. I wish Potter played more like he did on that date now. Impressive and mature.

Just googled it. There's actually 3 recordings: Cookin', Wailin', Tenor Time. Rhythm section is David Hazeltine (who is underrated as hell), John Webber, Joe Farnsworth.

To hear Eric Alexander and Grant Stewart together check out the excellent group Reeds and Deeds. Two releases (off the top of my head on Criss Cross?). Nice playing, good material.

Thanks. I sort of remembered Miles and Horns. Did he do Sonny Stitt and Bud Powell on Prestige?

(As an aside:) Didn't Don Martin of Mad Magazine fame do a few for Prestige? I remember the covers, not the LP titles.

By 'master of the groove' I presume you meant Fasstrack. No, we haven't met. I started to approach you at Teddy's concert but you guys were busy. Yes, I know it's swimming against the tide writing books about lesser-known jazz figures. Yet such documentation is of such importance. I myself got 200 or so pages through a memoir of the NY scene of the '70s-'80s, the linchpin of which is Barry Harris' Jazz Cultural Theater and the denizens thereof (C. Sharpe, Tommy Turrentine, Chris Anderson, et. al.) who befriended me as a young man and taught me the ways of the jazz life. The sad fact is that though the 3 I mentioned were great people and musicians and part of the spine of this music they are not marquee names, thereby a tough sell. I will finish it though and see if anyone bites. That you got that book out is remarkable, I know. I'll get in touch sometime.

Mr. Cohen, thanks for your comments and for checking in. (FWIW we have a mutual friend in Ben Salzano-and I love your web page's Jazz in Rocherter resource). I trust you took my critical remarks in the spirit they were meant. A search for Gryce the man to present had to prove elusive owing to his very inwardness and lack of a public profile. You (and Michael Fitzgerald) are to be commended for a work of great scholarship. How about a book on Teddy Charles? (i saw you in the audience and aswpart of the Q&A at the reconfigured Tentet concert at the Riverdale Y a few years back.His story was pretty amazing too-and what a character! I played with him and hung at his house way out on L.I. His is a great story begging to be told..

Thanks for posting this. I couldn't scroll to the end to read the owner's take on Miles getting shot, but he covered it in his autobiog. The interviewer mentions another interesting Bed-Stuy spot, The East, at 10 Claver Place. It was an African-American cultural center during the height of Black Nationalism. I remember they had a running ad on WRVR FM. Once I had a livery cab ride and the driver said he was active there. He invited me down but when I went a young man opened the door a crack, said the guy wasn't there, and got rid of me in a hurry. Oh well.. Then there was the Muse, which had classes for young jazz players. There were musicians coming up in the '70s who were Brooklyn legends, like Arthur Rhames. And there was Pumpkin's, on Nostrand Avenue, which had local jazz talent. Bill Lee still lives in Fort Greene, Randy Weston in Bed-Stuy. I only went as far back as my day, but Brooklyn has been a jazz hothouse from way back.

I've had similar problems trying to get past two pages on ANY topic. They simply won't display. Yet if I do a search old threads will come up. This only seems to be an issue since the software upgrade. S'up wit dat?

In terms of live music my old buddy Frank Griffith has a nonet that plays fairly often around. Check the listings when you get to town. He's a fine arranger and reedman and I recommend his group.

I don't know bassist as leader qualifies, but Ray Brown and Christian McBride were touring as a tandem front-line w/rhythm section. I figure they ought to have recorded. Anyone know if they did and if so what it's called? I know I heard live radio perfomances of the group. This would've been shortly before Brown's death in 2000.

I had the same problem (note that I post from either a cell phone or public library terminal-I'm saving up for smoke signals..) As someone said: if you enter your text OUTSIDE THE BOX of what is being quoted you should be fine.

This has been a long time in the works. He told me in 2006 it was already in gallies. At the time I understood Stanley to mean the entire work covered Parker's life up to the period with McShann. In other words, no Volume II. I suppose I misunderstood, or something changed since then. It's hard to conceive of any possible new take on the life of Charlie Parker. Also, the research of neccesity becomes further from the source as principals in Parker's life, even musicians that worked with him even a few times have mostly died off. I'll give SC the benefit of the doubt, though. I enjoy reading him, even though he overwrites and his prose can be riper than a May mango on Maui. He rarely fails to make me laugh or piss me off---or make me think.

And aren't there many books like this? Case in point: "Infatuation - The Music and Life of Theodore Fats Navarro" by Petersen and Rehak. There the music really is dissected almost to the tiniest atom. And though I have almost all of the released key recordings examined it is extremely tough listening closely enough to make something of ALL the analyses. So I must admit so far I've skipped a good deal of those analyses - and yet I don't regret having bought it. I tend to regard it as a sort of "commented discography" to be pulled out when I feel like spinning Fats' Savoy or BN recordings, etc., at length. Yes, there are many books like this, that micro-analyze every record date. It can get tiresome to read (especially when there's an extensive discography at the end). I think it might be a better approach to have the book come with a companion CD which bears witness to the key analyses---or (better yet) lets the listener listen on his own and draw his own conclusions. Not to put down the arduous research and scholarship that went into this book. I got a lot more insight into Gryce from the oral histories included. The Jimmy Cleveland interview was especially illuminating. There's something about reading an interview, the prose just moves. And the interviewee was there as said history unfolded. Just my opinion.

They look so happy. Sure this wasn't an ad for Stelazine?

Always a good thing. But when I saw the topic title I though this was gonna be about Bret Primack's old blog-especially with that avatar!

I had the incredible experience of sharing the bandstand for a year and a half in the mid-'80s with Jaki. It was a big band but he played a lot of solo. His knowledge of jazz piano history and classical music too was encyclopedic, and he put it all together-all these disperate influences-with great humor. Sometimes he'd turn to the audience, grinning, and say 'I'm showing off, ladies and gentlemen!' I can hardly wait to hear him and Flanagan, one of my all time favorites, together. Resonance is such a class act..