Mark Stryker

Many reliable sources reporting on social media that Sonny Fortune has died at 79. These include his former manager Marty Khan, Todd Barkan and others. (Moderators can decide when it's appropriate to add the R.I.P. to the thread.)

The orchestra did the right thing by hiring an outside law firm to investigate and then publishing the entire report -- complete transparency. (Though whether orchestra management had previously taken allegations that came from within its own ranks seriously enough -- before the Washington Post's story in August -- is a separate question.)

Suddenly, I feel as if I am Organissimo's Senior Sexual Misconduct Correspondent ... Here is yesterday's Washington Post story about the Cleveland Orchestra firing concertmaster William Preucil and its principal trombonist for sexual misconduct and harassment. It was Post reporters Peggy McGlone and Anne Midgette who first reported in August allegations of misconduct by Preucil and others in the classical music world. https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/music/cleveland-orchestra-terminates-two-musicians-after-sexual-harassment-charges/2018/10/24/4d213ca6-d7a1-11e8-a10f-b51546b10756_story.html?fbclid=IwAR2IblDP22d3s1RH7jEtZ2N5wl05pATEinSsNXKZ4ivJyU21shBUNyHl8i0&utm_term=.6dc3637e262a And here is today's Detroit Free Press story about a new allegation/lawsuit brought against countertenor David Daniels by a University of Michigan student for alleged sexual assault. This is not the same charge that emerged a few months ago about an incident in Texas. https://www.freep.com/story/news/education/2018/10/24/david-daniels-opera-singer-sexual-assault/1752862002/?fbclid=IwAR2ogX7JCFKGvfHyYbY_kVsQ7oM_FljyslHpPhVokvG24Aeg7fNzseUeiLE

Because I posted the initial story, I feel compelled to alert folks that Coleman has posted a long rejoinder on his Facebook page that quotes at lengths from his lawsuit. The link I was trying to share isn't working, but folks can find it. Or maybe someone else can link to it here.

This has been making the rounds. Don't think I saw it posted here. Ugly stuff https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6265369/Prominent-saxophonist-sues-accuser-claims-manipulated-sexual-relationship.html

It's no secret Elvin Jones played for a minute with Duke Ellington after leaving Coltrane, but this is the first I've ever heard a tape. January 29, 1966. Context: Elvin to Whitney Balliett in 1968. (The second drummer Elvin refers to is Skeets Marsh): "I joined him in Frankfurt, and my stay with him lasted just a week and a half, through Nuremberg and Paris and Italy and Switzerland. I was new. It was difficult for the band to adapt to my style and I had to do everything in a big hurry, trying to adapt to them. Then the bass player started playing games with me by lowering and raising tempos to make it look like I was unsteady, and finally I had to speak to him and he stopped. Hodges and Cat Anderson and Gonsalves and Mercer Ellington knew what was going on, but Duke didn't. And I guess I didn't connect with the anchormen, because they complained about my playing to Duke. I don't know whether Cootie who kept giving me the fisheye, wanted me to call him Mr. Williams and shine his shoes or what. Also, Duke had a second drummer in the band and he was an egomaniac. So Duke and I talked at Orly Aiport and I told him to send a telegram to Sam Woodyard and tell him to get himself over there, because he knew the whole book. I saw Duke later, after he'd found out what had been going on, and everything was fine -- no sweat. He told me I could come back with the band any time I wanted. He's such a great man. Given more time under different circumstances -- being left alone and all -- it might have been a beautiful thing for me."

You need a new theory -- I am a hater who has lived in the Midwest my entire life, for the last 23 years in Detroit.

Disagree

I'm prepared to die on this hill.

Limited exception allowed for women who look great in anything.

Leaving aside any discussion of Wynton and all that, let me just say that overalls are a seriously awful look on anyone at anytime outside of a literal farm. Don't do it. Just don't. No. A thousand times, no. This point is non-negotiable. Carry on ...

Is it just me or is there a Raymond Scott vibe to “Machine” — the character of the bass line and the ensemble riff and the repetition, etc.?

"The best Goes On" arranged by Shorty Rogers, yes? Some "Sidewinder" in there but great ensemble shouts in the intro and throughout. Half-step rubs in the middle of all that ...

Agreed. Hey, here's another one. CRAZY first tune -- Bill Reddie's "Machine" with choreography that's half West Side Story and half elementary school playground. Dig the band going in circles on space age teeter-totters and Jay Corre getting pushed around in a wagon during his solo. Obviously,, it's all dubbed, but Rich makes a joke about it to Greco after the number: "All that with two drums!" The introduction to Greco's "Moment of Truth" is new "Milestones." I wonder who wrote the chart. Marty Paich? Cathy Rich -- just 13 I think -- singing "The Beat Goes On." It's better than on the record. Rocking the Twiggy look too.

In case anybody missed it the first time around, I wrote this about Buddy a few years ago for Ethan Iverson's blog. https://ethaniverson.com/2015/03/01/traps-the-drum-wonder-by-mark-stryker/

Halfway through the third episode, there's an interesting short commercial/PSA for the Watts Summer Festival, which apparently is the oldest African-American cultural festival in the country, having started in 1966. The ad features founder Billy Tidwell and drummer Stix Hooper. I assume this was a "local" spot that aired only in Los Angeles or the West Coast. I've cued it up below, and here's a fascinating obit of Tidwell that ran in the LA Times in 2001. http://articles.latimes.com/2001/jun/29/local/me-16582

Hey, here's another episode: And a third:

Why didn’t Rich and Greco make a record together in this period? Might have seemed a logical idea, yes?

Apparently, Buddy Greco played with the band at least once on the show. He had skills. (Date on the video is wrong. This is summer ‘67.)

OMG -- never saw one of the the full shows before! This is going to take some time to fully digest. BTW, a trumpet enters early during the drum breaks on "Bugle Call Rag" -- the mistake is at 42:58. I would not have wanted to be that cat after the show. Coda: Ernie Watts plays his ass off on "Wack Wack." (And that's some weird-ass choreography with the band.)

All brushes. Trio with Kenny Barron and Chris White. 1974.

The vintage graphics during the drum solos on those Mike Douglas show clips are really period pieces.

Coda: I adore the Jackie McLean Quintet "HIpnosis/Vertigo session, which I got when I was 15. I transcribed everyone of those tunes to play with my band in college.

Could not agree more about James. I have his 1960 book "Ten Modern Jazzmen," published by Cassell (London). It's a collection of essays on Bird, Bud, Dizzy, Miles, Monk, Mulligan, Levis, Konitz, Getz and Gray. Some of these were from Jazz Monthly but others appear to have been written for the book. What's really needed is a collection of his pieces on the hard bop folks. I recall Gitler referring in some set of liner notes -- might be "Capuchin Swing" -- to a James essay on Jackie McLean. I've never seen it. Do we know what happened to James?