GA Russell Posted August 17, 2005 Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 (edited) The recent thread on favorite Blakey live recordings reminded me of something I've been meaning to post for a while. So here we are. Last year Concord released without much fanfare a 2 CD set (2 CDs for the price of 1) called Blakey's Beat. It is made up of two albums, both recorded live at Keystone Korner in San Francisco. The albums are much better than I expected. I didn't know that hard bop was alive and well circa 1980. (A personal aside. In the spring of 1970, two friends went to see Blakey and the Messengers at The Cellar Door, and came back raving about the front line of Randy Brecker and Carlos Garnett. I went to see the band about a year later, and was disappointed. I don't remember who was in the group, but I had not heard of any of them at the time. The hard bop they played seemed tired compared to some of the exciting jazz-rock I was hearing at the time. As the 70s progressed, I wasn't finding hard bop in the record stores, and I pretty much came to the conclusion that it was a thing of the past.) The first album is In This Korner, from 1978. The personnel is Valery Ponomarev on trumpet, Bobby Watson on alto, David Schnitter on tenor, James Williams on piano and Dennis Irwin on bass. The only standard is The Song Is You. All other songs were written by members of the group except one by George Cables. Valery Ponomarev is good! I'm not familiar with his work, and maybe some of you can recommend albums he's been on since. But as good as he is, the star of the show is Bobby Watson. He exhibits a lot of fun in his playing. James Williams on piano also exhibits noteworthy talent. The second album is Straight Ahead, from 1981. The lineup is Wynton Marsalis on trumpet, Bobby Watson on alto, Bill Pierce on tenor, James Williams on piano and Charles Fambrough on bass. [Edit: Wynton was the band's new musical director.] I find this album to be a little bit more enjoyable, perhaps because so many of the songs are familiar: Falling In Love With Love, My Romance, How Deep Is The Ocean and Miles' The Theme. Also included is a Bud Powell tune called Webb City, which I haven't come across before. Watson gives the most dominant solos, but I wouldn't say that they are as good as his solos on In This Korner. Wynton isn't given as much time to solo as Ponomarev was, but he shows great talent. His notes are very clean, and his runs in the high register are impressive. At the set's end, Wynton gets the biggest applause. I won't compare these groups to Blakey's bands of the 50s and 60s with people like Clifford Brown and Wayne Shorter, but I will say that I think this is a great buy for the money. I've been listening to it a lot. Anybody else familiar with these albums? Anybody have any opinions or recommendations of the players' other albums? Edited August 18, 2005 by GA Russell Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Fitzgerald Posted August 17, 2005 Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 I'm partial to the Roulette sextet sessions from just before the Concords, which is where this whole sound came into being. I don't mind the Wynton stuff, but he's set up as the showpiece far too often. Now, about that personal aside - how sure are you about the dates? I know the band played the Cellar Door in late 1969 with Brecker, Garnett, Sonny Donaldson, and Skip Crumby. Where did you see the band and about when? 1970 personnel is damn tough to learn. Always looking for Blakey recollections. Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GA Russell Posted August 17, 2005 Author Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 Mike, Blakey's appearance at The Cellar Door was during my sophomore year in college. If you insist that it was during the first semester rather than the second, I won't argue. The concert I went to was a Washington, DC, Left Bank Jazz Society affair. Since you do not have a record of who was in the band, maybe Blakey didn't have a regular band at the time, and this was merely some pick-up arrangement. Maybe that is why the playing was uninspired, although as I recall it was not the case that the musicians were just going through the motions. I remember feeling pretty much the same way when I went to another DC Left Bank Jazz Society concert, with Horace Silver. It was my feeling at the time that hard bop had run its course. I was young, of course, and didn't know a great deal, even if I knew more than my classmates. It all seemed tired to me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spontooneous Posted August 17, 2005 Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 P.S., The earliest Wynton recording with Blakey was the big band album on Timeless, from July '80. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Fitzgerald Posted August 17, 2005 Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 Certainly possible they played the Cellar Door again. The research is ongoing. So there was a DC Left Bank Jazz Society that was different from the Baltimore, MD one that was doing Sunday shows at the Famous Ballroom at the time? I know Albert Dailey was on one of those Baltimore LBJS shows with Blakey on September 13, 1970. Where were the DC LBJS shows held? (Sorry - it's only 35 years ago. I won't ask the soloist order.) Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GA Russell Posted August 17, 2005 Author Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 Mike, the DC Left Bank Jazz Society was an offshoot of the original in Baltimore. It's my vague recollection that the DC LBJS was started in '69, but don't be a stickler about that! I don't remember the name of the concert hall. It's been too long since I've lived there. It was an auditorium with a stage. It's not likely that the Messengers played the Cellar Door twice in one school year. I don't recall any act coming more than once a year, except Miles who came in February of '70 which I went to and again apparently in the fall of that year with the new band for the Cellar Door box recordings. Would that I had gone to that and seen a show recorded for history! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GA Russell Posted August 18, 2005 Author Report Share Posted August 18, 2005 P.S., The earliest Wynton recording with Blakey was the big band album on Timeless, from July '80. ← Spontooneous, I must be losing my mind. I have re-read the liner notes and there is no mention of this being Wynton's first recording. I'll try to edit the sub-caption to correct that. The liner notes do say that Wynton was the new musical director of the band, and coordinated with the sound engineer for the recording. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JSngry Posted August 20, 2005 Report Share Posted August 20, 2005 Have you heard Keystone 3? that one's a little more together, I think. The time on those first two seems a little uncentered. Maybe it's just the recorded sound of the bass, I dunno. To be honest, this mid/late 1970s phase of Messenger-dom is my least favorite, but I'll let it go at that. More to my liking is the fourth Concord, New York Scene, with Terrance Blanchard, Donald Harrison, Jean Toussaint, Mulgrew Miller, & Lonnie Plaxico. The "revivalist" flavor of the earlier albums/bands (at least that's how the records came across to me, although, it being Concord and all, maybe that was a record company move) was all but gone, and what you get is a very nice collection of neo-con Young Lions who sound less in awe of the "Tradition" as did their various immediate predecessors. Normally, that's the kind of thing I run like hell from, but it works well here. The same band did a video from Ronnie Scott's that is now available on DVD btw. Pretty nice, and although that whole generation's deliberate "aloofness" during this time (they take Plugged Nickel Wayne abstractionism as their point of departure and destination, only they leave out the warmth and humor) is at odds with Blakey's core values, it all comes to a satisfactory compromise in the end. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Fitzgerald Posted October 3, 2005 Report Share Posted October 3, 2005 Pinned down the LBJS-DC show you saw - March 28, 1970 at the Smithsonian Natural History Auditorium. This was after the Cellar Door gig which was October 27-November 1, 1969. The band was Bill Hardman, Ramon Morris, Albert Dailey, Larry Evans, Blakey. Guests were Etta Jones and guitarist Bill Harris. Tunes included: A Night In Tunisia, Now's The Time, 'Round Midnight, Ev'ry Time We Say Goodbye, It's Only A Paper Moon, Didn't We, and Jones sang on Fine and Mellow. Ringing any bells? Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GA Russell Posted October 3, 2005 Author Report Share Posted October 3, 2005 Mike, I believe that was a different show. I don't believe that any vocalist made an appearance. I also don't recall any guitarist. I also believe that the show I saw was during the following school year, but I could be wrong about that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Fitzgerald Posted October 3, 2005 Report Share Posted October 3, 2005 OK - This may be my last stab. How about an outdoor show that was rained out and had to reschedule and move indoors? July 10 (was July 9), 1970? At the "Departmental Auditorium"? (was Sylvan Theatre on the Washington Monument grounds). It was part of a 3-day LBJS-DC festival. Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scottb Posted October 3, 2005 Report Share Posted October 3, 2005 As another aside, are any of those Keystone dates recorded by a guy named Pendergraft (or something similar.) He's lives here in town and once mentioned that he used to be a sound engineer and had recorded Blakey once at the Keystone. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GA Russell Posted October 4, 2005 Author Report Share Posted October 4, 2005 OK - This may be my last stab. How about an outdoor show that was rained out and had to reschedule and move indoors? July 10 (was July 9), 1970? At the "Departmental Auditorium"? (was Sylvan Theatre on the Washington Monument grounds). It was part of a 3-day LBJS-DC festival. Mike ← No, I was home in New Orleans slaving away as a Mosquito Control Inspector each July! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GA Russell Posted October 4, 2005 Author Report Share Posted October 4, 2005 As another aside, are any of those Keystone dates recorded by a guy named Pendergraft (or something similar.) He's lives here in town and once mentioned that he used to be a sound engineer and had recorded Blakey once at the Keystone. ← No Pendergraft is listed in the credits. The "Recording and Mix Engineer" for both dates was Phil Edwards. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GA Russell Posted October 4, 2005 Author Report Share Posted October 4, 2005 Aha! As suggested above in post #7, I posted this thread as Wynton's first recording. But with Spontooneous's correction, I changed the subcaption of the thread and a sentence of text in the first post. I now see in the liner notes: 1981 Golden Feather Award "...the recording debut of Wynton Marsalis...in superb form...this rates five stars." - Leonard Feather LA Times I knew I wasn't making it up! I still know that I'm losing my mind, but not in this case! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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