How about some Sonny Criss ?

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Another great fan here of that Criss/Arvanitas 'Live In Italy' album. A splendid session!

Have been interested in this one,which tunes,how is the recording quality??

Dr. Jeff

This was a live date, recorded January 28, 1974 in Bologna.

Criss and the Arvanitas trio play:

- Tin Tin Deo

- Lover Man

- Sonny's Blues

- Summertime

- Willow Weep For Me

- Sunny

- Hooti's Blues

- Untitled Blues

Sound is very acceptable though a bit shrill.

I'd agree on the sound. It's better than Lou "Donaldson in Bologna" a decade later.

I didn't know the CD had a couple of extra tracks. The LP is pretty long - about 49 minutes. What are the bonus tracks like? Up to the same standard as the others?

MG

[Tom 1960]

Thanks to all who spoke highly of "Sonny's Dream" (Birth Of The New Cool). I just finished listening to this recording for the very first time and was totally knocked out. The man is incredible on this release. I'm probably going to play this a few times over the coming days. One of the best releases I've purchased this year. I already own "This Is Criss" and look forward to seriously digging into the mans catalogue. Underated? Absolutely.

[B. Goren.]

This is also recommended:

[Kalo]

Criss = bliss...

[sidewinder]

Thanks to all who spoke highly of "Sonny's Dream" (Birth Of The New Cool). I just finished listening to this recording for the very first time and was totally knocked out. The man is incredible on this release. I'm probably going to play this a few times over the coming days. One of the best releases I've purchased this year. I already own "This Is Criss" and look forward to seriously digging into the mans catalogue. Underated? Absolutely.

Everything about this release is great - the fiery alto solos from Criss, the cool cover art, adventurous instrumentation and very original scoring/compositions by Horace Tapscott. A winner !

[sidewinder]

Found that particular Japanese CD for $6 in LA many years ago. It's going on now.

[thomastreichler]

Listen to Sonny Criss on "The Cinch", a 1958 live recording by the Buddy Rich Quintet on the Spotlite label (not part of the Mosaic box set). The Quintet, besides Criss and Rich, consists of Ole Hansen (tb), Kenny Drew (p) and Phil Leshin (b).

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Listen to Sonny Criss on "The Cinch", a 1958 live recording by the Buddy Rich Quintet on the Spotlite label (not part of the Mosaic box set). The Quintet, besides Criss and Rich, consists of Ole Hansen (tb), Kenny Drew (p) and Phil Leshin (b).

That one has been reissued by Lonehill, coupled with "Intermission riff", a 1951 Shrine Auditorium gig that was previously out on Pablo.

Damn fine coupling if you ask me.

MG

[thomastreichler]

Listen to Sonny Criss on "The Cinch", a 1958 live recording by the Buddy Rich Quintet on the Spotlite label (not part of the Mosaic box set). The Quintet, besides Criss and Rich, consists of Ole Hansen (tb), Kenny Drew (p) and Phil Leshin (b).

That one has been reissued by Lonehill, coupled with "Intermission riff", a 1951 Shrine Auditorium gig that was previously out on Pablo.

Damn fine coupling if you ask me.

MG

Thank you for the hint, I was not aware of this reissue. I am not familiar with the 1951 session though.

Edited November 21, 2007 by Tommy T

[king ubu]

Listen to Sonny Criss on "The Cinch", a 1958 live recording by the Buddy Rich Quintet on the Spotlite label (not part of the Mosaic box set). The Quintet, besides Criss and Rich, consists of Ole Hansen (tb), Kenny Drew (p) and Phil Leshin (b).

That one has been reissued by Lonehill, coupled with "Intermission riff", a 1951 Shrine Auditorium gig that was previously out on Pablo.

Damn fine coupling if you ask me.

MG

Thank you for the hint, I was not aware of this reissue. I am not familiar with the 1951 session though.

That's probably because the only copy ever in a local shop disappeared when I bought it on sale for 10 swiss franks (I think at one of the lousy Hug stores... quite possibly even at the one in main station...) - good one indeed!

Edited November 21, 2007 by king ubu

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Listen to Sonny Criss on "The Cinch", a 1958 live recording by the Buddy Rich Quintet on the Spotlite label (not part of the Mosaic box set). The Quintet, besides Criss and Rich, consists of Ole Hansen (tb), Kenny Drew (p) and Phil Leshin (b).

That one has been reissued by Lonehill, coupled with "Intermission riff", a 1951 Shrine Auditorium gig that was previously out on Pablo.

Damn fine coupling if you ask me.

MG

Thank you for the hint, I was not aware of this reissue. I am not familiar with the 1951 session though.

That 1951 gig is very, very, good. Has Jaws on it and Jaws & Criss together is something that has to be heard! Also Joe Newman (tp), Bennie Green (tb), Bobby Tucker (p), Tommy Potter (b), Kenny Clarke (d). Gentlemen, we have lift-off!

MG

[Nate Dorward]

David Sherr recently recontacted me & gave m permission to post his private email about Sonny's Dream, on which he played. Enjoy!

*****

The Sonny session came about after he had recorded several Prestige lps with a quartet or quintet and he and Don Schlitten decided to try something different. Sonny gave me the information. The problem with “something different” is that it usually costs more than record companies want to pay for a relatively (and in this case thoroughly unjustly) obscure musician.

Sonny was a great artist, a fantastic saxophone player and in a lot of ways his own worst enemy. On the other hand we were friends from the time we met and none of the stories of the difficulty in getting along with him proved true, at least where our relationship was concerned. He went through periods where he would not play and in fact sometimes he wouldn’t leave the house for months on end. When one of those periods ended, he began playing in a rehearsal band lead by a tenor player named Vernon Slater. Horace Tapscott, whom I met at LA City College, was the pianist and arranger. I heard the band only once, in a club. I don’t think they did too many gigs. When Don and Sonny decided to do the session (I don’t know which of them had the idea first), it seemed logical (and cost effective) to use the charts Horace (we called him “Taps”) had written for Slater. I think Everett Brown, Jr. must have been a member of that band and I guess Ray Draper could have been, but the rest of us (except Pete Christlieb and Tommy Flannigan) were friends of Sonny from over the years. He and Teddy must have gone back to the middle 40s. Same thing with Al McKibbon. It just now occurred to me to wonder why Hamp Hawes wasn’t involved, but he may have been out of town or the fact that he didn’t read (which doesn’t seem to have slowed him down) might have been a factor. Years later, Dick Nash told me that Sonny met Tommy Flannigan that day. Sonny and Conte went back at least to the early 50s. Dick Nash knew him for years and they had been involved in a federal program called Operation Bootstrap. I’m not sure why Pete was there, except that he is a fantastic musician. He played a solo that somehow never made it to the record. I remember that it was great, but I could have been wrong. Unless Don knows, and will tell, I guess it will remain a secret. I met Sonny in 1965 when we played a show at The Friars Club in Beverly Hills.

I am away from my home for several months and don’t have the cd with me, but I remember that the rather ragged ending to one tune got a lot of laughs and a promise from Don that it would be on the lp. I don’t remember if it was, but it sure is on the cd. I assumed Pete’s solo would be on the alternate tracks on the cd, but it wasn’t. During the session, which Taps conducted, a business rep. from Local 47 showed up, a former (great) bass player named Sid Weiss. (Sid played in a lot of famous swing era bands and recorded with Don Byas among others. I knew him from my senior year of high school when I played in his son’s band. Sid told me he had been blacklisted during the McCarthy era hearings.) When Sid came into the room, Sonny, who probably would have been the worst poker player ever, turned bright red. (You could hear Sonny turning red on the phone.) I asked him what was going on. After Sid had left, Sonny explained that Taps was suspended from the union and shouldn’t have been working with us. Sid didn’t recognize him. That’s about it for drama unless you count Teddy’s new mouthpiece (“some nerve,” he said to me on a break, “bringing a new mouthpiece on the gig”). The session was done in six hours and didn’t include the AFM mandatory meal break. Straight through. Pete and I were working at the LA Music Center for three weeks on the Marlene Dietrich Show. The show started at 9PM and Sonny’s session ended at 7. A little closer and I would have had to turn it down, but Sonny promised it would not go overtime, which probably means there was no money to pay for it.

Your evaluation of the cd is pretty universally accepted, but to me it is way less interesting than almost any others of Sonny’s recordings. There is not much variety on the cd—it seems as if every chord is voiced exactly the same way. A band that size could have been used more colorfully. I would much rather hear him in a blowing context. In person, as he was on most of his recordings. But I guess the most important thing is that he finally get some of the recognition he deserves. He had only two students, Sid Levy, who has sort of disappeared (he teaches in Arizona), and Dylan Cramer, a great alto player who lives in Vancouver and seems to be working full time on preserving Sonny’s legacy.

[Nate Dorward]

This looks like it might also be interesting reading (from David's site): an account derived from his journals of being on the road with a jazz band at age 18 (in 1960). Note the passing anecdote about Jimmy Woods.

http://www.belairjazz.org/id26.html

[John L]

Thanks for passingt along that interesting commentary, Nate.

I agree with David Sherr in that I don't consider Sonny Dream to be one of Criss' greatest. It is a fascinating CD, if not altogether successful.

Horace Tapscott gives a very interesting account of this session in his autobiography. Tapscott writes that he assumed the deal included his LA band, which had rehearsed all of the material. He brought his band to the studio, but was then told that he could only conduct the other band that they had assembled for the recording. They wouldn't even let Tapscott play the piano. Tapscott's first inclination was to walk out together with the band, but he stayed on since he really needed the money. He felt very disappointed by the recording done by a band not familiar with his music.

[dprfish]

This is a fascinating bit of history, Nate! Many thanks for posting this.

I feel it's worthy of its own thread.

[dprfish]

Looks like David's first employer is still working, and the size of his band has increased!

 

 

Edited September 12, 2017 by dprfish
Edited to remove outdated link.

[Larry Kart]

Thanks for passingt along that interesting commentary, Nate.

I agree with David Sherr in that I don't consider Sonny Dream to be one of Criss' greatest. It is a fascinating CD, if not altogether successful.

Horace Tapscott gives a very interesting account of this session in his autobiography. Tapscott writes that he assumed the deal included his LA band, which had rehearsed all of the material. He brought his band to the studio, but was then told that he could only conduct the other band that they had assembled for the recording. They wouldn't even let Tapscott play the piano. Tapscott's first inclination was to walk out together with the band, but he stayed on since he really needed the money. He felt very disappointed by the recording done by a band not familiar with his music.

I'd be curious what anyone with experience in the jazz record business feels about Tapscott's account of what went down at this session, especially the part about actually bringing his rehearsal band to the studio. I don't doubt that there was serious static of some sort somewhere along the line, but I can't imagine an experienced producer like Don Schlitten actually hiring the musicians he did (and a good number of them, too) if he had any thought that a whole other band was going to show up. The possibilities for chaos boggle the mind. BTW, I review "Sonny's Dream" for Down Beat when it came out, gave it ****1/2 out of *****.

[chewy-chew-chew-bean-benitez]

that is an interesting story- so why do u think the producer didnt want the arkestra on the lp? did he prefer players he was more familar with?

[king ubu]

Still have to read that thing from David Sherr (thanks for sharing, Nate!), but I still felt like weighing in here... stacked up most of Criss' OJCs in one my many Fantasy buying panick attacks, and some of it is really, really good (and all the rest is at least good, too). The two albums with Walter Davis are likely my pick as well, but there's some good stuff on all the other albums as well... even the pop tunes I enjoy, which rarely is the case. I do have a weak spot for "Ode to Billie Joe", however, but also "The Beat Goes On" and even "Eleanor Rigby" is ok in the hands of Criss... but then some of the other tunes are kitschy pop/movie stuff, too, such as "Cry Me a River", so including some newer stuff wasn't that much of a departure - anyway I still was surprised how good all these Prestige albums work as albums, how good they hold together and how they make sense, one by one. I guess that's a nice production job done there!

That video thing mentioned above is great, too - quality is quite bad alas, but Criss is playing great! Was lucky to find that DVD on sale a couple of months ago when the local summer sales started... wouldn't have noted it otherwise!

[AllenLowe]

funny thing is, I can remember exactly where I was when JFK, Elvis, and Sonny Criss died - I was living in Brookline, Mass. when a friend of mine called to say he'd heard that Criss shot himnself, distraught over his stomache cancer - bad day -

[Nate Dorward]

Horace Tapscott gives a very interesting account of this session in his autobiography. Tapscott writes that he assumed the deal included his LA band, which had rehearsed all of the material. He brought his band to the studio, but was then told that he could only conduct the other band that they had assembled for the recording. They wouldn't even let Tapscott play the piano. Tapscott's first inclination was to walk out together with the band, but he stayed on since he really needed the money. He felt very disappointed by the recording done by a band not familiar with his music.

Hm, well, I'm sure that his trouble with the musicians' union (see David's account) would explain why he didn't get to play on the session. But it does seem extremely odd if two bands descended on the studio at the same time!

[davidsherr]

Some previous discussion of a Criss Prestige date here. Those sides w/Walter Davis (THIS IS CRISS and PORTRAIT OF SONNY CRISS) are quite strong, as Chuck says... I like just about all of Criss' Prestige recordings. And yeah, Nate, Horace Tapscott does address what went down with the BIRTH OF THE NEW COOL session in SONGS OF THE UNSUNG. According to HT he and Criss had been playing together at an L.A. community center, which led to Sonny's interest in doing an album of Tapscott compositions. The original band was supposed to be made up of members from the Ark, but HT said that Don Schlitten of Prestige brought in the musicians who actually played on the date... they did get Everett Brown to stay on drums. It's on pg. 115-116 of Horace's autobiography.

I haven't read Horace's biography (I will), but this is incorrect. Sonny Criss hired the band that played on Sonny's Dream. He called each of us personally with the possible exception of Tommy Flanagan, whom he met at the session (which of course doesn't mean he didn't call him, too). Everyone was in good spirits and the session started on time and ended on time. Don Schlitten had no say in the personnel (again, with the possible exception of TF).

[davidsherr]

David Sherr recently recontacted me & gave m permission to post his private email about Sonny's Dream, on which he played. Enjoy!

*****

The Sonny session came about after he had recorded several Prestige lps with a quartet or quintet and he and Don Schlitten decided to try something different. Sonny gave me the information. The problem with “something different” is that it usually costs more than record companies want to pay for a relatively (and in this case thoroughly unjustly) obscure musician.

Sonny was a great artist, a fantastic saxophone player and in a lot of ways his own worst enemy. On the other hand we were friends from the time we met and none of the stories of the difficulty in getting along with him proved true, at least where our relationship was concerned. He went through periods where he would not play and in fact sometimes he wouldn’t leave the house for months on end. When one of those periods ended, he began playing in a rehearsal band lead by a tenor player named Vernon Slater. Horace Tapscott, whom I met at LA City College, was the pianist and arranger. I heard the band only once, in a club. I don’t think they did too many gigs. When Don and Sonny decided to do the session (I don’t know which of them had the idea first), it seemed logical (and cost effective) to use the charts Horace (we called him “Taps”) had written for Slater. I think Everett Brown, Jr. must have been a member of that band and I guess Ray Draper could have been, but the rest of us (except Pete Christlieb and Tommy Flannigan) were friends of Sonny from over the years. He and Teddy must have gone back to the middle 40s. Same thing with Al McKibbon. It just now occurred to me to wonder why Hamp Hawes wasn’t involved, but he may have been out of town or the fact that he didn’t read (which doesn’t seem to have slowed him down) might have been a factor. Years later, Dick Nash told me that Sonny met Tommy Flannigan that day. Sonny and Conte went back at least to the early 50s. Dick Nash knew him for years and they had been involved in a federal program called Operation Bootstrap. I’m not sure why Pete was there, except that he is a fantastic musician. He played a solo that somehow never made it to the record. I remember that it was great, but I could have been wrong. Unless Don knows, and will tell, I guess it will remain a secret. I met Sonny in 1965 when we played a show at The Friars Club in Beverly Hills.

I am away from my home for several months and don’t have the cd with me, but I remember that the rather ragged ending to one tune got a lot of laughs and a promise from Don that it would be on the lp. I don’t remember if it was, but it sure is on the cd. I assumed Pete’s solo would be on the alternate tracks on the cd, but it wasn’t. During the session, which Taps conducted, a business rep. from Local 47 showed up, a former (great) bass player named Sid Weiss. (Sid played in a lot of famous swing era bands and recorded with Don Byas among others. I knew him from my senior year of high school when I played in his son’s band. Sid told me he had been blacklisted during the McCarthy era hearings.) When Sid came into the room, Sonny, who probably would have been the worst poker player ever, turned bright red. (You could hear Sonny turning red on the phone.) I asked him what was going on. After Sid had left, Sonny explained that Taps was suspended from the union and shouldn’t have been working with us. Sid didn’t recognize him. That’s about it for drama unless you count Teddy’s new mouthpiece (“some nerve,” he said to me on a break, “bringing a new mouthpiece on the gig”). The session was done in six hours and didn’t include the AFM mandatory meal break. Straight through. Pete and I were working at the LA Music Center for three weeks on the Marlene Dietrich Show. The show started at 9PM and Sonny’s session ended at 7. A little closer and I would have had to turn it down, but Sonny promised it would not go overtime, which probably means there was no money to pay for it.

Your evaluation of the cd is pretty universally accepted, but to me it is way less interesting than almost any others of Sonny’s recordings. There is not much variety on the cd—it seems as if every chord is voiced exactly the same way. A band that size could have been used more colorfully. I would much rather hear him in a blowing context. In person, as he was on most of his recordings. But I guess the most important thing is that he finally get some of the recognition he deserves. He had only two students, Sid Levy, who has sort of disappeared (he teaches in Arizona), and Dylan Cramer, a great alto player who lives in Vancouver and seems to be working full time on preserving Sonny’s legacy.

I listened again and I think it was my evaluation that was off-base. There is a lot of variety there and some tricky stuff with tempo that must have been a real challenge. We finished on time and mostly used the first completed take, so I guess any trepidation on Horace's part about people playing his music for the first time were unwarranted. Incidentally, if he was worried it sure didn't show. He handled the whole thing like an old pro, although at that point in his career he could hardly have done a lot of recordings with ensembles or this size.

[Niko]

welcome to the board! (enjoyed your text "on the road at 18" tremendously yesterday!)

don't have the tapsctt bio, but steven isoardi's other book the dark tree... there it says

Assuming that UGMA [Tapscott's organization] was performing Horace arrived at the studio early to find that Prestige's producer had already hired other performers. Horace was able to get a UGMA drummer, Everett Brown, on the date but was forced to work with musicians who, although immensly talented, were unfailiar with the music. UGMA had been performing the pieces regularly with Criss and would have brought to the session a more intense, bottom-heavier, edgier sound, as heard in their subsequent recordings

thinking about it, the story doesn't quite make sense (at least in the details) - tapscott arriving at the studio expecting to meet the guys he'd been hanging out with the other night, noticing other guys being there and then somehow getting Everett Brown on board... (btw, Ray Darper was a Tapscott man, too, iirc)

[sidewinder]

Welcome also to the Board, David and thank you for sharing your memories of the session.

I have the Horace Tapscott bio open in front of me so here's an extract of the text that refers to the session:

'The first day we went to the studio to record, we found another band there. All these other cats were around, like Dick Nash, Conte Condoli and Pete Christlieb. I didn't even know who Pete was then; he was just out of school. We came walking in with our guys and, man, we went off. I went off on Sonny first and then the producer from the record company. Don Schlitten from Prestige Records had brought in all these other cats. Sonny went crazy. He got drunk and got to hollering and screaming. So we had to get out of there and cool it. I walked out of the studio.

Cecilia came after me and said, "Baby, you spent the money already. You can get sued for this." We had paid bills and got out of some problems. So I had to go back and do it. We did get Everett Brown on drums, and their cats read the music well, but our cats had it down. They didn't need the music in front of them and we were getting a sound after playing the tunes at all the gigs. We had rehearsed every day, all day, because we had nothing but time. There wasn't much else going on for us during the day. And when we went to the clubs at night, we'd be just poppin'. I told the cats who did the recording that I wasn't angry with them, that this had nothing to do with them. It was between me and this guy, Schlitten.

That was a rough day, a real rough day.

After the experiences with Prestige and Flying Dutchman, my reputation was like, "He's really gone crazy now. No telling what he might do in the studio."'

Edited August 5, 2008 by sidewinder