The Earle, Ann Arbor, Michigan

[Hot Ptah]

I have fond memories of several memorable jazz concerts at the Earle in Ann Arbor. Does anyone else remember this club?

[GregK]

The Earle? It's a restaurant. I think they have the occasional piano trio playing while people eat, but I don't think it's a jazz club. I have a friend who used to waittress there.

[marcello]

[Hot Ptah]

The Earle was across the street from either Del Rio or Mr. Floods in downtown Ann Arbor--I forget which but it was on that side of the street. It was a basement music club in 1978-79, which also served food. At the Earle I saw Dexter Gordon, Betty Carter (with John Hicks), McCoy Tyner (with George Adams), Larry Coryell, Sonny Stitt, Elvin Jones, Leon Thomas and others. The Earle also presented blues and other music. I remember seeing Magic Slim and the Teardrops there. I was unable to make it on evenings when they presented Woody Shaw's quintet, and the Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Big Band.

It was a small club. You sat very close to the bandstand, which was at the level of the tables. The Dexter Gordon, McCoy Tyner, Betty Carter and Elvin Jones performances were very notable. It was so small that the performers would sit next to, or with, the audience members between sets.

[Jim Alfredson]

It's still small, it's still there, but they usually just have local solo pianists. A good friend of mine had a house gig there every Thursday night for awhile when I lived in AA. They had this soup during the winter months that was to die for... cannot remember the name, but it was a chowder and had winter sausage, noodles, barley, beans, and some other stuff in it. Very hearty and the perfect soup for winter. Come in from the cold, have a bowl of that soup, and listen to some nice piano.

There's not a lot of jazz around AA anymore. But hey, we'll be there on Dec. 7th at Goodnight Gracie's!

[Hot Ptah]

What strikes me about my memories of the Earle is that the groups, while a few feet away from the audience, would flat out wail, just play their hearts out at peak intensity and wildness. The McCoyTyner group included Joe Ford, George Adams, Charles Fambrough and Wilby Fletcher, and they put out incredible waves of sound. I remember George Adams blowing the roof off of the place during his solo on "Fly With The Wind", just blasting off into the stratosphere--it was the most intense playing I ever witnessed by George Adams.

Elvin Jones, too--I had seen several other great drummers that year, but I was struck by how Elvin, with a seemingly effortless flick of his wrist, created great masses of complex sound that basically wiped out any competition around at that time. To see it and hear it from a few feet away was amazing.

Betty Carter's group was John Hicks, Cameron Brown and Kenny Washington, and this was no polite piano trio. They wailed at peak intensity, and then Betty worked her magic on top. I just saw Kenny Washington last weekend in a piano trio where he was constrained to tap the drums lightly with brushes for most of the evening, and I think back to the whirlwinds of sound that Hicks/Brown/Washington laid down at the Earle.

There were some magic performances in that small room.

And then there was Larry Coryell. He has spoken of this drunken period in his life. He appeared in a duet with Chris Brubeck, who played bass and trombone. For most of the evening Coryell played the riff from Miles Davis' "It's About That Time" (Side 2 of "In a Silent Way")---Doo, Doo Doo, Doo Doo Doo Doo DOO Doo, over and over and over again on distorted electic guitar. After each playing of this short riff, he would shout out one line from an old rock and roll song while struggling to remain seated on his stool. Riff--Peggy Sue Peggy Sue Pretty Pretty Pretty Little PeggySue--Riff--You ain't nothin' but a hound dog--Riff--Come on baby whole lotta shakin' goin' on--Riff etc. etc. for what seemed like an endless time. I remember thinking--this is one of the great jazz guitarists? Again, from ten feet away it was a striking experience to witness.

[Jim Alfredson]

Joe does that a lot, too. Must be something about guitar players.