Freddie Hubbard tribute on WFIU this afternoon

[ghost of miles]

Hey all, I'm sitting in for our weekday-afternoon jazz host this week and will be doing a 90-minute tribute to Freddie Hubbard from 3:30 to 5 p.m. EST, with special guest David Baker--a friend and musical colleague of Freddie's from Indianapolis--stopping by to talk about the trumpeter's life and musical legacy. He'll also be bringing along some very early, unreleased recordings of Freddie and Larry Ridley's teenage Indy group the Jazz Contemporaries. We're going to try to tape the show and put it up as a file on the Night Lights site tomorrow morning.

[Big Al]

Hey all, I'm sitting in for our weekday-afternoon jazz host this week and will be doing a 90-minute tribute to Freddie Hubbard from 3:30 to 5 p.m. EST, with special guest David Baker--a friend and musical colleague of Freddie's from Indianapolis--stopping by to talk about the trumpeter's life and musical legacy. He'll also be bringing along some very early, unreleased recordings of Freddie and Larry Ridley's teenage Indy group the Jazz Contemporaries. We're going to try to tape the show and put it up as a file on the Night Lights site tomorrow morning.

Sweet! I'll have to take a break from listening to the sports-talk radio shows trashing the Cowboys to listen to this!

[ghost of miles]

The Freddie Hubbard tribute from yesterday's Just You and Me is posted for online listening. David Baker stopped by for about the first 45 minutes of the show, and we played a live recording of Freddie's teenage group the Jazz Contemporaries doing "Tadd's Delight" on Indiana Avenue in 1957.

[Mark Stryker]

The Freddie Hubbard tribute from yesterday's Just You and Me is posted for online listening. David Baker stopped by for about the first 45 minutes of the show, and we played a live recording of Freddie's teenage group the Jazz Contemporaries doing "Tadd's Delight" on Indiana Avenue in 1957.

Nice tribute David.

I'd encourage everyone to check out the 1957 bootleg of "Tadd's Delight," which precedes his formal debut on record with the Montgomery Bros. He's really sounding like Clifford Brown, but with lots of personality, authority and poise. He would have been 18 or 19 at the time. Also interesting to hear James Spaulding at this point playing tenor rather than alto and not really making all the changes. Of course, you could argue that even later he never really made all the changes either ... The rest of the cats are Al Plank, Larry Ridley, Paul Parker.

The lead-in discussion starts at about the 36-minute mark. You can move the cursor forward to get to it directly. Baker mentions in passing that Freddie studied briefly with a trumpet player in the Indianapolis Symphony. Maybe that's commong knowledge in the trumpet world but I had not heard that before. Would be interesting to know who that was and what he did for Freddie, because while Freddie must have had natural chops to play the way he does, and while he certainly practiced like crazy I wonder the degree to which his natural gifts were focused early on with fundamentals. Technique like that can't all be just a freak of nature.

Edited January 1, 2009 by Mark Stryker

[Tom 1960]

Thanks David for making this show available for us listeners and fans of Freddie Hubbard. I've been pretty much listening to the Freddie tribute on WKCR the past few days, but will defintely check out your show in the next few days.

[alocispepraluger102]

Thanks David for making this show available for us listeners and fans of Freddie Hubbard. I've been pretty much listening to the Freddie tribute on WKCR the past few days, but will defintely check out your show in the next few days.

me, too.

[ghost of miles]

Thanks for the comments, Mark--I wish I'd been able to put more time into it, but I've been doing all of the traffic this week for the station and it's been crazy with holiday specials, etc. Night Lights runs pretty far ahead, but I'm thinking of trying to do a more tightly-edited tribute down the line, with remarks from David and perhaps Don Pickett as well (a friend of Freddie's who contributed to the BACKLASH album, and who resides around these parts). Re: the Jazz Contemporaries date, it's the first time I've ever heard any live material from Indiana Avenue in its heyday...there must be more floating around, but I haven't come across it yet. I think David has some tapes of Wes Montgomery sitting in with David's late-1950s big band, but that's studio, not club (either way, though, I'd still love to hear it!).

[randissimo]

Thanks for the comments, Mark--I wish I'd been able to put more time into it, but I've been doing all of the traffic this week for the station and it's been crazy with holiday specials, etc. Night Lights runs pretty far ahead, but I'm thinking of trying to do a more tightly-edited tribute down the line, with remarks from David and perhaps Don Pickett as well (a friend of Freddie's who contributed to the BACKLASH album, and who resides around these parts). Re: the Jazz Contemporaries date, it's the first time I've ever heard any live material from Indiana Avenue in its heyday...there must be more floating around, but I haven't come across it yet. I think David has some tapes of Wes Montgomery sitting in with David's late-1950s big band, but that's studio, not club (either way, though, I'd still love to hear it!).

Last time I saw Freddie he was playing in top form.. It was in the late 80's at Sonny Buxton's jazz club "Milestones" in San Francisco. He had John Beasley on piano, Wyatt "The Bull" Wreuther on bass, and Carl Allen on drums.. Best I've ever heard Carl play! Freddie had him burnin' !!! A memorable night of music for me...