"Sophotocated Lady"

[Big Beat Steve]

Just a hint at this time of scurrying for gifts for your loved ones (who in turn might be grateful to know what they could give to YOU ):

Those of you out there who love to browse through coffee table photo works of our favorite era(s) and artists of jazz and can hear the music come out of the images could do a lot worse than to spring for the recently released German book "Sophotocated Lady" featuring the jazz photographies of Susanne Schapowalow, covering the years 1948 to 1965.

Susanne who, most of you will ask ... Well, on the German post-war jazz scene and through the photographers' credits in numerous issues of JAZZ PODIUM, the #1 German jazz magazine, she was well-established on the scene, up to and including making lasting friendships with lots of U.S. "name" jazz artists who had met and worked with her during their European tours.

On a total of some 200 large-size pages, this book not only gives an intriguing account (in German AND English) of those years of jazz as it happened over here but also covers the entire range of photographic documents from early post-war basement jam sessions to candid on and off-stage shots of visiting U.S. stars such as Armstrong, Ellington, Quincy Jones, MJQ, Oscar Pettiford, etc. as well as capturing the flourishing German and European jazz scene as exemplified by names such as Mangelsdorff, Koller, Rolf Kühn, Jan Johansson, Martial Solal and numerous others.

All of it in crisp, sharp, stylish, atmosphere-laden black and white photographs that are well worth the price of admission of 55 euros IMHO.

Some more info on it is found here (most of it in German but apparently the book has yet to make a big splash abroad):

http://www.jazzprezzo.de/schapowalow.htm

http://www.spiegel.de/kultur/musik/0,1518,797227,00.html

http://news.jazzjournalists.org/2011/11/jja-members-updates-november-2011/ (see comments on the book under "Wolfram Knauer")

Recommended for sure (and no, I am not connected with the publishers in any way and have nothing to gain from stating my opinion )

[brownie]

Nice shot of Nat 'King' Cole rehearsing with musicians from the Quincy Jones orchestra in Paris in 1960.

The musicians include, from right: Sahib Shihab, Budd Johnson, Phil Woods, Jerome Richardson...

Edited December 15, 2011 by brownie

[medjuck]

Is this book available in the US?

[Big Beat Steve]

It is fairly new (official release date early November, though it wasn't even on Amazon.de until much later in November), and like I said, it is not on Amazon.com yet (at least not last night when I checked). I hope it is going to be listed there soon but how am I to know for sure?

Neither, unfortunately, do I know which other U.S. sellers would be the ones to watch (or approach) to see if they decide to import a batch and sell them domestically (which would make sense instead of having to import it privately one piece at a time and pay full airmail shipping price).

It definitely is one to watch out for IMO, and at any rate there should be a worldwide market for it.

[Big Beat Steve]

Now available at the Zweitausendeins online shop at a greatly reduced price of 19.95 EUR.

https://www.zweitausendeins.de/susanne-schapowalow-sophotocated-lady-jazzphotographien-1948-1965.html

 

And at amazon.de at 22.95 EUR:

https://www.amazon.de/Sophotocated-Lady-Susanne-Schapowalow/dp/3981388291/ref=sr_1_1?__mk_de_DE=%C3%85M%C3%85%C5%BD%C3%95%C3%91&keywords=Sophotocated+lady&qid=1559659977&s=gateway&sr=8-1

A steal!

[Gheorghe]

I haven´t heard about her, but I did read Jazz Podium in the 70´s and early 80´s .

But what I can see is really great photos, she could be almost as well known as Wolff from BN.

[Big Beat Steve]

1 hour ago, Gheorghe said:

I haven´t heard about her, but I did read Jazz Podium in the 70´s and early 80´s .

IIRC her photographs weren't featured in JP at that time anymore. She was a regular in JP in the 50s, though, and her photographs also were featured here and there in German jazz books into the 60s. An unsung hero of jazz photography IMO.

[Gheorghe]

Yeah I think I had a German Jazz Book from around 1968, that had many many photos in it, not only US Artists, but many many German artists who later became very famous too, so maybe some of the photographs were done by her.

To bad I don´t know the title of the book anymore, but it fell apart, and since it didn´t have very much to read I had to throw it away when I moved.

[Big Beat Steve]

Sounds like Jazz Optisch by. J.E. Berendt (yellow spine and cover lettering, published in the mid-50s, though). Pity to throw a book like that away - originals of the book tend to be pricy by now. (Edit: The photo credits do not list her among the photographers, though)

Photos by her were also used in "Jazz - Gesicht einer Musik" by Siegfried Schmidt-Joos (1960).

 

Edited June 5, 2019 by Big Beat Steve

[mikeweil]

Thanks for alerting us to this, just ordered a copy through Zweitausendeins - one of the last nine they had. 

[Gheorghe]

About the photo with Nat King Cole.

Maybe I´m not too familiar with Nat King Cole I know more about Sahib Shihab, Budd Johnson than I should about Nat King Cole, but he must be a voice ladies love to listen to, my wife loves his album with latin tunes.

But: Since I´m not so familiar with him, at the first look I had thought it´s a photo of Miles in Paris 1949, because the way Nat King Cole sits, is dressed and has his hair slicked back looks exactly like the young Miles who fell in love with Juiliette Greco then in Paris 1949.

@Big Beat Steve : No, the book I threw away was not "Jazz Optisch" by Behrend. Not that I might agree with everything Behrend said, but I never would have threwn away a book written by him. The book with photos I threw away was something else, it was not a hard cover, so it must have been a cheaper edition, it HAD borrowed an article from Behrend, the one he wrote about "Free Jazz". The first part was photos, then was some explications what is jazz, what instruments has which combo, it left me the impression as if it was for schools, and something was written about jazz musicians going to a kid school and kids clappin their hands to the rhythms, ......anyway the book fell apart, it would have needed miles of "Tixo"  or "Tesa" to glue the pages back......

[Big Beat Steve]

1 hour ago, Gheorghe said:

@Big Beat Steve : No, the book I threw away was not "Jazz Optisch" by Behrend. Not that I might agree with everything Behrend said, but I never would have threwn away a book written by him. The book with photos I threw away was something else, it was not a hard cover, so it must have been a cheaper edition, it HAD borrowed an article from Behrend, the one he wrote about "Free Jazz". The first part was photos, then was some explications what is jazz, what instruments has which combo, it left me the impression as if it was for schools, and something was written about jazz musicians going to a kid school and kids clappin their hands to the rhythms, ......anyway the book fell apart, it would have needed miles of "Tixo"  or "Tesa" to glue the pages back......

Not a book I am familiar with, then. Your description matches none of the (not too numerous) German jazz books from the 60s that I own.

[Gheorghe]

1 minute ago, Big Beat Steve said:

Not a book I am familiar with, then. Your description matches none of the (not too numerous) German jazz books from the 60s that I own.

I think one little book from that time that I have is "Siegfried Borris - Modern Jazz". I think I bought it in the 70´s when I thought "modern" might be what started with Mingus and Dolphy, what did Ornette and Don Cherry, Sun Ra, Cecil Taylor......, and was surprised that the "modern style"  the book is about, is 50´s mainstream stuff, the MJQ, Stan Kenton ......, so it might have been "Modern Jazz" from a historical point of view....

[Big Beat Steve]

I have that one too. The kind of book you pick up when you come across it cheaply (as I did). Far from essential (even among the books of that time) but worth it for the "period" perspective of presenting the subject any time. This one incidentally has 5 photos by Susanne Schapowalow.

That 70s "modern" perspective you describe obviously was a widespread fundamental blunder at the time. A pardonable error from your then beginner's perspective, but in the 70s jazz rock and fusion-dominated era many casual listeners (who thought themselves "experts" anyhow) had HUGE blind spots and a totally skewed perception of what "jazz" (in its whole sense) was all about. Happens even today. Yet "Modern Jazz" even by today's definition DID start in 1945. In short, that book (and others like it) does cover MODERN jazz (the way it is understood even today) from its actual beginings and up to the time the book was written (obviuosly ...).

Edited June 6, 2019 by Big Beat Steve

[Gheorghe]

Got to have a look at those Schapowalow photos in that book. Right now, all my books are sealed, all my stuff, my Hi Fi everything since I have a huge house renovation, so I´ll look at it when I got everything fixed again.

Very interesting remark about the error from the beginner´s perspective ! Exactly the way you said it, that´s how it was. And Right ! It was the times. When I was a beginner, I had two albums "Miles Davis Steamin´" and "The Great Concert of Charles Mingus", and when I mentioned Miles to others, they started talkin about Bitches Brew and Aghartha, but they also were people who didn´t really know too much about jazz, so they told me "what you listen is "THE OLD MILES". And so I thought what Miles played with Trane and Garland and Chambers and Philly J.J. is "old time jazz", and when I really heard "old time jazz" I mean trad, dixie it was not my kind of stuff because I expected to hear 5 guys playin stuff like "Milestones" and "So What"  and what I heard as "oldtime"  sounded more like the score  from an old black white comedy film to me.

So, informations were scarce, as a boy it´s harder to get around the right people, but I learned very quickly and 1, 2 years later I was the "jazz expert" on our high school, having the most records, and hangin out in clubs even if I was underaged but tried to look older and it was ok for my parents as long as school was right and without complaints......

[Big Beat Steve]

1 hour ago, Gheorghe said:

Got to have a look at those Schapowalow photos in that book. Right now, all my books are sealed, all my stuff, my Hi Fi everything since I have a huge house renovation, so I´ll look at it when I got everything fixed again.

 

Just checked 2 of them this morning but they, for example, are not in the big book on special sale now.

[mikeweil]

When I returned home three hours ago the package with the book waited on my doorstep. Highly recommended. Some of the best photos I have ever seen of Connie Kay, the members of the 1960 Quincy Jones Orchestra of 1960, and Helen Merrill (calling king ubu!) Thank you so much for the hint!!!

[Big Beat Steve]

I knew you wouldn't be disappointed.

[mikeweil]

Zweitausendeins say their stock is down to seven copies. Don't miss it!

[mikeweil]

When I stepped over her name at discogs, I read the sad news that she has passed away on June 22, 2022 at the ripe old age of 100 years! R.I.P. - to me she belongs in the Hall of Fame of Jazz Photography alongside another European great we just lost, Giuseppe Pino.

Many CDs issued in Gernay durin the last 15 years with live recordings from the 1960's used her photos, here's an example illustrating how close she was with the musicians:

Edited October 8, 2022 by mikeweil

[Big Beat Steve]

RIP indeed. Given her age, I had figured she had already passed.

Her "Sophotocated Lady" book only touched the surface of her photo-documentary treasures. Let's hope her archives will end up with someone who will be prepared to make really good (publishing) use of it. Not like in the unfortunate case of her contemporary colleague (10 years her junior but deceased many years ago), jazz photographer Hanns E.Haehl (whose photographer credits also appeared under the "Jazz im Bild" name for a time in the 60s). His legacy of photo documents unfortunately sits in an archive storage basement without much (or any) hope of ever being worked into a book. They would very much deserve it too.

Edited October 9, 2022 by Big Beat Steve