Moe Koffman - Norwegian Wood

[Teasing the Korean]

I LIVE for records like this!

 

[Ted O'Reilly]

Well, I don't know how deeply your tongue is in your cheek, but forget the late-60s stuff there, and it's typical of Moe Koffman's ouevre...  We in Toronto know him to be a great musician, always on the go -- he wanted an audience, and the success attached.  But always a GREAT musician.  Moe would do pretty much anything to get some sort of a hit, but damn, the man could PLAY!

And BTW, thought you'll never be able to find one, I think, he did Norwegian Wood in a live performance at Expo '67 that our national broadcaster issued on a transcription disc that is pure jazz, sans the now-treacly faddishness.  Moe could f-king play!

[Teasing the Korean]

6 minutes ago, Ted O'Reilly said:

Well, I don't know how deeply your tongue is in your cheek,...

NOT AT ALL!

[Brad]

I could imagine hearing this in the restaurant scene in Bullitt. 

[JSngry]

It's better than that Sheep Swinging Blues thing, that's for sure!

I think it would have rocked harder with a Vinnie Bell electric sitar, but that's just me.

[Rooster_Ties]

Lovely track!  By any chance, is this available on any compilation CD's (various artists)?  Not sure I need a whole disc of this, but it could be a nice part of a bigger overview of some sort, I can imagine.

[medjuck]

I remember him being on the Canadian version of Your Hit Parade playing Swinging Shepherd Blues. 

[Ted O'Reilly]

Moe had a fairly good/ironic grasp of his need to succeed.  He used to introduce Swinging Shepherd Blues as "a medley of my hit"...

[sgcim]

I only bought his LPs if Ed Bickert was on them. "Museum Pieces" etc...

[Ted O'Reilly]

15 hours ago, sgcim said:

I only bought his LPs if Ed Bickert was on them. "Museum Pieces" etc...

There was commercial Moe and there was jazz Moe.  The latter is heard well on two-LP set recorded "Live at George's" (Moe's jazz home for decades) for the GRT label.  It dates from 1975, and if I'm not mistaken it has never shown up on CD.  Ed's on it, so is Don Thompson, Jerry Fuller...

[JSngry]

48 minutes ago, Ted O'Reilly said:

There was commercial Moe and there was jazz Moe. 

Who were the other three?

[Ted O'Reilly]

6 hours ago, JSngry said:

Who were the other three?

I think there's No Moe, but ask Louis Jordan.  But then, Ray Charles told us there's also "dontcha come back No Moe, No Moe..." or that's what I heard.

Edited July 28, 2019 by Ted O'Reilly

[sgcim]

8 hours ago, Ted O'Reilly said:

There was commercial Moe and there was jazz Moe.  The latter is heard well on two-LP set recorded "Live at George's" (Moe's jazz home for decades) for the GRT label.  It dates from 1975, and if I'm not mistaken it has never shown up on CD.  Ed's on it, so is Don Thompson, Jerry Fuller...

I'm gonna have to hunt that one down! 

[mikeweil]

I once heard that Shepherd tune on the radio, that was it. Never saw any of his records over here.

[Ted O'Reilly]

10 hours ago, mikeweil said:

I once heard that Shepherd tune on the radio, that was it. Never saw any of his records over here.

It was just a simple pop-ish blues, a quartet performance tacked on at the end of a Moe Koffman Sextet session, but it caught the ears of a lot of people.  Some remarked that it brought the jazz flute to the forefront for at least a while.  I think maybe Buddy Collette did a cover version, the Basie band had it in the book for a while.

I was at an Ella Fitzgerald performance in Toronto one time when she realized Moe was in the reed section backing her, and lit into an ad-lib version of it, much to Moe's delight.  I don't know anything about this version of it:  

 

[mikeweil]

On 28.7.2019 at 7:19 AM, sgcim said:

I'm gonna have to hunt that one down! 

https://www.discogs.com/sell/list?master_id=506336&ev=mb

[sidewinder]

On 27/07/2019 at 10:00 PM, Ted O'Reilly said:

There was commercial Moe and there was jazz Moe.  The latter is heard well on two-LP set recorded "Live at George's" (Moe's jazz home for decades) for the GRT label.  It dates from 1975, and if I'm not mistaken it has never shown up on CD.  Ed's on it, so is Don Thompson, Jerry Fuller...

The one time I can recall seeing Moe was through the window at George’s Spaghetti House when I walked past one evening. Sadly, never made it through the door. 

[sgcim]

13 hours ago, mikeweil said:

https://www.discogs.com/sell/list?master_id=506336&ev=mb

Thanks! That's the best price I've seen yet, but they get you on the shipping.

[John Tapscott]

On 7/27/2019 at 5:00 PM, Ted O'Reilly said:

There was commercial Moe and there was jazz Moe.  The latter is heard well on two-LP set recorded "Live at George's" (Moe's jazz home for decades) for the GRT label.  It dates from 1975, and if I'm not mistaken it has never shown up on CD.  Ed's on it, so is Don Thompson, Jerry Fuller...

These are all good jazz sessions from Moe (the Solar Explorations recording is quite advanced in places and has Sonny Greenwich on guitar)

These 3 along with Georges' are the only Koffman records I own. But they're all good. 

 

Edited August 1, 2019 by John Tapscott

[sgcim]

Devil's Brew and Moe Koffman Quintet Plays both have Bickert on them. 

19 minutes ago, John Tapscott said:

These are all good jazz sessions from Moe (the Solar Explorations recording is quite advanced in places and has Sonny Greenwich on guitar)

These 3 along with Georges' are the only Koffman records I own. But they're all good. 

 

Devil's Brew and Moe Koffman Quintet Plays both have Bickert on them. I'm sold. Thanks!

[Ted O'Reilly]

"Moe Koffman Quintet Plays" is the best of those, I'd say.

If you're into searching on small, now-dead labels, look for a 1998 issue on Duke Street Records (DSRD 31048) "Oop.pop.a.da" with Dizzy Gillespie, Ed Bickert, the wonderful Bernie Senensky on piano, bassist Kieran Overs and drummer Barry Elmes.

And, likely even harder to find would be a December 16, 1985 concert recording that I did as part of a radio broadcast series, released years after I left the station.  It was a fund-raiser for the station, issued as a tribute to Moe after his passing, with the slightly-less than an hour padded out with a couple of interviews I did with Moe.  Same fine band as above (sans Dizzy of course) and with Terry Clarke in for Elmes.  It might represent the working MK quintet in a pretty typical way, rather than the projects that Moe used to undertake.

I suppose one could approach the station and see if they had  any still kicking around. ("Live At The Ontario Science Centre" jazzfm CD 005)  www.jazz.fm is the link, I think.

[sgcim]

Thanks for the suggestions, Ted!