"Phil Talks with Quill"

[Larry Kart]

Shuffling through LPs I haven't listened to for years, I put on the 1980 reissue of this 1957 Columbia album, with Woods, Quill, Bob Corwin, Sonny Dallas, and Nick Stabulas. This was when Woods (for my taste) was still quite lucid, not yet the "jazzy" player he eventually became IMO, though in '57 he sure was hot as hell, while Quill was no less searing and with a unique slam-bang rhythmic  looseness -- a wild man he was. Annotator Mort Goode gets some good stories out of Phil, who is touchingly eager to have the album reissued because Quill by 1980 had been horribly beaten in a mugging, was paralyzed on his right side and would never play again. "This is some of the best Gene Quill ever recorded," Woods says, and it is.

Two minor goofs though. Woods says that on the night that he and Quill first met, they were playing at a session with "Johnny Williams on piano" -- Goode adding that was the John Williams of eventual movie soundtrack fame. No -- that John Williams played jazz piano in the LA area early on in his career under the name John Towner Williams (or just John Towner), but this was the John Williams who had been the pianist in the Stan Getz Quintet with Bob Brookmeyer and made a nice trio record for Emarcy Also, on what may be the fastest version of "Scrapple from the Apple" on record, Woods is said to be the first soloist, but it's definitely Quill, who proceeds to take the paint off the walls. Yes, they were similar but not that hard to tell apart.

Well known Gene Quill story: Some fan came up to him at a club and said, "All you're doing is imitating Charlie Parker. " Gene hands him his alto and says, "Here -- you try it."

[sgcim]

There should be some more on Quill coming soon from Phil's autobiography. Jill Goodwin (Phil's wife) emailed me and said:

" The book is getting closer to being finished. We've been over the discography and think it is as complete and accurate as we can make it. Hopefully, it will be useful to those interested in Phil's very prolific recording career. Stay tuned for an announcement about the release of Life In E Flat, hopefully later this year.

[HutchFan]

That's good news re: Phil's autobiography. 👍

Larry, I agree with you about that LP.  Wonderful stuff.