Archives for January 2006

Eric Felten’s call for suggestions of odd or unexpected pairings brought enough responses that we’ll run them in two installments. My first thought was simply to list the names of the musicians and their performances, but the comments accompanying your messages were as interesting as the couplings themselves. Wherever possible, the Rifftides staff has provided links to pertinent recordings. Some of the pairings don’t seem all that disparate, but perhaps oddity is in the ear of the beholder. I’ll … [Read more...]

Click on the highlighted words to link to the recordings. My hometown friend Bob Godfrey offered three nominations: Thelonious Monk and Pee Wee Russell Count Basie and Teresa Brewer Count Basie and Oscar Peterson Basie and Peterson recorded Satch Meets Josh in 1974 and followed it up over the years with four additional two-piano collaborations. For the 1998 reissue of Satch Meets Josh, aka Count Basie Encounters Oscar Peterson, I wrote: If Art Tatum and Fats Waller had teamed up in a recording … [Read more...]

A last-minute contribution from a Rifftides reader who identifies himself only as John. Worked: Don Pullen and the Chief Cliff Singers. (Sacred Common Ground, a collaboration between the pianist's avant garde African Brazilian Connection and a Native American vocal group. DR) Didn't (at least for me): Louis Armstrong and Leon Thomas. (Louis Armstrong and Friends, a 1960s album including Thomas, a sort of free jazz yodeler; Ornette Coleman, Miles Davis, Tony Bennett and others in a small … [Read more...]

I would gladly give all my symphonies, had I been able to invent the locomotive. —Anton Dvořák “Happy Go Lucky Local”...told the story of a train in the South, not one of those luxurious, streamlined trains that take tourists to Miami, but a little train with an upright engine that was never fast, never on schedule, and never made stops at any place you ever heard about. After grunting, groaning, and jerking, it finally settled down to a steady medium tempo. —Duke Ellington … [Read more...]

Very good site! Poishi … [Read more...]

This week, Jackie Cain, the surviving member of the vocal duo Jackie and Roy, sang with some of their arrangements from nearly half a century ago. Ms. Cain’s angelic voice, an instrument of purity and tonal accuracy rarely equaled in any area of music, has seldom been heard since Roy Kral, her husband, died in 2002. Her re-emergence performing with a big band was an event. Here is a bit of Zan Stewart’s report from the Newark Star-Ledger. Cain was spotlighted on several ballads, among them "Darn … [Read more...]

Eric Felten—trombonist, singer, bandleader and occasional Wall Street Journal contributor—is asking for Rifftiders’ suggestions, to wit: The other day I heard a cut that I had heard a time or two before, "Shine On Harvest Moon," with that remarkably odd combination of Jimmy Rushing and the Brubeck outfit. I found it weirdly compelling. It got me thinking about what other odd pairings have been made in jazz. Some have been great artistic triumphs—Coltrane/Hartman, anyone? And I imagine there have … [Read more...]

I saw a sign, beautifully hand-lettered, in front of a garden apartment not far from my house. WELCOME: FRIENDS BUTTERFLIES LADYBUGS BEES A good thought on a frigid January day. … [Read more...]

Several Rifftides readers have written that they regret not having been at the International Association of Jazz Educators bash in New York. Many of them were disappointed at not hearing the conversation between Ira Gitler and Sonny Rollins. Because of that session’s overlap with one I did, there was no chance for me to hear it. I thank DevraDoWrite for alerting us to a way to get tapes or CDs of that interview and dozens of other IAJE presentations. None of the major concerts is available, for … [Read more...]

The web site jazzstandards.com has added a Paul Desmond page with a biography and links to Desmond CDs and books. The site offers resources to researchers and entertainment to browsers. Fair warning: one thing leads to another on jazzstandards.com. Be prepared to spend time. … [Read more...]

In the current issue of The Village Voice, critic Francis Davis assesses venerable jazz survivors. Here's his lead: The votes are in: Monk and Coltrane at Carnegie Hall in 1957, my choice as the best jazz CD released in 2005, is the winner in JazzTimes' critics' poll, scoring 165 points to 87 for Dizzy and Bird at Town Hall in 1945—my runner-up as well. Number three with 73 points is Coltrane at the Half Note in '65, followed by the highest-ranking living performers: Sonny Rollins (40 points) … [Read more...]

Once in a while, the Rifftides staff checks the traffic report to see where our postings are being read. The most recent sampling includes: Cremorne, Victoria, Australia Manchester; London; Elsfield, Oxfordshire; and Hampstead Norris, West Berkshire, England Bors, Vastra Gotaland, Sweden Beijing, China Clarkson, Ontario, Canada Tigery, Ile-de-France Dozens of places in the US, from Tavares, Florida, to Port Angeles, Washington Several places identified by the site meter only as "Unknown … [Read more...]

A man may write at any time, if he will set himself doggedly to it. —Samuel Johnson No writer ever truly succeeds. The disparity between the work conceived and the work completed is always too great and the writer merely achieves an acceptable degree of failure. —Phillip Caputo … [Read more...]

Tim DuRoche's response is also posted as a comment to Dave Frishberg's Page Three story, but I didn't want to risk its being lost in the blog backwater. He wrote: I read Page Three a while back when I was doing a profile of Dave for a Portland magazine that went broke before they ever published their first issue. Here's my piece on him: DAVE FRISHBERG: Shooting from the Hip "I’m from the old school The proper and the prude school Where it’s stiff upper lip stay quietly hip" —Dave Frishberg, … [Read more...]

The Rifftides staff is racing a deadline for a large article that, unlike the blog game, will result in remuneration. More on that later. Posting this week will be done in proportion to progress on the project. We know that you understand. … [Read more...]

I will be a guest this (Monday) evening on Michael Atleson's Point of Departure program on WPMG, Portland, Maine. We will discuss Take Five: The Public and Private Lives of Paul Desmond, recent CDs and whatever else comes up. Air time is 9:00 pm EST, 8:00 pm Central, 6:00 pm PST. In the Portland listening area, go to 90.9 FM. Elsewhere, you can hear the show by going to WPMG's web site and clicking on "Listen." Hope you can join us. … [Read more...]

Before Dave Frishberg the pianist became Frishberg the celebrated songwriter, singer and wit, he was a journeyman musician. When he had established himself in New York in the late 1950s, he played with Al Cohn and Zoot Sims, Ben Webster, Jimmy Rushing, indeed, a cross section of the best jazz artists of the day. In the course of working into the jazz community, however, he took the jobs he could get. Pianist Jack Reilly recently sent me an account that Frishberg wrote some time ago about one of … [Read more...]

HOW HISTORY ALMOST HAPPENED AT THE PAGE THREE By Dave Frishberg Around the time I first came to New York, during the late fifties, I got a call from a piano player named Johnny Knapp. He asked if I would be interested in replacing him with the band at The Page Three. It was a two piece band--piano and drums. "You have to play a continuous show," he told me, "the hours are 9pm to 4am, and the pay is seventy-five a week." I told him I would be interested. The Page Three was a cabaret on Seventh … [Read more...]

Our posting about pianist Denny Zeitlin’s recording debut on Jeremy Steig’s 1963 Flute Fever coincided with critic Owen Cordle’s review in the Raleigh News and Observer of a rarity, a new CD by the flutist. Sample sentence: Steig is a busy soloist, and his tonal palette ranges from ravishing pure sounds to guitarlike overdriven grunge. To read the whole thing, go here. Zeitlin apparently has a cache of Flute Fever LPs and offers them for sale on his web site, autographed, for fifteen … [Read more...]

While he was in New York to accept his award as a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master, John Levy talked with National Public Radio's Sara Fishko. The result was a beautifully produced seven-and-a-half-minute piece that highlights the emotional side of a 93-year-old man who went from bassist to respected artists manager. It ran yesterday. If you missed it, click on this link to NPR's All Things Considered. … [Read more...]

I completed the Yakima-Seattle-New York-Seattle-Yakima odyssey Tuesday evening, only slightly the worse for wear, now rested and restored. Here's a wrapup of some of my experiences at the IAJE conference and elsewhere in New York: Buddy DeFranco, approaching his eighty-fourth birthday, played in concert with the U.S. Army Blues Jazz Ensemble. Made up of sergeants of various stripes and led by Chief Warrant Officer Charles Vollherbst, the Blues (named for their dress uniforms) is one of the best … [Read more...]

Back at Rifftides world headquarters, following the semblance of a night’s sleep, I prepared an introduction of the Brubeck Brothers Quartet, which played a rousing concert to a full house last night at The Seasons. Although the BBQ played a few Dave Brubeck pieces, listeners who may have come expecting to hear a tribute band covering Father Brubeck’s greatest hits were treated to originality, vitality and power. I knew Dan Brubeck’s drumming and Chris’s electric bass and trombone work, but … [Read more...]

The Rifftides staff is still wending its way from New York back to headquarters. Our two-day stopover is in Seattle, which is entering its thirtieth consecutive day of rain. Perversely, Seattleites are simultaneously complaining about the ceaseless downpours and saying, oh, what the hell, we're this close, let's hope we break the record. The thirty-three-day record was set in 1953. Washington and Oregon east of the mountains are getting less precipitation than the Puget Sound area, but enough … [Read more...]

The new class of NEA (National Endowment for the Arts) Jazz Masters was sworn in tonight at the IAJE bash: Ray Barretto, Freddie Hubbard, Chick Corea, Bob Brookmeyer, Buddy DeFranco, Tony Bennett and John Levy. Each spoke briefly and movingly as he accepted his award. Jon Faddis led a big band that played, beautifully, the "Beige" section of Duke Ellington's "Black, Brown and Beige." Bill Hughes and Dennis Wilson led the Count Basie band in a set that turned out to be mostly accompaniment for … [Read more...]

Here at the conference of the International Association of Jazz Education (IAJE) in midtown Manhattan, seven-thousand-odd jazz people are swarming in and between two enormous hotels. If life is a succession of choices, this is dramatic evidence. As I write this at 5:00 p.m., there are ten events on the schedule, six of which I am sorry to be missing. For three days, every waking hour has more or less that many concerts, clinics, demonstrations, workshops, panels and research presentations. The … [Read more...]

If you don’t check the other artsjournal.com blogs now and then, you’re missing things. For instance, you may have not have seen Jan Herman’s Straight Up piece about a singer who made his reputation in another field. This singer/author sublimated himself into one of his novels as a character who, among other things, appeared in Don Giovani and wrestled with how to do the serenade. I wanted to put it up a half tone, so I could get it in the key of three flats, but I didn't. It's in the key of two … [Read more...]