Pianist, singer and songwriter Dave Frishberg has suffered medical setbacks that have led him and his wife April to seek help in meeting his long-term health care needs. We cannot provide details about his condition but, now in his mid-eighties, Frishberg has had more than his share of problems in recent years. A fund-raising system has been set up for Frishberg admirers who would like to come to his aid. You will find details at this web address. If you are able to pitch in, remember that generosity is the Hopi way.
Archives for June 2019
Greta Matassa In L.A.
Following the recent Rifftides review of Gretta Matassa’s new album, I came across a video that she made when she was in Los Angeles for an engagement. Her longtime bassist, the Seattle veteran Clipper Anderson, was on board. Her other sidemen for the occasion were pianist Mike Garson and drummer Bob Leatherbarrow, stalwarts of the Southern California jazz community. The Riffides staff thought that you would enjoy Ms. Matassa and friends in their medley of songs written by George and Ira Gershwin.
Weekend Extra: Something New From Greta Matassa
Greta Matassa, Portrait (Origin)
Greta Matassa has never stopped performing extensively or touring with her widely admired quintet, but it has been years since she has made a new recording. The singer’s first album since 2011 is a reminder of the rare depth of her musicianship and her ability to fnd the essence of a song. The longtime colleagues with her on Portrait are veterans of the vital Pacific Northwest jazz community. Matassa selects thirteen songs that are among the finest of the past century, going back as far as1939 and “Just For A Thrill.” Matassa plumbs the soulful depths of that Lil Armstrong-Don Raye classic at a tempo that is slower than slow, sustaining long tones and at the end interacting with Alexey Nikolaev’s tenor saxophone in one of several appearances by that Russian-born musician. Nikolaev has become a mainstay of jazz in Seattle. “Gone With The Wind” opens with Matassa and the powerful bassist Clipper Anderson as partners in rhythm for a chorus before drummer Mark Ivester and pianist Darin Clendenin join them. Ivester’s subtle way with wire brushes is key to his effectiveness, but he exhibits full-range drumming on the up-tempo “If You Never Fall In Love With Me,” which began life in 1960 when bassist Sam Jones wrote it as an instrumental called “Del Sasser.” The piece became a staple in the repertory of Cannonball Adderley’s quintet. Donald Wolf added the lyric, which Matassa sings with zest reminiscent of Adderley’s on alto saxophone.
Among the album’s ballads, Matassa invests Johnny Mandel’s and Peggy Lee’s “The Shining Sea” with sweetness matched by Nikolaev’s tenor when he winds around and under her voice as the track dissolves in a subtle key change. The two are entwined even more tightly in Bob Dylan’s “To Make You Feel My Love,” written by Dylan without the word “To” in the title and first recorded by Billy Joel in 1997 before Dylan’s own version appeared. Other highlights in Matassa’s unusual and welcome album: Ennio Morricone’s “That Day” from the film Cinema Paradiso, with a lyric by Stan Dunn; The Lalo Schifrin-Gale Garnett ballad “Down Here On The Ground; a spirited non-showbizzy “Baubles, Bangles And Beads with pianist Clendenin inspired and Matassa scatting with a musicianly understanding of what the tune is made of.
Finally, I must mention Matassa and company’s visits to the Ellington-Strayhorn song book, first in her reflective treatment of Duke Ellington’s “Prelude To A Kiss.” Ivester’s brush work and Clendenin’s piano solo are essential elements in her interpretation of that classic. The album closes with Billy Strayhorn’s “Lush Life.” All members of the quintet support Matassa and one another in what could become known as a definitive vocal version of that masterpiece. The album’s cover painting of Greta’s mother is a work by her late father, James Goehle, whom she credits with inspiring her career.
Have a good weekend
The Eka Trio: O
The young Scandinavians of the Eka Trio combine the relaxed sensuosity of trends in Nordic music with their underlying commitment to the adventurousness that goes to the heart of jazz. In the album that they call “O,” the trio and two guest artists craft a collection of fourteen pieces that thrive on certain major-minor key relationships often found in music of Sweden, Norway and Finland, as well as on interaction among guitarist Tomas Hornberg, bassist Anne Marte Eggen and drummer Pontus Haggblom. In addition, saxophonist Karolina Almgren and trombonist Goran Abelli provide lyrical moments and, in Abelli’s case, grit that intensifies the musical pallete. It is a delightful…and frequently surprising…album.
Weekend Extra: Desmond Alert
Thomas Cunniffe’s excellent weblog Jazz History Online has managed to find the performance by Paul Desmond and his Canadian quartet originally broadcast in 1975 by the Canadian Broadcasting Company. That is good news for listeners who continue to follow the alto saxophonist’s career after the dissolution of the Dave Brubeck Quartet, in which he starred with Brubeck for seventeen years. Cunniffe also presents the complete interview of Desmond by the CBC’s Mary Lou Finlay, with enthusiastic, nearly rhapsodic, commentary by her co-host Paul Soles. Previously, the interview has aired in the United States mostly in bits and pieces. To see all of the interview, the segment by Desmond’s Toronto-based quartet, and Tom Cunniffe’s extensive backgrounder, click here.
Thanks to Thomas Cunniffe, Mary Lou Finlay and the CBC for sharing an important moment in jazz history.
Have a good weekend.
Samantha Boshnack’s Seismic Belt
During her years in Seattle, trumpeter Samantha Boshnack developed impressively as a player eager to take musical chances. At the same time, she often hiked the Pacific Northwest’s mountains, many of them volcanoes with explosions in their pasts, in the case of Mount St. Helens, a spectacular eruption in 1980. That is recent, in geological terms. Boshnack became intrigued not only with volcanoes but with the overall seismic behavior that continues to be a major and often disruptive aspect of life on Earth. Seismic Belt combines her musical and scientific interests in a powerful work of chamber music played by a group that includes strings. Her composing and arranging for the album are at least as central to its success as her trumpet playing. “Tectonic Plates” inspired by volatile seismic acitivity, features the string section, Ryan Parish’s baritone saxophone and Boshnack’s trumpet.
Seismic Belt was recorded in concert in 2018 at Crossroads School for the Arts and Sciences in Santa Monica, California.
Bud Powell
Occasionally, Rifftides presents something from the blog’s archive. The staff got together to discuss Bud Powell and agreed that if there is even a slight chance that someone, somewhere, has yet to hear Powell, we have a responsibility to correct that. To begin, then, let’s go back nearly a decade to an archive post:
Compatible Quotes: On Bud Powell
First Posted on January 21, 2010
No one could play like Bud; too difficult, too quick, incredible! –Thelonious Monk
Bud is a genius. –Charlie Parker
Bud is a genuine genius. –Duke Ellington
He laid down the basis of modern jazz piano. –Dizzy Gillespie
Bud was the most brilliant that a spirit might be, a unique genius in our culture. –Max Roach
He was the foundation out of which stemmed the whole edifice of modern jazz piano; every jazz pianist since Bud either came through him or is deliberately attempting to get away from playing like him. –Herbie Hancock
If I had to choose a single musician according to his artistic merit and the originality of his creation, but also for the greatness of his work, it would be Bud Powell. Nobody could measure up to him. –Bill Evans
…and you just know she loves Bud Powell. –Alan Broadbent to Gene Lees, on seeing a beautiful girl pass by.
If I had to choose one recording by Powell to celebrate all that he bequeathed us, it might be “Un Poco Loco†from 1951, with Curley Russell on bass and Max Roach playing drums. This is from volume 1 of Blue Note’s The Amazing Bud Powell, an album title that does not have a trace of hype.
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Fats Waller, Just Because…
…just because it’s Saturday night. You want to feel good as you fall asleep and even better when you wake up on Sunday morning. Fats will help. He always does
The tap dancer was Mary Lee. Later, she made several films with Gene Autry. Gene Autry! The other dancers were a bunch of guys named Joe.
Hope you’re having a good weekend.
Review: Alan Broadbent’s New York Notes
Since he moved from California to New York several years ago, Alan Broadbent has expanded his multifaceted ways as pianist, composer and conductor-arranger for major singers including Diana Krall, Natalie Cole, Sheila Jordan and the British discovery Georgia Mancio. New York Notes finds Broadbent leading a trio. That is the setting that brought him to the attention of audiences and critics early in his career. His associations with Woody Herman, John Klemmer and Charlie Haden’s Quartet West were milestones in his progress. New York Notes is another.
This is Broadbent reaching into his early bebop inheritance and expanding on it. In the company of longtime collaborators bassist Harvie S and drummer Billy Mintz, he reflects influences including Clifford Brown, Gigi Gryce, Lennie Tristano, Frederic Chopin and Tadd Dameron. In addition, he unveils three of his new compositions. “Clifford Notes,” inspired by trumpeter Brown, suggests Brown’s lyricism and, according to Allen Morrison’s liner notes, led Harvie S. to predict that the piece could become a new jazz standard. “Waltz Prelude” originates in Chopin’s Opus 28 Prelude in F-sharp minor and is laced not only with reminders of Chopin but also of hints at Broadbent’s love of the blues. Benny Harris’s “Crazeology,” one of many bop pieces built on the structure of “I Got Rhythm,” elicits a spirited solo (to say the least) from Harvie S. Broadbent’s “Continuity” features opposing lines within the rhythm section and inspires riveting intervals in Harvie S’s bass solo. Broadbent rolls into the harmonies of “Fine And Dandy” with the kind of irresistible forward motion and continuity of line that Bud Powell was accustomed to giving the piece. Indeed, the album may be considered a part of the Powell legacy that challenges generations of pianists. Few contemporary players of the instrument have risen to the challenge as impressively as Broadbent. Here is his composition “Continuity.”
It’s June. Bust Out.
A jazz version of “June Is Busting Out All Over”? you might ask. Who would think of such a thing? Finding the right tempo might be possible, but how about those Richard Rodgers harmonies?  Well, Bill Holman-or maybe it was Stan Kenton-thought it would work. From the period, presumably in the mid-1950s, when Holman was doing a good deal of arranging for Kenton’s band, let’s listen to his arrangement of the tune that has been welcoming  this month since the song debuted in the Broadway musical Carousel in 1945. Youtube provides no information about when it was recorded or who plays the solos. Sam Noto may be the trumpeter. The alto saxophonist? Possiby Charlie Mariano. Despite the claim of the unoriginal album cover, we do not hear a solo from Bob Cooper or Frank Rosolino. We do hear some nice writing by Holman.  As the song’s lyric famously declares, it’s June, June, June.
Wishing you a perfect June.