Sorry to hear of Eddie Bert’s passing last week. He was a trombonist who loved to play so much that if there were no paying gigs, he would find a band to sit in with. Bert was 90 years old and worked until shortly before he died. He was an asset in combos as well as big bands. His resume included work with Stan Kenton, Woody Herman, Charles Mingus, The Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Jazz Orchestra and several repertory bands, including the American Jazz Orchestra.

In New York, I frequently encountered Eddie in clubs, after concerts, on the street, commuting on the train to or from Grand Central. He was always well dressed, interesting to chat with, looked at least twenty years younger than his age, and was unfailingly cheerful, as he is in this recording with a dream rhythm section of Duke Jordan, Ray Drummond and Mel Lewis. It’s from his album The Human Factor.

For more about Eddie Bert, see this piece from the Stamford Advocate near the town where he lived in Connecticut and this 2004 essay on Bill Crow’s web site.

No one promised me a rose garden, but that’s what I got, and a resident rose expert who manages to keep it glorious well into autumn.

I’m a lucky guy.

Happy October.

If you’re keeping up with the adventures of the Brubeck Brothers Quartet in Russia, read Chris Brubeck’s latest blog post, an account of the BBQ’s good will mission to a country town. The band held a concert for the citizenry and, in return, heard some of the locals, including “extremely sturdy Russian women playing the melody of “In The Mood” with their balalaikas.”

You’ll find Rifftides posts about the Moscow leg of the BBQ tour here and here.

Everything else in life has not quite come to a standstill while I race the deadline for the Dizzy Gillespie project mentioned in the “Sweet Lorraine” post of September 20. It only seems that way.

Researching Gillespie’s “Brother K,” his tribute to Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy, I encountered a 1985 video known to few, if the low number of YouTube hits is reliable evidence. Robert Farnon conducts Dizzy and The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra not in one of Farnon’s own celebrated arrangements, but in a setting for the piece by the under-recognized Mike Crotty. The volume could be higher; you may want to crank up your speakers.

More to come.

Responding to the Brubeck-Desmond item in the previous exhibit, David Evans writes:

Thanks for sharing that! Desmond always kills me.

It takes tremendous strength and control to play with such a beautiful sound and such balanced phrasing. It sounds easy, but believe me, it’s not. Classical dancers make it look easy, too, like they are effortlessly floating around, but it takes great strength and toughness to create that illusion.

And Desmond’s solo construction is always so compelling. The development of a motive engages the listener–we recognize a phrase as it emerges again in a new tonality farther down the line–it brings us along, in a friendly way, through the song form. There’s the creation of an expectation, the asking of a question, then there’s the satisfaction of an answer…or a little twist, and it’s satisfaction with a surprise…
Most of all, I love it when he addresses two or more contours simultaneously–a melodic line and its counterpoint–it takes some sleight of hand on a monophonic instrument, but there it is. There’s a lovely melodic utterance–it lingers shining in the air while he resolves some inner voices for a moment–then he’s back to the melodic voice and it feels like he never left it. I would love to hear Desmond playing unaccompanied, that compositional skill on clear display as he spins an entire orchestration singlehandedly.

To me, Jim Hall is the other towering, beautiful contrapuntalist–certainly that’s why I love the Desmond/Hall RCA box set so much.

Thanks for this post!

Mr. Evans teaches tenor saxophone at Lewis And Clark College in Portland, Oregon, and plays it with Dave Frishberg, Chuck Israels, Retta Christie and Phil Baker, among others. Here he is a couple of years ago with Mr. Baker in a guest shot on Lynn Darroch’s program Bright Moments on KMHD-FM.

The following item ran on Rifftides more than five years ago, with a link to video that later disappeared from the web. The clip has been restored. In light of recent discussions about the blues theme that frequently appeared when the two men played together, even after the Brubeck Quartet dissolved in 1967, the item is worth presenting again. This time, the video is on your screen. The picture quality is bad. The quality of the sound and the music is good.

June 29, 2007 By Doug Ramsey

Dave Brubeck and Paul Desmond in duo were one of the great treats of the seventies even as Desmond contended with the lung cancer that was soon to end his life. Someone caught one of their reunions on tape–a short blues performance culminating in the “Audrey” or “Balcony Rock” melody that they favored for more than a quarter of a century.

Happy Sunday.

Rifftides reader Svetlana Ilicheva (pictured) responded from Moscow to yesterday’s post with an account of a later Brubeck Brothers Quartet concert during the band’s visit to Russia.

In addition to what Chris Brubeck wrote about his first concert at the Igor Butman club in Moscow and his panegyric to the US ambassador in Russia, I would like to add a few words about their concert in the Tchaikovsky Concert Hall on September 17.

I was invited to this concert at the last moment so was a little late and didn’t hear what the lady from the US Embassy said but was in time for the BBQ first number together with one of our best symphony orchestras, Russian National Orchestra (The chief conductor is one of our best musicians, Mikhail Pletnyev), conducted this time by Joel Revzen (US). It was “Blue Rondo a la Turk,” arranged by Darius Brubeck. The cheerful piece got the public worked up and was met by hearty clapping. The orchestra left the stage and the BBQ, joined by RNO member Maxim Roubtsov (flute), with a lot of pep played a piece by their pianist Chuck Lamb. Then the RNO brass quintet appeared on the stage and together they played “Dunes at Dawn” by Chris Brubeck. The combination was highly successful and Chris’s bass sounded quite interesting against the background of very good performance by the quintet (flute, oboe, clarinet, basoon and French horn). It was so thrilling to watch how the classical musicians were playing the field playing jazz (Excuse my playing on the words. I am afraid it is just the lack of vocabulary). It looked as if they all were really having a good time. Chris called them “crazy” musicians. By the way, he began almost all the numbers with a few words, sometimes joking, fluently translated by a young girl interpreter.

The first part of the concert ended with Chris’s Concerto for trumpet, trombone and orchestra, “The Blues and Beyond” (Russian premiere), with quite an impressive solo by trombone (Chris Brubeck) and trumpet (Vladislav Lavrik, RNO). The orchestra was superb, as usual.

The second part was dedicated to Dave Brubeck, selected compositions arranged for the orchestra, jazz quartet and soloists, with Igor Butman as a special guest, and ended with famous “Take Five” with an extremely long solo by Dan Brubeck. It seems everybody here knows “Take Five”. It was met with loud clapping and whistles! I wish Paul Desmond had heard it.

I like Mike DeMicco (guitar) very much and the pianist, Chuck Lamb, was also quite good. The concert created a very positive and cheerful mood.

The only question left is why the BBQ planned to give a concert at the old Russian town of Efremov (aka Yefremov). Why exactly this town, I wonder.

After she submitted her report, Ms. Ilicheva sent a message asking, “Are you quite sure my account is worth posting now? It may not coincide with Mr. Brubeck’s impressions…”

Yes, I’m sure. For his insider’s perspective, see Chris’s latest blog entry.

Chris Brubeck reports from Moscow about the Brubeck Brothers Quartet’s Russian tour. He last played there a quarter of a century ago as a member of his father Dave’s quartet, when the country was the Soviet Union. Chris writes on his blog that at the BBQ’s first concert of the current trip, the US Ambassador to Russia, Michael McFaul, introduced the band…

…in fluent Russian, right before our 2nd set. What he said in essence was that although he was the official Ambassador from the United States, hearing excellent jazz music with a very international audience was the best way to share our American culture and build bridges between countries. He said that we were the real Ambassadors. He probably had no idea, but this is the name of the recording and musical my parents wrote with Louis Armstrong as the star….The Real Ambassadors. I felt like some kind of giant clock had come full cycle as Michael McFaul (pictured on the right with Chris) arrived at the same conclusion as my parent’s musical, which was famously performed only once at The Monterey Jazz Festival back in the early 60’s. Back then it was considered controversial ….. but not today.

Chris, his drummer brother Danny, guitarist Mike DeMicco and pianist Chuck Lamb have four more days of concerts in Moscow, Samara, Efremov and St. Petersburg. To read about their adventures in Russia and their impressions of the country and people, follow Chris’s blog.

Here are the title song and two others from Dave and Iola Brubeck’s The Real Ambassadors, featuring Louis Armstrong, Carmen McRae and Lambert, Hendricks and Ross.

Here’s another shot from the visit to smoky central Washington State, where the wildfires are intensifying today. Now, firefighters are coming down from Canada to help in the battle to contain the blazes. The landmark in the hazy distance is Saddle Rock. You may recognize it as the skyline feature on the cover of Poodie James.

For a thorough roundup of Washington fire stories and pictures, go here. For a good song with “smoke” in the title, listen to Django.

Django Reinhardt (guitar) and Stéphane Grappelli (violin), with the Quintet of the Hot Club of France, 1935