Search Results for: Gerry Mulligan - Yardbird Suite

MULLIGAN AND “YARDBIRD SUITE”
Part 2
By Jeff Sultanof

When Jazz Lines began operation, Rob DuBoff had a meeting with Franca Mulligan and made an agreement. I contacted him about what Mulligan had said to me, and became his editor. Obviously the CJB library was a priority, but Jazz Lines also issued new editions I prepared of Mulligan’s contributions to the Miles Davis Nonet, which originally appeared in book form from Hal Leonard as scores only. (Photo by Hank O’Neal)

In 1995, Gerry told me he wanted to include “Rocker” (“Rock Salt”) in the play-along, and I asked him which version he wanted to use as a basis for the new lead sheet. He had a lead sheet already written, but made changes to it. He did not have the nonet version (Miles had that in storage, as I later found out), and he did not have his version for Charlie Parker with Strings (which was also in private hands and later donated to the Institute of Jazz Studies). Quite casually, I asked him about his arrangements for Parker and he said, “You know, I wrote something else for Bird, but didn’t finish it. I was going to California.”

When the Bird with Strings book of original scores and parts was acquired by IJS, it quickly became a collection examined by hundreds of scholars and fans. Rob published many titles recorded and unrecorded, which included a Mulligan composition named “Gold Rush” which was recorded privately. Of course I was thrilled to work on it, and figured that this was the mystery arrangement Mulligan had spoken about.

I was wrong!

Some months ago, Rob and I met with Franca to get more Mulligan music for eventual publication, including his Octet for Sea Cliff, and some CJB material. Rob was flipping through the master list of Mulligan’s collection and found the title “Yardbird Suite.” Surprised to see this listing, he located it in a folder with a photocopy of a sketch score inside. It was indeed “Yardbird Suite,” the arranger was listed as ‘Jeru’ (Mulligan’s nickname) and had the following note at the top right hand corner: “Bird, you’ll hafta (sic) do something with the last chorus – I couldn’t finish it.” Mystery solved!

Rob made a copy and sent it to me to evaluate. Could this be published? I figured that I would start working on it and see where the music took me.

Mulligan sketched this arrangement as two staves for two trumpets and a trombone, one stave for English Horn, two staves for five saxophones (including Parker), a stave with chord names, two staves for strings, and one for bass. He certainly would have written this out with each instrument on its own stave as a finished score that would be copied and played, but he had not gotten to that point and never would. He went to California during the Spring of 1952, so dating the music was not an issue.

Bird was touring with an ensemble of oboe/English Horn, strings and rhythm during this period, an instrumentation different in “Yardbird Suite.” Why the saxes and brass? I believe that this was written for a proposed recording date with a small ensemble and strings. The names Walter and Roy appear at one point on the score, indicating drummer Roy Haynes and pianist Walter Bishop, Jr., who were playing with Parker at the time. Solos in addition to Parker are for baritone sax (Mulligan) and trombone (at a guess, Kai Winding, but maybe J.J. Johnson or Bill Harris). Perhaps Bird wanted to make an album that was commercial (hence the strings) but would also be more jazz oriented; it is tempting to think of what such an album would have sounded like.

The second question: could this setting be finished? As it turned out, Mulligan sketched out only half of the last chorus. I examined every page of the sketch, and soon noticed that Gerry wrote two different versions of the last eight bars of the first chorus, and one of them could certainly be used to complete the arrangement. Except for filling in string harmonies in two spots (the chord changes were indicated, so this was simple based on how he wrote the rest of the arrangement), a final chord to end the piece, and a few other details, this is 97% Mulligan. It is now published and for sale.

“Gold Rush” showed how far Mulligan had come in writing string parts vs. his first experience with “Rocker.” “Yardbird Suite” takes this a bit further. Mulligan told me that by 1948 or so, he was thinking more horizontally than vertically when writing ensemble music, and he was no longer boxed in by standard chord structures, part of the legacy of his discussions with Gil Evans. There are subtle dissonances in “Yardbird” that fly by which lend a bit of spice to a beautiful swinging setting.

Mulligan had a real flair for string writing, and it is a pity he had few opportunities to feature strings in his music until much later, when he composed such symphonic orchestra pieces as “Entente for Baritone Saxophone and Symphony Orchestra” and “Momo’s Clock.” How wonderful it is to have a bit more of his writing for strings, just as it was incredible to discover that George Russell had written a Bird with Strings version of “Ezzthetic” that Bird didn’t play.

Obviously I consider this version of “Yardbird Suite” a very important find, and am very humbled by the opportunity to help bring it to light.

©2012, Jeff Sultanof

Rifftides is grateful to Mr. Sultanof for the opportunity to publish his story. We look forward to someone recording this Mulligan-Parker collaboration that never was. For more information about the score, and to hear a computerized indication of how it might sound by an orchestra, go here. If you’re a musician, you may be tempted to play along in the sections meant for Charlie Parker’s solos.

Please see the previous post for the first installment.

BENNY CARTER, PART 2
By Jeff Sultanof

In 1999, I went to Los Angeles to celebrate New Year’s Eve with Jerry Graff, my mentor and second father, as well as to visit with Gene Lees and Roger Kellaway. I got a call from Ed Berger to see Benny; he was sorting out his catalog and needed some guidance. I went to his beautiful home in Beverly Hills. Carter immediately took me aback when he said, “I understand you are a very fine arranger.” He introduced me to his wife Hilma and we sat down in his living room, surrounded by gorgeous African art.

Carter had an interesting problem. During the late 1950s through to 1960s, Benny was working at Revue Studios, which was the television arm of Universal Pictures. He wrote many hours of music for various television shows, most notably “M-Squad” (now available on DVD). His boss was a man named Stanley Wilson, who supervised the music for the company. Wilson gave many composers their starts in writing for film and television; Carter, Elmer Bernstein, Dave Grusin, Quincy Jones, Juan Garcia Esquivel, Oliver Nelson, Lalo Schifrin and John Williams (when he was still known as Johnny Williams). Wilson kept them very busy.

What was the problem Berger wanted me to help Benny with? Carter was putting together a master list of all of his compositions, and was trying to sort out his work for Revue. When a composer wrote a score for television, in some cases the cues (individual pieces of music written as underscoring) would go into a library to be re-used in other shows to save time and money. CBS did the same thing: there were compositions by Bernard Herrmann, Nathan Van Cleave, Fred Steiner and Jerry Goldsmith in their collection. This was perfectly legal, since the composers wrote this music as work-for-hire. As long as they were paid royalties, it was a true win-win situation because a TV show generated composer monies when it was seen anywhere in the world, and the music continued to be used in new TV series. I suggested to Benny that some of his cues may have been cut or altered and given new names, creating new compositions which were unknown to him since he didn’t own the music. “As long as they are paying me,” he said. Obviously, these old shows were still in reruns. He told me that his royalty checks were healthy. “They help me continue the lifestyle to which Hilma and I are accustomed,” he grinned. He never did finish the list, but the encounter was a great opportunity to sit and visit with him.

At lunch, I told him of my dream that his music be properly published and available. He was enthusiastic about the idea; he was pleased with the book Hal Leonard had already published and fully expected to continue his association with them. His pianist, Chris Neville, was assembling a book of his lead sheets, and Benny wanted me to work on it with him. Neither project happened. I offered to work on the lead sheet book gratis, but Benny found that unacceptable.

Earlier, I said that Benny has finally found an appreciative audience that loves his music and loves to play it. This phase of his career began when he started teaching at Princeton University in 1969. He revised his earlier scores and continued to write new music, initially for students and then later for concerts with all-star bands. I’ve spoken to one or two students who studied with him while he was at Princeton, and they described a warm, gracious, highly skilled musician who was open to any kind of music. It is clear that he changed their lives.

Sierra Music published his Kansas City Suite for Count Basie. Many middle and high schools in the U.S. now have at least one of the sections in their books. Here was true educational music: written for professionals, playable by amateurs and students. The writing is perfect for training an ensemble to become an even better one, and the chord structures are interesting but basic enough for young improvisers. Now, a lot of young players know who Benny is. Jazz Lines Publications now has an agreement with the Carter estate; 29 Carter compositions and arrangements have been released so far (many for big band, but some for saxophone ensemble), and they are among the company’s biggest sellers, to the surprise and delight of Ed Berger and Hilma Carter. There is more to come: more compositions (some quite modern) and even arrangements that he prepared for vocalists. Quite a few of the works are at Brigham Young University, repository of a collection of scores recorded for Capitol Records.

The beauty of great art is that it lives on to entertain, enlighten and inspire people many years after it was created. Benny Carter’s music has finally come into its own with those who will keep the tradition of big bands and combos alive for many years to come.

Jeff’s previous Rifftides piece concerned Gerry Mulligan’s unperformed arrangement of “Yardbird Suite” for Charlie Parker and strings. It came in two parts, here and here, and it contains a link to a synthesized performance of the arrangement.

Now and then, the Rifftides staff calls your attention to recordings selected from the stacks of more or less recent arrivals. Comments are brief, in an effort—no doubt doomed—to catch up with worthwhile releases.

Dutch Jazz Orchestra, Moon Dreams: Rediscovered Music of Gil Evans & Gerry Mulligan (Challenge)

Languishing in the stacks, this 2009 album called to me. I’m glad it did. It features arrangements that Gil Evans, in his mid-30s, and Gerry Mulligan, in his early 20s, wrote for the Claude Thornhill band in the late 1940s. Their work from that period anticipates what they, John Lewis and John Carisi created in 1949 and ‘50 for the nine-piece Miles Davis band later indelibly labeled Birth Of The Cool. Impeccably played by a fine Dutch repertory big band, the pieces include Evans’ chart on “Yardbird Suite” and his medley of “Easy Living,” a stunning “Moon Dreams” and “Everything Happens to Me.” There are buoyant Mulligan arrangements of “Rose of the Rio Grande,” “Joost at the Roost“and “Poor Little Rich Girl.” Sixty years later, all sound remarkably undated. In another 60, Evans’ treatment of “Lover Man” will still be fresh. If The Cool was born with the Davis band, it had a rich gestation period with Thornhill.

Wadada Leo Smith’s Mbira, Dark Lady Of The Sonnets (TUM)

Smith suggests imagery for each of the five pieces. If you are capable of envisioning 60,000 Zulus dancing on the surface of a lake in “Zulu Water Festival,” fine, but you need not hear this as program music. It may be best to let it wash over you and discover what your mind develops in response. Like all of Smith’s recent work, this transcends the category of free jazz with which the trumpeter and composer is usually identified. It is no surprise that the formidable percussionist Pheeroan akLaff, a longtime colleague, works hand-in-glove with Smith. Min Xiao-Fen, born in Nanjing, is a surprise. A collaborator with John Zorn, Jane Ira Bloom and Björk, she makes remarkable music with the pipa, an ancient Chinese stringed instrument, and with her voice. She and Smith occasionally play carefully crafted unison lines that have the precision of electricity. Her singing on the title track is haunting. The three players alternately blend with and highlight one another. Space is an essential element of their music. Smith calls the trio Mbira, the name of an African thumb piano, although there is no African thumb piano on the CD. Consider it part of the mystique of the music, which in his notes Smith says is in “a creative contextualization defined in the contemporary music language.” That language encompasses the blues. A pronounced blues sensibility washes through and beneath the surface of the playing, which manages to be at once contemplative and daring.

Phil Dwyer, Changing Seasons (Alma)

The composer and orchestrator Phil Dwyer allows Dwyer the tenor saxophone virtuoso a solo in the “Summer” section of this beautifully realized album. He gives fellow Canadian Ingrid Jensen a trumpet slot that is integral to the success of “Winter.” Most of the solos, however, are by Mark Fewer, a dazzling violinist who glides lyrically through Dwyer’s seasonal suite. The work may have been inspired at least in part, as any music with such a theme must be, by the example Vivaldi set 250 years ago. Clearly, though, Dwyer’s experience in modern jazz and classical music provides the basis for the pieces. He integrates a full string section and a big band in what amounts to a violin concerto blended into a concerto grosso. He and Fewer, who is not only the featured soloist but also conducts the strings, get what could have been an ungainly machine to swing mightily in the “Winter” section. In an unusual achievement for our length-obsessed CD era, the suite runs 35-and-a-half minutes, but it is so satisfying that it’s hard to imagine why it should be longer

Anthony Wilson, Seasons: Live At The Metropolitan Museum Of Art (Goat Hill DVD and CD)

Wilson’s album appeared at about the same time as Dwyer’s. Aside from subject matter and titles, they could hardly be more different. John Monteleone, an American guitar maker respected by his fellow craftsmen and revered by guitarists, created four magnificent archtop instruments named for the seasons, then commissioned Wilson to write a suite for them. Wilson engaged fellow guitarists Steve Cardenas, Chico Pinheiro and Julian Lage to perform the work with him in concert at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Fittingly, the Monteleone guitars—subtly tinted and illustrated by the luthier—will be on display at the museum through July 4th as works of art. Each of the guitarists is featured in a movement of the seasonal cycle, with the other three playing Wilson’s often-intricate ensemble accompaniments. Cardenas begins with the moody “Winter;” the young Brazilian Pinheiro dances through the samba “Spring;” Wilson celebrates “Summer” with an Ozarks twang; Lage has the central part in “Autumn’s” harmonic complexities, wrapping up the 32-minute suite. The DVD has the suite, masterfully photographed and directed at the concert, a documentary about Monteleone making the guitars and Wilson writing the music, and an extensive slide show. The CD has the suite, each of the guitarists in a solo feature, then all of them together in a ‘round robin on Joni Mitchell’s ”The Circle Game.” This is a remarkable guitar chamber music experience.

More reviews coming soon, listening and contemplation time permitting.

Mark Stryker, the jazz columnist of the Detroit Free Press, read the Clifford Brown posting and wrote:

Given Soupy’s Detroit connections, I once wrote a story about Soupy and the Clifford tape not long after it first surfaced in 1996. There’s no link but I’ve copied some details below, as well as some of Soupy’s other memories.

Comedian Soupy Sales, a television pioneer, began rooting around his Beverly Hills garage in 1994 at the request of a documentary producer at the A&E network. Eventually, he exhumed a film canister containing a handful of episodes of “Soupy’s On,” his five-day-a-week, late-night variety show, which aired live from 1953 through ’59 on WXYZ-TV (Channel 7) in Detroit.There, nestled among the pie-in-the-face comedian’s collection of goofy characters like Wyatt Burp and Ernest Hemingbone and Charles Vichysoisse, was five minutes of priceless jazz history — the only surviving film of Clifford Brown, one of the greatest trumpeters in jazz.

The film features Brown — or “Brownie” as he was known to friends and fans — roaring through the Eubie Blake ballad “Memories of You” and George Gershwin’s “Lady Be Good” in early 1956, just months before he was killed in an auto accident on the Pennsylvania Turnpike at the age of 25. Brown segues between the two tunes without a break, and the segment concludes with a brief interview with Sales. “When we’d come into Detroit, we’d play the Rouge Lounge at that time, but we’d always do maybe five minutes or so to promote the gig on Soupy’s show,” says drummer Max Roach, who, with Brown, led an influential quintet from 1954-56 and also played on Charlie Parker’s seminal bebop records in the ’40s.”In this particular instance, Clifford just ran down and did it with the rhythm section that was on Soupy’s show. But it’s an unusual tape in that all you see is Clifford from different angles. You can see the way Clifford’s chops and embouchure are and the way he used his right hand; it’s a fabulous study in the way Clifford dealt with the the trumpet. It’s just unbelievable.”

As word of Sales’ Indiana Jones-like discovery spreads through the jazz community — and videotape copies of the Brown film are traded like talismans — speculation has become rampant among musicians and fans: What other treasures lie buried in Soupy’s archives? The answer, tragically, is almost nothing, even though Soupy’s On featured the most remarkable collection of jazz talent in television before or since.A short list of the jazz giants who performed on the program includes: Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Billie Holiday, Lester Young, Chet Baker, Coleman Hawkins, Gerry Mulligan, Ella Fitzgerald, Stan Getz, Lee Konitz, Illinois Jacquet, Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Earl Hines and Thelonious Monk. Miles Davis, who lived in Detroit for five months in 1953-54, was a regular, as were Detroit-bred stars such as Pepper Adams, Tommy Flanagan and Yusef Lateef. But these were the days before videotape, and unless a program was shot on film or saved via a kinescope — a film of the TV screen — it simply vanished. That was the fate of “Soupy’s On,” except for a few episodes that Sales had a friend film in order to document his comedy characters. It’s serendipity that Brown happened to be on a program that survived. “Don’t forget, you’re talking about 1955, and nobody ever thought about taping stuff like that in those days,” says Sales, 70, speaking from a hotel in Huntington, W.Va., where he was performing.

Other than Brown, the only jazz musicians captured on Sales’ private films are pianists Eddie Heywood Jr. and Erroll Garner; Heywood is a minor figure, and film of Garner is plentiful. Even the shows near the end that were actually videotaped were all erased in the ’60s by the station in order to recycle tape.

Sales was the biggest TV star in Detroit in the ’50s, making a reported $100,000 a year by 1958. His noontime show for kids, “12 O’Clock Comics,” was so highly rated that he replaced “Kukla, Fran and Ollie” on the ABC network for eight weeks during the summer of 1955.”Soupy’s On” ran from 11 to 11:15 p.m. in the early days, growing eventually to a full 30 minutes. Each show featured sketch comedy, talk and a healthy dose of jazz. The show’s theme song was Charlie Parker’s bebop anthem “Yardbird Suite.”Detroit’s thriving club scene ensured a steady stream of top jazz performers, who Sales says were paid scale — $25 — to appear on the show. There was never any rehearsal. A soloist would choose a standard and a key that everyone was comfortable with and just play, says Jack Brokensha, who played drums and vibes with the Australian Jazz Quintet in the mid-‘ 50s and left the road to become a staff musician at WXYZ during the final year of “Soupy’s On.””It was live TV, and you only got two or three minutes per tune. And I remember one night Thelonious Monk played ‘Round Midnight’ and you couldn’t stop him, and we had to roll the credits over him,” says Brokensha of Bloomfield Hills.

Though not a musician, Sales was an aficionado who hung out in clubs and knew jazz like an insider. The show’s original producer and director, Peter Strand, remembers that Sales’ knowledge of the music led to the kind of incisive interviews you never see today.”It was not idle chat. Soupy knew why they wrote what they wrote, so they opened up and could be themselves,” says Strand, now of Glenview, Ill.Sales says he knew at the time that the nightly parade of jazz stars was special. “That always occurs to people who star in their own shows . . . and it’s only afterwards that everybody else says, ‘We should’ve saved that.’

Soupy Sales remembers a few of the jazz greats who appeared on “Soupy’s On.

“Ella Fitzgerald, vocalist: “Ella was wonderful. She was just the sweetest lady who ever lived. She was like sugarcoated; you just wanted to hug and kiss her. Anything you wanted she did.
“Duke Ellington, bandleader: “With Duke, you were in the presence of greatness, you know. He sat down and played “Satin Doll” and “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore.”

Chet Baker, trumpet: “There you’re looking at a potential big movie star. He was like another James Dean had he kept himself straight. He had such a beautiful face, and he was really a nice guy, a great personality, and he could sing. It was a shame to watch a man destroy himself in front of your very eyes.”

Billie Holiday, vocalist: “Some people had a concern when we had her on. They said, ‘You gonna let that junkie on?’ And I said: ‘Listen, I have her on ’cause she’s a great singer. I don’t care what she does in her private life.’ She came on and sung her ass off. . . . She sang ‘Fine and Mellow’ and ‘Lover Man.’ I’ll never forget that.”

Stan Getz, tenor sax: “He was so whacked out. He said, ‘Just let me know when you want me to go up there.’ And he’d play, and we could not get his attention ’cause he played with his eyes closed. He got through and said, ‘How was it?’ And I said, ‘We went off the air five minutes ago.’ “

Milt Jackson, vibes: “He once was doing the show, and he pulled out a glasses case, and a joint fell on the floor, and I stepped on it. Afterwards, I said, ‘You look underneath my shoe, you’ll see something you dropped.’ He said, ‘Oh, thank you so very much.’

Thanks for keeping the blog — it’s become part of my everyday routine.

Mark Stryker