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I was unable to attend Sunday night’s benefit concert for Dick Sudhalter because St. Peter’s Lutheran Church in New York is 3000 miles from Rifftides world headquarters. Friends who went, some of whom performed, sent reports. By their accounts, the event was a success on all fronts.

Richard M. Sudhalter, as many of you know, is an invaluable jazz historian and a respected cornetist and trumpeter. His biography of Bix Beiderbecke is the benchmark work about that genius of early jazz. His biography of Hoagy Carmichael is a modern classic. Sudhalter’s monumental book Lost Chords: White Musicians and Their Contributions to Jazz 1915-1945 is balanced, objective, and brilliant. Many of its detractors, once they saw its subtitle, read no further or read through lenses of bias and launched vicious attacks accusing Sudhalter of racism. To anyone who knows him, that would be laughable if it wasn’t so untrue and unfair.
For a couple of years, Dick has been in the long aftermath of a major stroke. He is also battling the effects of a rare condition called multiple system atrophy (MSA). His current debts and prospective medical costs are huge. Allthough his speech and movement are limited, his brilliant mind and ability to write are not. The trumpeter Randy Sandke and the clarinetist Dan Levinson organized the concert to help with expenses. Dick’s companion Dorothy Kellog executed the planning. Judy Kahn, Bill Kirchner’s wife, was the stage manager. The Jazz Ministry of St. Peter’s cooperated in the presentation. The friends honoring and supporting Dick played to a full house. The review that follows is an amalgam of reports from Jill McManus, Dan Morgenstern, Daryl Sherman, Randy Sandke and Bill Kirchner.
This is not a short posting. I hope that it gives you a sense of the evening.
Sandke sets the scene and provides the lineup:

I thought it was a warm and very touching tribute. More than 70 musicians offered to participate. Because of some airline snafus, a few couldn’t get in on time, but below is a list of the musicians and groups who did in fact play at St. Peters last night:
OPENING REMARKS BY DAN MORGENSTERN – Director of the Institute of Jazz Studies
ED POLCER’S GANG FROM 54th STREET Ed Polcer – cornet, Tom Artin – trombone, Joe Muranyi – clarinet, Harry Allen – tenor sax, Dave Frishberg – piano, Bucky Pizzarelli – guitar, Frank Tate – bass, Jackie Williams – drums
DAVE FRISHBERG (piano solo: “Dear Bix”)
DAN LEVINSON’S LOST CHORD SEEKERS Jon-Erik Kellso – trumpet, Orange Kellin – clarinet, Dan Levinson – C-melody sax , Brad Kay – piano, Jeff Healy – guitar/vocal, Brian Nalepka – bass, Kevin Dorn – drums, Molly Ryan – vocal
DARYL SHERMAN (piano solo/vocal); one tune with Joe Wilder, trumpet
CAROL SUDHALTER BAND Carol Sudhalter – sax, Dick Katz – piano, Jim Ferguson – bass, Jackie Williams – drums, Keisha St. Joan, vocal
STEVE KUHN – piano
DAVID OSTWALD’S GULLY LOW JAZZ BAND Jon-Erik Kellso – trumpet, Tom Artin – trombone, Joe Muranyi – clarinet , James Chirillo – banjo, David Ostwald – tuba, Kevin Dorn – drums
JACKIE CAIN with Steve Kuhn – piano
HEALY’S HAPPY HARMONISTS Brad Kay – cornet/piano, Dan Levinson – clarinet, Jeff Healy – guitar/trumpet/vocal Scott Robinson – bass sax, Kevin Dorn – drums
MARIAN McPARTLAND with Frank Tate – bass
THE BIAGI BAND Jordan Sandke – trumpet, Carol Sudhalter – sax, Sam Parkins – clarinet, Andy Stein – violin , Chuck Folds – piano, Bill Crow – bass, Giampaolo Biagi – drums, Francesca Biagi – vocal
SY JOHNSON vocall and piano
BILL KIRCHNER TRIO Bill Kirchner – soprano sax, Armen Donelian – piano, Jim Ferguson – bass/vocal
RANDY SANDKE’S BIXOPHILES Randy Sandke – trumpet, Dan Levinson – clarinet, Scott Robinson – C-melody and bass sax, Mark Shane – piano, Marty Grosz – guitar, Nicki Parrott – bass, Rob Garcia – drums
LOREN SCHOENBERG BIG BAND

Daryl Sherman:

Dr. Bob Litwak (a semi-pro drummer greatly supportive of the jazz community), chief of thoracic medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital for many years, got up and spoke about Dick’s condition. There were some handouts along with the printed programs that also explained a bit about MSA. Most touching, though, were Litwak’s words of encouragment to Dick…for instance that despite being sidelined on the horn, he’s vital still with his writing ability. He mentioned Dick’s working on the Red Nichols reissue package for Mosaic–that he’s available for more writing gigs but should still keep his lip ready. And most moving, at least for me, was Litwak’s eloquent way of lauding Sudhalter as one of the great thinkers.

Jill McManus, the pianist and composer, was in the audience:

The concert was wonderful – such an affection for Dick from the 350 or so people there, educators, musicians, friends, most of them there until the end. Dick in a wheelchair, beautifully dressed, listening intently to all the various bands, from old style to swing, nodding. He got up front to say his own brief “thank you,” then called on his friend Terry Teachout to read something Dick had written, very touching, literate as ever. Dan, of course, set the warm tone of the evening with his opening comments.

Dan Morgenstern:

Great and unsusal chance to hear Frishberg on piano in the kickoff group, Ed Polcer’s Gang from 54th Street, doing “Sometimes I’m Happy.”

Jill McManus:

Then Dave did his wryly moving solo thing on “Dear Bix.”

Daryl Sherman:

My favorite group name, Lost Chord Seekers with Jeff Healey on guitar (he also had his own set and made a huge hit) and Brad Kay on piano, featured Molly Ryan singing “I Never Knew” (which included a lovely verse I never knew).

Dan Morgenstern:

Healy is a triple threat on guitar, trumpet and vocal. He’s blind. Came by
himself from Toronto, Canada.

Daryl Sherman:

It was perfect that I should follow that group since I am one of the original lost chord seekers. With a nod to Sudhalter’s little known or heralded vocalizings, I did one of his staples (stolen from Bing Crosby), Hoagy Carmichael’s “Moonburn.” (Hoagy Jr was in the audience!) I also got a chance to play for Joe Wilder on “When I Fall In Love”.

Jill McManus

Daryl and Joe played gorgeously together. Daryl reminisced briefly before her set – told a story of the night Dick’s horn was stolen from him.

Bill Kirchner relays the story:

About twenty years ago, Dick was playing a gig at the Red Blazer Too on Third Avenue and 89th. There was a front/side room where musicians would keep their horn cases, and he foolishly left his cornet in the case in that room. After the gig, he went out there to get it. It was gone. As you can imagine, he was crestfallen. The next day, he had to go out of town on a tour. So, he got in a cab and went over to the office he used to have in midtown. He had a spare horn there and wanted to try it, see if it was playable and take it on the tour.
He does that, leaves his office, goes down and hails a cab. About five cabs pass by, but he finally gets one. He gets in the cab, looks over on the back seat. There is his horn, sitting there in the case. He says to the cabbie, “This is my horn.” The cabbie immediately gets defensive: “No, no, no….” So, finally, Dick says, “Look, if I can describe the contents of this case, you can tell this is my horn.” He did, and the guy ‘fessed up that a couple of guys had hailed his cab up in the eighties and had this horn and sold it to him for fifty bucks. So, Dick says, “Okay, I’ll give you fifty bucks. I want my horn back.” Dick later went to somebody who was familiar with the art of odds-making. He determined that the odds of this happening were several trillion to one.

Jill McManus:

Dick Katz played intelligently and poignantly both in Carol Sudhalter’s band (Carol took a masterly laid-back solo, and Keisha St. Joan sang well, “Come Rain or Come Shine”) and with Loren Schoenberg’s smoothly melodic band at the end.

Dan Morgenstern:

Steve Kuhn, Dick’s oldest friend at the concert, played a ballad. They were high school classmates in Newton, Mass. (another was Roger Kellaway, who wasn’t there).

Daryl Sherman:

Steve played “Old Folks,” (which I’d never heard him do before.) Masterful and ruminative. It was clearly a nod to Dick, with his penchant for Willard Robison–and particularly that song. There’s a collector’s item photo Dick has of one of the many Newton jam sessions in his basement. Kuhn with brushcut sitting just as erect as he does now at the piano, Kellaway at the bass (also brushcut) and Sudhalter with those nerdy black glasses.

Jill McManus:

David Ostwald’s Gully Low Jazz Band had a delicately swampy New Orleans-ish feel, with James Chirillo on banjo, and Joe Muranyi’s haunting clarinet. Tom Artin subbed for Wycliffe Gordon on trombone.

Dan Morgenstern:

Chrillo was great on banjo with Ostwald. It’s nice to hear modern changes on that instrument.

Daryl Sherman:

Kuhn played for Jackie Cain. One of the vivid memories of the Hoagy Carmichael concert Dick produced for JVC around 1979 or ’80 was Jackie’s opening the evening. She came out alone and sang the verse to “Stardust” acapella. Sunday, she referred to that night, telling the audience how nervous she’d been. She chose not to do “Stardust” here and instead beautifully sang a touching song, “Music Reached Places,” by Fran Landesman and Simon Wallace (Fran’s recent collaborator.)

Dan Morgenstern:

Steve comped beautifully for Jackie C. and played a lovely solo.

Daryl Sherman

Marian McPartland has been in Dick’s corner for many years and she really came through for him last night. She’s been in constant pain with arthritis and knee problems and it was a huge schlep for her to make this–but there she was looking and sounding splendid with Frank Tate on bass. Of course, she played Carmichael: “Heart And Soul” and “New Orleans,” weaving her spell and beautiful colors as only she can do. It was a special moment for me to dig all the piano players standing around in the back reverentially digging her.

Dan Morgenstern:

The Biagi Band, led by drummer Giampolo Biagi and vocal by Francesca Biagi (no relation), had Andy Stein on fiddle; Sam Parkins, clarinet; Chuck Folds, piano; Bill Crow, bass, who brought his wife and was the most consistent listener of all the musicians present. You know how it is with hanging out backstage.

Jill McManus:

Sy Johnson played a blues tune I never got the name of and also sang “Skylark.” His piano playing and harmonization on that one were particularly lovely.

The Bill Kirchner Trio with Armen Donelian on piano and Jim Ferguson singing and on bass gave a moment of such grace that the whole place fell silent and the musicians were at rapt attention.

Daryl Sherman:

Jim Ferguson played and sang Willard Robison’s “Deep Summer Music” accompanied so sensitively by Armen Donelian and with an especially evocative soprano solo from Bill Kirchner. Sudhalter taught it to me years ago, and beneath the elegiac simplicity is a tricky melody and harmony that makes you walk on eggshells when you play and, particulalry, try to sing it. The song could not have been better served than with Jim’s treatment – a real highlight for me. In fact of all the lovely vocals last night his was my favorite -although bassist Nicki Parrott did a great job singing as well as playing “You’d Be So Nice To Come Home To” with Randy Sanke’s band. Gotta hand it to these bass players particularly since Jay Leonhart’s song laments that it’s impossible to sing while playing the bass.
Loren’s band was so terrific. Wish they had a steady spot somewhere. Barbara Lea sang the title song from her new CD (wonderfully recorded with the band and Loren also on piano), Ellington’s “Black Butterfly.” Loren had the advantage of being able to use many of the ‘veterans’ like Randy Sandke, Scott Robinson, Dick Katz, Eddie Bert, but he’s really done so well finding new younger musicians who really seem to take an interest in this music.

Bill Kirchner:

They did Mark Lopeman’s lovely chart on Dick’s tune “A Dream Deferred.” It was written especially for this occasion.

Dan Morgenstern:

Scott Robinson was heard on bass sax with Jeff Healy’s Happy Harmonists, on C melody sax with Randy Sandke’s Bixophiles, on tenor and clarinet with the Loren Schoenberg Big Band–great as usual on all his horns, but what a job to carry all that stuff! The big band, celebrating their new CD, also did “When Lights Are Low” (featuring Jon Gordon’s alto), Gerry Mulligan’s fine early Krupa chart on “If You Were the only Girl (announced as ‘Goy’) in the World”, with a splendid trumpet solo by the underrated John Eckert. Also heard from was amazing trombonist Eddie Bert, looking great now that he’s let his hair be its natural white. The band finished the night with a rousing “South Rampart Street Parade” (Scott R. on clarinet). Kevin Dorn did a nice job on drums–one of the youngest musicians on hand.

Jill McManus:

Afterwards, in the “parlor,” I was talking with Dick, he being quiet but gracious, and I mentioned that I was getting tired standing, yet I hurt from sitting through this magnificent concert. He got up out of the wheelchair and offered me his seat! Never missed a beat! I loved that. (I’m not ready for a wheelchair myself just yet!!) He said that he never felt that people had admired him, that he had a very small audience. Perhaps, I said, but what an audience of jazz history-knowers! In his writing, how arduously careful he had to be with the facts, and he was the most meticulous of almost anyone.

Daryl Sherman:

I was surprised to witness the huge turnout from both musicians and civilians. There was an outpouring of respect and admiration for Dick. After hearing from him for so long that he feels invisible and doesn’t even know himself anymore, believe me, this was the best medicine.He’s really overwhelmed by all this now and I sure hope it helps him to fight harder, cause he’s gonna need it.
Furthermore, it is a wonderful testament to the devotion to this music. Through acknowledging Sudhalter’s contribution as fervent champion in print as well as on horn, it unifies the collectors, musicians, writers, fans and believers all over the world who have dedicated their lives to this aesthetic. And interestingly enough, they all seem to know each other, if not personally, then by reputation. From Dave Frishberg to guitatist/collector Jeff Healey in Toronto to Enrico Borsetti, an ardent fan from Italy who helped initiate this benefit for Dick, it really seems like a special brotherhood (with a few sisters,too.) It may be a pinhead of the population at large, but the passion never dies.

Dan Morgenstern:

What made it special, I think, is that everybody who was there wanted to be there for Dick, not just to hear some music.

The concert is over, but Dick’s need is not. Contributions to the Sudhalter medical fund are being accepted at
Richard M. Sudhalter
Post Office Box 757
Southold, NY 11971

I had lost track of the trumpeter Tim Hagans, whose searching, edgy, extraharmonic improvisational style I admire. I did an internet search and ended up on his modishly designed and constructed website, whose style reflects his adventuresome, but centered, music. Roaming through the site, I found surprises equivalent to those a listener encounters in Hagans’ playing. Click on “Bio” and up comes a menu under the heading “Hagans Portrait.” Click on Chapter 7 and you will find a declaration of independence entitlted, “The Artist’s Role in Society.” Here is a section.

Artists are scary. They celebrate individualism. They portray the nuances and emotions of life in abstract terms. Music is the most abstract art form and improvised music creates the intangible in the moment. An artist’s mission is not to entertain although entertainment can be a desired by-product. Their mission is to give the receiver of the artistic statement emotions and impressions to reflect upon. Whether the receiver likes or dislikes the statement is secondary.

Visitors to the Hagans site get biographical, discographical and events information, cleverly produced, plus a generous audio helping of complete performances. They also get a six-part movie called Boogaloo Road. It contains many of those surprises I mentioned, not the least of which is footage of the trumpeter practicing while driving. To find the film, move your cursor down the audio player at the bottom right of the screen. The Tim Hagans website is here.

Thanks to Terry Teachout for alerting me to the existence on YouTube of video performances by the great early 1960s Sonny Rollins Quartet with Jim Hall. As I lamented in the previous exhibit, that band is absent from Rollins’s own web site. The clips are from Ralph Gleason’s Jazz Casual series on Public Broadcasting. You will see four of them, totalling more than twenty minutes of the group playing “God Bless The Child,” “The Bridge,” and “If Ever I Should Leave You,” the latter in two installments.
In his artsjournal.com About Last Nigtht blog, Terry has built a list of links to videos of music in a variety of genres, a fine public service. Scroll down his right-hand column until you come to the Videos heading. Bravo, TT.

Yesterday was Sonny Rollins’s 76th birthday. He celebrated it, in part, by installing on his website nine video clips of performances over forty-nine years, beginning in 1957. They comprise a fascinating tour of his career. They will be accessible for six more days. Among the sidemen are Henry Grimes, Joe Harris, Don Cherry, Billy Higgins, Niels Henning Orsted-Pedersen, Al Foster, Kenny Drew, George Duke, Stanley Clarke and Jack DeJohnette. Unfortunately, there is nothing of his early 1960s quartet with Jim Hall, but it would be churlish to complain in the face of such riches. You will see and hear a “Moritat” (aka “Mack The Knife”) from Tokyo in 1981 that swings about as hard as anything can swing. To witness the performances, go to the Sonny Rollins website.

Let’s wrap up the survey of a few of the recent CDs from High Note.
Billy Hart, Quartet (High Note). Hart is a 65-year-old drummer prized by Stan Getz, Wes Montgomery, Herbie Hancock, McCoy Tyner, Dena DeRose, Pharaoh Sanders, Frank Morgan and virtually anyone else who has ever played with or heard him. Here, he leads an eclectic group with pianist Ethan Iverson of The Bad Plus; the quiet, strong, tenor saxophonist Mark Turner; and Ben Street, a bassist who operates in the present with the past and the future in mind. Hart’s compositions are as hip as his playing. I see no reason why his ballads “Charvez” (with allusions to Rachmaninoff) and “Lullaby For Imke” should not become jazz standards. Taken together, his four tunes, those by Iverson, Turner, John Coltrane and Charlie Parker, and resourceful playing by all hands, add up to one of the freshest albums I’ve heard this year. How does a band play the melody of “Confirmation” four times in a row at the beginning of the piece without seeming repetitious? It has to do with the drumming. They compensate by not playing the melody at all at the end. Clever.
Cedar Walton, One Flight Down (High Note). Walton, among the finest jazz pianists for more than forty years, grows at once more expressive and more economical. Not that he has lost power or facility. Rather, he is increasingly judicious in his choices and placements of notes. Space is often an important ingredient in his solos, but he still marshals all ten fingers to build harmonic sequences of majestic density. Walton connects “Lush Life,” “Daydream” and “Raincheck” in a medley of Billy Strayhorn compositions, keeping the tempo bright even on “Lush Life,” so often played at the pace of a slow crawl. He does the same for another ballad, “Time After Time,” infecting it with a cordial, loping quality and a Red Garland tag ending. Walton’s longtime bassist David Williams, solid as ever, has an engagingly witty solo on Sam Jones’s “Seven Minds. Twice in “Raincheck,” drummer Joe Farnsworth plays two chorus-long solos using brushes. In both, he demonstrates that “melodic drum solo” is not an oxymoron. High Note’s ubiquitous Vincent Herring plays tenor saxophone rather than his customary alto on two Walton pieces, “One Flight Down” and “The Rubber Man.” If Cannonball Adderley is his model on alto, Herring’s primary inspiration on tenor seems to be middle-period John Coltrane, with a substantial Hank Mobley component. Of Walton’s scores of albums, this seems to me one of his best.
Briefly noted:
Ernie Andrews, How About Me (High Note). At seventy-nine, Andrews rolls on, as moving when he sings the blues as he is with superior standards. In addition to well-known popular songs (“The More I See You,” “This is Always”) and plenty of blues-inflected material, he includes rarities: Berlin’s “How About Me,” Ellington’s “It Shouldn’t Happen to a Dream” and Sammy Fain’s “The Wildest Gal in Town.” Tenor saxophonist Houston Person and a good rhythm section assist.
Frank Morgan, Reflections (High Note). The story of Morgan’s kicking his bad habit and rehabilitating his career is two decades old. The important news is that, approaching his mid-seventies, he is playing the alto saxophone with great beauty. Morgan’s work here is centered in calmness and consideration that justify the album title. Alec Wilder frequently railed against musicians who failed to observe his melodies at least on the first chorus. He would love Morgan’s first chorus on “I’ll Be Around.” I have a feeling that Wilder would like the improvisation, too. Thelonious Monk might even smile a little at what Morgan and pianist Ronnie Mathews do with “Monk’s Mood.” Full disclosure: I wrote the liner notes, during the course of which I listened to the album repeatedly and became captivated by it.
Coming soon: reviews of CDs from a variety of labels, including the intriguing and intriguingly-named Cryptogramophone.

If you are in the New York City area or can get to it by Sunday evening, please consider attending the concert to benefit Richard Sudhalter. If you don’t know about Dick’s medical predicament and the staggering bills he faces, you will find details here. As I wrote a couple of weeks ago, the quality and range of musicians who have volunteered to play for Sudhalter constitute a testimonial to the respect and affection he has earned.
Tickets are $40.00. Contributions above that amount are needed and encouraged.
RICHARD SUDHALTER BENEFIT CONCERT
St. Peter’s Lutheran Church
Lexington Avenue & 54th Street
New York, New York
Sunday, September 10, 2006
Some of the performers:
Harry Allen, Dan Barrett, Eddie Bert, Bill Crow, Jim Ferguson, Dave Frishberg, Wycliffe Gordon, Marty Grosz, Becky Kilgore, Bill Kirchner, Steve Kuhn, Dan Levinson, Marian McPartland, Joe Muranyi, David Ostwald, Nicki Parrott, Bucky Pizzarelli, Scott Robinson, Randy Sandke, Daryl Sherman, and the Loren Schoenberg Big Band.

Coincidental with the Rifftides review of a new Louis Hayes CD, Mark Stryker of The Detroit Free Press devoted his column to a festival that featured Hayes and others who began their careers in the Motor City.

A remarkable chunk of Detroit-bred jazz history reunited on Monday evening at the Detroit International Jazz Festival, and it was hard to listen to the Detroit Jazz All Stars – pianist Barry Harris, trombonist Curtis Fuller, alto saxophonist Charles McPherson, drummer Louis Hayes, trumpeter Marcus Belgrave and bassist Rodney Whitaker – without shaking your head once again at this city’s historic role as an incubator of jazz talent.

To read the whole thing, go here.

It was my intention to write mini-reviews of several more High Note CDs for this posting, but other matters intervened (see the previous item). One will have to suffice.
Vincent Herring, Ends And Means (High Note). We last encountered Herring ghosting Cannonball Adderley on a new Louis Hayes album. When he emerged in the 1980s, the young alto player was one of the few on his instrument to demonstrate a primary Adderley influence. That aspect of his playing has never diminished, but he has broadened his concept. I hadn’t heard him in a few years when this and the Hayes album arrived and was taken with the freshness of Herring’s playing within the Cannonball matrix. Trumpeter Jeremy Pelt, Herring’s front-line partner in the Hayes group, is with him on four of the tracks, including “The Song Is Ended” decked out with altered harmonies in the bridge and a suspended ending that converts the standard song into a semi-modal piece.
“Ends and Means,” by the Slovenian pianist Renato Chicco, opens the album with an air of mystery resolving into thoughtful lyricism. On it, Herring roughens his tone, as Adderley often did, adding an edge to some of his more heartfelt passages. Benny Golson’s “Stablemates” is an established modern classic (note to the producer; the title is one word, not “Stable Mates”). Mulgrew Miller’s “Wingspan,” evoking Charlie Parker, is fast becoming another jazz standard. Both are ideal vehicles for Herring. On “Wingspan,” Pelt matches Herring’s bebop intensity, as does Danny Grissett, a pianist in his mid-twenties new to the New York jazz milieu but already established enough to be joining trumpeter Tom Harrell on tour in Europe this month. That honor and his recording with Herring would seem to announce that Grissett has arrived. The veteran bassist Essiet Essiet and the Swiss drummer Joris Dudli round out the rhythm section.
All hands execute an exercise in elation on Juan Tizol’s “Caravan.” The arrangement is built around a bass line in what a musicologist might identify as crippled cadence that works its way into exhilirating straight time. This album by a solid and satisfying alto man has a nice mix of familiar and new material.

The other day, Ashley Foot, the ebullient young host of the internet’s Radio Allegro, invited me to be on his program. In the recorded interview, I told him, “There’s an incredible outpouring of jazz CDs these days. You’d never know jazz was dying.”
“It’s dying!” he said in alarm, “What are you talking about?”
Having failed to transmit irony, I explained that someone or other is always saying that jazz is dead or dying or not very well, but that the stream of albums seems to be swelling, not shrinking. Now that any musician who can scrape up $1500 or so can be a recording artist, can even be his own record company, it’s a question whether many of those CDs will ever be more than digital calling cards. Still, success stories like Maria Schneider’s declaration of business independence with her artistShare venture prove that it is possible for musicians to control their own destinies if they have bases upon which to build.
Hundreds if not thousands of jazz CDs appear each year from individuals with vanity labels, from startup independents, from established companies. Facing this flood, all that a reviewer can do is be selective. Over the next few postings, I’ll give you brief accounts of a few of the CDs that lately have caught my attention.
It could be nearly a full-time job just keeping up with the output of The Jazz Depot, the umbrella company that produces the High Note, Savant and Fedora labels. I have chosen a few recent CDs from this prolific outfit.
Houston Person with Bill Charlap: You Taught My Heart to Sing (High Note). As leader of his respected trio, Charlap is a Blue Note artist, but materializes as a sideman on other labels. That is good news for listeners, who get to hear the pianist in fresh contexts, and it is good news for Person. The veteran tenor saxophonist’s duets with Charlap are triumphs of quiet authority and lyricism. Most of the pieces are slow ballads, but even when the tempo is that of a brisk walk, as in “S’Wonderful,” the two are relaxed and assured in their swing. This is a pair of tonemeisters. Person’s sound has both softness and strength. Charlap’s touch–the pianist’s equivalent of tone–allows him a combination of delicacy and firmness in a league with Hank Jones, Jimmy Rowles and Tommy Flanagan. It is a joy when he combines it with his exqusite harmonic sensibility in the accompaniment to Person’s speech-inflected solo in “Don’t Forget The Blues.” Their “Sweet Lorraine” is a modern classic version of that infectious song.
Louis Hayes and the Cannonball Legacy Band: Maxiumum Firepower (Savant). Hayes was the drummer in one of Cannonball Adderley’s most potent quintets with his cornetist brother Nat. Here, he recruits five of the brightest younger players to summon up the irrepressible spirit of that band. Vincent Herring, long established as the keenest inheritor of Adderley’s style, is on alto sax. Jeremy Pelt is the trumpeter. Richie Goods is the bassist. Rick Germanson and Anthony Wonsey split piano duties. All of the pieces but Pelt’s tribute “The Two of Them” are from Addlerley’s repertoire, the hits (“This Here,” “Sack O’ Woe”) and the favorites of musicians (“Unit 7,” “Sweet Georgia Bright”). If the playing doesn’t quite attain the volubility and fire of the Adderleys, it is nonetheless excellent and comes as close as any living musicians are likely to achieve.
Larry Willis: The Big Push (High Note). Willis is a far less well known pianist than his talent warrants. Jackie McLean, Stan Getz, Kai Winding, Cannonball Adderley, Branford Marsalis and Roy Hargrove are among the leaders who knew his value. This CD with bassist Buster Williams and drummer Al Foster has the potential to be the big push he needs to gain a wider audience. Willis is modeish in Wayne Shorter’s title tune. He devises bracing chords for “Surrey With the Fringe on Top.” In “Poppa Nat, ” he finds new things to do with “I Got Rhythm” changes, and invests “Everything I Have is Yours” with rare poignancy, from its rarely heard verse to a filagreed ending shared with Foster’s cymbals.
Reviews of more CDs in the next Rifftides posting.

Gillespiana In The Berkshires

On vacation this week, in Connecticut to visit friends. Looking for musical diversion, I stumbled across the Tanglewood Jazz Festival at the summer home of the Boston Symphony in Lenox, MA.
Due to time constraints, I was able to attend only one concert – so I chose the Dizzy Gillespie All Star big band. For me, a great choice. Led by veteran trombonist Slide Hampton, the band was legitimately “all star”… a killer trumpet section: Roy Hargrove, Claudio Roditi, Lou Hunt (phenomenal chops, stratospheric high notes) and Frank Greene (ditto). Trombones: Steve Davis (several good solos), Jason Jackson, Jonathan Boltzock, Douglas Purviance (bass trb). Saxes: Gary Smulyan, Andres Boiarsky (new to me and very good), Mark Gross and Antonio Hart (altos) and Jimmy Heath (looking old and somewhat frail but playing well). Rhythm section: Cyrus Chestnut, piano; John Lee, bass; Dennis Mackrel, drums; and Duke Lee on congas.
Hargrove was heavily featured and worth it. He shone especially on Benny Golson’s “I Remember Clifford” on fluegelhorn and on several other tunes. Roditi was lyrical and thoughtful, playing his rotary-valve horn.
Cyrus Chestnut was showcased on the Dennis Mackrel arrangement of Monk’s “I Mean You” and was alternately Monkish and funkish to the delight of the sold-out audience of 1200 in Meiji Ozawa Hall. Other highlights: Jimmy Heath’s tribute to Dizzy, “Without You, No Me”… “Con Alma”… “Manteca”… Quincy Jones’ “Jessica’s Day”.
Roberta Gambarini came on for a couple of tunes in each half of the concert. She’s good, especially effective in a dramatic reading of “Stardust”. Her singing of “Samba de Orfeu”, arranged by Slide Hampton, was an adventure in Portuguese and English, with changes in tempo and excellent vocal work. She scatted to advantage on “Blue-n-Boogie” which also included some Roy Hargrove scatting. He continues in the trumpeter/scat vocalist tradition of Louis Armstrong and Clark Terry. Electric bassist John Lee pleased the crowd with his work on “One Bass Hit”. Mackrel is a fine big band drummer and his arrangements are fresh and interesting.
Hampton is a congenial leader, mixing humor, enthusiasm and information to engage the audience. The obvious pleasure the band got from the music and their colleagues’ solos was infectious, further bringing the audience into the moment.
So – if you get a chance to hear/see the DG All Stars in your town, by all means do it. They’re still carrying the big band bebop banner. Long may it wave.
Your traveling Washington correspondent,
John Birchard

We continue to get comments on the news that pianist Steve Kuhn will record for Blue Note. This one is from drummer Steve Grover in Farmingdale, Maine.

I enjoy Rifftides and I was pleased to see that some attention is being directed toward Steve Kuhn. I think he is one of the most intelligent jazz pianists of our time (or any time). Steve occasionally comes through New England, and I caught him a couple of times. One trio performance with George Mraz and Al Foster stands out. The club was about half full, but the subtle, witty and quote-laden interplay between the three musicians was sublime. I hesitate to bring up the quoting, which is a gratuitous practice in most hands, but Steve unfolds his improvisations with such wit, melody and musicality that quotes are a seemless part of the web. His time is impeccable and he is always engaged with the tendencies of his musicians. The term ‘musical conversation’ is a common phrase, but rarely have I heard such probing music that clearly defined that expression.
Yet I heard him with Kenny Washington a few years later at The Knickerbocker one night and he was playing deep in the pocket, swinging hard. This kind of sympatico is natural to Mr. Kuhn, and it is never obvious, yet apparent. I love his deep-in-the-keys sound; it is a beautiful, singing sound, and it permeates everything he plays.
Steve Kuhn is a major figure and I hope he gets more than a one-off with Blue Note, but I’ll take that happily when it comes out.

With video clips proliferating on the internet, you never know what you’ll run across. Roaming around YouTube, I happened on one called Trumpet Summit ’04. The lead-in box showed a still frame of Jon Faddis. Something clicked. When I punched up the clip, sure enough, it was part of the Vienne, France, twentieth anniversary festival that I covered, not in 2004, but in 2000. YouTube’s accuracy of information is at the mercy of its contributors. The piece is “Honeysuckle Rose.” To hear and see it, click here. Below is my account of the entire concert, as it ran in a long report in the February, 2001, issue of Gene Lees JazzLetter.

The night’s theme was Louis Armstrong. The Trumpet Summit Band had the formidable rhythm section of Cedar Walton on piano, Doug Weiss on bass and Idris Muhammad on drums supporting trumpeters Terell Stafford, Randy Brecker, Lou Soloff, Roy Hargrove, Terence Blanchard and Jon Faddis. Backstage, as they milled around getting ready to go on, Brecker told me, “We don’t know what the hell we’re doing.” They figured it out on the first number, “Indiana”. The solos were brief, at the most a couple of choruses apiece, encouraging self-editing. Stafford began with a straightforward bebop solo. Brecker dug into the chords. Hargrove did a nice adaptation of Dizzy Gillespie and observed Clifford Brown’s rule of contrasting phrases. Soloff quoted Armstrong’s “West End Blues” introduction. Faddis and Stafford sidled up close on opposite sides and stared at him. Soloff ignored them. Blanchard played cleanly, high, and without the slurs and half-valve notes that so often dominate his improvising. Muted, Faddis combined traces of Gillespie and Sweets Edison and reduced the others to head shaking and laughter with his impossibly high and humorous playing. Walton played the first of his eight perfect solos in the set. Everyone avoided the temptation to quote “Donna Lee.”

Faddis and Stafford shared “Blueberry Hill”, Faddis muted and growling, Stafford using a plunger and making rich harmonic choices. On “Sunny Side of the Street,” Soloff showed the mature wisdom of using pauses as notes. Brecker went deep inside the changes and found material to make a beautiful new melody.

Hargrove’s tone, phrasing, sense of harmonic changes and control of time on “Sleepy Time Down South” combined in a solo that brought sustained applause from the audience and his colleagues. Later, he told me, “Man, that’s a hell of a way to learn a tune.” He said he had never before played it. Blanchard used his slurs and half-valve effects in Sleepy Time and worked them into a climax worthy of Roy Eldridge. Everyone played on Honeysuckle Rose. The big surprise was Stafford, with his aggressive and imaginative use of swing and bop elements. He has recorded with Tim Warfield, Stephen Scott, Bobby Watson, the Clayton Brothers, and others, but he was new to most of this audience and they let him know that they were impressed.

Soloff and Faddis played the “West End Blues” intro in unison, leading into a long, slow blues. Iraklì de Davrichewy materialized onstage for the first solo, unintimidated by this high powered company, and did well. So did they all, but Brecker is one of the few trumpeters alive who seems to have truly heard what Fats Navarro discovered about changes. His solo proved it. Faddis roamed around in the altissimosphere, then dropped down into the range of mere high Cs for some pure Louis. Walton incorporated “After Hours” without making it a corny trick.

The encore was “Get Happy,” played fast. Not until near its end, in a series of four-bar, two-bar and one-bar exchanges did the ad hoc gathering deteriorate into the messy jam session it might have been in lesser hands.

I hope that more videos from the 2000 Vienne festival turn up. It was a remarkable festival.

Last night I dropped into The Seasons to catch the last half of a concert by the Finisterra Trio, the hall’s artists in residence. They are violinist Kwan Bin Park, cellist Keven Krentz and pianist Tanya Stambuck. In previous posts, I have mentioned this Seattle piano trio’s finesse and enthusiasm. One of their other strong points is an eagerness to range through music in search of pieces outside of the usual repertoire. They played Edouard Lalo’s trio in a-minor. In his role as introducer and staff musicologist, Krentz described Lalo as a “B composer,” but in this piece–new to me and most of the audience–Lalo produced “A” material.
As Krentz explained, Lalo, a Frenchman of Spanish extraction, was a sort of precursor to the French impressionists, but he is often described as having the stolid characteristics of his late nineteenth century German contemporaries. Not in the a-minor trio. It has the passion of Lalo’s Iberian forebears, highlighted by a highly charged second movement laced with fun, a slow third movement to make your heart ache and a finale to make it race. Park, Krentz and Stambuck poured energy and ardor into the piece. In return, they got applause after each movement, and a standing ovation at the end. They deserved warm appreciation, but the obligatory Standing O is becoming as common among classical audiences as is automatic applause for jazz solos, no matter how dumb or boring. If you’d like to review the Rifftides applause discussion of a few months ago, you can go here and trace it back through the links.
On their website, Finesterra has MP3 samples of the Lalo a-minor. Unfortunately, they have yet to record the entire work. Until they do, there are choices. Still high on the aftereffects of the Finesterra performance, this morning I sampled other options. I found the Gryphon Trio‘s approach a bit soggy. The Parnassus Trio edged out the Salomon for second place to what I heard last night. They both have fine versions, but they don’t achieve quite the vigor of the Finisterrans. It’s good to see chamber music alive and well in the hands, minds and hearts of a hip young group like the Finisterra Trio.

George Ziskind writes from New York:

Good to have Kuhn in the air of late. And it reminds me of this:
Steve has always been an adventurous player. Yet nothing I had previously heard him do prepared me for the time, around seven or eight years ago, when I was listening to his Dedication CD (Reservoir). I was in the first chorus of Like Someone in Love, specifically at bar 7, and no matter how many times I replayed that bar I got the same result: damn if the tempo wasn’t slowing down there, almost imperceptibly yet definitely noticeably! I chalked it up to being some kind of other-worldly recording anomaly.
A few weeks thereafter I went to catch a set by Steve at the Knickerbocker – a terribly noisy club that uses good piano players. And by gosh, what did he play? “Like Someone In Love,” of course. And what happened at bar 7? The tempo slowed down again, a tiny smidge, just as on the CD.
After the set I buttonholed him, asking if there was some mystical meaning to this, or perhaps at least a personal explanation? Why did he slow down the tempo there?
He replied, “Why not?”

Many Rifftides readers are themselves bloggers. Richard Carlson, the proprietor of JazzoLOG, called my attention to a fine piece about his memories of Maynard Ferguson. Here’s a taste of it.

Maynard stood out in front of that band like a cheerleader/drill sergeant somehow combined. He was constantly on the move to the rhythm. He must have been in a marching band around his home of Montreal when he was a kid, because he liked to tuck his horn under his arm and just march up there while the ensemble played away. A huge smile on his face and eyes closed, marching, marching, a bit hunched over…until time for that closing climax, when he’d face us and let loose with such a screaming, molten sound, our jaws would drop and stay that way. He loved to talk to us during breaks and gave us all the time we wanted.

One night, the young Carlson and his friends asked Ferguson how he reached so high on the trumpet. To read the answer and the rest of a lovely memoir, go here.

Regarding the Steve Kuhn CD that will be issued next year on the Blue Note label, the Rifftides reader who calls himself drjazzphd writes:

This is only supposed to be a one-off deal for the live date but I’m very pleased to see Blue Note taking an interest in such a fine pianist, who has lurked in the shadows for many years now. Also Blue Note will be releasing an album recorded two weeks ago at Iridium of the Charles Tolliver Big Band on the heels of the article in DownBeat a couple months back. This is also positive because it shows that this major label is putting its money where its mouth is to support great art. Just wish they did it more often. Also on the horizon for 2007 along with the Kuhn and the Tolliver, there will be a new record by Jackie Terrason, which I believe will be a solo record.

Not that I would ever doubt a man with a Ph.D., but I checked his information (those old reporter genes keep kicking in) with Cem Kurosman at Blue Note, who replied:

All true. And you can also tell your “source” that we will be recording a supergroup under the leadership of Kenny Werner next week (Werner, Dave Douglas, Chris Potter, Scott Colley, Brian Blade), another release that will come out in the Winter/Spring 2007!

The exclamation point is Kurosman’s.
That’s that. This blog will not become a middleman for record company previews, but it is good to see solid, uncompromising musicians getting a break.

It was my intention to spend most of yesterday auditioning a few of the CDs that lately have been pouring in here like Lake Pontchartrain emptying into New Orleans. But first, I thought, how about a nice morning mountain bike ride in Cowiche Canyon.
At the bottom of that canyon northwest of Yakima is a three-mile trail on the bed of a railroad that was abandoned in 1984. It’s a great place to see wildflowers and an assortment of birds and small animals, mostly cottontails and an occasional reptile. For demented mountain bikers, the attraction is less the gravelly path along Cowiche Creek than the narrow dirt trail that snakes along the south canyon wall. From the rim of the high desert uplands to the canyon floor, the elevation drop (term used advisedly) is 450 feet. The trail is narrow, uneven, studded with large rocks and full of hairpin switchbacks, many of which edge out into space. If you are going to test your balance, strength and reflexes by riding this rollercoaster, it is a splendid idea to be sure that your machine’s brakes are functioning properly.
Somewhere in the dim (term used advisedly) recesses of my mind, I knew that the front brake on the bicycle I acquired for next to nothing at a yard sale was a bit weak. The fact came back to me powerfully as I began making my way down the first segment of the descent. In this photograph, the trail on the canyon floor is that thin ribbon way down there.
In the lower left, you see a portion of the trail I was on. The picture does not do justice to its pitch. Suddenly, gravity was moving me along much faster than one would think warranted by the negligible combined weight of me and the cycle. I jammed the front brake lever nearly into the handlebar, but it barely slowed me. The slightest pressure on the rear brake lever locked the rear tire into a skid that threatened to fishtail the bike and its occupant over the edge and dash us down among the sagebursh and fragments of basalt on the steep slope.
Experimenting gingerly with various combinations of pressures on the rear brake and what was left of the front, I was able to keep my speed down enough not to zoom off the lip of a 180-degree switchback. Somehow, I managed to stop the cycle and walk around the turnback, then remount and inch along to the next hazard. In that way, slowly, turn after turn, I made it to the bottom. When I got on level ground, I found myself looking around to see whether anyone had been watching. Absurdly, I was proud to have survived my stupidity and hoping for witnesses, but I was the canyon’s sole occupant. My only injury was a deer-fly bite.
Emerging from the bottom of the canyon onto a paved road and back into civilization, I rode immediately a mile or so to Revolution Cycles, where the always agreeable Mike readjusted the front brake. He asked if I’d had a good ride and where I had gone. Yes, I said, a good ride. Cowiche Canyon.
“We’re lucky to have that, aren’t we?” he said.
“Well,” I told him, “I feel lucky.”
Maybe I’ll get to those recordings today.
(Photo, Eric Noel, B.L.M.)

I just discovered by way of Nick Catalano that Steve Kuhn has signed a contract with Blue Note Records, putting him once again with a major jazz label, where he has always belonged. Among important pianists, Kuhn has received nowhere near the share of recognition he has earned. Catalano writes.

To celebrate the event Kuhn was reunited with bandmates Ron Carter and Al Foster at Birdland earlier this month. The Steve Kuhn trio carved out an important slice of immortality when it was first formed 20 years ago. If the group’s efforts at Birdland are any indication, it is shortly about to add to its legend .

To read Nick’s account of Kuhn’s Birdland engagement, go here. I’ll have more about Kuhn anon. In the meantime, see if you can find a copy of this album, one of his career triumphs.

Thanks for your wonderful appreciation of Maynard Ferguson. In many ways, Ferguson transcended jazz and big bands. His high-octane enthusiasm and optimism captured the spirit of an entire generation of post-war Americans who believed anything and everything was possible and that the only way to go was flat out. Despite Maynard’s massive musical ego, he never made anyone feel badly and encouraged everyone he encountered to be better–as a person and as a musician.
One of my favorite Maynard appearances wasn’t an appearance at all. That’s Ferguson (and Sal Salvador) playing on Kenton’s “Invention for Guitar and Trumpet” in the film Blackboard Jungle (1955), which is heard just before the high school thugs smash their teacher’s prized jazz platters. The clash between the generations in this camp film was somewhat prescient given that the rock culture ultimately would wind up “smashing” the entire jazz scene some 10 years later. What’s especially fascinating is that Maynard’s energy level and prowess in “Invention” and Bill Haley’s intensity in “Rock Around the Clock” (the film’s opening theme) aren’t that different. Both are generational clarion calls. Here, in this film, you can actually hear the continental divide where jazz and rock/r&b met, and Maynard was there. There, before your eyes, the adult appreciation of virtuosity gives way to the teenage demand for a big beat. I often wondered what Maynard thought of Blackboard Jungle.
Regarding the “hen’s teeth” Maynard Ferguson Mosaic box and the entire Roulette catalogue, it almost seems as if some entity is sitting on the re-release of the catalogue to keep eBay auction prices high. Perhaps Michael Cuscuna at Mosaic can shed light on why Maynard’s Roulette catalogue is not in print and when that might be changed. Those babies could use a CD remastering.
Marc Myers