{"id":7457,"date":"2016-04-08T22:29:31","date_gmt":"2016-04-09T05:29:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/?p=7457"},"modified":"2016-04-08T22:29:31","modified_gmt":"2016-04-09T05:29:31","slug":"weekend-extra-borrowed-from-bill-crow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/2016\/04\/weekend-extra-borrowed-from-bill-crow\/","title":{"rendered":"Weekend Extra: Borrowed From Bill Crow"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-7458\" src=\"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/Bill-Crow-bass-blue-shirt.jpg\" alt=\"Bill Crow, bass, blue shirt\" width=\"207\" height=\"194\" \/>Bill Crow has played bass with several of of the world&#8217;s leading jazz artists, Stan Getz, Art Farmer, Marian McPartland and Gerry Mulligan among them. A terrific writer, he has developed a sidebar career as a story teller. His <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/s\/?_encoding=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;field-keywords=Bill%20Crow%20Jazz%20Anecdotes%20Birdland%20to%20Broadway&amp;linkCode=ur2&amp;tag=rifftidougram-20\" target=\"_blank\">books of anecdotes<\/a>, great fun to read, are standard reference works, but Bill doesn&#8217;t rest on his laurels. His flow of anecdotes continues in The Band Room, his column in <em>Allegro, <\/em>the monthly publication of New York local 802 of the American Federation of Musicians. With Bill&#8217;s and Allegro&#8217;s permission, <em>Rifftides<\/em> now and then hijacks stories from The Band Room and brings them to you. Here are two from last year. The <em>Rifftides<\/em> staff has incorporated musical supplements.<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\">\n<p><strong>December 2015<\/strong><\/p>\n<div>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">When Gerry Mulligan formed a quartet in Los Angeles and hired Chet Baker on trumpet,<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-7459\" src=\"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/Mulligan-Baker.jpg\" alt=\"Mulligan &amp; Baker\" width=\"220\" height=\"159\" \/> the musical chemistry between them produced some wonderful results. One night Dick Bock visited the Haig, the club where they were playing, and asked Gerry if he could sell him a record. Gerry told Bock that the group hadn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t recorded yet, and Bock said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Well, how much does it cost to make a record?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d When he found out that it could be done for just a few hundred dollars, he got the quartet into a recording studio, and the Pacific Jazz label was born. It went on to successfully record many West Coast jazz groups.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">The Mulligan Quartet records were an immediate hit. Everyone was amazed at the interplay between the two horns, and the inventiveness of their soloing. Someone remarked to Gerry, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I understand that Chet doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know anything about harmony.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Gerry replied, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153He knows everything about harmony! He just doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know the names of the chords.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div align=\"center\">\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/9aTsO5IpMUg\" width=\"420\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<div>\n<div align=\"center\"><\/div>\n<div align=\"center\">\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>September 2015<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">After reading my note about the Nut Club in a recent Band Room column, Phil Woods sent me this note:<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-7460\" src=\"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/Young-Phil-Woods.jpg\" alt=\"Young Phil Woods\" width=\"184\" height=\"239\" \/>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I worked the Nut Club after Juilliard in the early 50\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s, with Nick Stabulas (leader), George Syran (piano) and Jon Eardley (trumpet). We mostly played bebop, even for some of the strippers, but \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcHarlem Nocturne\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 and \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcNight Train\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 were frequent for the three shows a night. (I did not see a woman from the front for three years.)<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">\u00e2\u20ac\u0153One night someone told me Bird was across the street jamming in Arthur\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Tavern (which is still there!). Bird was playing Larry Rivers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s baritone and was scuffling with the beat-up horn. I was on a break and asked the maestro if he would like to use my horn. At the time I thought the horn was not happening. Didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t like the horn, the mouthpiece or even the strap. The piano was only about three octaves and the cat playing it had to be 95 \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and his father was on drums that consisted of pie plates and a skinless tom-tom! \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Bird played \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcLong Ago and Far Away,\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 and my horn sounded just fine. Even the strap sounded great. Then Mr. Parker handed me my horn and said, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcNow, you play.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 I knew the tune. I knew all the tunes. I was a living <em>Real Book<\/em>. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Bird leaned over and whispered in my ear: \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcSounds real good, son!\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Be still my heart! I levitated back to work and played the bejesus out of \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcNight Train,\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 stopped complaining about the horn and started practicing 26 hours a day. Best lesson I ever had!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div align=\"center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/VtuyATXu1bU\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<div align=\"center\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: left;\" align=\"center\">\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>After dealing with emphysema for years and never allowing it to stop him from playing and leading his quintet, Phil ordered his doctors to stop treatment for the disease. He died on September 29 last year. He was 83.<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>To see Bill&#8217;s anecdotes in the current edition of The Band Room, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.local802afm.org\/news-allegro\/bill-crows-band-room\/\" target=\"_blank\">go here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Have a good weekend.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Bill Crow has played bass with several of of the world&#8217;s leading jazz artists, Stan Getz, Art Farmer, Marian McPartland and Gerry Mulligan among them. A terrific writer, he has developed a sidebar career as a story teller. His books of anecdotes, great fun to read, are standard reference works, but Bill doesn&#8217;t rest on [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-7457","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-main","7":"entry","8":"has-post-thumbnail"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7457"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7457\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}