JazzWax

Clarence Johnson: Low Down Papa

Before radio, before the phonograph and before the jukebox, there was the piano roll. An ingenious invention dating back to the 1890s, the piano roll was the first way in which the public could hear recorded music. Many of the major piano roll companies were in Chicago, and by the early 1920s, some of these companies were recording black musicians who had relocated to the city from the South to play in speakeasies. One of these musicians was Clarence "Jelly" Johnson, whose piano rolls from the mid-to-late 1920s appear on a new release from Delmark Records.

First, a word about the piano roll. A piano roll was and is a roll of paper with holes punched in it for use on a player piano. To create a roll, a pianist sits at a specially outfitted piano that operates like a musical typewriter. As the musician plays, a mechanism turns the roll while another punches tiny holes in the  paper. Later, when the roll is loaded into a special player piano, the roll turns, and when little holes on the roll pass over a special track bar, corresponding keys of the piano are depressed, as though the original musician were sitting there playing them.

Piano rolls were manufactured for home use and for use in restaurants, road houses, bars and other public places. In commercial establishments, player pianos were coin-operated, and those who recorded the rolls had to play clearly and distinctly so the reproduction would be equally pristine.

Of course, when radio came along in the 1920s, with the phonograph and record discs, these formats became much more widely distributed and popular. Radio was a single purchase that allowed for all the free music you could hear. The same was true for records, which were much more durable than piano rolls and easier to change. Besides, records didn't require a tricked-out hulking piano sitting in the living room.

One of the most prolific piano-roll recording artists was Jimmie Blythe. The Capitol Roll Company released about 200 of his piano roll recordings on its various subsidiary labels. Lesser known was Clarence Johnson. Born in Kentucky, he migrated to Chicago just before World War I.

During the war Johnson served in the Army and was wounded in Europe. Back in Chicago, he composed songs and recorded piano rolls starting in 1919. Unlike Blythe [pictured], who did not like to travel, Johnson went to New York in 1923 and recorded 78-rpms. Though his 78-rpm records are few, his piano-roll output rivaled Blythe's. Many were fox trots and waltzes, but he also was captured on rolls playing blues and stomps for Capitol's nickelodeon rolls, which were similar to piano rolls except they held multiple songs for play in public places.

At the end of the 1920s, Johnson moved to Detroit, where he died in 1933.

Clarence "Jelly" Johnson: Low Down Papa (Delmark) provides you with an inexpensive time machine. First, the 14 tracks on this album are as clear as a bell. Unlike scratchy, hissy records from the period, these rolls by Johnson merely needed to be placed on a player piano and recorded. So they sound as though Johnson and the piano are in your room. The sound really is remarkable. [Pictured: Chicago in the 1920s]

What you hear is another age, a haunting recording in its clarity. Before disco, rock, soul, r&b, hardbop, cool, bebop and swing, there are these recordings. The result is syncopated Chicago of the early 1920s.

On this album are Johnson playing gems such as the floral It's All Over Now, the foot-tapping Dyin' with the Blues and sparkly I'm Going Away to Wear You Off My Mind.

Johnson's style was precise and robust, and these recordings transport you to a place of rolling kegs, snorting horses, rubber car horns and women laughing. A remarkable recording by any measure.

JazzWax tracks: You'll find Clarence "Jelly" Johnson: Low Down Papa here.

JazzWax tracks: Here's a piano roll of Clarence Johnson playing Low Down Papa, released in October 1923...

Curious about the piano roll? Here's all you need to know...

Sunday Wax Bits

NEA Jazz Masters (1982-2011). I wasn't quite sure what to make of the news last week that President Obama's 2012 budget proposal pitched the elimination of the National Endowment for the Arts' Jazz Masters award. Sadly, the NEA is being downsized, and similar opera and folk awards programs are joining jazz in the budget-cutting Dumpster. 

My first reaction was a shrug. Since 1982, 119 jazz artists and groups have been hailed as a jazz master, including an entire family last year. Seems that everyone who is or was someone in jazz has been recognized by the NEA. If the pace continued, the regal roster would soon include great jazz listeners. [Pictured: NEA Chairman Rocco Landesman]

Then I realized how much I will miss the annual NEA gathering at New York's Jazz at Lincoln Center. There are no real gala affairs for jazz, where all of the living legends come together in one place for a night dressed in tuxedos and wearing broad smiles. For a jazz fan, this is a red carpet affair, akin to the Oscars. [Pictured: Jazz Master Gerald Wilson]

Then I realized that President Obama isn't to blame. The real question is why such a prestigious event is on the federal endowment dole in the first place. At the heart of the problem is the jazz community's complete inability to work the system effectively.

What do I mean? Let's do some math: The prize handed out to each NEA Jazz Master last year was $25,000. Since there were five winners, the total was $125,000. I have no idea what it costs to rent out Jazz at Lincoln Center, hire bartenders and a band. But let's say the whole event plus labor clocks in at $300,000.

Now let me show you a couple of things. In this age of draconian belt-tightening, New York State's members of Congress this year have requested nearly $7 billion in earmarks. Earmarks are requests for dollars for constituents' programs that Congressmen add to unrelated bills. They're financial stowaways. But to be fair, I fully understand that's how our system works and how the world turns.

So I decided to take a look online to see who is requesting and receiving $300,000 in earmarks this year. According to Taxpayers Against Earmarks, Rep. Charles Rangel [pictured] has requested $300,000 for a green roof construction for the 116th Street Block Association. Here's the entry for the request:

"The funds will be used for complete construction of a green roof that will contribute to the better quality in the community, including the completion of a recreation area and garden for the residents of Colon Plaza Apartment."

Now I have nothing against green roofs, 116th Street, Rep. Rangel or the Colon Plaza Apartment [pictured]. My only point is if Rep. Rangel is willing to submit an earmark for a block association, perhaps someone with some pull and savvy can ask him to request the same amount for a Jazz Hall of Fame in New York.

But wait. Since a Jazz Hall of Fame will need to be up and running for 10 years to raise funds and generate interest, let's opt for $3 million (10 x $300,000). At this level, New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand [pictured] requested $3 million for the Brooklyn Museum's climate control system for its Living Legacies gallery. Thirty jobs will be created.

Again, no knock on Senator Gillibrand or the Brooklyn Museum. This is how things are done. What I would recommend, however, is that if someone is planning a Jazz Hall of Fame, he or she might want to take someone at the Brooklyn Museum to lunch to find out how this earmarks stuff works. And on the way home, this person may want to swing by the 116th Street Block Association. They may have a few pointers as well.

Toni Harper. Singer Toni Harper sent along an email last week to inform me that a collection of her videos has been posted here. And here's a sample of what you'll find there. Toni is joined in Tokyo in 1963 by Joe Zawinul on piano, Sam Jones on bass and Louis Hayes on drums...

Gil Evans. Ryan Truesdell, a composer, copyist and producer, has been given complete access to the late Gil Evans' scores by Evans' family. Now Truesdell is planning to hire an orchestra to record the arrangements in May 2012. But first he has to raise cash. He has come up with a novel way of doing so. Go here.

Jazz radio. AccuJazz is an all-jazz radio platform that holds over 50 jazz channels based on categories of style, instrument, composer, region, decade and more. Each channel is further customizable by the option to "deselect" artists the listener would rather not hear. Go here.

 Oddball album cover of the week. Once again, here's Lenny Dee, our hombre of the Hammond, strutting his double-decker stuff in 1962. Decca's spending on the pop organist's album-cover concepts knew no bounds. Here, the kooky keysman is accompanying a water skiing ballerina as she  whooshes backward (based on the spray). Most amusing is her enjoyment of Dee's riffs, despite the fact that there are no speakers on board Dee's skiff. Makes you wonder how many times they had to shoot this one to get it right. Dee's shoes certainly must have taken a beating. I can't tell if that's a cow's head on the organ. If someone has the actual cover, please let me know.

JazzSnap: Buddy and Conte (1947)

JazzWax has come into the possession of some amazing digital jazz photos from the 1940s. What makes these images special is that many were snapshots taken by a woman named Betty who was and remains crazy about jazz and jazz musicians. In fact, Betty was friends with many of her subjects. She also had a remarkable eye for composition, and she positioned her camera lens up close. Through her photos, you get a vivid sense of her subjects' ambition, charm and cool. I will feature Betty's photos (sent along by her friend Chris) from time to time. Think of them as a surprise, just as they were to me.

Today's image above is of clarinetist Buddy DeFranco (left) and trumpeter Conte Candoli, circa 1947, when both were in the Boyd Raeburn band. This one was likely taken on the loading dock of a New York City theater during a break between performances or at a rehearsal. As Buddy mentioned to me the other day after viewing the image, "We look like we're 14 years old. In fact, we might have been!"

Very Best of the Ronettes

When I was a kid growing up in New York City in the '60s, there were only two groups that mattered: The Ronettes and the Four Seasons. The Beach Boys were from a place where teens drove cars and surfed. My friends rode bikes and played stickball. Parents were the ones who drove cars in New York and had to move them to different sides of the street each day to avoid tickets. The Beatles also were foreign—they came from a place where people talked funny and seemed chipper all day long. Neither group did moody or brooding very well.

By contrast, the Four Seasons looked and sounded like the older brothers of our friends who hung out at the candy store and pizza shop. They were slick, sharp, passionate and coolly adult-looking. The Ronettes seemed like their girlfriends. They had secretary hair, they pouted, they were exotic looking (Italian? Spanish? Jewish? black? white?) and they had strong New Yawk accents. For example, on The Best Part of Breaking Up, Ronnie Bennett (before she married Phil Spector) unashamedly pronounced quarrel as "quaw-will." Or on Walking in the Rain, she said "she-eye" for shy. And Ronnie's "ooo's" at the end of lines quivered slightly, like she was about to bust into tears.

Summer weekends as a kid were spent heading out to Jones Beach in the back of a stifling hot Rambler with my brother Danny and a green-and-white Coleman cooler between us filled with ice, sodas, sandwiches and Yodels. My parents were up front, their eyes glued on the car in front of us.

In the days before cell phones, the only way you wound up on the jam-packed sand with your friends is if your parents were swift enough to follow their neighbor's car out to the beach and other friends could follow yours. The caravan had to drive slowly, as though in a funeral procession, and arrive unbroken. Otherwise, you were sure to pull into one of the massive parking lots alone. As far as I could tell, it was as painful for parents to be stuck with their kids all day alone as it was for kids to be alone with overprotective mothers and exhausted fathers.

But enough nostalgia. I tell you all of this because Sony Legacy has just released The Very Best of the Ronettes, which is one in a series of releases showcasing producer Phil Spector's work in the early '60s. Spector's "Wall of Sound" technique of recording artists was great and all, but the artistry of the Ronettes was a cut above his other acts. No knock against the Crystals, Darlene Love, Bob. B. Soxx and the Blue Jeans or the rest. For me, no group resonated as deeply or as sincerely as Ronnie Bennett, her sister Estelle and cousin Nedra Talley. The Ronettes were heartbreakers and risk-takers, singing with first-hand knowledge of rickety fire escapes, lipstick application and leather jackets.

According to the liner notes by Lenny Kaye, the Ronettes came to attention of Phil Spector by accident. Recalled Ronnie:

"We were supposed to do a background for Del Shannon, and my sister was making a call and she dialed the wrong  number. Phil Spector answered. And so he says, 'Who's this?' and she said, 'Who's this?' and he had heard of us. He asked if we would be interested in doing a background session for one of his groups, and we met the next night at studio on 49th St. [in New York]. He wanted to hear how we sound. And we never did that background..." 

Reissue producer Rob Santos has done a masterful job of giving these recordings a fresh lease on life. For years, the only digital recording was an early '90s effort from ABKCO,  remastered under Phil Spector's supervision but oddly lousy. One suspects that the remastering technology at the time was in its infancy and prevented the result from being more dimensional and dynamic. Since then, Spector never allowed the recordings to be touched. One suspects that his conviction and imprisonment has changed his perspective on the reissue. I can tell you that the new CD has a warmth and glow that sounds mighty close to the sonics on the original 45-rpms. 

Dig Born to Be Together. Or When I Saw You. Just breaks your heart how great this material sounds now. Or Do I Love You and Walking in the Rain. For me, it's the sound of open fire hydrants, handballs thwacking against cement walls and buses accelerating gruffly after picking up passengers. Which is pretty funny, since these girls from New York's Washington Heights (where I grew up) made these records at Gold Star in Hollywood.

My only quibble is that How Does It Feel was left off the collection But no worries. I'm sure it will be on a complete Ronettes package down the road. I, for one, can't wait.

JazzWax tracks: The Very Best of the Ronettes (Sony Legacy) is available at iTunes or here. There are three other CDs in this new Very Best of series:  Darlene Love, The Crystals and Phil Spector 1961-1966. All were compiled and produced by Rob Santos.

JazzWax clip: Here's Walking in the Rain, recorded in September 1964. Talk about drama...

Sammy Nestico: Fun Time & More

Nobody swings like Sammy Nestico. The 87-year-old arranger knows how to get the heel of your foot bouncing and hands clapping without you even realizing they're moving. It just sort of happens, especially if you dig big bands. Sammy is old school, so his swingers build and build and build. The whole point, Sammy says, is to drive the listener wild, and Sammy always succeeds. Between 1968 and 1983, he was the pen on 10 Count Basie albums, four of which won Grammys. I just received his latest release, Fun Time and More Live: Sammy Nestico and the SWR Big Band. It's so good I was moved to give Sammy a call last evening. More with Sammy in a moment.

I first discovered Sammy in the mid-1970s, when my high school big band ordered a package of arrangements from Sammy's company. Back then, Sammy always included a black floppy vinyl record with a pro band playing the songs, so you could hear how they were supposed to sound. I still have the disc. Sammy has published 600 tunes and thousands of arrangements, and the chart craftsmanship on his new live album is remarkable.

Fun Time and More is a concert reading of compositions that Sammy and Germany's SWR Big Band recorded in the studio over the past few years. Surprisingly, the band takes each song at a perfect pace. Which is unusual for a live album. As you know, live recordings tend to be rushed, often due to stage nerves, and they lose something in the process. Not so here. This live album is as cool as can be. I only wish I could hear the SWR Big Band playing Sammy's arrangements at New York's Village Vanguard, Birdland or the Blue Note.

Speaking with Sammy by phone is like talking to the Santa Claus of jazz. Sammy is so full of life and laughter—and his passion for swinging hard knows no bounds:

"You like the album? I'm so glad. I haven't even heard it yet. I'm recording another one soon at the Capitol Tower in Hollywood with my favorite studio musicians. The arrangements will be all standards. I have 10 of them done. I just need two more, and we'll be ready to go.

"On Fun Time and More, I think my favorite tune is Blue Samuel. I took the chord changes from Frank Rosolino's Blue Daniel, like Dizzy [Gillespie] used to do basing new songs on the chord changes of older ones. The chords on my tune are nice and the progression is real good, don't you think?

"I also like my arrangement of Johnny Mandel's Not Really the Blues, which he wrote originally for Woody Herman. I first took on that tune back in 1993, when trombonist Bill Watrous was recording an album of Johnny Mandel songs. Johnny had sent me the lead sheet, and I loved every bar of it. The energy just won't quit. I redid my arrangement of his song for the SWR Big Band, and it came out great.

"Whenever I write a tune and arrange it, I first sit in my home and work out both on my piano. After, I record myself playing it on the piano and load the result onto my iPod. Then when I take my walk each day around the circle in our neighborhood, I fine-tune the song here and there. I call the process 'surgery.' "

When I let Johnny Mandel know about Sammy's new album over the weekend and how he reworked Not Really the Blues, Johnny was excited but not surprised that Sammy had done a masterful job: "Of course he did. He's one of us." [Photo of Johnny Mandel by Marc Myers]

JazzWax tracks: You can sample Fun Time and More Live: Sammy Nestico and the SWR Big Band at iTunes and here.

JazzWax note: For my two-part interview with Sammy, go here.

JaxzzWax clip: Here's the SWR Big Band in 2009 playing Blue Samuel... 

And here's Sammy's studio version of Johnny Mandel's Not Really the Blues.

Nat Cole: That Sunday, That Summer

Everyone has a favorite Nat King Cole song. Mine is That Sunday, That Summer. In addition to the song's melody being artfully crafted, the lyrics retain an old fashioned formality that's long gone. It's an unusual love song, in that it casts the singer as a reminiscing romantic singing to his wife or love interest about a special moment on a special day. It's both hip and delightfully square.

I also love Ralph Carmichael's arrangement, with the bass trombone hitting like a heartbeat and the choir adding just the right amount of confectionery accompaniment. Over the weekend I spoke to Dick LaPalm about the song. Dick is a legendary jazz and pop record promoter who worked closely with Cole to gain radio airplay for his many Capitol releases.

As we were talking, I said I thought the song was symbolically the last entry in the American songbook. Recorded in the spring of 1963, the song was released on the last day of August, hit the charts in September and reached No. 12 on November 2—before all hell broke loose. Dick laughed. "Don't even explain, I know exactly what you mean." Of course, within months, President Kennedy would be assassinated, the Beatles' I Want to Hold Your Hand would be released and a generation would pass.

Here's what Dick said about the song:

"Nat loved That Sunday, That Summer. He adored the melody and the lyrics. Joe Sherman wrote the music and George David Weiss wrote the words. George was amazing. He wrote the lyrics to Lullaby of Birdland, Too Close for Comfort and What a Wonderful World. Joe and his brother Noel wrote Ramblin' Rose, Graduation Day and so many others.

"I remember Joe came backstage
to see Nathaniel while he was working the Latin Casino in Philadelphia. He didn’t have a demo of That Sunday, That Summer, just sheet music. Nat could read music, of course, so he just read it down. He thought the song was interesting.

"As you know, Nat always brought excellent taste and intelligence to the songs he sang along with tremendous polish. Part of the reason for this was the amount of thought he gave to a song's words. When he found a song that interested him, he’d have Charlotte, his assistant, type up the lyrics on 3 x 5 cards. Just the lyrics, and one or two lines per card.

"He’d keep these cards in his jacket pocket, and whenever he had time, he’d take out a card and study the words. For Nat, the lyrics had to move him, and this was his way of savoring them, putting them to the test.

"He did that on so many songs. I remember back in 1958, in St. Louis, we were taking a cab somewhere and he reached into his pocket, pulled out a card or two and smiled. He showed me a couple of them. On the cards were the words...

As I approach the prime of my life
I find I have the time of my life
Learning to enjoy at my leisure
All the simple pleasures
And so I happily concede
That this is all I ask
This is all I need

"I asked him who wrote the lyrics. He said Gordon Jenkins [pictured]. The song, of course, was This Is All I Ask, which he was about to record with Gordon for the album The Very Thought of You.

"Nat did the same thing with That Sunday, That Summer, and he wound up falling in love with it. He recorded the song on May 16, 1963 at Capitol in Los Angeles, with Ralph Carmichael's arrangement. They recorded a couple of other songs that day—Tell Me Your Dream and Don’t Forget. But That Sunday, That Summer was the winner.

"My job was to get the single played, which wasn't too hard since radio guys adored it. Art Pallan [pictured] was a disc jokey at KDKA in Pittsburgh. He jumped all over it first and helped break it. KDKA was a strong, 50,000-watt station, and Pallan began to bang it pretty heavily. Then Joey Reynolds at WKBW in Buffalo played it, followed by Wally Phillips on WGN in Chicago and William B. Williams on WNEW in New York. The song hit the Billboard pop chart in September and peaked at No. 12 that fall.

"If Nathaniel liked a song, he’d do it in his show. He sang That Sunday, That Summer for about a year after the recording. And you're right: Everything did change after that song."

JazzWax track: That Sunday, That Summer can be found remastered on many recent Nat King Cole compilations. It was first released on Those Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer here.

JazzWax clip: Here's Nat King Cole singing That Sunday, That Summer on a British BBC-TV special called An Evening with Nat King Cole from September 1963...

Stan Getz on Clef and Norgran

On Friday, November 14, 1952, tenor saxophonist Stan Getz caught a break. The demand for tickets to a Carnegie Hall concert celebrating Duke Ellington's 25 years in the music business was so strong that a second midnight show had to be added. Fortunately for Getz, he was given a 40-minute slot on stage in each of the two shows, ensuring maximum exposure for him and his quintet.

Earlier that year, in March, Getz had recorded a jazz-pop jukebox hit. Playing behind guitarist Johnny Smith, they recorded Moonlight in Vermont, a gentle, pulse-beat rendition that crossed over and resonated with the easy-listening market. At Carnegie Hall in November, Getz would provide a rendition of his hit backed by guitarist Jimmy Raney, pianist Duke Jordan, bassist Bill Crow and drummer Frank Isola.

On stage, Getz and his group took Moonlight in Vermont at a faster clip than his earlier recording. No more playing second fiddle to Johnny Smith. This concert version was all Getz. The song attracted prolonged applause and caught the ear of producer Norman Granz [pictured]. After the concert, Granz signed Getz to his Clef label, starting a relationship that would result in some of Getz's finest recordings.

Now Hip-O-Select at the Verve Music Group has issued Stan Getz Quintets: The Clef & Norgran Studio Albums. The three-CD set features Getz in the 10-inch LP era on the two labels Granz started before he launched Verve in 1956. The pairing of Getz and Granz was perfect. By the early 1950s, Granz had come up with an ingeniously simple recording formula. By signing top jazz artists with enormous stamina and a seemingly endless well of ideas, Granz would have them record American songbook classics. They would start out playing the melody and then improvise their hearts out on the chord changes. The purpose was to widen public support for jazz and attempt to eat into the lucrative pop market.

Many of the tracks on this new set have appeared on collections in the past. What makes this box special is the pristine sound of the tracks and handsome packaging. What comes through your system is so clean and distinct that you can hear Getz's saxophone pads clicking away as he jets through songs. The liner notes by Ashley Kahn appear as a book, and the CD sleeves are reproductions of the original 10-inch LP covers. The same appealing format was used recently for the label's Oscar Peterson and Dinah Washington packages.

This set is unofficially divided into two parts—Stan's quintet with guitarist Jimmy Raney and his quintet with valve trombonist Bob Brookmeyer (though there are a few tracks without Bob).

The first disc features Stan Getz Plays and The Artistry of Stan Getz, both recorded at the tail-end of  1952. From the opening track, Stella By Starlight, Getz takes your ear by storm. You're reminded once again how remarkable he was on virtually everything he played. By adapting Lester Young's cool phrasing and Charlie Parker's drive, Getz's tone was caressing and his ideas seemingly endless.  On the Raney section of the box you realize how gifted Duke Jordan was as an accompanist.

Throughout this first disc—Time on My Hands, 'Tis Autumn, The Way You Look Tonight and on and on—Getz flies through as though as though hydroplaning, effortlessly inventing one fresh alternative melody after the next. His sense of swing was spellbinding and machine-like in its precision and duration.

The second and third discs feature Getz competing playfully with Bob's [pictured] valve trombone. The union is as smooth as can be, with Getz offering high-register tenor solos following by Bob's morse-code valve trombone. Lyrical tracks include The Nearness of You, Tangerine, Feather Merchant and the perky Pot Luck. Their polished counterpoint was the cool jazz version of Dixieland—and the East Coast approach to what Gerry Mulligan and Chet Baker were developing in California.

You listen to these recordings, and it's hard to believe that the married Getz during this period was a heroin addict and recklessly promiscuous. How music so wonderful could come out of a soul so dysfunctional and self-destructive is impossible to fathom. But there it is, and this set reminds us that Getz could be both beautiful and baffling without missing a beat. [Photo: Herman Leonard/CTSImages.com]

JazzWax tracks: Stan Getz Quintets: the Clef and Norgran Albums (Hip-O-Select) can be found at iTunes or here.

JazzWax clip: Here's Getz and Bob Brookmeyer in 1953 on Crazy Rhythm. Note that the recording used here is not from the new box...

Sunday Wax Bits

Last Tuesday night, my friend Kevin from Memphis was in town and we went off to see Elvis Presley in Concert at Radio City Music Hall. This one-night performance featured Elvis on a series of large screens singing about 25 songs from multiple concerts. The footage was primarily from material shot for the MGM concert films Elvis, That's The Way It Is (1970) and Elvis on Tour (1972) and from the 1973 global TV special Elvis: Aloha from Hawaii. [Photo by Marc Myers]

On stage accompanying the vivid vocal track were members of Elvis' original Taking Care of Business backup band. The TCB band last week included legendary guitarist James Burton, pianist Glen D. Hardin  and drummer Ronnie Tutt as well as the Sweet Inspirations and Stamps vocal groups. And brass and strings.

Mind you, I'm not an Elivismaniac. But I do appreciate the charismatic candle power this guy had and continues to exhibit in film, and the grand-slam sound of his voice. [Pictured: long-time TCB guitarist James Burton]

Before you mock me, here's Elvis singing You've Lost That Loving Feeling in a show that's nearly identical to the one I saw last week, only a few years back. You decide...

Ben Webster radio. Symphonic Sid Gribetz of New York's WKCR is hosting a five-hour radio program today devoted to Ben Webster's recordings in the 1950s. The show starts at 2 p.m. (EST). You can access the show on your computer from anywhere in the world by going here.

Itiberê Orquestra Familia radio. Jazz musician and writer Bill Kirchner hosts Jazz From the Archives tonight on New York's WBGO starting at 11 p.m. The subject of his show will be Brazil's Itiberê Orquestra Familia. You can access the show from anywhere on your computer by going here. And here's a taste...

George Shearing interview. New York's Hamilton College sent along an email informing me that it hosts free public access to its online archive of interviews that feature jazz greats and other notables. The main archive is here. Interviews with Oscar Peterson, George Shearing, Clark Terry and Milt Hinton were conducted by vocalist Joe Williams, who was instrumental in establishing the college's oral history project. Here's Joe Williams interviewing George Shearing.

Memphis doings. If you're heading to Memphis soon, be sure to check in on the I Love Memphis blog hosted and written by Kerry Crawford. Lots of neat inside stuff to hear, eat and do here.

CD discoveries of the week: One of the finest piano albums to hit my desk in some time is Chantale Gagne's Wisdom of the Water. I last wrote about Gagne back in 2009, when her first album came out. This one is a more mature work, with greater drama and panoramic imagery. Songs linger, giving the instruments time to develop ideas and converse with a folk feel. The group here is exceptional. Joining Gagne is Joe Locke on vibes, Peter Washington on bass and Lewis Nash on drums. Sample Roseline and The Light We Need. You'll find this one at iTunes or here.

Sony just reissued another set of CTI recordings from the 1970s. Two standouts are George Benson's White Rabbit and Paul Desmond's Pure Desmond. White Rabbit retains its original acoustic-electric tension and world-music orchestration. On the title track, Benson's guitar plays neatly off fusion guitarist Jay Berliner, bassist Ron Carter, electric pianist Herbie Hanock and drummer Billy Cobham. The Summer of '42 Theme still sounds grand and California Dreamin' captures the head-shop and fusion feel of the late '60s and early '70s perfectly. Hats off to Don Sebesky's arrangements. You'll find this at iTunes or here.

Paul Desmond's Pure Desmond was purposely kept spare. Recorded in 1974, the alto saxophonist was joined by guitarist Ed Bickert, bassist Ron Carter and drummer Connie Kay. The delivery lives up to the album's title, and the release was perhaps Desmond's finest during his late period. Bickert's tasty guitar feeds Desmond neatly throughout, allowing the breezy high-register reedman to float around like an autumn leaf. In many ways, the guitar was the most natural accompanist for Desmond's caressing tone, and Bickert was an ingenious choice. Sample Why Shouldn't I, the MASH Theme and Wave. You'll find this one at iTunes and here.

Oddball album covers of the week: This plexiglass astronaut's helmet really made the rounds on album covers in the late '50s and early '60s. We know now, of course, that one needs a bit more than a fishbowl on one's noggin to visit the solar system. But back then, it was all about style—and a photographer being able to capture the subject's face. Makes you wonder whether there were lots of bubble helmets or just one sitting in the same photographer's studio. The Dave Pike album is from 1965, Ted Heath's from 1957 and Mel Torme's from 1960.

Nancy Wilson on Shearing

I am particularly fond of The Swingin's Mutual, the album that singer Nancy Wilson recorded with the George Shearing Quintet in June 1960. Her six tracks with Shearing represented a crisscrossing over at the time for both artists. For Nancy, being accompanied by just Shearing's group rather than a big orchestra created a special intimacy that allowed listeners to hear just how special her voice was. As for Shearing, he was able to show off a more soulful feel within the confines of the quintet's sound, which by 1960 had become quasi easy listening.

A good example is My Gentleman Friend, my personal favorite from the album. The Shearing quintet exhibits its trademark, ice cubes dropped into a crystal glass sound. But this isn't sticky Satin Affair fare. Shearing brings enormous soul forward as Nancy swings with kittenish abandon. Highly sophisticated stuff within its tasteful simplicity.

On Wednesday, I had a chance to speak with Nancy about Shearing and The Swingin's Mutual. Here's what she told me:

"The Swingin’s Mutual was recorded because George Shearing and I were both represented by talent manager John Levy. We also were on the same label—Capitol. John thought it would be a great idea, and he was right. [Photo of Nancy Wilson at The Swingin's Mutual session in 1960 by John Levy]

"I don’t remember when and where I first met George. It was probably in 1959. We had performed together that year at New York's Basin Street East. That was a great place to play. It was a jazz supper club rather than just another jazz club. [Photo of George Shearing and Nancy Wilson at the Capitol Tower by John Levy]

"When we decided to record the album in 1960, George and I sat down and talked about the type of material we’d record. Then we picked out the songs. There was no specific strategy to having me record only six songs and for George to record six with just the quintet. We used the same six-and-six format on Nancy Wilson with Cannonball Adderley, which we recorded a year later in 1961.

"I suppose it was set up that way so the album could sell in both of our record bins. Buyers who wanted the instrumentals would have them, and the different audiences would be exposed to each of us.

"The photo on the cover? I believe those images were taken at separate times and then they joined the pictures together to make it seem as though we were sitting back to back. In fact, I'm sure of it. I owned an orange dress, so I didn’t have to buy one for the photo shoot. But I didn’t have orange shoes so I had to dye a pair.

"After The Swingin’s Mutual came out, everyone loved it. So did I. George and I toured for a time and performed concerts together. We’d appear separately at the clubs but then come out and do songs together. [Photo of Nancy Wilson in the vocal booth at The Swingin's Mutual session by John Levy]

"George was a joy. He had a light touch and was...I guess the word would be tasty. There also was a little humor in the music every now and then, too.

"As a singer, you’re always listening to the piano. To sing accompanied by the Shearing sound really was wonderful. His style encompassed and surrounded my voice beautifully. He knew what to play and when. He’d always embellish, and the result made you sound even better.

"Of course, let’s not forget his beautiful chord structure. These are all the things you’re listening to as a singer for excitement and inspiration.

"George had a humorous and odd wit. He could come up with some really odd things when he was on the microphone. He told jokes that weren’t really funny in the traditional sense. But he meant well so you just had to love him and his sense of humor.

"As good as The Swingin’s Mutual was, I loved what George did on Hello Young Lovers, which I recorded in 1962. Most people aren't aware that George wrote all the string arrangements for the album. I heard them for the first time when the orchestra played them down in the studio at the Capitol Tower in Los Angeles. There’s such grandeur and sweep to that album, I love it.

"Swingin' came along just at the right time. It broadened my audience and took George out of jazz and put him in my thing, which he liked. Interestingly, we both needed that type of album. My style was and is pop of the day. I’m now called a jazz singer, which makes me laugh. I’m a song stylist who sings show tunes, Broadway and contemporary hits. That's who I am. Swingin' gave me a pop-jazz feel and it gave George a jazz-pop feel.

"The Swingin’s Mutual was a breakthrough for me, commercially. It raised my profile and showed off my versatility. The album that I recorded with Cannonball [Adderley] in New York did even more for my career in terms of my being taken more seriously by jazz and pop listeners.

"George was always about the ears. I remember there was a party for George in 1999 at Carnegie Hall to celebrate his 80th birthday. We were in a studio rehearsing, and he played the songs from our album note for note, just as he played them on the record. I had never known anything like that. To sit down and play exactly what you had played on an album from so many years ago. Well, it blew my mind. But that was George."

JazzWax tracks: Nancy Wilson and George Shearing's The Swingin's Mutual is available at iTunes or here. Nancy Wilson with Cannonball Adderley is available at iTunes or here. Nancy Wilson's Hello Young Lovers, arranged by Shearing, has not been reissued, although some tracks appear on compilations.

JazzWax note: The quintet on The Swingin's Mutual featured Shearing on piano, Eddie Costa on vibes, Dick Garcia on guitar, George Duvivier on bass and Walter Bolden on drums.

JazzWax clip: Here's Nancy Wilson and George Shearing on My Gentleman Friend. Dig Shearing's halting, tumbling intro arrangement. Then dig Shearing's soulful solo on the break before being joined by the quintet's synchronized lines. And catch Shearing's hinting of Horace Silver's Ecaroh riff on the repeated outro...

Interview: Marjorie Hyams

The George Shearing Quintet's "sound" was hugely dependent on the musical hand-holding of the piano and vibes. All of the instruments in the late pianist's quintet were vital, of course. But it was the block chords of the piano tempered by the daintiness of the vibes that both excited and charmed listeners. In the original George Shearing Quintet of 1949, those vibes belonged to Marjorie Hyams.

Margie, as she likes to be called by friends, and bassist John Levy are the only surviving members of Shearing's first highly successful bop-over-easy ensemble. Many people aren't aware that Margie, prior to joining Shearing, was a member of Woody Herman's First Herd band for two years in the mid-'40s, recording with the orchestra and with Mary Lou Williams and Charlie Ventura before joining Shearing's famed group in late 1948. She also helped arrange much of the Shearing quintet's early material.

In a rare interview earlier this week, Margie, 90, spoke about growing up in New York, the mean trick Hermanites played on her, recording in a pre-Shearing quintet with Mary Lou Williams, why Charlie Ventura's sound wasn't her cup of tea, and how she was able to arrange so much of the Shearing sound so quickly:

JazzWax: Where did you grow up?
Marjorie Hyams: In Jamaica, Queens. My brother Mark was a pianist who eventually played with quite a few big bands but never got the recognition he deserved. Probably the best-known band was Will Hudson’s, starting in the mid-‘30s. He also recorded with Spud Murphy’s band in the late ‘30s. He married L'ana Webster, a famous female saxophonist and bandleader. Until Mark died a couple of years ago, we talked weekly to each other about music.

JW: When did you start playing piano?
MH: When I was 6. My brother was two years older than me and already playing and I followed in his footsteps. My father was a sometime trumpet player but he wasn’t active. He was involved in some kind of band music at the time. I remember him practicing.  I also had a sister, but she died very young.

JW: How did you come to jazz?
MH: I just loved it from the beginning. I also loved classical, but the turning point for me came when I heard Art Tatum. I had never heard anything like that. The other turning point was when I first heard Igor Stravinsky. His music was very exciting and inspirational. That was the sound I was looking for. I loved classical music but it didn’t give me the satisfaction that Tatum and Stravinsky did.

JW: When did you start playing piano professionally?
MH: In the early 1940s. I started with a quintet of young musicians that had a program on NBC radio. We did a lot of folk music, pop, college anthems—you name it. But they already had a great pianist, so they dragged in a vibraphone and asked me to play just background notes and arpeggios.

JW: Had you played the vibes before?
MH: No, never. All of my studies had been on the piano, and I didn’t know how to play the vibes when I picked up the mallets that day. Unlike most vibraphonists, I didn’t come to the instrument from the drums. I was a piano player. So I approached it as though I was playing a keyboard. It just came to me. We toured mostly in East Coast clubs, from New Orleans to Boston.

JW: How did you meet Woody Herman?
MH: I was playing in Atlantic City on the boardwalk in 1944. Renault Wineries had a shop there that sold pink champagne. I had always worked at Frank Palumbo’s Click Club in Philadelphia. In the summer, I worked in Atlantic City. Woody was playing the Steel Pier with his band. He came in to hear me at a nearby club where I was playing piano, vibes, singing and writing arrangements. He liked what he heard and kept coming back. Finally he offered me a job.

JW: What did your club band think?
MH: I had a conference with my men and asked if they would be mad if I left. They were all local guys who knew they would pick up work pretty fast. They encouraged me to take the job.

JW: What did you think?
MH: I was so excited. This was during the war, when bands were losing a lot of guys to the draft, so guys like Woody were constantly looking for people to take over the empty chairs. I just loved Woody. He was a great, sweet guy. He was extremely open-minded. He had no preconceived notions about anything.

JW: How did the band treat you?
MH: Well, that was a different matter [laughs].  It wasn’t all terrific with Woody. He gave people free reign, so he didn’t really know there was sort of sexism going on. There were guys in the band who really helped me and were supportive and wanted me to succeed. But there were others who went out of their way to make things hard.

JW: Like what?
MH: Guys would do mean things, petty things, that would impinge upon my ability to perform. For example, they’d move my vibes to a place on the stage that wasn’t easily accessible or where I wouldn’t be seen. Really dumb stuff. That now seems so silly.

JW: Did you leave Herman in 1946 to join Mary Lou Williams?
MH: No, I recorded with her while I was with Woody. I’ve always arranged for quartets or singing groups, putting together hooks. Leonard Feather suggested we record those sides. Mary Lou was wonderful. We had a lot of fun and respect for each other. She had a terrific sense of humor and camaraderie. As a female jazz musician, it was good to play with women who knew what you were about.

JW: Did Williams have a strong personality?
MH: Yes. She always commanded a lot of power. She already led a couple of major bands, so she didn’t have as much trouble as I did with the guys. At that point in time, I was making my way and she had already made it. She also was very important as an artist. She was very well respected.

JW: Whose idea was it to use piano, vibes, guitar, bass and drums?
MH: That was Leonard’s doing. He had this thing about a sound he heard in his head. He thought that by using that quintet set up, he’d get a big band sound on a budget.

JW: Feather isn’t really given enough credit.
MH: That’s true. He was really something else. He always had great ideas and he was very generous with me. I lived in Greenwich Village at the time and he lived there as well with his wife Jane. So I was over their place often. He never held me back when I wanted to do something else, and he was always there when I wanted to do something and add an idea.

JW: He played an important role in the development of bebop.
MH: Yes, he did. He was always looking at ways to promote it, create new sounds using it as a base, and raising the music’s visibility. When I first moved out to California when my husband died, I was tired of the cold Chicago weather. I got together with Leonard and went to dinner at his house. I remember bringing records and telling him who he should be listening to. Can you imagine, I was telling Leonard who to listen to? My favorite at the time was vibist Bobby Hutcherson. Sure enough, in one of his columns, he gave Bobby a nice review. He really listened to me.

JW: In 1946 and 1947, you were with Charlie Ventura. How was that?
MH: It was OK. Neal Hefti and I wrote the book for the Ventura band. As good as Charlie was, I never liked his sound much.

JW: Why not?
MH: It was too big and didn’t float. It was cumbersome. I didn’t really have a happy time in that band. He was an odd guy. I think he was beholden to some people. I don’t think he had free reign to do what he wished. Those people had an agenda for him. I don’t think he was his own man for a while and I don’t think he was happy about that.

JW: How did you wind up in the original George Shearing Quintet?
MH: By 1948, no recording was being done because of the second musicians’ ban. I was playing solo piano and singing  at a club in the Village. I can’t remember the club’s name. I wasn’t making it the way I had wanted to, probably because I didn’t have a gimmick that would attract people. I didn’t wear ball gowns, cocktail dresses and other costumes female jazz artists wore then. I was silly enough to think that the music was enough. I guess I was kind of arrogant to think that I could make it just on the music.

JW: What kind of music were you playing?
MH: Show tunes, pop tunes. I sang a lot of American songbook things but I went beyond that. I liked to find songs that were a little esoteric and that people didn’t know about. 

JW: What changed?
MH: One night, on one of my breaks, Leonard came up to me. We chatted and he said, “How would you like to go with George Shearing?” I said, “Let me think about it…” [laughs]. No I didn’t. I jumped at the chance right away. Wow, George Shearing. Leonard knew I could play vibes.

JW: Did you already know Shearing?
MH: Yes. When he first came over from England in 1946, I was playing on 52nd Street at the Three Deuces. George would make the rounds to the various clubs. He was living with pianist Lennie Tristano for a while. Lennie was a good friend of my brother and our paths crossed.

JW: Did Shearing handpick the group?
MH: I don’t think so. He knew me and had been playing with John [Levy] and Denzil [Best]. We all had big ears. George had the best ears of all, though.

JW: How good was Shearing’s hearing?
MH: Oh, amazing. I was playing at the Hickory House in 1946 or 1947 with a trio—Mundell Lowe was on guitar, I was on vibes and there was a bass player. Leonard brought George in. When they arrived, we were playing an original boppish song that was fairly intricate and nice. Leonard asked if George could sit in. I said sure and asked George what he wanted to play.

JW: What did he say?
MH: George said let’s play that song you just played. I asked him if he was sure. George said, “Absolutely.” So we did it. After hearing that song just once, George did it. We were all blown away.

JW: When the quintet started rehearsing in late ’48, how did it work?
MH: Fortunately I had Buddy DeFranco’s book of songs to start with and transposed his arrangements. What a gorgeous player Buddy was. George and Buddy and John and Denzil had all been playing together just before the quintet was formed. Buddy had written out the charts to the songs they had played while they gigged and had given them to George when he left the group. George gave the book to me. Then going forward, whenever George came in with a song, we’d work on it as a group to give it the same sound. When I left George in 1951, I wrote a whole book of arrangements of our songs and passed it on to Don Elliott, who replaced me.

JW: Did members of the George Shearing Quintet realize how good you sounded right away?
MH: Oh yes. George may have had a plan for that group and we fell in with it. But I remember we’d talk about what octave I should play and where Chuck [Wayne] should be. It sort of just came collaboratively. It wasn’t something that was carefully planned out. That’s what George liked about us. We felt it and got it right.

JW: Did you have a hard time on the road in an interracial group that also featured a woman?
MH: People would constantly make me aware of that. What really got people is when George played solo piano and I sat down on Denzil’s [pictured] drum case with him. People would say, “How can you do that?” Those kinds of comments were disgusting.

JW: Did George ever talk about the racial tension?
MH: George and I talked about it a few times. The group used to kid George and tell him he was black. He’d pick up on that and tell people he had three black guys in the group, a white guy and a woman. George loved our humor.

JW: Where did you play on the road?
MH: Most of the clubs were simpatico with interracial groups. Most jazz clubs were used to seeing black and white musicians playing together. The extra ingredient was a white woman.

JW: What did you think?
MH: I always viewed myself as a musician. I never had the sense that I had to seem like a seductress. I was allowed to be me. That was the nicest part of everything. I didn’t have to play a part. I was just one of the musicians. Being blind, George had no conception of anything beyond the music. Nothing else mattered. Of course, he was aware of what was going on and how unjust it was. In his group, it didn't matter.

JW: Did you enjoy playing the quintet’s book?
MH: Yes, we looked forward to playing every night.

JW: All of the songs?
MH: Well, we did get a little bored with September in the Rain. But it was one of the biggest selling singles of 1949. Do you know, we recorded that in one take and it sold 1 million copies. One take, can you imagine?

JW: How did it feel to be a jazz star?
MH: I don’t know that I’d go that far. But I did meet a lot of great musicians through George.

JW: Like who?
MH: Miles Davis. Miles was amazing. He was younger than I was and as sweet as they come. As eccentric as he was as he got older, he was that sweet when he was younger.

JW: Give me an example?
MH: Back in 1944 I had recorded in a small group that Woody had with musicians from the band—Flip Phillips’ Fliptet. I had an 8-bar solo on one of the records. Well, when I met Miles, he told me how much he enjoyed my line and sang it for me. I couldn’t believe he had remembered it. We formed a friendship from then on.

JW: Did you see him in later years?
MH: Yes. When he was being difficult in his later years, my husband and I in Chicago wanted to go down to The Sutherland Lounge to hear him and John Coltrane. Musician friends warned me not to expect much and said he doesn’t talk much.

JW: Did you go?
MH: Yes. As we were making our way to our table, the bar was jammed. As we passed the bar, I got very close to Miles to get to our table. I whispered in his ear, "Does the name Margie Hyams mean anything?”

JW: What happened?
MH: His whole face lit up. He kissed me and hugged my husband, and we talked for some time. John Coltrane was my favorite of all, though. And Bill Evans. I met Bill when he was playing in Evanston, Illinois, in the early '50s [while stationed in the Army]. On his break, I went in the back to talk to him. it wasn’t as warm a meeting as I would have liked.

JW: What happened?
MH: I just wanted to tell him what I thought of him. He knew who I was but was a little cold. I did amuse him, though. I had had an old turntable and used to transcribe music off it. When I first heard Waltz for Debby, I really loved it. But I didn’t realize how off my turntable was. I told him I had gotten the song down and that it was in the key of E. He corrected me: it’s in the key of F [laughs].

JW: Why did you leave the George Shearing Quintet in ‘51?
MH: I got married, and my husband lived in Chicago. George was going to go on a world tour and I didn’t want to go. My daughter recently said to me that I gave up a lot by leaving the group, but I don’t think so. I always used to kid Leonard. He used to say in print that I had retired after I married. But that wasn’t true. From 1951 to until 1970 I played and taught and arranged in Chicago. I said to him, “Boy you’re strict. If I’m not playing with George, then I must be retired” [laughs].

JazzWax tracks: To sample Margie Hyams with the Flip  Phillips Fliptet, a small group within Woody Herman's band, go here and click on 1-2-3-4 Jump. You can also hear her with Herman's band on Woody Herman: V-Disc Years 1 & 2 (1944-46) here. She's also featured on Mosaic's Complete Columbia Recordings of Woody Herman box here.

Margie's recordings with Charlie Ventura (Either It's Love, Please Be Kind, Misirlou and How High the Moon) can be found on Charlie Ventura: 1946-1947 here.

The best George Shearing set of his early works (1939-1951), including the original quintet recordings, is George Shearing: From Battersea to Broadway (Proper Box) here.

JazzWax clips: Here's the original George Shearing Quintet with Margie Hyams on vibes playing The Continental. Dig Margie's tender solo...