Act now—tickets are going fast to my multimedia presentation of Why Jazz Happened at 92Y/Tribeca in New York on February 4 at noon. I'll be taking you through the history of post-War jazz between 1942 and 1972—connecting the dots, complete with music tracks and large-size jazz photos. To buy tickets and for more information, go here.
"The book represents scholarly work and integrates sociological and
technological factors influencing the music in a way different from the
usual writing about the music and jazz musicians. Highly recommended."
TV talk about John Cale. Yesterday, I was on the WSJ's Lunch Break to talk about my John Cale piece in Friday's paper...
How to access JazzWax tracks. Whether you read JazzWax online or you're a subscriber and wait until your
email version arrives in the evening, you know by now that many of my posts include a track to illustrate the music I'm writing about. For those unsure how to start the music, here's a tip:
At the site, move your cursor over the left side of the gray bar; a "play" arrow will appear. Just click to hear.
On the email, click on the link, and in a few moments a song bar should appear and the music will start automatically.
Free Art Pepper. Laurie Pepper has once again made a track by her late alto-saxophonist husband free to one and all. This month, it's Tickle Toe from disc #1from the three-CD set The Art History Project (Widow's Taste). To play and download, go here.
Ella Fitzgerald fans will be overjoyed to see what Bret Primack found on YouTube. Here, the First Lady of Song is joined by Duke Ellington on a scat version of Cottontail in the 1960s. Dig tenor saxophonist Paul Gonsalves. Go here.
Buddy Rich'sWest Side Story is a favorite of Wrecking Crew drummer Hal Blaine's. He found this one at YouTube from 1980 in Germany...
Arnett Cobb. At Armin Büttner's Crownpropellor's Blog, you'll find an unpublished interview with Arnett Cobb from 1980. Go here.
Bethlehem Records—the 1950s label that producer Creed Taylor brought into the LP age in the mid-'50s that went on to feature terrific jazz into the early '60s—is back. The vintage label was recently purchased by the Verse Music Group in New York. The company has already begun to make the 150-200 recordings in the Bethlehem catalog available at iTunes. Here's what's available now:
Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers—Hard Drive
Art Blakey's Big Band—Art Blakey's Big Band
Charles Mingus—A Modern Jazz Symposium of Music and Poetry
Charles Mingus—East Coasting
Duke Ellington—Historically Speaking
Duke Ellington—Duke Ellington Presents…
Helen Carr—The Complete Bethlehem Jazz Collection
Johnny Hartman—All of Me: The Debonair Mr. Hartman
Mel Tormé—It's a Blue World
Mel Tormé—At the Crescendo (Live)
Mel Tormé—Mel Tormé Sings Fred Astaire
Nina Simone—Little Girl Blue
Stan Levey—This Time The Drum's On Me
The Australian Jazz Quartet—At The Varsity Drag
According to the company, each song on the albums has been taken from analog tape and completely remastered to give them a crystal clear, digitally remastered sound. Verse is still searching for physical distribution in the U.S.
CD discoveries of the week. Trumpeter Adam O'Farrill and drummer Zack O'Farrill team up with tenor saxophonist Livio Aleida, guitarist Gabe Schnider, pianist
Adam Kromelow and bassist Raviv Markovitz for Sensing Flight (Zoho). The O'Farrill Brothers are sons of pianist Arturo O'Farrill and grandsons of the legendary arranger Chico O'Farrill. This album is a jazz outing with rich moods and challenging rhythms. Sample Mind Troubles and Sensations.
If you're not hip to drummer Duduka Da Fonseca, a great entry point is a CD he slapped into my hand when I saw him a few weeks ago: Songs from the Last Century(Blue Toucan). The 2005 album has everything—Duduka's sublime cat's whisker drum style, strings arranged by Oscar Castro-Neves, bassist Eddie Gomez, alto saxophonist Phil Woods soaring along lyrically and others. I love all of Duduka's albums, but this one is particularly beautiful. Sample Three Views of a Secret, Bluesette and Very Early. The Brazilian touch doesn't get much more sublime than this.
If you missed Houston Person's So Nice (HighNote) from 2011, circle back and give a listen. As always with Houston's albums, there's a terrific mix of standards you
actually want to hear as well as blues. On this one, there's even a Stephen Sondheim medley. But the album's choice cuts are the surprises: a skippy version of Burt Bacharach and Hal David's Close to You; Star Eyes and Kiss and Run taken as smokey ballads; and an uptempo I Wished On the Moon. A jazz songsmith of the highest order, Houston is joined on tracks by cornetist Warren Vache.
Oddball album cover of the week.
Last week I posted an album cover featuring a frolicking couple calmly wading in what appeared to be the raging Niagara River. This week, here's a cover from the bottom of the falls—showing violins, violas and cellos enjoying a skinny dip, with bows neatly tucked behind their strings. No sense getting those wet.
In the Mansion section of today's Wall Street Journal (go here), I took John Cale back to his old apartment at 56 Ludlow St. on New York's Lower East Side for an interview. The apartment is significant because it was there—in 1965—that John with Lou Reed and Sterling Morrison co-founded the Velvet Underground. They also recorded demos there in July '65 that became the basis for "The Velvet Underground & Nico," which Rolling Stone has ranked #13 on its "Greatest 500 Albums of All Time" list, calling it “the most
prophetic album ever made.”
That's pretty much right as far as rock albums go. The music’s droning sound,
extended tracks, controversial subject matter and pop-art minimalism influenced two generations
of future art-rockers ranging from David Bowie and David Byrne to Patti Smith
and Nirvana. This makes Cale the Elvis Presley of art-rock.
When I researched the Velvet Underground in the fall in preparation for my interview with John for an article on the re-issue of The Velvet Underground & Nico: 45th Anniversaryset (Universal), I came across fascinating material on the apartment and the demos. Then in December, when I heard that John was coming to New York to perform at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, I pitched my wild idea to my editor. She said, "Let's do it."
Some of you may recall that I wrote a similar piece for the Wall Street Journal on tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins a few years ago, when we spent the afternoon visiting his old neighborhood in Harlem just before his 80th birthday concert at New York's Beacon Theater (go here). [Photo above of Sonny Rollins by Jamie-James Medina]
So I gave John a call. Now there's something you should know about him. Like all true artists who love improvisation and live on the edge, John understood the friction and out-there aspect of my out-there idea immediately. "Yeah, man, let's do it," he said.
After asking permission to visit from the apartment's current occupants—Germana Pucci, a musician-editor, who lives there with her multimedia artist husband Giancarlo Biagi and songwriter daughter Michelle—we were all set. John showed up a little early with his manager Nita. I was already there with Philip Montgomery, the photographer.
The building, which dates back to the turn of the 20th century, is in remarkably good shape. Today's, it is a co-op inhabited by artists similar in many respects to the musicians, painters, poets and filmmakers who rented space when Mr. Cale picked up his mail in the narrow vestibule. [Photo above of 56 Ludlow St. by Philip Montgomery]
When Germana came down to let us in, we were all introduced, and John bounded ahead, leading the way up the familiar stairs. “This was all raw brick then,” John said, slapping the plaster wall on the third-floor landing. “The staircase is new, too, much more solid now.”
On the fifth floor, John decided to continue up to the roof before visiting his old apartment. Darting around the outdoor space, John seemed in awe and emotionally overwhelmed. That's when I conducted a flash interview with my FlipCam...
Originally from Wales, Mr. Cale studied music and composition at the University of London’s Goldsmiths’ College. There, he met composer Aaron Copland, who in 1963 helped him secure a summer scholarship to the Tanglewood Music Center in Massachusetts. At summer’s end, Mr. Cale decided to move to New York, where he began playing viola in an experimental performance group led by La Monte Young.
He had met Young through composer John Cage, and he and Young began rehearsing daily. In September 1963, John performed on piano in an 18-hour concert with Cage at the Pocket Theater, which stood on Third Ave. near 13th St. Then a week later, he went on TV's I’ve Got a Secret...
While playing in Young’s group, John befriended experimental filmmaker and musician Tony Conrad, who in January ’64 invited John to move into his 1½ bedroom apartment at 56 Ludlow. John took the living room and Conrad had the back bedroom—and they split the $25 monthly rent. Cutting-edge artists lived in the building at the time—poet Angus MacLise, filmmaker Piero Heliczer, abstract painter Jack Smith and actor Mario Montez.
At a party in ‘64, John and Conrad met Jerry Vance of Pickwick Records, which was a B-level label trying to ride the Teen Pan Alley wave. Vance liked John and Tony's
edgy look and asked if they wanted to record and play gigs to support a new pop song called The Ostrich. John and Tony went out to the label's offices in Queens, where they met Lou Reed, who was a Pickwick staff songwriter. Here's the result, as The Primitives, with Lou Reed on lead vocal...
Up on the roof, John reminisced about the neighborhood and how bleak it was. Then the photographer set up some shots, including the one you see in the Wall Street Journal today. I begged Philip not to have John step off the five-story building onto a ladder, but John was game.
Down in the apartment, Germana encouraged John to
walk around freely. He went immediately to the bedroom window facing Ludlow St. Sitting on the bed’s edge, he looked down at the street and spoke about the neighborhood and where he slept in the apartment (under the window). He also mentioned his starving artist diet of canned stew and milkshakes.
Looking out the window, John recalled hearing high school students singing doo-wop in the doorway early in the morning. Then he sprang up and walked into the living room, running his hand along a protrusion in the wall. He said the old fireplace was behind the plaster, where he and Conrad had burned crates and furniture to keep warm, since the gas stove was the apartment's only source of heat in the winter.
When I asked where exactly in the apartment the famed demos were made in July '65, John said, "Right where you're standing, here, near the fireplace."
I asked if Lou Reed had moved in, as most books on the Velvet Underground claim. John said he didn't: "After graduating
from college, Lou continued to live at home in Freeport, on Long Island. When
Lou and I began working hard on ideas for the band, he’d commute in on the weekends
to the apartment."
They called themselves the Warlocks at first and then the
Falling Spikes. The group finally named the band after an S&M novel Conrad had found on the street: The Velvet Underground. But they had a rough time of it. After Maureen “Moe” Tucker joined on drums, their art-driven music had little in common with commercial transistor radio hits.
"Our songs ran longer, the topics we were singing about were controversial and we liked sound textures. We couldn't care less whether people were able to dance to it," he said. "That was the world of 45s. We were doing something completely different, something that hadn't really been done before."
By the end of ’65, Conrad moved out of 56 Ludlow and John soon followed, relocating to a loft on nearby Lispenard St. The band's association with Andy Warhol followed in '66, and the Velvet Underground was on its way, creating an urban avant-garde counterpoint to San Francisco's folk-rock scene of '67.
John Cale is significant. He helped start a movement powered by individualism, expression and art—not sales, conformity or media drama. This sensibility continues to this day, as evidenced at the Brooklyn Academy of Music's New Wave Festival this week. John has never compromised in his recordings or his performances, and he always remains true to his performance-art and art-pop roots. By combining modern classical forms with drone music and Anglican edge, John is still one of the truly innovative and freshest rockers around, proving that avant-garde isn't pretend but a way of thinking.
Here's John today in a video for Face to the Sky, from his new album, Shifty Adventures in Nookie Wood...
So, how important is John Cale and the Velvet Underground in shaping the direction of rock history post-1965? This documentary, with rare footage, sums them up...
JazzWax tracks: You'll find John Cale's Shifty Adventures in Nookie Wood (Double Six) here.
Mike Worthington (above) is a fabulous photographer. He has a wonderful eye for composition and perspective and I love how he gets up-close to his subjects and captures energy and expression. All of his subjects seem to be in motion—even if they are snapped standing still. This takes enormous patience. I asked Mike to share a handful of his jazz works along with text so you'd know where and how they were taken.
Take it away Mike:
B.B. King...
I took this image while on an editorial assignment in
Burlington, Vt., covering one of many stops on the guitarist's tour back in
2007. Despite being slowed down by Type II diabetes to
the point that he needs assistance being helped to the stage, Mr. King still
managed to knock everyone out. Camera: Canon 1D Mark IIN; lens: Canon 24-105mm F4 L Series IS Lens; exposure: 1/80th of a second at F4.
Chuck Brown...
I was asked to photograph Chuck Brown in 2009 for some promo shots by his management company. We coordinated the shoot around a Thanksgiving weekend gig he was to perform at the Ram's Head/Fordham Brewery in historic downtown Annapolis, Md. while I was in town for the holiday. I picked the alleyway behind the club because of the bright colors painted on the 200-year-old brick. Sadly, Chuck Brown passed away of heart failure in May of this year. Camera: Canon 5D Mark II; lens: Canon 24-105mm F4 L Series IS Lens; lighting was provided by 2 Dynalite heads triggered by a PocketWizard Mini; exposure: 1/80th of a second at F6.3.
Ray Vega...
I first met Ray when he was playing in the great Paquito D'Rivera's band. This shot was taken during the 2011 Burlington Jazz Festival when he was performing at the Flynn Space with his band. Camera: Canon 5D Mark II; lens: Canon 70-200mm F2.8 L Series IS Lens; exposure: 1/60th of a second at F2.8.
Ornette Coleman...
I captured this shot at the 2008 Burlington Jazz Festival when Ornette Coleman was one of the headlining performers of that year's festival. I was positioned stage-left, backstage when Mr. Coleman took a short pause and looked back. Note that he's playing a trumpet rather than his customary alto sax. Camera: Canon 1D Mark IIN; lens: Canon 70-200mm F2.8 L Series IS Lens; exposure: 1/50th of a second at F2.8.
Sonny Rollins...
I took this one at the 2010 Burlington Discover Jazz Festival where Sonny Rollins was one of the headlining performers. I was lucky to capture one of those moments when he was just looking up and where you can see his eyes through his glasses. Camera: Canon 1D Mark IIN; lens: Canon 70-200mm F2.8 L Series IS Lens; exposure: 1/60th of a second at F2.8.
Esperanza Spalding...
This shot was taken at the during the 2009 Discover Jazz Festival on the Flynn Theatre Main Stage in Burlington, Vt. Here she is playing a Fender electric bass versus the upright bass she is usually photographed playing. I took this shot from behind stage-right. Camera: Canon 5D Mark II; lens: Canon 70-200mm F2.8 L Series IS Lens; exposure: 1/125th of a second at F2.8.
JazzWax note: Whether on assignment for magazines or corporate clients, Mike Worthington knocks the ball out of the park. All of his images grab you and hold your attention. To view many more of his images, go here. To reach him, email him at mike@worthingtonimages.com.
The history of R&B and rock and roll would be incomplete without mentioning Big Jay McNeely—father of the honking tenor sax sound. Incredibly, Big Jay still has not been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. If he were scandal-ridden or white, I suppose that would have happened a long time ago given who has slid in. For shame, Fame voters. [Photo above of fans reacting to Big Jay McNeely at the Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles in 1951 by Bob Willoughby]
In 1949, Big Jay recorded Deacon's Hop, an instrumental that reached #1 on Billboard's R&B chart and all but launched small-group jump-boogie. The sound would become synonymous with road houses, rolled-up jeans, tricked out cars and drag racing. He also had big sellers with Nervous, Man, Nervous, 3-D, All That Wine Is Gone and There Is Something on Your Mind. Here's what Big Jay told me when I interviewed him in 2009:
"At the end of 1948 [right after the second AFM strike], Ralph Bass, an a&r guy at Savoy [in Los
Angeles] asked me if I wanted to do a record. I said, "Yeah." He told me to put a tune together. A kid I knew in Watts had a record shop. He gave me a record by Glenn Miller that opened with the drummer playing the sock cymbal. I can't remember the name of the song, but I built a blues off of it called Deacon’s Hop, which became a big hit [#1 on the R&B chart in early 1949]."
In 1950, Big Jay was playing Clarksville, Tenn., when he had an idea to amp up his act:
"When we played Clarksville for the first time, the audience didn’t respond. They just sat there. I couldn't understand that. The music usually got people going. So on the next set I did something different. I got
down on my knees to play. Then I laid down on the stage and played from there. People went crazy. After the concert, I said to myself, “I’m going to try this again." So I did it in Texas. And again, everyone went crazy. Back in L.A., I did it, too. The kids went nuts. They loved that I was on my back blowing like that, and my energy fired-up theirs."
His appearance in Los Angeles at the Olympic Auditorium in 1951 was immortalized in photos by Bob Willoughby, who told me he was astonished by Big Jay's performance and the passionate reaction by the integrated audience. [Photo above of Big Jay McNeely at the Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles in 1951 by Bob Willoughby]
Miraculously, Big Jay at age 85 is still touring and recording—mostly in Europe, where musicians and audiences recognize and appreciate his gifts and importance. But he can't seem to get gigs or kudos here.
A few weeks ago Big Jay called to tell me about his new album—Life Story (Brisk). Big Jay is backed by Ray Collins' Hot-Club & Friends—12 German musicians who live and breathe jump-boogie and swing rock-and-roll.
This is R&B before vocalists—when the music and energy rested on the shoulders of a single star instrumentalist. Early on, the music appeared on 78-rpm records, since the 45's popularity with teens was still a few years off. Big Jay recreates the sound beautifully, knowing how to work a lick and enthrall listeners.
I hope someone from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is reading this. If Abba, the Ventures and Donovan can wind up crowned, isn't there room for Big Jay? [Photo above of teens reacting to Big Jay McNeely at the Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles in 1951 by Bob Willoughby]
JazzWax tracks: You'll find Big Jay McNeely's Life Story(Brisk) here, here or at iTunes.
And while you're at it, sample The Best of Big Jay McNeely (1948-55) here. That's right—he's not in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
JazzWax note: You can read my interviews with Big Jay McNeely here and Bob Willoughby here.
JazzWax clips:Here's Big Jay McNeely with Ray Collins' Hot-Club...
Here's Big Jay in San Francisco a few years ago, blowing his big hit Deacon's Hop...
Before MFSB, the Delfonics, McFadden & Whitehead, Blue Magic and the Trammps, there were the artists of Arctic Records. Like Motown in Detroit, Stax in Memphis and Scepter in New York, Arctic documented Philadelphia's emerging soul sound in the '60s, which emphasized tight vocal harmonies and heartbeat ballad tempos. [Pictured above: Arctic artist Barbara Mason]
Unlike most other labels at the time that specialized in recording African-American artists, Arctic wasn't obsessed with crossing-over. What's more, artists weren't groomed to sound like clones of more successful acts on more popular labels. Instead, Arctic captured dozens of local artists in their element—radiating innocence and singing passionately about love, cheating, breakups and all the rest. This sound became an integral part of the Philadelphia soul and disco movement in the '70s.
Now, the entire Arctic catalog has been released on a six-CD box set called Cooler Than Ice: Arctic Records and the Rise of Philly Soul (Jamie/Guyden). The mono recordings have been lovingly mixed by the legendary Tom Moulton, who probably knows more about the Philly sound and how to bring it into distinct sonic relief than anyone else. Tom, of course, has spent much of his career producing Philly soul and disco recordings, inventing the commercial 12-inch single and remastering and remixing dozens of disco and soul collections for the digital age. Tom's mixes were then mastered by Peter Humphreys at Masterwork Recording.
Arctic was founded by WDAS program director and deejay Jimmy Bishop [pictured above], with the help of attorney Harold Lipsius of Jamie/Guyen Records, in September 1964. Bishop admired Atlantic Records and chose the name of another ocean for the label's name. Arctic's biggest hit was Barbara Mason's Yes I'm Ready, but the label had quite a few local hits that moved love-struck teens.
The label released 60 singles in all, and their success owed a great deal to Bishop's drive and networking savvy among disc jockeys nationwide. Among the joys on this set are artists like Cindy Gibson (Whisper You Love Me, Boy), Kenny Gamble (Down By The Seashore), Mike and Ike (Ya Ya), Honey & the Bees (I'll Be There), the Ambassadors (I Dig You Baby), the Royal Five (Ain't No Big Thing, But It's Growing), Della Humphrey (Over The Tracks), Winfield Parker (Brand New Start), Teddy and the Fingerpoppers (Soul Groove Part 1), the Temptones (Girl I Love You and Good-Bye) and super-early Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes (Go Away and What Can A Man Do). And plenty of Barbara Mason (26 A- and B-side tracks).
The '60s were a special time if you were a kid who loved 45s. There were so many independent labels and record stores, and early soul acts took their time—with strings, hooks and singers who could sell songs seductively. Just listen to what Arctic's Ambassadors did with Frankie Valli's Can't Take My Eyes Off of You in 1969.
Philadelphia had other labels (Swan, for example), but none would be as consistent or as influential as Arctic when it came to producing music that went on to sway a decade and put the city on the music map.
Hats off to Frank Lipsius [pictured above], son of Harold Lipsius, who co-founded Jamie/Guyden Records and helped Jimmy Bishop start Arctic. Frank has worked for the company since the late '60's and became the head of the label when his father passed away a few years ago. He has a masters in history from Cambridge in England, and this is his baby.
For the New York launch party recently held in a used record store in Tribeca, he even chartered a bus and brought a dozen or so Arctic artists up to mingle, perform and be celebrated. You've never seen so many people having so much fun—artists and guests.
JazzWax tracks: You'll find Cooler Than Ice: Arctic
Records and the Rise of Philly Soul (Jamie/Guyen) here. It's a pricey set but if you love soul, it's well worth it. The 10-inch set comes with six CDs, six 45s and a 50-page book of liner notes by Bill Dahl. To download the set or individual tracks, go here.
Last week, Grant Stewart sent along a lengthy email from Uruguay, where he was performing at the Punta Del Este International Jazz Festival. I've known Grant for five years—my first liner notes were written for his album Young at Heart (Sharp Nine). When I saw him recently and he told me he was heading down to Uruguay, I asked him to send along an email that I could share with you:
Hi Marc,
I just finished playing the 17th annual Punta Del Este International Jazz Festival tonight [January 9]. This is
such a beautiful place with incredibly kind people. Really something else.
This year I played a set with Jesse Davis on alto. It was great to be with him again. It has been a while, and he's sounding better than ever. We were joined by the great David Hazeltine on piano, Nat Reeves on bass and Jason Brown on drums.
I also played a tribute to Charlie Parker led by Paquito D'Rivera on alto, me on tenor and Jesse Davis on alto, with Terell Stafford on trumpet, Gary Smulyan on baritone, David Hazeltine on piano, Nat Reeves on bass and Jason Brown on drums. Everyone played their asses off!
There was a trumpet tribute to Clifford Brown with three terrific players: Diego Urcola, Joe Magnarelli [pictured above] and Terell Stafford. They were accompanied by the Mike LeDonne Trio, featuring John Webber on bass and Joe Farnsworth on drums. It was really cooking.
Magnarelli and Smulyan also did a super tribute to Pepper Adams and Gerry Mulligan, with the Mike LeDonne Trio. Paquito did a set with his quintet with trumpeter Diego Urcola, pianist Alex Brown, bassist Zach Brown and drummer Eric Doob—which was beautiful. "Jazz Meets Classical" was the concept.
Pianist Alex Brown (from New York ) and David Feldman (from Brazil) played tonight with their trios, and both sounded great. Good times after the concerts, with a dinner followed by a jam session.
The festival is put on by Francisco Yobino [pictured above, right], and Paquito D'Rivera is the musical director. It's held each year at Francisco's farm, and over the past 17 years he's had pretty much all the greats out there to play. It's truly amazing that he puts it on each year purely out of his love for jazz. It renews your faith to see people like this!
Francisco's farm is about 15 minutes inland from the stunning coast of Punta Del Este. It's set among rolling hills, forests, horses and free-range jazz saxophonists. It's hot here during the day—in the high 80's or low 90's. In the evening the temperature drops down to the 60's.
It's amazing the number of jazz fans here. I've been playing the festival for the last four years and have gotten to know quite a few of them. Fortunately I learned to speak Spanish years ago and still have it on the old mental hard drive. [Pictured above: Punta Del Este, Uruguay]
The fans in Uruguay are super enthusiastic about the music. There also were a lot of fans and musicians who came over from nearby Argentina, including the great drummer Pipi Piazzolla (grandson of Astor Piazzolla) and many other leading players. It's only a short flight or ferry ride to Buenos Aires from here.
Food-wise, this is one of my favorite places in the world. Argentina is praised for its beef, but Uruguay has fantastic meat as well. Dulce de leche is another sinfully good export. It's funny, when you eat it here in the fresh air, with nature all around you, it actually feels healthy to eat caramel. Mind over matter.
This year I didn't venture into the city of Punta Del Este, but it's considered the Riviera of South America by the jet-set crowd. When you drive by the smallish airport here, you see more private jets than a Criminal Minds marathon. Maybe too obscure a reference, but put simply, there are a lot of business jets.
The festival lasted only five days, but they were very intense days, musically, and the people at the festival here are like family. It's always sad to leave, but hopefully I'll be back soon.
If anyone's looking for a winter vacation next year this is the place.
Beautiful beaches, beautiful people and some really swinging music. Darn
good food, too.
I've got a week back in New York and then I'm off to play with the great trumpet player John Marshall in Switzerland and Austria. It should be a blast, and I'm really looking forward to it.
Gotta say, I'm really grateful that I get to do this for a living. The word "work" came up among the musicians at one point the other day, and immediately a Mark Twain quote came to mind: "What work I have done I have done because it has been play. If it had been work, I shouldn't have done it."
Well, it's 3 a.m.—time for bed. Take care and I hope to see you soon.
Grant
Jazzwax note:Here's the site of the Punta Del Este
International Jazz Festival. If you want to go next year, start taking a look in the fall.
JazzWax clip: Here's Grant Stewart playing Somewhere in the Night from his new release, Live at Smalls, with Tardo Hammer on piano, David Wong on bass and brother Phil Stewart on drums.
Dig Grant tagging Crepuscule With Nellie and The Things We Did Last Summer at 2:08—in the same line!
Get your tickets now to Why Jazz Happened—the multimedia show at 92Y/Tribeca on February 4 at noon. I will take you through 30 years of jazz with images and music. I'll also tell you the reasons eight different jazz styles emerged. From World War II to Watergate, you'll hear and see how jazz evolved from bebop to fusion. This is for experts and novices who want to learn why jazz is such a big deal. For more information and tickets, go here.
Duke Ellington. Terry Teachout informs me that he has just finished writing the first draft of his hefty biography of Duke Ellington. High five, Terry. Read more here. [Photo of Duke Ellington above by William P. Gottlieb]
Lester Holt is more than just a fine NBC news journalist. He's also a jazz bassist...
Jazz-classical—New York style. On Sunday, the Chris Byars Quartet will join Sinfonietta of Riverdale, a classical ensemble, to premiere a new jazz-classical work. Time: 2:30 p.m. at the Riverdale Temple, 4545 Independence Ave. (at 246th St.) in the Bronx. Free parking. For directions, go here. Tickets are $35 each ($25 for seniors and $15 for students. [Pictured above: Chris Byars]
For more information, go here. How good is Sinfonietta of Riverdale. Hear for yourself...
Patti Page, 1957. Let's say it's 1957, and you've just come home from work. There are no computers, cell phones, iPads or iPods. Just the old radio and your new
television set. The kids are upstairs listening to their phonograph, so you'll have the TV all to yourself. Back then, there wasn't much on—just a handful of stations, and your only means of seeing pop stars during the week was by tuning into one of the many variety shows hosted by singers. Most of these shows were pretty bland, and they don't hold-up well, this one included, but they had their moments. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Patti Page and The Big Record, complete with ads...
Platter chatter. If you bemoan the loss of record stores—a place to hang out, listen to music and spend some money—meet Sally White of Westport, Conn. (use Safari or Chrome to access). A special thanks to Dave Sampson for sharing...
Harold Mabern is featured on piano here by Solos, which promotes New York City music, dance, visual arts and comedy by creating original video content. More about Solos here. Here's Harold (use Safari or Chrome to access by link)...
Hal Blaine x 2. Take a driving trip to Norway, courtesy of the famed Wrecking Crew drummer...
What's it like to be a recording engineer? Hal sent this one along...
Radio. Next Wednesday, John Greenspan of KSFR in Santa Fe, N.M., will host his annual show featuring favorite jazz CDs from 2012. The show airs at from 9 a.m. to noon (MST). To listen, tune-in here.
Gene Shaw. Trevor Preston of Toronto, Canada, sent along an interview he conducted with trumpeter Gene Shaw's family. Go here.
CD discovery of the week. By now, you know how fond I am of the new jazz-groove style emerging from artists like Robert Glasper, Esperanza Spalding and others. The style is digital-savvy and reaches
backward to the '70s and integrates the soul feel with current sounds to create dynamic textures. Add to the list Yeah, a German band. On The Challenge, an action-packed album, Yeah fuses a big beat, horns, organ, Fender Rhodes, a synthesizer, a rubbery bass, wah-wah guitar, scratching, samples, programmed riffs and more. It's Tower of Power meets Les McCann meets Roy Ayers. I can't stop listening to it. To sample, go here. You'll find this one hidden at iTunes.
Who are these guys? Here's an email from the band...
"We're based in Berlin. Most of us are in our mid-20s and hung up on old sounds. This means we are down with old samples, recording on tape and classic miking. Style wise we're not too strict. Nevertheless there's definitely always a tendency toward jazz. Four of us
form the basis of Yeah. Several tracks feature friends, and we even included a children's choir at the end of No Matter What).
"The Challenge is our first release on 180-gram vinyl.It
was recorded and mixed last year in Germany and mastered by Dave Cooley
in Los Angeles. The cover is by Markus Mai in Berlin. Band members:
Christian Schock, Flo König, Leo Hilsheimer and Philip Lawall."
Oddball albums cover of the week.
There's nothing like falling in love and frolicking with your special other—in the Niagara River.
On the front page of today's Mansion section of the Wall Street Journal (go here), I interview architect Renzo Piano and husband-and-wife architects Billie Tsien and Tod Williams about their homes. These interviews are part of my ongoing series on world-class architects and the choices they've made with their own residences and living spaces. [Photo above of Billie and Tod's Central Park South penthouse by Bryan Derballa]
In the case of Renzo and Billie and Tod, both have two homes that they use regularly and in both cases they designed one with a spectacular view and renovated the other for a retreat. [Photo above of Renzo Piano's glass house and multistory office in Genoa, Italy, overlooking the Lugurian Sea]
Renzo [above] is one of the world's best-known designers of bold, game-changing buildings. His most recent is The Shard in London. Billie and Tod most recently designed the new Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia that opened in May 2012. But where do these architects live and what sorts of choices do they make for their own living spaces?
Renzo built a modern glass home on a hillside in in Genoa, Italy, that is in the style of greenhouses there. He also has an apartment in the Place des Vosges in Paris [above]. He spends two weeks in Paris, a week in Genoa and a week in the U.S. or wherever projects take him. As he told me, these two homes are extensions of his soul and he treats them like rooms in the same house separated by a flight and drive.
Billie and Tod designed a glass penthouse on the roof of a building on Central Park South in New York. They also renovated a duplex apartment in a building on the city's Upper West Side. As Billie said during our conversation at her duplex, one is their exposed glamour-pad that they use to think and entertain while the duplex is their cocoon—where they read, view their art and just watch TV.
For more in this series, read my interviews with Richard Meier and Frank Gehry on their residences.
JazzWax clips: See a slide show of Renzo Piano and Billie Tsien and Tod Williams's own homes (go here).
Here is a time-lapse video on Renzo Piano's The Shard in London...
Here's a time-lapse video on the Billie Tsien and Tod Williams's new Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia...
Singer Marlene VerPlanck has a new album coming—Ballads, Mostly. It's a delicious collection of moody songs with an upbeat feel. Seven of the 15 tracks were arranged by Marlene's late husband, Billy VerPlanck, who died in 2009. Though Marlene spent three decades recording demos and jingles starting in the '60s, she began her professional career in the bands of Charlie Spivak and Tommy Dorsey and recorded many terrific jazz albums over the years.
Marlene also continues to perfom. On Saturday at 1 p.m., she will be singing at the Sheet Music Society of New York City, at 322 W.
48th St., just west of 8th Ave. AFM members are free, $10 for others. She will be joined by pianist, songwriter and singer Ronny Whyte. CDs and sheet music will be available, with all proceeds going to The Cancer Fund. For more information: (212 245-4802). She has an amazing range and often soars in into the high range without fear.
During our recent conversation, Marlene talked about how she got her start and meeting a guy in the street with a glass of milk:
JazzWax: Where did you grow up? Marlene VerPlanck: I was born in Newark, and we lived there until I was 16. Then my family moved to Bloomfield, N.J., about 15 minutes away. We needed a bigger house for me and my younger brother and sister. We were a very close Italian family. There are 13 of us in my generation, and I still get together with my first cousins.
JW: Was your family musical? MV: No. My family was in the restaurant business. My grandfather started the biggest Italian restaurant in Newark—Biase’s—and it was around for about 85 years. Originally my grandmother was in the kitchen there. My mother also was a master chef. My favorite recipe of hers was lasagna.
JW: Did you train as a singer? MV: No. Actually, I didn’t start singing until I was 19 years old. I recorded my first album in 1955, a session for Savoy that Ozzie Cadena produced.
JW: How did you go from no experience to a Savoy record date? MV: As a kid, my mother always had the radio dial on WNEW in New York, which played big band and pop music. I also used to sing along with records all the time. I used to go down to WNJR in Newark and pull records for Carl Ide, who had a show. I hung out there and one day decided I was going to sing. I never looked back.
JW: You really hadn’t been singing professionally? MV: Just a little. Before age 19 I had never worked at a club. Then, in the summer of 1955, I began singing at The Well in Caldwell, N.J. I was so young and green. My dad took me to the club and told them he was my agent.
JW: Who was playing? MV: There was a trio. After I sang, one of the local piano players said, “You know, I’d use you on the job but you don’t know any songs.” So I went home and learned every song in a fake book. When I came back, there wasn’t a song I didn’t know, and I kept the gig for several months. That must have been where Ozzie first heard me. [Pictured: Marlene with the John LaSalle Quartet; if you have this one on CD, please let me know]
JW: Not a bad Savoy session in November ‘55. MV: Oh, you mean Joe Wilder, Hank Jones, Eddie Jones and Kenny Clarke. Yes, I know [laughs]. They were brought in special to record my album.
JW: In early ’56, Charlie Spivak [pictured above] asked you to join his band. MV: For a singer, it was a great opportunity. The big band era was over, but there was still a market for people who liked to listen to bands.
JW: Did you tour? MV: Yes, right away. The band was leaving from the front of the President Hotel in New York in February 1956. My parents drove me into the city and it was snowing. We sat in the car, and one by one the guys in the band began showing up. All of a sudden we see this one guy with an overcoat that was too small on him with a trombone case, carrying a glass of milk. My mother grabbed my arm and said, “I hope you don’t get in the car with that one.”
JW: What happened? MV: I wound up sitting between him and another guy in one of the cars. He was so gentle and nice, we hit it off immediately and started talking. He was funny and everything I ever wanted in a guy. We were so compatible. After each gig we’d go and talk. He also had brought his records and phonograph. He was the only one in the band who did that, because he was passionate about music.
JW: And the guy’s name? MV: Billy VerPlanck [pictured above]. We met in February ’55 and married in October. My family name was Pampinella, but I had been going by Marlene Paula, my middle name, at clubs. After we wed, I took Billy's name, which I liked very much.
JW: In October? MV: He proposed in an elevator. I didn’t hesitate. I really loved him by then. We were together and in love until Billy died in 2009.
JW: How long were you with Spivak? MV: Not long. We joined Tommy Dorsey’s band for a short period. Billy worshiped Tommy. He thought he was the greatest player and a superb businessman. The last Dorsey band was great—it had Louis Bellson, Charlie Shavers and Sonny Russo. Billy wrote arrangements.
JW: How was it singing with the band? MV: Our first gig was in North Carolina. There must have been 6,000 people in the audience. I figured that on the first night, Tommy would ask me to do one or two songs. So I learned the book to be sure I had them all covered. But that night he asked me to do them all. At intermission, Tommy called out to me: “Marlene! Marlene!” I’m quaking in my boots. What did I do wrong? Tommy said, “When you take your bow, take a real one.” I had been just nodding [laughs]. He was right. Tommy was a real showman.
JW: What was it about Dorsey? MV: When Tommy walked out on stage, he was the last one to come out. Trombonist Vinnie Forrest usually did the intro. Then Tommy would stride on stage like a stallion. Big and broad and imposing. He had a presence. Jimmy was quiet and laid back. Tommy was the leader.
JW: A nice guy? MV: You didn’t get close to Tommy. The more you stayed away the better off you’d be. The night before Billy and I got married, Billy rode with him in his car to the next gig. Tommy said, “Don’t get married, it’s just trouble.” Billy was so scared. After we got married, Billy was afraid to tell him. Then Tommy died in November, and we had a decision to make.
JW: How so? MV: At the end of ‘56, after Tommy died, the band went to Las Vegas. But neither of us wanted to go out there. I said to Billy, “Let’s stay in New York. If we don’t do it now, we’ll never get back here again.” It turned out to be the best thing we ever did.
JW: Why? MV: Because the work picked-up for both of us. Fortunately, Billy said he didn’t want me to be a musical moron. I could learn songs fast but I wasn’t a sight-reader. So I studied with Helen Jordan. I put my nose to the grindstone and worked my tail off for six hours a day, seven days a week, for three years. At the end, in 1960, I could read anything.
JW: Why was that important? MV: I wound up with a ton of work for demos and ad jingles for the next 30 years. It was a very lucrative period. All the songwriters from the Brill Building would come in and I’d make demo records, which they’d then use to sell publishers on the songs, who in turn would use them to win record deals for artists.
JW: What about jingles? MV: I was like one of the women on the show Mad Men. I started singing "Mmm, Good" for Campbell’s Soup. I sang the “Yeah” in the Michelob beer ads, I sang “Nationwide is on your side,” and many of the most familiar ad tag lines.
JW: Did you work with Sinatra? MV: Yes, on Trilogy. I sang on the date and contracted the 16 background singers in the choir. It’s the album with Don Costa arrangements. His charts were to die for.
JW: Did Billy come to the sessions? MV: Billy usually never came to my record dates. He didn’t want to get in the way. But in this case, I said, “You have to come, you’ll love it.” Billy agreed. Up until that point, Sinatra was doing only one take of each song. When Billy came in, they had just finished Just the Way You Are. But on playback, there was a mistake and they had to re-do it. Billy got to hear it live. You could cry it was so beautiful. We were two crybabies when we heard things that were great.
JW: What happened after? MV: Billy saw Sonny Burke in the booth. He said to me, “I just have to shake his hand.” If Billy liked something someone played or did, he’d always go up to the person to shake his hand. He tapped Sonny as he was walking out. Sonny turned around briskly. Billy said, “I just wanted to tell you I was on Jimmy Dorsey’s band and played your arrangement of Lover every night. Sonny smiled from ear to ear. “That’s my favorite arrangement,” he said.
JW: You and Billy were quite a couple. MV: We were. I miss him. He never went out with the guys and I never went out with the girls. We went out together and went to each other’s sessions. We both got lucky.
JazzWax tracks: Marlene VerPlanck's wonderful new album, Ballads, Mostly, will be released soon. Until then, here are my favorites, many with arrangements by Billy VerPlanck...
Ada Louise Huxtable, the country's most respected and eloquent architecture critic, whose finely crafted articles, essays and books held architects and their works to high humanistic standards, died January 7. She was 91.
Ada Louise was most recently the architecture critic for the Wall Street Journal, but she was an early mentor of mine when I worked as a college intern at The New York Timesin the late 1970s, and she was a member of the Editorial Board. A formidable and elegant presence, Ada Louise's eyes could simultaneously exude quiet understanding and steely aggression—leaving powerful male editors and architects unsure of her thoughts and hesitant to learn more.
As a critic, Ada Louise believed firmly that urban planning, buildings of historic note, and new structures had certain civic obligations. To be sure, buildings had a functional purpose and economic constraints, but they also had a distinct responsibility to enrich the streetscape and improve society's quality of life.
For architecture and interior design to be considered significant by Ada Louise, they not only had to be magnificently bold but also respect the people who would have to use them and raise the public's collective aesthetic. Ada Louise believed that architecture wasn't the private domain of minds that knew better but a practice charged with elevating how a community felt about itself and its future.
To readers of this blog who believe they don't care a lick about architecture or understand its value, I can tell you that you actually do. Just as you can tell the difference between a gorgeous Nelson Riddle arrangement and a cheap chart, your soul can discern between what pleases your eye and what is offensive. The uninitiated simply need to switch on the line of communication between the eyes, heart and thoughts.
Ada Louise's writings helped bridge those gaps, describing in simple but eloquent terms why a design succeeded or failed. And she could do so effortlessly, with deft praise or the swish-swish of a literary foil. No one took misguided architects and lousy architecture to task like Ada Louise. As a reader, you almost felt sorry for the subject of her criticism—until you were reminded of the work that person left behind.
The reason I love architecture today and write about architects for the Wall Street Journal (in addition to music) is largely because of Ada Louise. When I worked at The Times while in college, part of my job was to make sure that the dozen or so books that arrived each day for her were removed from their envelopes or tight corrugated packaging and stacked neatly in her office. (I also had daily duties for the other 15-or-so editorial board members and Op-Ed editors.)
Ada Louise wasn't a tall woman, but whatever she lacked in imposing height was more than offset by her untouchable elegance and poised stare. In other words, she was apart and held in awe, particularly by those like me whose job it was to make sure all was in order. Each day before she arrived, I assembled the new books on Eero Saarinen, Alvar Aalto, the Chicago school, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, the Stick style, John Ruskin, Frank Lloyd Wright and dozens of others. [Photo above of Ada Louise Huxtable in the New York Times newsroom in 1970 with chairman Arthur Ochs Sulzberger after winning the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism; photo by Librado Romero]
These were big books, before publishing became cheap, with huge full-page photos and wonderfully written captions and text. Little by little, I became more and more curious and enamored—not with the nuts and bolts of architecture but the glory, the beauty and the reasons why some buildings and cities were spectacular and others were garish and meaningless. To understand the difference, I needed to know everything.
One morning, I lingered too long in her office reading one of her new books, and Ada Louise surprised me—before I could leave and turn off her lights. Fumbling, I apologized for being there. But rather than chastise me, Ada Louise asked what I was reading. When I showed her the book on Mies van der Rohe's Farnsworth House, she asked me if it was good. I told her it was and asked how something so simple could be so captivating and impossibly beautiful. [Photo above by Gene Maggio]
I can't remember her exact words, but Ada Louise said something about lines and geometry being very powerful things when used boldly and placed in nature just-so, and that when a building's design and materials engaged us on a human level, they made us feel special. She insisted I keep the book.
Back at college, I began taking a long series of architecture courses that gave me a finer appreciation of the profession, the history and the art. Each time I returned to The Times for a tour of duty (I was enrolled in a five-year work-study program at Northeastern University in Boston), my conversations with Ada Louise grew longer, as did our correspondence.
Naturally, when I began writing on architecture for The Wall Street Journal in 2010, I felt a certain confidence and satisfaction—understanding not only the importance of the form but also the history and what makes certain buildings and architects special. My first piece was on Manhattan's modernist Mad Men office lobbies that had remained intact since their installation in the '50s and early '60s (go here).
That's when it happened. Ada Louise, who was the paper's architecture critic at the time, saw the article and sent along an email:
"Marc - Wonderful piece. Who else is a connoisseur of those lobbies and could have written so delightfully and knowledgeably about them! So glad the WSJ gave it such a great display. Liked the anchoring quotes too - they added that extra stamp of authoritative comment.' And you may have scooped the new locale [of Mad Men], too - lovely. -All best, Ada Louise"
Yesterday, I choked up re-reading that email. Ada Louise and her books opened a new world of adventure for me back in the '70s that continues to this day. She also taught me that passion, when applied just so as a writer, can help your words leap to life and sweep readers up in your joy. Ada Louise was special. Her many books—given to me as gifts so long ago—still remind me always to do my best.
More on Ada Louise in today's Wall Street Journal tribute here.
And here's Ada Louise three years ago on Charlie Rose...
Marc Myers writes frequently on music and the arts for the Wall Street Journal. He is author of "Why Jazz Happened" (University of California Press). In 2012, JazzWax was named the Jazz Journalists Association's "Blog of the Year."
