JazzWax

Tom, Artie and Helen

In the Wall Street Journal this week, I interviewed actor Tom Blyth for my "House Call" column in the Mansion section (go here). Tom plays Billy in the Epix drama series Billy the Kid. [Photo above of Tom Blyth by Chris Large, courtesy of Epix]

Here's the trailer...

Artie Kane (1929-2022), a distinctive West Coast studio pianist and organist who can be heard on dozens recordings and who was a prolific TV and movie composer and arranger, died on June 21. He was 93.

Perhaps Kane's best known contribution was his opening organ part on Frank Sinatra's The Summer Wind in 1966. I interviewed Artie back in 2016 when I wrote an essay for the Wall Street Journal arguing that Strangers in the Night is Sinatra's finest and most perfect Reprise album, thanks in great measure to Artie's witty organ throughout, except on the title track. [Photo above of Artie Kane with Henry Mancini]

Why the title track was recorded first with a different arranger and orchestra and how Sinatra beat Jack Jones onto the radio with the song even though Jones recorded the song first can be found in my WSJ essay here. My JazzWax posts on the 1966 album and my conversations with Artie are here and here.

In tribute to Artie, I decided on two clips. The first gives you a brief look at Artie at work on a song with the fastest tempo ever recorded by Sinatra. The second is my send-off to Artie, who was adored by singers for his hip and sophisticated musical playfulness. As Peggy Lee says in the following clip about Artie's organ fills mid-song while looking over at him, "I like that"...

Here's Sinatra singing The Most Beautiful Girl in the World from Strangers in the Night. As the boom camera swings off to the left and pans right, watch for Artie Kane on the right side of your screen on the organ and Nelson Riddle conducting...

And here's Peggy Lee singing So What's New, a song for which she wrote the lyrics to John Pisano's music, with Artie on organ...

Jerry Lewis was in his fair share of terrific comedy scenes, but this one takes the cake, from the film Who's Minding the Store (1963). A book could be written just on how exactly this scene was shot and reshot and reshot. I haven't a clue how they did it, but the scene is mind-blowing. Go here...

Jeff Beck has a new album coming with Johnny Depp on vocals (whoops). Here's Beck live with an instrumental of Brian Wilson's Caroline, No. A terrific rendition, leaving me surprised that someone didn't urge him to cover the entire Beach Boys' Pet Sounds album. Would have been spectacular. Go here...

Joan Chamorro is a jazz giant, a high-energy multi-instrumentalist, an arranger-composer and an inspiring jazz teacher beloved by his students in Barcelona, Spain. Here he is in May 2002 on baritone saxophone with Germany's WDR Big Band playing Dizzy Gillespie's Bebop...

And finally, here's Helen Reddy in 1972. No words are needed...

Recreating a Famed Bossa Rehearsal

As a Brazilian teenager and budding guitarist in the late 1950s, Nara Leão befriended many of the singer-songwriters pioneering the bossa nova in Rio de Janeiro. These artists included Roberto Menescal, Carlos Lyra, Ronaldo Bôscoli, João Gilberto, Vinicius de Moraes and Antônio Carlos Jobim. Employed at hotels as musicians along the Copacabana beachfront, these soft-sound artists were often invited over to the nearby home of Leão's parents in 1958 to rehearse bossa songs and refine their style. Leão would become known as the "muse of the bossa nova" and a bossa star in her own right. [Photo above of Nara Leão, right, at her parents' apartment with Antonio Carlos Jobim, pointing, and other bossa nova artists in 1958]

Last week, Nelson Porto in Brazil sent along a YouTube video clip of leading bossa nova artists (and an English one) recreating what those rehearsals sounded like. I'm guessing the video is from 2011. Marcos Valle is in a rose T-shirt, Roberto Menescal (who was at the original rehearsals) is in white, famed Brazilian singer Leila Pinheiro is in black, Andy Summers (English guitarist with the Police) is in blue and popular bossa nova vocalist Pery Ribeiro is in the two-toned pink shirt. They are performing Marcos Valle's Samba de Verão, also known in English as Summer Samba. I spoke with Marcos earlier today. "We were all in the former Leão apartment. The current owner had allowed us all to come over and play and tape." By the way, behind Pinheiro is Marco's wife, Patricia, who also is an accomplished singer.

Here's the clip...

JazzWax notes: To read my post on Nara Leão, go here. To read my WSJ "House Call" with Marcos Valle at home, go here.

JazzWax bonus: Here's Leila Pinheiro's Isso é Bossa Nova from 1994. All of the album tracks, featuring Pinheiro's beautiful voice, follow this one at YouTube...

One of the Best Sassy Videos Ever

Last week, Nelson Porto in Brazil sent along a link to a Sarah Vaughan video that I hadn't seen before. To me, it's by far one of the finest live videos of Sassy on stage in the second half of her career. It's a duet with Wilson Simonal, who is little known outside of Brazil but who was one of that country's leading singing sensations in the 1960s and '70s. [Photo above of Sarah Vaughan]

Vaughan didn't speak a word of Portuguese and Simonal didn't speak a word of English, but they figured it all out, and the chemistry between them is what makes this clip so special. It didn't hurt that Vaughan was clearly smitten by Simonal looks, charm and talent. His English vocal was produced by memorizing words with little sense of their meaning. Same goes for Vaughan's Portuguese at the start. But how they felt about each other is evident and will put a smile on your face. [Photo above of Wilson Simonal]

PS: I have a majority of Wilson Simonal's albums in my collection, so I'll have a post on him soon, complete with clips.

Here's Simonal and Sassy in Rio singing The Shadow of Your Smile in September 1970...

Bonus: Here's Vaughan in March 1970 singing There Will Never Be Another You on Playboy After Dark. As you listen, count the number of uncomfortable characters in the audience, starting with the creepy pipe-smoking Hefner and the high-strung clapper in the front row. Poor Sarah. The entire room seems to be hyperventilating through their first cocaine experience. All of which is probably why her eyes remained closed for much of her sterling vocal performance...