JazzWax

Interview: Paul Bacon (Part 1)

Even if the name Paul Bacon doesn't ring a bell, his covers for more than 200 jazz albums will. Paul helped set the mood and mystique for modern jazz back in the early 1950s at the dawn of the LP jacket. Back then, Paul was the illustrator and art director of many early Blue Note albums and became Riverside's art director until the 1960s, when he went on to an even more illustrious career as a book-cover designer. [Photo of Paul Bacon in 2002 by Hank O'Neal]

Paul's covers include Thelonious Monk: The Genius of Modern Music, The Amazing Bud Powell (which he also illustrated), Fats Navarro: Memorial Album, James Moody and His Modernists, Milt Jackson: Wizard of the Vibes and dozens of others. His art direction for Riverside includes Randy Weston: Cole Porter in a Modern Mood, Thelonious Monk's Brilliant Corners and Monk's Music, Sonny Rollins' The Sound of Sonny and Freedom Suite, Chet Baker Sings, Everybody Digs Bill Evans and many more.

In Part 1 of my four-part interview with Paul Bacon, 86, the graphic designer and art director talks about growing up in Newark, N.J., the girl he met as a teen who would later change his career, his interest in graphic design, serving in World War II, and designing early covers for Blue Note:

JazzWax: Where did you grow up?
Paul Bacon: I was born in Ossining, N.Y., but my family lived in many places in the New York City area. My father didn’t know how to do anything and was 27 years old when the stock market crashed in 1929. In the 1930s, my family was broke. We bounced around from place to place. It wasn’t pleasant but it also wasn’t unusual. Many families faced the same difficulty. We settled in Newark, N.J. in 1939.

JW: Were you happy about Newark?
PB: Yes. Especially since there was a "hot club" there. I don't mean a nightclub but a club made up of teens who were passionate about jazz. The club was quite a serious enterprise. We met, we listened to jazz records and talked about the music all the time in school. [Pictured: Newark, N.J., in the 1930s]

JW: Where did you go to school?
PB: I was lucky enough to attend Newark Arts High School, New Jersey’s equivalent of Manhattan's prestigious High School of Music and Art. At Arts High, you could major in art, music or theater. 

JW: So you were already interested in jazz before your family arrived in Newark, yes?
PB: Yes. My introduction came through the radio. My brother and I realized we were jazz fans after hearing Benny Goodman on the Camel Caravan show in 1935. In Newark, we not only listened to Goodman and Artie Shaw but we met people who’d tell us about Bix Beiderbecke, Louis Armstrong, Bessie Smith and others. The people who lived in Newark were older and hipper than we were. They had been listening to jazz and reading books like The Magic Mountain, which was foreign to us.

JW: Why did you feel drawn to jazz?
PB: The music transported me to another place. In Newark, our jazz club had about 23 teenage members of every conceivable background. Some had great collections of records. My brother and I had records but we didn’t have a phonograph. But the club did.

JW: How did you first hear about the club?
PB: We found it by making friends in school with Tony Tamborello. I became fond of his whole family. Tony could play Bix’s In a Mist on the piano. Tony eventually became Tony Bennett's right-hand man. One day Tony Tamborello said that his girlfriend liked the same music we did and that she was a member of this jazz club. He was a musician and didn’t have time for the club. But he told her about my brother and me, and she brought us into the club.

JW: Who was the girl?
PB: Lorraine Stein, who would marry Alfred Lion of Blue Note and later marry Max Gordon of the Village Vanguard, becoming Lorraine Gordon [laughs].

JW: What did you do after high school?
PB: I took a job with Scheck Advertising, a small agency in Newark. I talked my way into it. They thought I knew far more than I actually did. I could always draw, as well as write, sing and design. I was at the agency for two years and learned what I needed to know. I also was drawing and lettering on the side. Back then, if you wanted lettering on a poster or an ad, someone who knew how to letter had to do it by hand. 

JW: Did World War II alter your plans?
PB: I was drafted in 1943. My brother was already in the Marine Corps. They wanted me for the Army but I insisted on the Marines because it was a family tradition. I was 6 feet tall and weighed 133 pounds so they let me in. I was sent to Guadalcanal, Guam and China.

JW: How was it?
PB: I never heard a shot fired in anger. My brother was injured within 24 hours of landing at Bougainville Island in the South Pacific in late 1943. I stayed at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina until 1944. Eventually I was shipped out to the Pacific as a replacement. At Guadalcanal [pictured], the U.S. had already secured the island and there was a large base there. Then I spent time at Peliliu Island working. At this point I was a corporal. After Japan surrendered, I spent six months in China doing virtually nothing. In April 1946, the Marines sent me home.

JW: Where was your family?
PB: They had moved to Union Beach, N.J., so my mom could have fresh air. My brother had gotten married. When I returned, I didn’t bother taking advantage of the G.I. Bill. I got a job for $30 a week at Zamboni Associates on East 48th St. The person who hired me, Hal Zamboni, was a good typographic designer. I knew a fair amount about lettering and could draw. I was there for about nine years. We did mostly design work for companies, and I did the scratchboard drawings, which were popular at the time. Without getting too technical, it involved using a sharp tool to etch into a thin layer of clay coated in India ink.

JW: How did you meet Alfred Lion and Francis Wolff of Blue Note Records?
PB: When I returned from the war, Lorraine Stein had married Alfred. I had already known of him and Frank in the years before Pearl Harbor. Members of Newark’s "hot club" knew them.

JW: Where did you meet Lion?
PB: I had had a close friend in the Marine Corps, a radar guy. When I was living in N.J. after the war, I found his name in the phone book and where he was living. I called him up and we decided to get together. One day I started off in the direction of his house near Union Beach but it started to rain. I realized I didn’t really want to go, so I called and told him I wasn't coming. Then I called Lorraine [pictured]. She invited me over to their place at 50 Grove Street. When I arrived, Lorraine, Alfred and I sat and talked and listened to records. That afternoon I became interested in modern jazz.

JW: When did you move into New York?
PB: Soon afterward. One of the members of the "hot club" called and said, “You still want to live in New York?” He told me he knew a trumpet player who was looking for a roommate. Moving in those days was easy. You took your raincoat, typewriter and two albums and hailed a cab. Bob Dugan was the trumpet player, and I eventually married his cousin, Maxine Shirey, who was a dancer.

JW: Where did you live?
PB: Where Hunter College is now, at 68th St. and Lexington Ave.

JW: How did you meet Orrin Keepnews?
PB: Through his partner Bill Grauer. In the late 1940s, Bill and Orrin published the Record Changer magazine. Bill had asked Alfred if he knew anyone who could write jazz reviews for the Record Changer and Alfred recommended me.

JW: How did you do?
PB: I took to the music very quickly. I loved musicians like Fats Navarro, Bud Powell and others, and I became the magazine’s modern jazz critic.  My first review was Erroll Garner's Bouncin' with Me, which was recorded in 1945 but reissued on a 10-inch LP.

JW: Did you do any illustrating?
PB: Not at first. The Record Changer covers were being illustrated by Gene Deitch. He also did a running cartoon that they ran in every issue. At first I just reviewed records.

JW: When did you start illustrating for the magazine?
PB: When Bill Grauer found out I was a struggling graphic artist. He asked me to design the interior pages. I was already designing Blue Note album covers for Alfred and Frank Wolff and writing for the Record Changer. I also was doing a lot of scratchboards for Hal Zamboni. But I knew I could handle the extra work.

JW: What were your early Blue Note covers?
PB: Pretty traditional stuff: Sidney Bechet, Meade Lux  Lewis, Albert Ammons. They were graphic visions of the music. They were drawn by hand and represented the best I could do at the time with two colors.

Tomorrow, Paul Bacon talks about meeting Thelonious Monk, why the pianist was so fond of him, saving Charlie Parker from embarrassment, Monk's soft spot for artists, and how Monk came to be photographed for Riverside sitting in a red wagon.

A JazzWax thanks to Hank O'Neal.

Ira Gitler on Parker's Moods

Ira Gitler is a national jazz treasure. Each time we talk (which is often), the esteemed author, liner-notes writer, reviewer and historian sheds light on a jazz recording, artist or event with fresh detail and stories. Like Woody Allen's Leonard Zelig, Ira seems to have been at every major turning point in jazz history, an eyewitness to events most of us can only listen to or read about. Ira's books Swing to Bop and Masters of Bebop bear this out, and both are essential reading, as are his other works. [Photo by David Sokol]

During one of our recent chats, I wondered aloud if Ira knew the origins of Charlie Parker's more obscure song titles. Ira is a hard-core bebopper dating back to hearing Dizzy Gillespie and J.J. Johnson on 52d Street in the mid-1940s. His response to my request was, "Sure, let's do it." 

Here's Ira Gitler on the meaning of 17 Charlie Parker recordings:

Another Hair-do (1947)—In Bob Porter's liner notes to The Complete Charlie Parker on Savoy, Bob quotes Savoy Records producer Teddy Reig [pictured]: "That was just Bird's way of saying it was the same old thing with a new look." The song is a blues—same old thing with a new hair-do.

Barbados (1948)—When Reig wanted to avoid Savoy's owner Herman Lubinsky, he says in Bob Porter's notes, he'd head out to Brooklyn. Reig said, "I had a friend [there] named Otto Wilkinson. His family had a print shop, and he had a little record section in the front. Otto was from the islands and the whole Brooklyn scene had a lot of West Indian flavor. So Barbados was named for Otto and that whole thing."

Billie’s Bounce (1945)—was named for Billy Shaw's secretary. Shaw was Bird's manager at the time.

Bloomdido (1950)—For years this song was assumed to have been named for Augie Blume, a jazz enthusiast who dug Bird. But at the time the record was released, I had heard that the title was actually named for Maury Bloom, a jazz disc jockey in Buffalo, N.Y.

Cheryl (1947)—was named for Miles Davis' first child.

Constellation (1948)—is an up-tempo tribute to the Lockheed Constellation, at the time the fastest of the airliners. The first time I flew in one was in the spring of 1947, from St. Louis to New York, at the end of my first year of college.

Dewey Square (1947)—was named for Harlem's Dewey Square Hotel, where Bird was staying at the time.

Donna Lee (1947)—was named for bassist Curly Russell's daughter.

Half Nelson (1947)—technically part of the Miles Davis-led session featuring Bird on tenor sax, this song was named for bassist Nelson Boyd, who was short in stature.

Kim (1952)—was named for Chan's daughter. When Bird married Chan, Kim adopted Parker's name and grew up to be a very hip singer.

Klactoveesedstene (1947)—When Dial Records owner Ross Russell asked Bird what the word meant, Bird said, "It's a sound." 

Klaunstance (1947)—Savoy's Teddy Reig makes a reference to "Klaunevanstance," characterizing it as "one of Bird's weird titles." Klaunstance may have been for a lady whose real name was Constance but was a bit of a clown. 

Laird Baird (1952)—was named for Bird and Chan's son Baird.

Marmaduke (1948)—was named for a cat owned by Doris Parker, Bird's second wife.

Quasimado (1947)—originally misspelled when issued by Dial [pictured], the title wasn't corrected until decades later. The beautiful melody is based on the chord changes to Embraceable You. Of course, the title is named for Quasimodo from The Hunchback of Notre Dame, who wasn't very embraceable. I don't know who named the song, but Bird did have a sense of humor.

Sippin’ at Bells (1947)—This is another track recorded with Miles Davis as the leader. According to John Szwed's book, So What: the Life of Miles Davis, Miles' first wife Irene returned to New York, leaving their baby daughter Cheryl with Miles' mother in East St. Louis. Miles and Irene moved into a large apartment between Broadway and Riverside Drive on 147th Street. The apartment was owned by Bob Bell, an East St. Louis guitar player who had married well and whose wife had set him up in business. [Photo of Miles Davis by Herman Leonard/CTSImages.com]

At 147th and Broadway, the Bells owned a cocktail lounge, a restaurant and an ice cream parlor. The Bells had taken the Davises around New York and gave Irene a job as a cashier. In 1944, when Miles would return from his classes at Juilliard, he and Irene would sip ice-cream sodas at Bell's. 

Wee (1947)—When first recorded in 1946, this song was on a Coleman Hawkins' session for RCA Victor as part of an album showcasing musicians who were part of the 52nd Street scene. Tenor saxophonist Allen Eager [pictured] was featured on this number, and producer Leonard Feather named it Allen's Alley. Composer Denzil Best received full credit as the song's composer, but when Parker reintroduced the song a year later, it was called Wee. Perhaps the song title should have been Whee, since the opening note seems to express the sound of that word.

George Wein on the Rebel Festival

Most people are unaware that in 1960, Newport, R.I., hosted not one but two jazz festivals. There was the big one that had been produced by George Wein since 1954. And there was a smaller, alternative festival put on by Charles Mingus. But after the riot of July 2, 1960, the smaller concert series known as the Rebel Jazz Festival was all but forgotten in the flurry of headlines.

In Burt Goldblatt's book, Newport Jazz Festival, Lorraine Lorillard, freshly divorced from her husband by 1960 and forced off the Newport Jazz Festival board, is quoted on the origin of the Rebel Jazz Festival:

"In 1960, Nat Hentoff called me from New York and said that Charlie Mingus and Max Roach were fed up  with the Festival. They said they didn't believe in the idea of it. I went to Cliff Walk Manor and spoke to the owner, Nicholas Cannarozzi [about having an independent festival there with Mingus and Roach]. He was delighted with the idea and very cooperative.

"It was a lovely setting, right beside the ocean. We were going to have this marvelous publicity. All these musicians sleeping in tents, the way it really should be, except that Charlie Mingus and Max Roach slept in the hotel. They were photographed putting their own stakes in for the tents. It was beautiful."

"There was a lot of intrigue, and they were suspicious that I was really only crossing them and going back and forth to George [Wein]. That was ridiculous. I was suing George and the Festival [after being voted off the board]. I wasn't about to jeopardize that."

The Rebel Jazz Festival included Mingus, Roach [pictured], Ornette Coleman, Abbey Lincoln, Kenny Dorham, Jimmy Knepper, Roy Eldridge and Jo Jones. The music went unrecorded, so in November 1960, Nat Hentoff gathered the musicians and recorded them in a New York studio for his Candid label.

How did Mingus wind up angry with the Newport Jazz Festival? According to an article in the Providence Evening Bulletin in 1960 (included in Goldblatt's book):

"The revolt got in motion two months ago when the Newport Festival, in a New York advertisement, listed Mingus as a 1960 performer at Freebody Park [where the festival was held in Newport]. Festival officials say Mingus had agreed over the telephone to appear for $700 but later insisted on $5,000, mentioning the Benny Goodman fee. Wein says Goodman received $7,500 for an entire evening's program and out of this paid his 17-man band, plus singer Jimmy Rushing."

How did George Wein feel about the rival concert? I spoke with George about the Rebel Jazz Festival, Charles Mingus and what would have happened had the riot not occurred:

JazzWax: Did you and Charles Mingus have a falling out prior to the 1960 Newport Jazz Festival?
George Wein: Charlie Mingus was upset over money. So he and others grumbled about non-jazz acts appearing at the festival. I would have loved to have included everyone every year for 30 days straight for whatever amount they wanted. But we just couldn't. Our space, time and funds were limited.

JW: What was the Rebel Jazz Festival exactly?
GW: It was a masterpiece of public relations by Charles Mingus, who organized it, and the jazz musicians who played there. It was an alternative jazz festival, which today is commonplace. This may have been one of the first. All of the musicians who played there had worked for me appearing at the Newport Jazz Festival from the beginning in 1954.

JW: Did you hold a grudge against Mingus for staging the Rebel concert?
GW: Not at all. When I came back to Newport in 1962  to restart the festival, the first person I hired was Charlie Mingus. [Photo of Charles Mingus in 1962 at the Newport Jazz Festival by Jerry Corwin]

JW: Was Mingus’ beef with you over how much he was going to be paid to appear?
GW: Mingus had a beef about life. Mingus’ concern was getting the focus of attention. He was a brilliant musician who was the first to discover that if he talked enough he’d get more publicity. He was built-in copy for anyone writing an article about a concert.

JW: Did the Rebel Festival have anything to do with encouraging the mass influx of young people pouring into Newport?
GW: Not at all. Mingus’ festival attracted only 200 people to their festival at Cliff Walk Manor, which was located down by the beach. It was the last house on the right before you reached the water. But you couldn’t fit more than 500 people there.

JW: So what was the point?
GW: It was a symbolic thing. And a wonderful thing to do. It showcased a range of very talented musicians who we didn't have room for on our schedule.

JW: Did the Rebel Festival detract from the Newport Jazz Festival?
GW: It wasn’t a headache to me. The headache was the press harping that the Rebel Jazz Festival featured real jazz and the Newport Jazz Festival was the establishment. Which I understand because it made for great copy. But look, when you’re on top the way we were, that kind of thing comes with the territory.

JW: So the Rebel Festival didn’t cut into the Newport Jazz Festival or stir up the crowds?
GW: Not at all. The Rebel Jazz Festival was so small it wasn’t an issue. In terms of its appeal and success, we don’t know what that weekend would have been like if there hadn’t been a riot. I can tell you this: I would have unquestionably invited the Rebel Jazz Festival into the auspices of the Newport Jazz Festival at a second, larger location and sent more fans there.

JW: Would Mingus have gone for that?
GW: I'm sure he would have. Despite all the dust, I knew Mingus well. In 1962, when I produced his concert at Town Hall, he told me that he wanted the concert to be a stop-and-start recording session. His point was to show the audience what a recording session was like. But a paying audience doesn’t want to see a rehearsal. They want a concert.

JW: What did you say to him?
GW: I said, “What the hell are you doing?” Mingus said, “Don’t worry, George, we’re going to make a lot of money.” For Mingus, it was all part of the carnival, and this was true about the Rebel Jazz Festival. You had to go along with him because he happened to be a very talented musician.

JW: You really managed to keep calm through all of it.
GW: I learned over the years to react but not lose my cool. My reaction to a musician who pulled things like Mingus was never to say, “That guy will never work for me again.” I have a big ego, which you have to have in this business. But I have never felt I was more important than the artists appearing at my events or the music. [Pictured: George Wein with his wife Joyce in 1970]

JW: After the fuss settled after the 1960 riot, how did you manage to convince Newport to let you stage concerts there again, starting in 1962?
GW: The people there wanted the festivals. They wanted to see the stars, and local businesses made money. There were always town council members who resisted. It was a hot political issue for many years.

JW: What was the turning point?
GW: Eventually the town had a nonbinding referendum in a local election. The question was: "Do you approve of the annual jazz and folk festivals?" When the results were in, 70% approved of the jazz festival and 60% approved of the folk festival. We were amazed by that.

JW: Why?
GW: I think many of us assumed that the riot had doomed us, that the community and the residents held us somehow responsible for what had happened that night, that somehow we had mismanaged things. The truth is we had nothing to do with the riot and didn't mismanage anything. 

JW: In 1961, Newport turned to Sid Bernstein [pictured] to put on a music festival. How did it do?
GW: The festival went well but they didn’t know how to stage it profitably. They wound up losing money.

JW: What didn’t Bernstein understand?
GW: They didn’t know how to structure what they were doing. At the end, Sid said, “The only one who knows how to do this is George.” When I returned in 1962, I had no problem getting a license from the town.

JW: A pretty amazing comeback on your part, in a lifetime of comebacks.
GW: I know what I’ve done over my career, but I never believed it was that important except to the jazz world. I never believed I was a powerful person. Maybe that’s the secret to what I've managed to do. [Pictured: George Wein at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1967 by Jerry Corwin]

JazzWax tracks: There are two CDs that feature the exciting music of the Rebel Jazz Festival recorded by Nat Hentoff in Candid's studio in November 1960. They can be found here and here. I'm not sure why two different CDs feature completely different selections.

To hear the music of 1960 Newport Jazz Festival, including the July 3d blues concert the town permitted to take place after the riot, visit Wolfgang's Vault here.