You could say that trumpeter Nick Travis was the East Coast Don Fagerquist. Blowing with a warm tone and lyrical style, Travis could swing. And like Fagerquist, Travis was always busy in the studios. Though he died at age 38 in 1964, he was on 350 jazz recording sessions, which is quite a significant number over roughly 20 years. Fagerquist, who started at about the same time as Travis in the early '40s and played until the late '60s, was on 362 jazz dates. Yet Travis recorded just one album as a leader—The Panic Is On—for RCA in March 1954. [Photo of Nick Travis in 1947 by William P. Gottlieb]
I spoke with saxophonist Hal McKusick about Travis yesterday. More with Hal in a minute.
The Panic Is On was a quintet date that featured Al Cohn on tenor sax, John Williams on piano, Teddy Kotick on bass and Art Mardigan on drums. One senses that the arrangements were largely by Cohn to showcase Travis' story-telling solo style.
Travis could gently but insistently climb improvisational ladders and joyously roll down the chord changes. This is certainly the case on Travisimo and Jazzbo's Jaunt, which beautifully showcase Travis' soloing grace. Of course, having Cohn along on the date gave the tracks smoky heft and mobility.
Travis and Cohn often played together throughout the 1950s. Collaborative albums include Al Cohn Quintet (1953), The Jazz Workshop: Four Brass, One Tenor (1955), Billy Byers: Lullaby of Birdland (1955), Manny Albam: The Jazz Workshop (1955), Elliot Lawrence: Plays Tiny Kahn and Johnny Mandel (1956), Joe Newman: Salute to Satch (1956), Maynard Ferguson: Birdland Dreamband (1956), Terry Gibbs: Swingin' (1956), John Benson Brooks: Folk Jazz USA (1956), Manny Albam: Jazz Greats of Our Time (1957), and on and on.
The swinging stuff is great kicks, but dig Travis on the ballad, You Don't Know What Love Is, a song that always separates the passionate poets from the high poppers. Travis' lines here are sultry and sublime, rendering Cohn's presence on the track almost unnecessary, if that's even possible. [Photo, from left, of Don Goldie, Nick Travis and Al Stewart in 1962 courtesy of Al Stewart]
Hal played on 30 dates with Travis:
"Nick was a great player and a great guy. He was so busy in the 1950s. He'd get done with work at 2 a.m., head off to his home in New Jersey and be back the next day in a New York studio at 8 a.m. Zoot told me a funny story. Nick was so tired one day that he slept in. His phone rang early that morning. Nick sleepily answered: "Hello?" "Hi Nick, it's Zoot." Nick paused and said, groggily, "Zoot who?" [laughs] [Pictured: Hal McKusick]
"I remember Nick as being quiet and intelligent. He spent a lot of time with his instrument. When you’re working the way we did, you didn't have a lot of time to practice, so work was practice. He was a great lead horn player and quite a soloist. Nick was always there on a date in every way. Efficient, on time and he never hit a bad note.
"Ultimately, Nick probably had too much work. We all did. Nick was in such great demand by so many different orchestrators and contractors at the time that he probably had a hard time handling the stress internally. He kept a lot of it bottled up, I guess. I didn't realize he had passed from ulcer troubles.
"As sounds go, Nick's was down the middle. You'd hear his horn and if you didn't know who was playing you'd say, 'Wow, who is that? That sure sounds good.' He caught your attention. Nick also was a wonderful reader, which was why he was in such demand. Nick played caringly."
JazzWax tracks: Like most of the RCA jazz catalog from this period, The Panic Is On is out of print. Fresh Sound issued it in 2004, and CD copies are available here and probably at some download retail sites.
JazzWax clip: How good was Nick Travis? Dig him here with Zoot Sims on Fools Rush In. Tasty and strong but never overbearing or imposing. And dig Zoot's Glad to Be Unhappy tag!...
Nick Travis worked with many big bands, like Quincy Jones a.o. With Gerry Mulligan Nick recorded early 50's and with his Concert Jazz Band early 60's.
Norman Granz organised one European tour for the Gerry Mulligan Concert Jazz Band in the fall of 1960 with trumpetplayers Conte Candoli, Don Ferrara and Nick Travis. In the Amsterdam Concertgebouw these 3 played at the 5 november nightconcert after intermission beautiful solo's and chases. One journalist wrote: "Each followed the other so beautiful, it seemed like one instrument was speaking."
Han Schulte
Netherlands
Posted by: Han Schulte | August 30, 2011 at 07:32 AM
Great post -- great player.
Harry Allen & Joe Cohn recently recorded "Travisimo" on an Arbors date. Nice
to hear that tune again.
That's Travis trading with Maynard on "The Wailing Boat" -- dig the double-toungue mariner quote from Nick. Extremely difficult technically; probably only Clark Terry could also have done it that way...
Posted by: Peter Sokolowski | August 30, 2011 at 10:04 AM
I don't think I ever heard of Nick Travis before, though I'm guessing if I looked at the liner notes on my records more closely, I would find him.
And that's why I visit this site about every day - which I could have already said about a dozen times, and maybe I did!!
Love the bell on his horn in the pic at the top of the post. Looks like it saw a little trauma.
Posted by: T.K. Tortch | August 30, 2011 at 10:02 PM
Marc, not sure why you equate Nick Travis with Don Fagerquist. Nick’s tone was fat and warm, Don’s was thinner and cooler. Don was also a master of the ‘controlled breathing’ technique only practiced by a handful of others. Nick wasn’t. Other than both being very busy musicians, I really don't see much in the way of similarities.
I’m happy to say I still have my vinyl copy of “The Panic is On”, a bubbly recording bursting with energy. So thanks for the reminder, it's been years since I've had it on. I think I’ll now go pull it down from the shelf and play me some tracks.
Posted by: Jery Rowan | August 31, 2011 at 12:51 AM
Out of left field, but does anyone know where Nick was buried? No one seems to know. He had a son living in Austin Texas, also a musician, but I found out about him only after he passed away. Nick was from the Olney section of Philadelphia, and a childhood friend of his told me he was serious about the horn from a young age--something that shows up in this post. He and Conrad Gozzo died within days of each other. Ironic.
Posted by: RJS | August 05, 2012 at 11:09 AM