A huge find today—the lost musical tracks recorded by the new Dave Lambert Singers at an RCA audition in New York in 1964. The tape has always thought to have been erased soon after, leaving no complete evidence of Lambert's original music or group. Now it turns out the tracks have survived and I have them for you below. But first, a little background...
Shortly after Lambert, Hendricks & Bavan broke up in early 1964, singer Dave Lambert assembled a new vocalese group and rehearsed them. When the time was right later that year, Lambert asked producer George Avakian to get him an audition at RCA. Fortunately, someone had the good sense to tell filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker, who captured the entire studio try-out. The result was Pennebaker's Audition at RCA.
I posted about Pennebaker's 15-minute film back in 2011 here, when it first surfaced on the web. Though Audition at RCA disappeared soon after my post, it now appears to be back—essential viewing for what you're going to hear further down in this post...
When Audition at RCA first went up on the web, I couldn't get enough of it. I must have watched the film 30 times, studying every note, every exchanged glance and every nuance. To my knowledge, it's the only footage we have of Lambert talking and singing in a studio setting. I became so obsessed with the film that I even tracked down Mary Vonnie, one of the singers, and posted about her here two months later.
Unfortunately, Lambert didn't get the record deal he had hoped for that day at RCA. What's more, the audio tape used to record the singers had been wiped clean—erasing any evidence of the music. [Pictured above: Mary Vonnie]
Now a tape of the studio recordings has surfaced for the first time.
A week ago, someone uploaded all five songs from the session at YouTube. Not the bits from the film but full studio tracks! Apparently, Pennebaker had recorded the music and made occasional cassette copies for friends. One of them uploaded the music. [Pictured above: George Avakian]
A few surprises here: we now have the inclusion of Old Folks—which doesn't appear in the film—and a complete version of Comfy Cozy, which sheds new light on Lambert's composing and harmony genius. Lambert wrote four of the five songs. [Pictured above: Dave Lambert]
Appearing on the tracks are Dave Lambert, Mary Vonnie, Sarah Boatner, David Lucas and Leslie Dorsey (vcl), Moe Wechsler (p), George Duvivier (b) and Gary Chester (d). In fact, that's Chester who asks for a level reading at the start of Comfy Cozy (below) because he was switching from brushes to sticks. [Pictured above: Sarah Boatner and David Lucas]
Without further delay, here are the five tracks recorded by the Dave Lambert Singers at RCA Studios that day in 1964:
Think of Me...
Leaving...
Old Folks...
Comfy Cozy...
JazzWax video: Want to own a copy of Audition at RCA? D.A. Pennebaker is selling a DVD of the film along with many of his other documentaries. You'll find it listed as Lambert & Co. Go here.
