JazzWax

John Williams: Before Star Wars

If you intended to become a jazz musician in the 1950s, "John Williams" was probably not the most ideal name to go with. By my count, there were eight during this time period. This doesn't include several John Williams with middle initials and others who went by Johnny Williams. Perhaps the best known of the bunch today is John T. Williams, also known as John Towner Williams, the movie-score arranger, composer and conductor who orchestrated Superman and Star Wars among many other films.

Back in the late 1950s and early '60s, Williams went by Johnny Williams and arranged and conducted several West Coast jazz-pop albums, including Rhythm in Motion in April and May 1961 and So Nice! with vocalist Johnny Desmond in February 1958. Both albums have a lot going on in terms of instrumentation, which makes for terrific listening.

Both are on the pop side of jazz, but they are still a joy to hear, since there's so much going on and Williams understood even then how to juxtapose heavy heat with delicate passages. The result is Henry Mancini meets the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra. What's exciting is how wide Williams scored and how songbook standards wound up sounding cinematic.

The personnel on the instrumental album, Rhythm in Motion, featured the cream of the West Coast studios, including Pete Candoli, Dick Nash, Ted Nash, Joe Mondragon, Larry Bunker and Shelly Manne.

The vocal album, So Nice!, featured engaging arrangements by Williams and Bill Holman in support of a warm-voiced, swinging Desmond, who was probably best known as the vocalist in Glenn Miller's Army Air Force Band. Desmond also had a #3 hit with The Yellow Rose of Texas in 1955. On So Nice!, the smooth baritone's big band experience gave him solid power in the swing and note-holding department.

The musicians on this date included Don Fagerquist, Bob Enevoldsen, George Roberts, Bill Holman, Buddy Clark and Frank Capp.

John Towner Williams, 83, is still hard at work today in Hollywood.

JazzWax tracks: You'll find both Rhythm in Motion and So Nice! (Fresh Sound) here. The album comes with three wonderful bonus tracks: Tuesday's Theme (from Williams' score for the film Bachelor Flat); The Black Knight (from his score for the early 1960s Checkmate TV series) and Augie's Great Piano (a 1963 showcase for Williams' piano playing).

JazzWax clips: Here are two clips from Rhythm in Motion and one from So Nice! with Johnny Desmond:

Here's Put on a Happy Face...

Put on a Happy Face

Here's Life Is Just a Bowl of Cherries...

Life Is Just a Bowl of Cherries

And here's My Happy Time...

My Happy Time

Billy May: 1951-53

Before Frank Sinatra signed with Capitol Records in 1953, the label already had on staff a growing team of arrangers and bandleaders that were pouring the foundation for a neo-swing era. With the rise of suburbia, thanks in part to the G.I. Bill, albums of 78s and 45s by vocalists and instrumental pop orchestras were in greater demand by young adults for whom R&B and classical music meant little. To meet the growing demand, Capitol turned to conductor-arrangers like Paul Weston, Nelson Riddle, Les Baxter, Frank De Vol and Skitch Henderson. But perhaps the label's most signature arranger between 1951 and 1953 was Billy May.

May's instrumental recordings weren't quite soothing pop or cerebral jazz but a swaggering mix of swinging bombast and nattering orchestral sections. His fingerprint sound rested on saxophones bending notes almost in a wail. The dragged notes, particularly among the alto saxes, would become closely identified with Sinatra after he began recording May-arranged material.

One could argue that May invented the cocky updating of the big band sound that Sinatra, Nat King Cole and Peggy Lee slipped into comfortably later in the 1950s. This sound is certainly evident on a two-CD set—Billy May & His Orchestra: Studio Recordings 1951-1953. Over the course of these two years, May was orchestrated a new sound that seemed to be a mashing of Glenn Miller, Sy Oliver and Stan Kenton. Listening to these sides now provides a glimpse into May's approach and how it developed at Capitol. Instead of syrupy instrumentals, May's arrangements had a brashness, like someone stumbling around metal ash cans while trying to find the house keys after one too many. There also was a long-legged slyness about the charts, with one section (often the reeds) leading the melody while the trumpets and trombones exploded here and there with squawking commentary. 

Ultimately, May's early instrumentals captured Hollywood's bright optimism of the early 1950s. Their slinky humor and punchy confidence make one think of Kodacolor home movies featuring hulking black and emerald cars with round lines, red-and-cream plaid shirts, sand-toned Los Angeles deco buildings, drive-in hamburger stands, new highways and desert suburbia. As this set shows, May doesn't get nearly enough credit for inventing a new '50s sound.

Billy May died in 2004.

JazzWax tracks: You'll find Billy May & His Orchestra: Studio Recordings, 1951-1953 (Jasmine) here.

JazzWax clips: Here's My Silent Love (1951). Dig the reed rundown at the end...

 

Here's My Last Affair (1952)...

 

Here's Easy Street (1952), with the bending saxes...

 

Here's Billy May's Hollywood in 1952, via a brief home movie of Walter Shields, a trombonist in Ray Anthony's band...

 

Here's Beany's Drive-In Restaurant in Long Beach in 1952...

 

And here's Los Angeles in 1954...

 

George Wallington: Trios

In its infancy in the mid-1940s, bebop was about speed and generating ideas on the fly. This was particularly true of the piano, the instrument that typically kicked off bebop songs, kept the rhythm going and put meat on the bone, so to speak. At first, bebop's velocity made the style a private club, since few musicians could improvise in the vernacular at such a lightning-fast tempos. Speed also limited the number of musicians who could figure out the music and play it authentically.

Four pianists come to mind as bop's first speed demons—Bud Powell, Al Haig, Dodo Marmarosa and George Wallington. Each was involved in advancing the music, each was terrifyingly fast and each was astonishingly capable of inventive intros and flawless runs. 

Of the four, only Wallington did not record with Charlie Parker, though Parker is reported to have used him on an unreleased strings session for Norman Granz. Nevertheless, Wallington was in the thick of things on 52d St. from the start when Parker and Dizzy Gillespie first began playing bop together in early 1945. In fact, he had been in Gillespie's quintet at the Onyx Club in early 1944 when the group was recorded playing A Night in Tunisia.

Throughout the late 1940s, Wallington's deft bop skills made him a busy sideman at clubs and in New York recording studios. By 1949, he began leading his own trios. These are among his finest recordings. He recorded in this format in 1949 (with Curley Russell on bass and Charlie Perry on drums), in 1951 (with Russell on bass and Max Roach on drums), in 1952 (with Charles Mingus and Oscar Pettiford on bass and Roach on drums), in 1953 (with Russell on bass and Roach on drums), in Paris the same year (with Pierre Michelot on bass and Jean-Louis Viale on drums), in 1954 (with Russell on bass and Art Taylor on drums) and in 1956 (with Teddy Kotick on bass and Nick Stabulas on drums).

Wallington's career intersected with jazz history at several points in the early 1950s. As Gerry Mulligan's favorite pianist, Wallington was Mulligan's first choice when he traveled to Los Angeles in 1952 and formed a group. But when Mulligan called him, Wallington was unwilling to move to California. Mulligan went on to form his pianoless quartet.

In 1953, Wallington was in Europe and joined Lionel Hampton's big band along with British singer Annie Ross. According to Nick Catalano book, Clifford Brown: The Life and Art of the Legendary Jazz Trumpeter, when Quincy Jones formed a unit within the band to record separately in Oslo for the Metronome label, Wallington naively mentioned the session to Hampton, who hit the roof. According to Art Farmer, Hampton had the band's road manager, George Hart, sit in the lobby to prevent the musicians from leaving. The group went out the back door. When the Hampton tour traveled around Scandinavia and then Belgium, audiences booed Ross and Wallington, the orchestra's only white artists, since they expected an all-black band. Eventually, Ross was stranded by Hampton in Europe when the band left for the States. Wallington quit the band in protest. 

As a composer, Wallington was superb, and a number of his songs became jazz standards, including Lemon Drop and Godchild. In 1960, tired of touring and sensing a decline in jazz earning opportunities, Wallington left music to work in his family's air-conditioning business. He began recording again in the 1980s and died in 1993 at age 68.

Wallington's trio work remains breathtakingly beautiful. His playing was bouncy, firm and graceful, and his hands could take off at a moment's notice with tremendous speed. What set Wallington apart from his peers were his knotty grooves and lyrical strut. Wallington never over-played and had a delicious way of accenting with eighth-note triplets in his right hand.

JazzWax tracks: You'll find many of George Wallington's trio sides on George Wallington Trios: Complete Sessions, 1949-1956 here.

JazzWax tracks: Here's Wallington in 1951 playing Fine and Dandy with Curley Russell on bass and Max Roach on drums...

 

Here's Wallington in 1953 with Russell and Roach playing My Nephew and I...

 

Here's Wallington playing his Godchild in 1956 with Teddy Kotick on bass and Nick Stabulas on drums...

 

A special JazzWax thanks to David Langner

Earl "Fatha" Hines: 1963

In his time, Earl "Fatha" Hines was the Louis Armstrong of the keyboard. There's no better way to end the week than to have Professor Hines illustrate the styles of those who influenced him most and the evolution of his own "trumpet" piano style. Here's Hines on Ralph J. Gleason's Jazz Casual TV show in 1963...

Elliot Lawrence on the Road

What was it like to be on the road in a big band in 1950? It's difficult to say, since we only have the recollections of musicians who were there, and who knows how accurate those memories are. In the case of Elliot Lawrence, two members of his band then—Bob Karch and Howie Mann—took color home movies. As you'll see in the following eight clips, the country was young then. TV hadn't yet penetrated most markets, radio dominated and bands were being still being booked to play dances and proms. At YouTube, each clip below includes a description of what's going on in the segment.

I'm guessing this was the general personnel of the band in 1950: Joe Techner, John Dee, Gerry LaFurn (tp) Bill Danzien (tp,fhr) Sy Berger, Ollie Wilson, Gene Hessler (tb) Herbie Steward (as) Phil Urso, Stan Weiss (ts) Vince Ferraro, Merle Bredwell (bar) Elliot Lawrence, Bob Karch (p) Mert Oliver (b) Howie Mann (d) Rosalind Patton (vcl). [Pictured above, Elliot Lawrence with models]

These are home movies, so be patient. If you watch carefully, you'll get a strong feel for what young ambitious musicians were up to 65 years ago—goofing around, performing and just enjoying themselves and the scenery during a summer swing through the rural West...

Part 1...

 

Part 2...

 

Part 3...

 

Part 4...

 

Part 5...

 

Part 6...

 

Part 7...

 

Part 8...

 

Tiny Kahn and Elliot Lawrence

A few years ago, composer-arranger Johnny Mandel told me that Tiny Kahn was one of his favorite arrangers. As Johnny put it, no one could craft a flag-waver like Kahn, with huge build, drive and swing. Johnny and Kahn go back to 1944, when both were in Henry Jerome's band. Both also arranged for Woody Herman and Elliot Lawrence in the early 1950s. [Pictured above, Tiny Kahn and Elliot Lawrence]

In addition to being a strong arranger, Kahn was a marvelous drummer (on sticks and brushes) and cymbal stylist, as evidenced by his work behind Stan Getz on Live at Storyville from October 1951. As for drums on barn-burners, all you need to hear is Kahn with Chubby Jackson's big band in 1949 on Father Knickerbopper and Tiny's Blues, both Kahn compositions. [Pictured above, Tiny Kahn, with Red Rodney on trumpet]

Sadly, Kahn's writing and playing genius would be short-lived. He died on Aug. 19, 1953 of a heart attack at age 29 while vacationing on Martha's Vineyard off the coast of Massachusetts. [Pictured above, Red Kelly on bass, drummer Don Manning standing and Tiny Kahn in 1949 at New York's Apollo Theatre]

Yesterday, I listened to eight of Kahn's arrangements for Elliot Lawrence's big band: TNT, Blue Room, My Heart Stood Still, Jeepers Creepers, Who Fard That Shot?, Walkin' My Baby Back Home, Alone Together and Maybe. The first five are from Elliot Lawrence Plays Tiny Kahn & Johnny Mandel, from January 1956, while the last three are from Lawrence's Swinging at the Steel Pier in June 1956. The personnel on Kahn & Mandel features Nick Travis, Bernie Glow, Al Derisi and Stan Fishelson (tp); Eddie Bert, Urbie Green and Paul Selden (tb); Tony Miranda (fhr); Sam Marowitz and Hal McKusick (as); Al Cohn, Zoot Sims and Eddie Wasserman (ts); Charlie O'Kane (bar) Elliot Lawrence (p) Buddy Jones (b) and Sol Gubin (d). Now that's a band!

Kahn's arrangements are tightly written and smartly constructed, with a snappy intro, compelling section dialogue and lines that invariably rise up and explode with excitement. A joy at every turn.

JazzWax tracks: You'll find three of the tracks above on Elliot Lawrence: Swinging at the Steel Pier here. The other five are on Elliot Lawrence Swings Cohn and Kahn here.

JazzWax clips: Here's Tiny Kahn's arrangement of his own TNT for Elliot Lawrence...

 

Here's Kahn's arrangement of Blue Room, with saxophonist Al Cohn featured...

 

Here's Kahn's arrangement of Walkin' My Baby Back Home live at the Steel Pier in Atlantic City....

 

A special thanks to Robert Kahn, Tiny's cousin.