In The Wall Street Journal this week, I interviewed director-producer Barry Sonnenfeld for my "House Call" column in the Mansion section (go here). Barry's memoir is the funniest book I've read in the last two years. In my column, Barry talks about growing up in Manhattan's Washington Heights (about 15 blocks south of where I grew up) and the neurotic tyranny of his mother and oddities of his dad. Among the films Barry directed are the Men in Black series, the Addams Family series and Get Shorty. [Photo above of Barry Sonnenfeld by Sasha Erwitt courtesy of Barry Sonnenfeld]
Here's a taste of how much fun it is to interview Barry...
Lee Konitz. Following my appreciation of the late alto saxophonist and father of cool jazz, I received the following from bassist Harvie S. [Photo above of Lee Konitz and Marc Myers in 2013]:
Hi Marc. Sad about Lee. He was my first gig in New York. The following clip was recorded in 1994 and was released only in Japan. I think you'll enjoy it...
Betty Bennett. Following my post on the late Betty Bennett, I received the following from bassist and singer Jim Ferguson [Photo above of Betty Bennett and André Previn when they were married between 1952 and '57, courtesy of Betty Bennett]:
Hi Marc. Thanks so much for the Betty Bennett interview. Working with Mundell Lowe over the last 20 years or so of his life afforded me many opportunities to be around Betty in their San Diego home and occasionally on road trips. Betty was always so kind, so bright, and so funny, as I imagine you found her to be.
I loved her stories, which could rival Mundell's tales of his life in jazz. There's a priceless Betty joke regarding Vince Guaraldi's departure from the Cal Tjader band in her memoir that still makes me laugh out loud.
On a personal note, I remember working in San Diego with Mundell as a duo when a line from the lyric to Detour Ahead escaped me. I was stuck and couldn't recall it. A senior moment, I suppose. Except that Betty, 25 years my senior, called it out from the back of the room to get me back on track. She was the jazz mom I never had.
The two of them together were pretty special, and I miss them both. Thanks again!
Tony Aless. Following my post on pianist Tony Aless and his sole leadership album, Long Island Suite, Brian Michel Bacchus sent along this email:
Hi Marc. I found this William P. Gottlieb image (above) of Tony at the piano during a rehearsal for the first performance of the Ebony Concerto in March 1946 at Carnegie Hall. That's conductor Walter Hendl, pianist Tony Aless, guitarist Billy Bauer, bassist Chubby Jackson, drummer Don Lamond, Woody Herman, and Flip Phillips. Igor Stravinsky wrote the concerto for Woody Herman in 1945.
This email from Ed Shanaphy...
Hi Marc. I'm thrilled to learn about this work by Tony Aless You mentioned that you didn't know what happened to Tony after his last recording in 1958. Back in the '60s, Tony and Sanford Gold taught jazz piano in a studio they had in a building adjacent to New York's Winter Garden on 7th Avenue. I was studying with Sanford, and it wasn't until later in chatting with pianist Ted Rosenthal that I learned he was up there in the next room studying with Tony.
Sanford sent me on gigs. That's how I came to join Bobby Hackett who was filling in for Ray McKinley on the Glenn Miller Band. Some 20 years later, when I was publishing Piano Today and Sheet Music Magazine, I contacted Tony to see if he would like to write piano arrangements for one of the magazines. He did one—a beautiful solo piano rendition of I Can't Get Started. This was in August of 1984. We had a couple of phone calls after that and that was my last contact with him. Thanks for bringing Tony back into focus. A wonderful talent.
And this one from Brian Bacchus...
Hi Marc. I knew Tony Aless and took lessons from him while I was in high school in 1973. He had a school and piano lab in Great Neck Long Island. I had taken rudimentary formal piano lessons all through childhood but stopped around 7th grade. I later resumed playing, picking out things from records and the radio by ear.
I told my father I wanted to take lessons again, but more jazz and blues. My father worked at the United Nations and had a friend who knew guitarist Billy Bauer. He borrowed two albums from him for me to check out. One was Bauer's Plectrist and the other was The Great Oscar Peterson on Prestige which knocked me out. I told my pop I'd love to take lessons with Bauer, even though he was a guitarist. It turned out that Bauer wasn't taking any more students and referred us to Tony Aless.
So I ended up taking lessons from Tony for about two years. He was a wonderful player and teacher, and I learned a lot of music theory from him in a very short time. Of course, I also got to hear various stories about Woody Herman, Stan Getz, Charlie Parker and Charlie Christian, to name a few, as he demonstrated various features of their playing and/or related stories about them and their musicianship.
For Tony, Bird was it, though he loved many other musicians like Bill Evans. Sadly I never got to interact with him again after those few years taking lessons with him. I do remember him being a big smoker. Perhaps that's why he left us so early at age 66, in 1988. Thanks for highlighting this recording and Tony.
Book of love. If you love rock and electronic keyboards, Alan S. Lenhoff and David E. Robertson have just published Classic Keys: Keyboard Sounds That Launched Rock Music (University of North Texas Press). The 406-page coffee table book is beautifully written and features page after page of photos of electronic keyboards that gave rock its personality. There are in-depth chapters on the Hammond B-3, the Vox Continental, the Farfisa Compact, the Hohner Clavinet, the Minimoog, the Wurlitzer, the Hohner Pianet and many others. Each chapter is loaded with history about their development, the rock bands that used them and hits that featured them. Enormous fun reading through while listening to vintage vinyl. Go here.
Dave Thompson, an exquisite pianist, sent along a SoundCloud of a practice session. To listen to What Kind of Fool Am I and an original, May Waltze, go here.
Michael McDonald recorded a video of him playing and singing On My Own in his living room for The Tonight Show at Home Edition. Go here...
Joan Jett. Following my recent post on rock singer-guitarist Joan Jett, I received the following email from John Guerrasio...
Marc, one day in the 1970s, I was heading home to my Manhattan loft diagonally opposite CBGB when I spied The Runaways holding a photo shoot in a filthy vacant lot across The Bowery. I wandered over to watch.
The band was dressed in punk splendor and struck pouty poses. Then a group of real punks (not the CBGB kind) came to heckle. I suspect some of these punks were also real runaways. And their heckles got filthy real quick. I wanted to defend the ladies' honor but I was outnumbered and I could tell the photographer wasn’t going to be much help. So, I was relieved when the band wisely scooted back to CBGB for cover. The Runaways were bad but not "for real" bad.
Charles Mingus radio. WKCR-FM will present its annual "Charles Mingus Birthday Broadcast" on April 22, playing his music for 24 hours. To listen on your computer, iPad or phone from anywhere in the world, go here.
Folk at a click. Last week, Jimi Mentis in Athens send along a link to Folk Cloud. You click on a region of the world and up comes a page of audio clips by artists from that region. Go here.
James Moody. Jim Eigo of Jazz Promo Services sent along a beautiful clip of James Moody playing Cherokee on the flute, backed by Mike Longo (p), Paul West (b) and Candy Finch (d), performed at the 1968 Dizzy Gillespie Reunion Band concert in Copenhagen...
What the heck. Here's Italian pop singer Mina singing Nessuno (Nobody), her 1959 hit, in the Italian musicarello film Urlatori Alla Sbarra (Howlers in the Dock). And yes, that's who you think it is in the bathtub...
Here's Chet Baker in another clip from the same film singing Umberto Bindi's Arrivederci...
