Last week in The Wall Street Journal, I interviewed actor Peter Kim for my "House Call" column in the Mansion section (go here). Peter co-stars with Radha Blank in the film The Forty-Year-Old Version, now on Netflix. Peter talked about his parents, hard-working South-Korean immigrants, and a music teacher in fifth grade who became his mentor and piloted him into acting school before she died while Peter was at college. He didn't learn of her passing until months later. The new film is about a Black female playwright nearing 40 who decides to become a rapper to find her own voice. Radha Blank stars. She also wrote, directed and produced the film. Peter plays her manager and best friend. [Photo above of Peter Kim, courtesy of Netflix]
Here's the trailer...
Gilles D'Elia, a photographer friend in Paris, keeps an online portfolio diary. Each day, he adds another photo that he took that day on the streets. For example, the one above was from February 18. For the rest of his fine work and visual log, go here.
Gilles also sent along an email relating to my post on the video featuring Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis and Zoot Sims:
Marc, my parents were at this concert on July 19, 1975 at the Arènes de Cimiez in Nice (my hometown)! And I was there. I was 3. It's incredible, what an emotion to see this video which I did not know existed., Thank you a thousand times, my friend. I watch it (and I especially listen to it) without getting bored. Obviously, I had no memory of the music.
I don't know if you know how the Nice Jazz Festival was staged. At the time, the festival was called "La Grande Parade du Jazz." There were three stages—the main stage was known as the Arena and was where this concert was filmed. There also was a stage in the olive grove. Many on YouTube were filmed there, including concerts by Miles, Dizzy and Al Jarreau. I even saw Henri Salvador and James Brown there. And finally a smaller stage located between the two: in front of the Matisse Museum.
You'd buy a ticket good for the entire evening and walk around, stopping to listen at the stage of your choice. Each stage featured three concerts per evening. Between each concert, you could walk in the gardens and eat Niçois specialties such as Socca or Pan-Bagnat.
My friends and I knew that behind the gardens of Cimiez was a place in the gate with a hole in it. Very discreet. Then one year, they repaired the gate and we started paying. We were ready to pay because we had caught the jazz bug.
Joe Derise. Last week, following my post on Joe Derise, rock and jazz writer Michael Simmons sent along the following note:
Marc, Joe Derise was my Uncle Joe—married to my mother’s sister — and my favorite relative. I loved him dearly. He was warm, funny, supportive and, by far, the hippest. A singer, songwriter, pianist, guitarist, arranger and recording artist, he excelled at everything and lived and breathed music. He married my mother’s sister Pat Easton before I was born and was the father of my cousins Jimmy Derise and Fay Richardson. Aunt Pat was the “Jill” of their vocal group Four Jacks and a Jill in the early 1950s. Pat also sang with Woody Herman and performed a duet with Tony Bennett (when he still went by Joe Bari in the late 1940s). The song was "Vieni Qui (Come To Me)," which I believe was Tony's first released recording.
In 1965, Uncle Joe went to Manny’s Music on 48th Street in New York with my mother to pick out a guitar for my 10th birthday present. It became the most important and treasured gift of my life. By the 1970s and ‘80s, I’d regularly go see Joe perform in nightclubs. I sang with him and his combo at my sister Julie’s wedding in 1981 and it was a blast! I recall singing "The Gypsy" and "Five Minutes More. As a singer, Uncle Joe's phrasing was relaxed and natural and full of life and heart. His intonation was perfect and he always swung. I revered him as a musician and loved him as my uncle. The photo at the top features Uncle Joe at the keyboard accompanying me singing at New York's Tavern on the Green restaurant in 1981.
Alex Baird, a singer I featured last year in a post on Wes Montgomery, had some good news to share last week. She was signed by Next Records, an independent label and rights management company that provides distribution and administration services for recording artists, record labels and rights holders. Which means Alex needs funding to record. Next Records is helping with gifts at different levels of contribution. To donate to a good cause, go here.
Here's Alex talking about songwriting...
Martin Scorsese. Oliver in Dublin sent along a link from NME featuring podcaster Edgar Wright sharing director Martin Scorsese's list of 50 favorite British films. Go here. [Photo above of Martin Scorsese courtesy of IMDB]
Art Pepper. Laurie Pepper, Art Pepper's wife, has digitized the late alto saxophonist's 1979 memoir, Straight Life: The Story of Art Pepper. The classic book, written by Art and Laurie, is based on interviews Laurie conducted with her husband over a period of seven years. You can listen to an audiocast of the book here.
CDs you should know about:
Franck Amsallem—Gotham Goodbye (Jazz & People). After 20 years spent living in New York, Franck bid farewell to the city with this recording before returning to Paris. Released in 2019, the album shows off Franck's wonderful playing and chord voicing. He's joined here by tenor saxophonist Irving Acao, bassist Viktor Nyberg and drummer Gautier Garrigue. Go here.
A bit of background from Franck:
I was born in Algeria in 1961 during the independence war, and my family (all 9 of them—6 kids, parents and grandma) moved to Nice, France, in 1962. I was lucky enough to go to Berklee College of Music in Boston from 1981 to 1984 on a scholarship. Then I moved to New York in '85 and attended Manhattan School of Music on another scholarship and stayed there until 2002. I relocated to Paris in 2002, where it's easy to travel for tours and concerts. That is, until Covid 19 arrived. Since 1990, I have recorded 10 albums under my name, some with Gary Peacock, Joe Chambers, Bill Stewart and Scott Colley. All are on YouTube and streaming services.
Here's a promo video for the album...
Bianca Rossini—Rio Paradise (Apaixonada Music/BDM). Bianca, a singer who divides her time between Los Angeles and her native Rio de Janeiro, has just released a five-track EP that includes three new originals that she wrote with Peter Roberts—Mariana, Canto de Mi Tierra and Ipanema Paradise. At a time when travel and vacations are all but impossible, listen carefully and her voice and music will put you on a Rio beach. Her beautiful voice will remind you of turquoise water, silky sand, palm-tree shade and the distant sound of children playing. A sensual audio experience. Go here or Apple Music.
Here's Canto de Mi Tierra...
Chu Berry radio. On Sunday, February 21, from 2 to 7 p.m., WKCR-FM in New York will rebroadcast Sid Gribetz's five-hour retrospective on tenor saxophonist Chu Berry. Listen from anywhere in the world by going here.
And finally, here's Dinah Washington singing All of Me at the Newport Jazz Festival on July 6, 1958 backed by Don Elliott (mellophone,vib), Urbie Green (tb), Terry Gibbs (vib), Wynton Kelly (p), Paul West (b) and Max Roach (d)...
