Formed in 1960 as a subsidiary of Archie Bleyer's Cadence Records, the Candid label was headed by Nat Hentoff, who was given complete control of who and what he wanted to record. By then, Nat was well established as one of the country's leading jazz writers and civil rights activists. Nat would record 34 albums, among them important LPs by a range of jazz artists, including Charles Mingus, Max Roach, Eric Dolphy, Booker Little, Phil Woods, Don Ellis and blues artists Otis Spann, Memphis Slim and Lightnin' Hopkins. [Photo above of Nat Hentoff in 1961]
But Nat's efforts were short-lived. Before long, it became clear that what Nat loved didn't necessarily translate into dollars or even operating liquidity. In late 1961, Cadence shuttered Candid with hopes of keeping its head above water. Cadence had been first to record the Everly Brothers and Andy Williams before both artists moved on to major recording careers at bigger labels. In 1964, Cadence itself closed, and Bleyer sold both catalogs to Williams, who owned Barnaby Records.
Nat later viewed his two years at Candid with a heavy heart. In his 1997 memoir, Speaking Freely, he wrote, with irony, “The fantasy was common to jazz buffs, as we used to be called. [That] someday, somehow, I would have my own record label and record my favorite musicians. The releases would be pure jazz, and therefore would last for generations. Untold numbers of people all around the world would remember my name gratefully.”
While Nat's work as A&R chief was time-consuming and thankless due to low interest and sales, the fruit of his labor was a catalog of music that documents important artists at their peak and free to express themselves as they wished. As Nat discovered, even good taste and freedom requires marketing dollars and hits. On a personal note, Nat was a leonine mentor of mine who called frequently to chat, praise my JazzWax interviews, pushed me to call his book editor (who, in turn, bought my pitch for Why Jazz Happened) and thunderously encouraged me to keep JazzWax going no matter what. If Nat was your champion, he was all in, which is what those musicians experienced at the dawn of the 1960s. Nat died in 2017.
In 2019, the Candid back catalog and label was sold to Glen Barros (above) and Exceleration Music. Barros brought in John Burk, Charles Caldas, Amy Dietz and Dave Hansen as partners, and they are now remastering and reissuing Candid albums. The following five recordings have just been released on CD and streaming and will be available as vinyl albums on June 24. The sound of these remastered albums is warm and vivid:
Charles Mingus Presents Charles Mingus (released in December 1960) features the Charles Mingus Quartet—Mingus (b), Eric Dolphy (as, bass cl), Ted Curson (tp) and Dannie Richmond (d). The album opens with something of a performed wish. Mingus addresses an imaginary club audience and beseeches them not to applaud or make noise ("don't rattle ice in your glasses and no ringing of the cash register"). It was a jazz musician's manifesto for club silence and attention. In truth, the album was recorded in the hushed confines of New York's Nola Penthouse studio.
There are just four tracks on the album—Folk Forms No. 1, Original Faubus Fables, What Love and All the Things You Could Be by Now If Sigmund Freud's Wife Was Your Mother. Original Faubus Fables was called "original" because the version released a year earlier on Columbia's Mingus Ah Um did not include the desired vocals by Mingus and Richmond. Suits at Columbia wouldn't allow the taunts chastising Arkansas governor Orval Faubus, who refused to comply with the Supreme Court's decision vacating the segregation of public schools. In 1960, Columbia Records had forbid Candid from using Mingus's title, Fables of Faubus, fearing a backlash in sales of Mingus Ah Um. So Hentoff and Mingus re-titled Mingus's song.
Overall, the album today feels a bit ponderous and long-winded. But in all fairness, at the time of its release, the record itself was a daring political statement that openly took on a Southern governor, racists, jazz club chatterboxes and other mainstream attitudes and behavior that compromised expression and freedom. As a result, it represents a brave attempt to prod society with urgent solos and extended compositions. Go here.
Max Roach—We Insist!: Freedom Now Suite (Dec. 1960) is another socially conscious political statement that advocated for racial equality. The album consists of five pieces addressing the Emancipation Proclamation and the African independence movement taking place in the 1950s. Roach and vocalist Abbey Lincoln appear on all five tracks. The rest of the album features different musicians on different songs, including Booker Little (tp), Julian Priester (tb), Walter Benton, Coleman Hawkins (ts), James Schenk (b), Michael Olatunji (congas, vocals) and Raymond Mantilla and Tomas du Vall (perc).
Overall, the music was more blunt and cogent as a civil rights statement than Mingus's album, but both works were milestones in the movement and nudged folk revivalists to focus on the civil rights struggle in the here and now rather than on earlier, post-Depression causes such as the plight of workers under capitalism. Folk musicians got the message. Go here.
Abbey Lincoln—Straight Ahead (February 1961) features Booker Little (tp), Julian Priester (tb), Eric Dolphy (as, bass cl, fl, piccolo), Walter Benton, Coleman Hawkins (ts), Mal Waldron (p), Art Davis (b),
Max Roach (d) and Roger Sanders, Robert Whitley (congas). Four of the seven tracks were co-written by Lincoln. Widely considered to be her most important and powerful album, Straight Ahead remains a salient plea, and Lincoln's voice and jazz-folk lyrics are delivered as spirituals. The record remains a message album with bite, much in the way Marvin Gaye's What's Going On would make a similar conceptual statement 10 years later. Among the highlights are Lincoln's vocal on Blue Monk, African Lady and Retribution. Go here.
Otis Spann Is the Blues (fall 1960). Blues pianist and vocalist Otis Spann is joined on this album by guitarist-vocalist Robert Lockwood Jr. Six of the 10 blues are by Spann and the rest were by Lockwood. This was the piano legend's first leadership album. Born in Mississippi, Spann was one of five children who began playing piano at the age of seven. At 14, he was playing professionally before moving to Chicago to perform with Muddy Waters and as a solo act. It's somewhat remarkable that Spann had gone unrecorded as a leader until Hentoff coaxed him into the studio in New York. Overall, the album remains a powerful, spirited blues record and a master class in piano blues. As Nat noted in a Wall Street Journal essay in 2000, "I'd heard [Spann] often with Muddy Waters, and he was on my list of people I wanted to record when, for a short time, I was able to actually live a jazz fan's fantasy by having the freedom to record anybody I wanted to [as Candid's head of A&R]." Go here.
Lightnin' Hopkins—Lightnin' in New York (1961). All eight blues on this album are by Hopkins. The same goes for the singing and guitar playing. The Texas blues artist was discovered playing in Houston in 1946 by Lola Anne Cullum of Aladdin Records, the Los Angeles-based independent label. She had him travel immediately to L.A., where he recorded for Aladdin with pianist Wilson Smith. They recorded 12 sides. Hopkins returned to Texas in 1947 and recorded for Gold Star in Houston for years. In 1959, blues researcher Robert McCormick presented Hopkins to integrated audiences in Houston and California during the folk revival movement and then at New York's Carnegie Hall in 1960, where he came to the attention of Nat at Candid. Go here.