Last week in The Wall Street Journal, I interviewed men's clothing designer and retailer John Varvatos for my "House Call" column in the Mansion section (go here). His designs always seem torn from the pages of rock magazines. John was born in a working-class suburb of Detroit and grew up listening to rock and thumbing through fan magazines. Which is how he developed an eye for the singular fashion trends of rock stars. After stints working for Ralph Lauren and Calvin Klein, and time spent at the Fashion Institute of Technology, John started his own company specializing in menswear with a rock-star feel. [Photo above courtesy of John Varvatos]
SiriusXM. On Wednesday at 10 a.m., I'll be on SiriusXM's Feedback (Ch. 106) with co-hosts Nik Carter and Lori Majewski to talk about Janis Joplin and the new 50th anniversary set of Cheap Thrills, one of hard rock's critical turning-point albums.
George Romanis and Rey Michel. Following my post last week on the 1959 and '61 big-band albums of George Romanis and Rey Michel, Brett Gold sent along the following:
"Marc, you're right to highlight Romanis's obscurity—I certainly had never heard of him or Rey Michel. A couple of comments on the I Can't Get Started arrangement from Romanis's Double Explosure! The solo is by Urbie Green (clearly), and on the second eight bars of the melody, the arrangement tracks the background accompaniment of the classic Dizzy Gillespie sextet arrangement of the tune, including the downward chromatic chords that conflict with the melody."
Here's Gillespie playing and singing I Can't Get Started with his sextet in January 1945, with Trummy Young (tb), Don Byas (ts), Clyde Hart, (p) Oscar Pettiford (b) and Shelly Manne (d). Many forget that Manne started playing bop early with Gillespie and others in New York...
And here's the Gillespie big band in Paris in 1948 performing the song at the Salle Pleyel...
Bin bash. Congrats to Jim Eigo (pictured right, with guitarist Dave Stryker) on the opening last week of Original Vinyl Records—Jim's new vinyl record shop at 314 State Route 94 South in Warwick, N.Y. Jim, of course, also heads Jazz Promo Services. For information and regular store hours, call 845-987-3131.
Melvin Rhyne radio. "Symphony" Sid Gribetz will host a five-hour tribute to organist Melvin Rhyne this Sunday, December 16, 2018, from 2 to 7 p.m. on “Jazz Profiles” on WKCR-FM in New York. Listen from anywhere in the world on your phone or computer by going here.
Wanda Stafford recorded In Love for the Very First Time for Roulette in 1960. The album featured Bernie Glow, Burt Collins, Louis Mucci and Johnny Glasel (tp); Bill Elton, Don Sebesky, Eddie Bert and Kenneth Guffey (tb); Dick Meldonian (cl,as); Tony Ferina (bar); Bill Evans (p); Howard Collins (g); John Drew (b) and Ed Shaughnessy (d).
Wanda will be singing at the Panama Hotel Restaurant in San Rafael, Calif., on December 18 from 7 to 10 p.m. Wanda has performed at the venue regularly for the past 20 years with pianist Si Perkoff. If you're in the area, catch the singing legend. For more information, go here. To read my two-part interview with Wanda, go here and here.
Here's Wanda singing The Most Beautiful Words with Bill Evans (p), Howard Collins (g), John Drew (b) and Ed Shaughnessy (d)...
What the heck:Here's brother and sister Karen and Richard Carpenter singing Hurting Each Other in the early 1970s. The late Karen Carpenter remains one of the great voices of the 1970s...
Oddball album cover of the week.
I'm sure music comes naturally to moonshiners, who have to spend hours sitting around waiting for corn mash poured into a sealed copper pot to heat to 175 degrees. When it does, the vapor travels through a copper pipe to the thump keg and then to the worm barrel where the vapor passes through coiled tubing submerged in cold water and emerges as clear whisky. I'm not sure where you'd plug in a turntable in the woods to spin this album. But I suspect the music isn't for the makin' of the hooch but for the settin' and samplin'.
Nancy Wilson, a sassy and sultry jazz-pop singer with extraordinary vocal and visual performing talents who emerged in 1959 just as the pop charts were starting to be dominated by soft Brazilian voices, vocal harmonies by beach bands, British invaders and back-beat soul from Detroit and Memphis, died yesterday. She was 81.
Nancy was first and foremost a superb story-singer who let songs run through her and whose face and voice perfectly expressed the elation or pained determination detailed in the words. Never one to over-emote or over dramatize, Nancy sang with a soulful integrity, as if the songs were about something she herself experienced. Hearing Nancy on albums delivered only half the story. To see Nancy sing was to become part of the song's agony or ecstasy, and she never disappointed audiences, emerging from a song's turmoil with her head down in a bow, raising it with a broad smile.
She came up at the dawn of the 1960s during this country's most difficult and tumultuous time, especially for an African-American songbook singer. Young audiences were flocking to music with a beat, the Civil Rights movement was becoming increasingly visual and violent, and her black and white competition was formidable. The fact that she became established and revered so quickly in the very early 1960s is astonishing. And despite the rise of female pop singers such as Dionne Warwick, Shirley Bassey in the U.K., Diana Ross, Dusty Springfield, Petula Clark and Aretha Franklin, Nancy remained the godmother of the pop vocal whose voice could seduce or tear your heart out with vocal power.
I interviewed Nancy several times over the past 10 years, once for The Wall Street Journal and again for JazzWax, where her lengthy interview is posted for free and is among the blog's most popular reads. When I think of Nancy, I think of two things. First, her hands, which I was able to touch when seeing her backstage at B.B. King's some years ago. She had impossibly long and graceful fingers that slashed the air when she sang. And her mouth, which was a wonder to watch as she performed, curling to let out a note, dipping on one side to release a fusillade of emotion. First Aretha. And now Nancy. What a year. Sigh.
In tribute to Nancy, here is my original five-part interview with her in 2010 combined in its entirety:
Nancy Wilson was the last great female song stylist of the 1950s and the first American female pop-soul singer of the 1960s. Though she began by performing locally in her hometown in the 1950s, her Capitol career started at the tail end of 1959, just as one era was ending and another was beginning. Throughout the 1960s, Nancy was known for brassy updates of jazz standards and hip pop soul and rock renditions. And yet today, she hasn't been properly credited or celebrated by our national cultural institutions for transforming both. Nor has she been fully recognized for confronting and easing the racial barriers that made the 1960s a very different world from the decades that followed.
Nancy's career truly was remarkable. She recorded more than 50 albums—two albums a year for Capitol between 1959 and 1970 (her most recent album was recorded in 2007). Eleven of her singles appeared on Billboard's Top Pop Singles chart—while 22 landed on Billboard's Top R&B Singles chart. Nancy was nominated for 20 Grammy Awards—and won 3. Her polite, sultry style, her confident phrasing, and her exciting delivery paved the way for Diana Ross, Dionne Warwick, Dusty Springfield and so many other female pop and soul vocalists. As Whitney Houston said during a 1992 tribute: "Nancy Wilson's artistry has outlived the trends of various decades." How true. [Photo of Nancy Wilson by Robert W. Kelley for Life]
JazzWax: Where did you grow up? Nancy Wilson: I was born in Chillicothe, Ohio, but I grew up just outside of Columbus. My parents had six children. I’m the oldest so I had to keep the others in line growing up [laughs]. I have a brother who is close to me in age. My other siblings are younger by 10 years or more.
JW: What did your parents do for a living? NW: They both worked. My mom was a hairdresser. My father was a supervisor at an iron foundry. He was a strong guy—6 feet-3 inches tall and 240 pounds. JW: Did you learn to sing in church? NW: Not really. I learned on my own. I did sing in church, but not my mother’s church. When my father remarried, I was 8 years old. My mother was Apostolic— which is Pentecostal. I wasn’t allowed to sing in my mother’s church because I liked to sings songs like Margie, Street of Dreams and The Nearness of You. So I went over to the Methodist Church to sing in its choir. By the time I was 10 years old, I was the choir’s lead singer.
JW: Did you have a childhood? NW: [Laughs] No.
JW: Did you sing in concerts as a pre-teen? NW: Yes, in a gospel concert. With my aunt and sisters—or they sang with me [laughs]. During a separate part of the show, Clara Ward [pictured], the great gospel singer, performed. For a little kid like me who loved to sing, hearing Clara Ward was a big deal. It was so moving. I loved it.
JW: But where did you get your training? NW: It’s all natural. I was taken to singing lessons but the teacher told my mom that my voice would soon change, so lessons would be a waste. But my voice didn’t change. The confident attitude didn’t change either [laughs].
JW: How did you learn? NW: I listened to the radio a great deal and heard a lot of male singers. My dad listened quite a bit to records by singers like "Little" Jimmy Scott [pictured], Billy Eckstine and Nat Cole.
JW: When were you listening to female jazz singers? NW: When I was a little older I would go to the nearby coffee shop where there was a jukebox. I'd listen to Dinah Washington, Ruth Brown and Lavern Baker. I loved Dinah [pictured] most of all. When I think of me and the humor I use in my songs, much relates to Dinah's approach. She was of the song, talk-singing the story—and having a ball. It’s one thing to sing. It’s another thing to have fun doing it.
JW: When I watch you sing in clips, there’s a show going on. NW: What do you mean?
JW: Your facial expressions, your eyes, your body language, most of all your hands—you're acting while you're singing. NW: That comes from years of performing on stage and in front of television cameras. I was always aware that there was an audience out there and that as a performer I had to make a warm connection. Audiences want to see a song as well as hear it.
JW: What a great image. NW: That’s why I've always enjoyed performing in smaller venues. People can see all of me there. In large venues, audiences miss the essence of who I am. Part of what I do is in my body language, my hands, my arms—all of that. You miss a lot by just hearing my voice. It’s a performance, it really is, and I love doing it.
JW: Which pop singer taught you the most about phrasing? NW: “Little” Jimmy Scott. I used to love how he made one word sound like three, just bending the notes. I heard him when I was 10, when he was with Lionel Hampton’s band. Jimmy is from Cleveland, and my father had his early records, like The Show Must Go On and Everybody’s Somebody’s Fool.
JW: You two share an artistic closeness, don't you? NW: Oh, yes. We are very much soulmates as far as the lyric and delivering them is concerned. In 1966, I recorded a song that I had never heard Jimmy sing. It was I Wish I Didn’t Love You So. When I finally heard his 1962 version some years later, I realized that our intros and first 15 bars were identical. We had approached the song the exact same way. We feel the same way about songs.
JW: And you both have that deep passion. NW: Oh yes.
JW: I read you won a contest and appeared on TV at age 15. True? NW: Actually I didn’t win that contest. Where do these things come from? I want to clear that up. At the time, there was a citywide talent contest in Columbus. I was sent to represent my school. But when I auditioned at radio station WTVN and they heard me, I was asked not to participate.
JW: What do you mean, "not participate?" NW: Just that. They wanted to have a contest and felt that if I were included, I would run away with it.
JW: How did they make it up to you? NW: [Laughs] They gave me a TV show. I sang on the air twice a week. I was 15 years old.
JW: Were you nervous? NW: The stage never bothered me. I enjoyed it. On TV, viewers would write in asking me to dedicate a song to someone. I was on the air 15 minutes twice a week, after the news. The show was called Skyline Melody.
JW: Your singing career started just like that? NW: Just like that. Career-wise, things for me have always just come and have been there. But I’ve also been very selective about what was best for me.
JW: For example? NW: Like knowing early on that I didn’t want to go out on the national level until I knew who I was as a person. I resisted the pull as long as possible. I knew that show business was not the greatest thing for your personal life. So I waited until I was sure.
JW: You said you wanted to know yourself better before committing to show business. How did you discover who you were? NW: Well, it wasn’t something that came to mind when I woke up one day. I grew up very knowledgeable about life. I was blessed with a little common sense and a family that supported me. No one in my family was in show business, but I knew the deal and knew I had to proceed cautiously. I had to be sure I knew what I wanted and that I was making the best possible choices.
JW: So you resisted the pull? NW: I just didn’t want to be swept away by show business too soon. I was very proud of being my mom and dad’s daughter. They never really fought against any of the decisions I made. When I was 18 years old, I decided against joining a band and went to college instead. I studied education, but the singing work was always there, beckoning. That constant lure made attending college for four years difficult, especially after having been on the stage so often when I was young. I was bitten.
JW: Did you enjoy college? NW: Very much. I attended Central State College in Ohio for a year on a scholarship and was a good student. College had always been part of the plan for me. But no one had to sit me down with the rules and regulations about what to do after high school. I just wanted to go to college and try to live an ordinary life. At college, I wasn’t allowed to declare a major, but I did take a few music classes. To this day I still don’t know how to read music.
JW: How then do you know so many songs? NW: The ears. If a song was played on the piano once or a band played a song down, I knew it.
JW: But how did you capture the melodies of songs that were new when you sang them? NW: There are only so many places a note can go [laughs]. I was a very careful listener.
JW: Did you sing in college? NW: As a freshman you weren’t supposed to go off campus on the weekends. Which made it hard because there was always work for me singing. I was constantly being pulled toward show business. After my first year, the pull was too strong. I loved performing too much. So I decided to leave college in 1956 to join Rusty Bryant's Carolyn Club Big Band. We toured for two years and recorded for Dot Records.
JW: How did you meet alto saxophonist Cannonball Adderley? NW: I met Cannon in 1958. Talk about a cliché—I met him on the corner of 52nd Street and Broadway. I was still with Rusty. The band was in New York to record before heading up to perform in Buffalo, N.Y.
JW: What happened? NW: Rusty and I were walking down the street when we ran into Cannon. Rusty and Cannon knew each other. The three of us talked for a while. Cannon said his band was breaking up. Nat was going with Lionel Hampton and Cannon was going with Miles Davis. Soon after meeting Cannon, I saw him again in Columbus, Ohio. Rusty and I were playing at a club there called Marty’s 502. Cannon played there with Miles.
JW: Did you talk to Adderley? NW: Yes. I knew he was managed by John Levy [pictured]. John managed all the greats—George Shearing, Ahmad Jamal, Ramsey Lewis, Dakota Staton and so many other superb artists. John had a huge reputation for being smart, tough and honest. So John was very much on my radar. I wanted him to represent me.
JW: Did you return to New York? NW: Yes. In August 1959. My purpose was to meet John and get him to hear me sing. He wasn’t going to escape from this little girl from Columbus [laughs]. I took a job at the Triangle Handbag Co. for about a minute [laughs]. Then I learned the P.B.X. board, to be a phone operator. I ended up at the New York Institute of Technology as their switchboard operator and soon became secretary to the dean because his secretary quit. They were wonderful to me.
JW: How so? NW: As things progressed for me, they allowed me time off to take publicity photographs and whatever else I had to do. My hours were from noon to 8 p.m., which allowed me time to sing at night. They went along and helped me out. I don’t know that things would have gone my way if they hadn’t been so supportive and accommodating. They wanted to help and were very good about it.
JW: Where were you performing in New York? NW: I would hang out at this club in the Bronx called the Blue Morocco with my roommate, Sonja La Forte, who sang with organist Johnny "Hammond" Smith. Irene Reid was the house singer. I sat in with the band a few times. One day Irene broke her leg, so the club called me to replace her. I don’t remember all of the band members but I do recall that Arthur Jenkins was on piano.
JW: What was the next step? NW: To get John Levy up there to hear me perform. I thought the impact would be stronger if John saw and heard me rather than just sending him a demo tape.
JW: How did you get John to make the trip? NW: Oh, that was easy. [pause... laughs]. Look, when his assistant is from Ohio and knows you personally, and Cannon knew what I wanted, it didn't take much. I told Cannon, “I’m going to be singing at the Blue Morocco.” So John's assistant and Cannon both called him and urged him to go. He had always been telling them, “Look, I need to see her first.”
JW: As you’re recording in the 1960s, female soul-pop singers such as Diana Ross, Dionne Warwick and Dusty Springfield are entering your space. NW: Well, yes, they were on the radio [laughs]. Radio made it possible for everyone. When I was coming up in the 1950s and 1960s, there was a jazz station on at least one AM radio in every city. You could hear jazz all the time on the dial, no matter what time of day. Now you have to hunt for it. Back in the early 1960s, more and more singers were being featured on the radio, and listeners were exposed to many good singers who sang many different styles.
JW: As the 1960s wore on, were times increasingly hard for song stylists with a jazz feel? NW: I think so. If I were 22 years old now starting out, I probably would not choose to do what I did because the marketing is very different today. Few record labels even have jazz divisions now.
JW: Did radio allow for greater competition among female soul-pop singers? NW: Yes. But AM radio played my records a lot. Some of the disc jockeys talked about me so much on the air it was embarrassing [laughs].
JW: Why was AM radio so important? NW: It was the frequency that older people listened to in cars when they drove to work and teens listened to on transistor radios. AM radio was everything for artists then. It's how your music got out.
JW: Was recording 47 albums for Capitol challenging for you? NW: Not at all. We all did it at Capitol Records—Nat Cole, Peggy Lee, Tennessee Ernie Ford, Dakota Staton. Every six months you were in the studio recording.
JW: That sounds like a tight period of time per album. NW: It wasn’t, at least not for me. It took only three days to make an album then.
JW: Three days? Would you rehearse the music beforehand? NW: No [laughs]. I would pick the songs with John [Levy] and Dave [Cavanaugh]. Then I’d hear the chart for the first time at 8 pm on a Wednesday night or whenever we’d record. The band would run it down. That would be the first time I heard how it would sound. Then we’d record three songs a night over three days.
JW: No rehearsing? NW: No. I’d just pick up a chart and sing it. I would know the melody lines to the songs I picked in advance, of course. I would listen to demos of the songs and have the words and melody down. I was always extremely prepared before I entered the studio. I knew the material. But my approach on a song—how I would phrase the notes, tell the story—was always decided on the spot after hearing the arrangement.
JW: Do you listen to your Capitol recordings today? NW: No.
JW: Why not? NW: It’s all in my head and in my body.
JW: Because you don’t like the way you sound? NW: No, no, no. I just don’t have an appetite for it. It kind of gets on my nerves when I go to someone’s house and they think they’re doing me a favor by playing my records for me. [Pictured: Nancy Wilson in a Johnson & Johnson ad with daughter Samantha]
JW: I don't understand. NW: I have all that music in my head. I don't have to hear it again. I know the charts. I can hear them playing and me singing.
JW: Is that true of music in general? NW: Pretty much. I prefer to listen to books more than music. And I read. I’m more of a reader and a listener of books.
JW: What were the 1960s like from inside the music business? NW: It was a great time. I was having a ball, especially after I really caught on in 1964. That was the year of my popular live album [The Nancy Wilson Show!] and How Glad I Am, my biggest hit. At that point, I looked back and realized how lucky I had been over four and a half short years—recording on Capitol and with George Shearing, Cannonball [Adderley], Ronnell Bright, Jimmy Jones, Gerald Wilson and everyone. It doesn’t get better than that.
JW: But you were experiencing the '60s, weren't you? Or were you always stuck in the studio? NW: Records took only 14 hours every six months. I was in supper clubs most of the time.
JW: How often did you sing in clubs? NW: One year I worked 48 weeks. Eventually I had to put my foot down. No more.
JW: Was there much interaction between you and the Beatles? You were both on Capitol. NW: I love Yesterday and recorded it as well as some of their other songs. But I didn’t know them or come in contact with them. I knew who they were, of course, but I didn’t pay much attention to the whole rock scene. It just wasn't my focus. Audiences followed that but as a performer, I didn't have the luxury or the time to follow music trends closely. Few recording artists did then. You're just too busy trying to remain out there. One time I was in Japan doing an interview... [pause]. By the way, is Cream a group Eric Clapton was in?
JW: Yes. NW: Did I know that when I was asked? No [laughs]. The interviewer asked me something about Cream and I didn’t have a clue. It took me years to know what that question was about. Remember, I was constantly working or I was traveling to perform. The sixties for me were about work.
JW: So there were many different 1960s, depending on who you were and where you were. NW: The 1960s were about Selma, Alabama, where I marched in 1965. Those years to me were more about Martin Luther King and the Civil Rights struggle than the music scene. As an artist then, taking such a political stand came with professional risks. But it had to be done.
JW: Did you face racism growing up? NW: Not really. In Ohio, I didn’t grow up with segregation, and I never went down South until way later. So I didn’t experience what many others did. But I’m so grateful to singers like Bessie Smith, Lena Horne and Nat Cole for breaking barriers in the music industry. And on TV. I did a lot of television in the 1960s, including shows hosted by Carol Burnett, Nat Cole and The Smothers Brothers. And I had my own TV show on NBC, of course, in the late 1960s.
JW: Performing so often in clubs, did you get weary of the material you sang? NW: Goodness no. When you pick good songs with different paths to where you want to go, you never get tired of the material. Also, each audience is different, so the feeling in the room changes. That's where my humor comes in, making songs fun to sing, you know?
JW: Did Burt Bacharach ever consider using you instead of Dionne Warwick to record his songs? NW: I have no idea. He was always tied to Dionne. They have a musical thing. We met once. That’s about it.
JW: Your TV show in 1967 and 1968 featured a wide range of guests. NW: The show was great. I was able to let audiences know that there was more to me than singing in nightclubs. Cannonball [Adderley] was my favorite guest.
JW: You were close with the Adderley brothers, weren’t you? NW: Yes. We were all card players together. Cannon didn’t play pinochle all that well, but Nat and his wife did, and we were tight. We played cards at our homes whenever I was in New York or they were in Los Angeles. Nat's house in Teaneck, N.J., was my home away from home.
JW: You’ve worked with amazing arrangers. NW: Sid Feller was a doll, a sweetheart of a man. Oliver Nelson, though—oh, my—Don’t Rain on My Parade and The Grass Is Greener. That was a biggie. Oliver wrote beautifully. And Jimmy Jones—oh my [sighs]. Another sweet man. Ronnell Bright was my conductor for quite a few years. Llew Matthews has been my conductor for 18 years. I had the same bass player for 20-something years. And drummer Roy McCurdy, who was with Cannonball, has been with me since Cannon passed [in 1975].
JW: Looking back, would you have done anything different? NW: No. I’m content with where I am. Any little change could have made things different. I’m glad the way things went. It’s nice to reach my age and be comfortable in my house. I’m only doing six shows for the rest of year. I cut back starting in 2008.
JW: Why? NW: My late husband was so ill before he passed away that year, I cut my schedule back dramatically to be with him. It amazed my husband that I would do that given how much work was a part of me. We were so close. It was so sad.
JW: When you were coming up, did you ever wish you had received more media attention, like your contemporaries in rock and soul? NW: I’ve never been into all that “who I am” thing or comparing myself to others. I was a husband’s wife and a kid’s mother early on. I was 26 years old when I had Kacy with Kenny Dennis, my first husband. I was 39 years old when I had Samantha with Wiley Burton, whom I married in 1974.
JW: Did you want to be a sensation? NW: You know, I was never really an A-list person.
JW: What? NW: I mean the kind of person who would be at parties, getting in trouble and all the rest. When I wasn’t working, I was home with my family, where I wanted to be. And it’s the same way today. I love being home. JW: Do you think your mature and graceful presence on albums, in clubs and on TV played a role in helping America get beyond race in the 1960s? NW: How do you mean?
JW: When I watch you sing and perform in clips, you seem to be telegraphing a message to audiences—“We’re all the same. See?” NW: I like to think so. I didn’t encounter prejudice as I was coming up the way many earlier artists did. Fortunately, I came along at the right time. I have a feeling that if I had come along 10 years earlier it would have been a different story. That’s what I loved about doing The Carol Burnett Show. There was no color involved. I didn’t have to play black characters. I could just do comedy, which I loved to do.
JW: I think the more you appeared on TV with your warm personality, the greater your influence on integration. NW: I was trying to pull audiences together, to make people see that harmony wasn’t that hard, that being black or white made no difference. My message was about artistry, and my audiences were made up of people. I had no idea who was in the camera lens or in a darkened club. They were just people who wanted me to do my best. I was completely comfortable, and they became comfortable, too. Music can do that. It can change the way people feel and think.
JW: There was always a ministerial quality about your approach, perhaps a result of your gospel roots? NW: I had an uncle who was a bishop. And he knew how I felt and still feel about God and the supreme being. Gospel is in my blood. In fact, I have four sisters and we all married reverends [laughs]. My second husband was ordained the week we were married.
JW: What did he say to you? NW: He asked me when I planned to get in the pulpit. I said, “Uncle Nelson, you have your pulpit and I have mine” [laughs]. My mom’s mother once said to her, “Nancy should be singing for the glory of the Lord.” My grandmother’s comment put my mother in tears. The comment hurt her because she was so proud of me. I said to my mom, “What makes her assume I’m not doing that now?”
JW: So the subtext of your performances and the image you conveyed was harmony? NW: Yes, exactly.
JW: Did your mother ever hear you perform? NW: Not in the nightclubs. No, no, no. She would never do that. But she heard me in concerts.
JW: Throughout your career, you've always charted a graceful course. NW: That’s the gift. Truly. I knew the path I wanted to take. That’s part of the thing you talked about. Being given the gift to sing and perform is one thing. Having the sense to handle it is another. I wanted to stay on the path I chose for myself.
JW: But you must have been a charmer, too. NW: I knew how to get out of situations [laughs]. That’s part of the gift, too.
JW: What would you do back then when asked to do things you didn’t want to do? NW: I would laugh. No one ever told me what to wear or how to sing. It just did not happen that way.
JW: But situations must have come up. NW: I have a little finesse about me [laughs]. I can get out of things by keeping the mood easy and light. You just have to stay out of the way of those who want to put you on the wrong track.
JW: So looking back, it’s all good? NW: The one good thing about reaching this point is that I can look back and know that I’ve used my life wisely, I’m proud of my kids, and I get time off to do nothing, which is wonderful. I couldn’t be happier.
A Gal in Calico was written by Leo Robin and Arthur Schwartz for a rather dumb film from Warner Bros. called The Time, the Place and the Girl. Released the day after Christmas in 1946, the B-movie was a post-war good-time jubilee featuring a dopey plot and a mess of stage talent and dance numbers. But nestled within the movie morass was a Western scene with lariat twirlers. The Oklahoma-like production needed a song, so Robin and Schwartz wrote A Gal in Calico.
The song was gold in the late 1940s. Artists who recorded it wound up with a hit, since the public couldn't seem to get enough of the upbeat, post-war, settling-down song. Perhaps the best version during this period was by Johnny Mercer (above) and the Pied Pipers in 1947 with Paul Weston's arrangement and band. Here it is...
Two terrific jazz versions stand out at the dawn of the the LP era: Ahmad Jamal's revival of A Gal in Calico in 1952 on his The Piano Scene (Epic) and Miles Davis's rendition in 1955 on The Musings of Miles (Prestige), with Red Garland on piano....
The Jamal and Davis recordings are pure perfection and now are jazz classics. But a recent favorite of mine was by pianist Hod O'Brien's on drummer Aaron Binder's album, Fortune Smiles on Aaron Binder, from 2000. O'Brien was backed by bassist Scott Fitzsimmons and drummer Binder.
Here's Hod O'Brien playing A Gal in Calico, a robust and addictive tribute to Red Garland's feel...
Jordi Pujol's Fresh Sound label continues its nifty "Rare & Collectible Albums by Unsung Bandleaders" series by releasing killer recordings by George Romanis and Rey DeMichel. I last wrote about this terrific lost bandleader collection in May, when I posted on Sam Trippe's Explosion! album for the Sheen label that was released just after Trippe's fatal car crash in Los Angeles in late 1959 (go here).
Never heard of Romanis (above) or DeMichel? You're not alone. Both were big-band sidemen and arrangers who worked behind the scenes for bigger-name artists in the 1940s and in the movie and television studios of the 1950s and beyond. Interestingly, both arrangers recorded just two albums each as leaders of big bands at the dawn of 12-inch stereophonic sound. Back in the late 1950s, stereo was just catching on and labels were hungry to hire leaders and arrangers who could fully exploit the new format's wide, dimensional sonics.
Romanis was based largely in New York and DeMichel (above) in Los Angeles. The Romanis albums are Modern Sketches in Jazz for Coral and DoubleExplosure!!! for Decca. The DeMichel pair are Cookin' With Rey and For Bloozers Only, both on the Challenge label. Both two-fer sets are tight, powerhouse albums.
In the case of Romanis's Modern Sketches (1959), the band featured Ernie Royal, Doc Severinsen and Joe Ferrante (tp); Eddie Bert and Urbie Green (tb); Don Butterfield (tu); Al Cohn (ts); Jerome Richardson (ts,fl); Barry Galbraith (g); George Duvivier (b); Mousie Alexander (d); and Joe Venuto (perc), with Romanis conducting.
On his Double Explosure! (1961), the knockout band consisted of Ernie Royal, Doc Severinsen, Clark Terry, Nick Travis, Jimmy Maxwell and Jimmy Nottingham (tp); Urbie Green, John Messner, Wayne Andre and Frank Rehak (tb); Paul Faulise (b-tb); Don Butterfield (tu); Tommy Newsom (fl,pic); Eddie Costa (vib); Barry Galbraith (el-g); Chuck Wayne (g); George Duvivier (b); and Mousie Alexander and Bunny Shawker (d,perc), with Romanis conducting.
On the West Coast, DeMichel's Cookin' With Rey (1959) was arranged by John DeFoor and featured Marvin Brown, Irv Bush and Ollie Mitchell (tp); Dave Wells (tp,b-tb); Ed Freudenberg (tb); Lanny Morgan (as); Jay Corre and Jack Kernan (ts); Dave Madden (bar); Dick Grove (p); Buddy Matlock (g); Jack Smalley (b); and Roy Roten (d); with DeMichel conducting.
And his For Bloozers Only (1959), arranged by Kenny Farrar and John DeFoor, included Marvin Brown, John Anderson and John Audino (tp); Dave Wells and Ed Freudenberg (tb); Lanny Morgan (as); Teddy Edwards (ts); Modesto Briseno (ts,bar); Ted Parker (bar); Joyce Collins (p); Buddy Matlock (g); Jack Smalley (b); and Roy Roten (d) with DeMichel conducting.
All four albums sound like a professional boxer working out on a heavy bag. The blows are loud, hard and firm. You can feel each explosive rhythmic shot. All four albums are flawless and there isn't a dud arrangement among them. The musicians on the dates were all crack studio players. Plus, the album's tracks sing, swing and sting. I hesitate to call them dance-band albums, since such a term comes with the stigma of commercial intent and proms. These are simply great big band albums with swell barely-known leaders at the peak of the stereophonic big-band era. Let's put it this way, my left hand is sore from snapping absentmindedly to the beat.
JazzWax tracks: You'll find the George Romanis set here and the Rey DeMichel set here.
Joyfully, both two-fers are available at Spotify!
JazzWax clips: Here's I Can't Get Started from George Romanis's Double Explosure!...
Ira Gitler turned me on to Italian jazz pianist Roberto Magris in 2008. Roberto's superb album, Il Bello Del Jazz, with alto saxophonist Herb Geller, had just reached the U.S. after being released in Italy in 2006. Over the years, Roberto and I have remained in touch, with Roberto sending along his latest releases. All have been superb, especially his Lee Morgan Rewind Vols. 1 and 2.
His latest album, World Gardens, was just released on the JMood label, and it's excellent. The songs were recorded in 2015 and 2016 and feature Roberto backed by Dominique Sanders (b), Brian Steever (d) and Pablo Sanhueza (congas and percussion).
Here's Roberto in his liner notes on the meaning of the album:
"I wanted to pick some beautiful flowers from my musical garden for your listening pleasure. I chose a colorful variety from different places in the world that have a special meaning to me. As a musician and world traveler in search of answers, I have experienced a multitude of people, languages and cultures. I have brought home many different seeds to help my garden grow in a richness of shapes and colors. As a jazz pianist, I enjoy looking at the present and new directions in all types of music, but I never forget my roots in the jazz tradition."
Tracks on the new album include the pop hit Never Can Say Goodbye (the Jackson 5 and Gloria Gaynor); Pilgrim; Blue Bamboo; Roberto's Another More Blues, Song for an African Child and Blues at Lunch!; and All the Most Beautiful Flowers; High Priest; I'm Glad There Is You; and Stella by Starlight.
Roberto plays lyrically but with conviction and power. He has a strong, hungry attack but poetry always plays a key role. So does a dash of beauty and abstraction. I love his sound.
JazzWax tracks: You'll find Roberto Magris: World Gardens (JMood) here.
Each December for the past 11 years, I've carefully chosen a different album for inclusion in my annual JazzWax Vintage Holiday Album Hall of Fame. I established this yule honor in 2008 to steer you to great seasonal favorites that may be unknown to you or merely forgotten.
My induction this year is Gap Mangione's Family Holidays. Recorded in 2005 at three different studios in Upstate New York for the Josh label, the album features Dennis Tribuzzi, Jeff Jarvis, Jack Schantz and Pat Carney (tp,flhrn); Mark Kellogg and John Hasselback (tb); Bob Kalwas (b-tb); Gerry Niewood (as,sop,fl); Andy Weinzler (ts,as,sop); Pat LaBarbera (ts,sop); Ed Xiques (bar,sop); Gap Mangione (p,keyboards); Grant Geissman (g,synt,perc,vcl); Neil Swainson and Tony Levin (b) on different tracks; Steve Gadd (d) and Cindy Miller (vcl). [Photo above of Gap Mangione courtesy of Gap Mangione]
The album swings from start to finish and will put you in the jazz holiday spirit. Kudos to Gap for his knock-out big-band arrangements. [Photo above courtesy of Gap Mangione]
Here's Gap's Bellezza (Italian for beauty), featuring solos by Gerry Niewood (as), Mark Kellogg (tb) and Andy Weinzler (ts)...
You'll find Gap Mangione's Family Holidays (Josh) here or here.
Now meet the rest of the JazzWax Vintage Holiday Album Hall of Fame, in order of their induction, with links to buy (most are probably available at Spotify as well)...
2015—Two albums with the same name: Bobby Timmons' Holiday Soul and Don Patterson's Holiday Soul. Both trio albums were recorded for Prestige in Nov. 1964—the former on the 24th and the latter on the 25th.
Here are albums that have already been inducted into the JazzWax Holiday Album Hall of Fame... - See more at: http://www.jazzwax.com/2012/11/duke-pearson-merry-ole-soul.html#sthash.V0RZmXiQ.dpuf
This week in The Wall Street Journal, I interviewed Howie Mandel for my "House Call" column in the Mansion section (go here). Howie talked at length about his childhood passion for TV's Candid Camera as well as his ongoing battles with obsessive-compulsive disorder and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder. An open and touching conversation. Howie started out as a frenetic standup comedian and then landed roles in movies and TV, including St. Elsewhere. Now he's back on TV in the new Deal or No Deal game show on CNBC. What I find fascinating is how a hyperactive brain can snap into sharp focus when in front of the camera. If you watch Howie on TV—on talk shows or on Deal or No Deal—his delivery is flawless. He thinks in unbroken ribbons of thought without having to stop and think. Howie said he doesn't know why his thought process works that way, but it does. He may be a fast thinker but he's also really, really funny. When the interview was over, my face hurt from laughing.
And here's Howie on Ellen a couple of weeks ago...
SiriusXM. Last Thursday, I was on SiriusXM's Feedback (ch. 106) with Nik Cohen and Lori Majewski to talk about the history of the saloon song and Frank Sinatra's perfect recording of Angel Eyes on Frank Sinatra Sings for Only the Lonely (1958), now out from Capitol/UMe in a first-time stereo mix and original mono. If you missed the show, go here.
Speaking of Sinatra, director Raymond De Felitta sent along a link to a post at his blog, Movies 'til Dawn, featuring a video interview he conducted with Harlan Ellison, who died in June. The video is an outtake from Raymond's 2006 documentary, Tis Autumn: The Search for Jackie Paris. In the clip, Ellison tells a good Sinatra story. Go here.
Dave McKenna. Following my post on Dave McKenna, Tom Shaker sent along this email:
"Hi Marc. Just wanted to let you know how thrilled I was to read your recent post about Woonsocket, R.I.’s own Dave McKenna. My (co-written) book, A Treasury of Rhode Island Jazz & Swing Musicians (available here) has a nice little anecdote about the late pianist along with his biography. The 2000 photo above features Dave with another Woonsocket native, the wonderful cabaret singer-pianist Daryl Sherman."
Tessa Souter radio. The singer will be interviewed and showcased on Sunday, December 9, at noon (EDT) on WBGO-FM in New York. She'll be interviewed by Michael Bourne on his Singers Unlimited show. Tessa also will sing three songs live. You can listen from anywhere in the world on your phone or computer by going here.
Les McCann radio. Chris "King" Cowles hosted a four-hour tribute to pianist Les McCann on December 1 that included an interview with McCann. You can listen to a Soundcloud of Chris's Greasy Tracks show an hour at a time on WRTC-FM in Hartford, Conn., here.
New Year's Eve. Singer JaRon Eames (above) is opening the parlor space of his home on Manhattan's Upper East Side on New Year's Eve to entertain and feed guests. There will be live jazz and dinner—BBQ chicken, red beans and rice, hot-buttered cornbread, creole rice, Louisiana seafood gumbo, green salad, wine, Champagne and dessert. The tab is $50. The evening starts at 9 p.m. and runs until 1a.m. For more information and reservations, email JaRon directly at jaroneames@gmail.com. Here's a view of JaRon's parlor...
What the heck.Here's flugelhornist Art Farmer and guitarist Jim Hall in 1964...
Oddball album cover of the week.
Late hours? How about dawn. The milk bottles and paper have already been delivered (left, front). What's more, our female model seems about to keel over or she's just really done with her date. "Yeah, yeah, yeah, the most beautiful girl in the world. Got it. Listen, if I don't go in there and get some sleep, I'm gonna drop right here."
Trudy Pitts wasn't as well known or as prolific as Shirley Scott, but the organist was a tasty player just the same. Sadly, she didn't record nearly enough, releasing just seven leadership albums starting in 1967 compared with Scott's several dozen albums beginning in the late 1950s. To be fair, Scott's recording career goes back even further, to the late 1940s, leaving Scott plenty of time to establish herself as a name player. Pitts came up in the late 1960s, when recording opportunities were drying up, especially for women in jazz. To read blogger Doug Payne's appreciation of Pitts after she died in 2010, go here. My brief appreciation is here. A special thanks to Andrew J. Sordoni III, who sent along a link to the first video below. I added a few:
Here's Trudy Pitts and her husband, Bill "Mr. C" Carney ...
On Joe Henderson's 1965 album In 'n Out, the listener enjoyed five giants for the price of one. The tenor saxophonist and trumpeter Kenny Dorham were joined by powerful cookers: pianist McCoy Tyner and drummer Elvin Jones, who were two-thirds of John Coltrane's rhythm section, and bassist Richard Davis, who had just recorded with Eric Dolphy on Out to Lunch (1964). Recorded for Blue Note in April 1964, In 'n Out features three Henderson originals and two by Dorham. This is a perfect album, so it's tough to pick a favorite, but Punjab is a tiger. Henderson's modal composition is stormy and swishes restlessly between bright and dark tones. The music here is a reflection of its times—lyrically hopeful but fed up with the era's racism. The brilliant cover design was by Reid Miles.
As a bonus,here's baritone saxophonist Pepper Adams with Zoot Sims (ts), Tommy Flanagan (p), Ron Carter (b) and Elvin Jones (d) recording the song on Encounter! on December 11 or 12, 1968, 50 years ago. Interesting how they slowed it down by half...
Following my post on Joe Mooney's Wait Till You See Her a week ago, I received a high level of emails from readers who didn't know much about Mooney but loved what they heard. The same was true at Facebook, where there was quite a bit of traffic in favor of the lounge singer-organist-accordionist. [Photo above of Joe Mooney in 1946, by William P. Gottlieb]
Since so many of your are Mooney fans now, I figured I'd turn you on to some research I did nearly 10 years ago on Mooney's five little-known, sublime sides he recorded with the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra in 1952 and '53.
But first, let's travel back to the early 1950s, when big-band arrangers Eddie Sauter and Bill Finegan formed the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra. Their aim was to have superior studio musicians play near-symphonic jazz scores using a seemingly endless combination of instruments. While the results sounded somewhat pop and, at times, unashamedly corny, the instrumental sophistication was not lost on a younger generation of arrangers, including Gil Evans, Nelson Riddle, Johnny Richards and Billy May.
Originally conceived strictly as an instrumental aggregation, Sauter and Finegan agreed in the fall of 1952 to add vocalists. The move most likely came after pressure from their label, RCA, which wanted to give the somewhat wooden format a more human touch and pop appeal.
Remember, this was the pre-rock era of earnest vocal groups such as the Ames Brothers, the McGuire Sisters, the Four Aces and the Four Lads who appealed largely to the rapidly expanding white suburban market with a car radio and home radio-phonograph console.
When Joe Mooney arrived to record with the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra in late 1952, he was there to provide vocals that wouldn't overshadow the band's six-lane orchestrations. Backing Mooney on the tracks were two different vocal groups: the Ray Charles Singers: Gene Lowell, Artie Malvin and Steve Steck; and the Doodlers: Sally Sweetland and Lillian Clark. The tight choral parts were written by veteran vocal arranger Ray Charles.
The first track Mooney recorded on November 3, 1952 was Nina Never Knew, a song written by Louis Alter and Milton Drake. The gorgeous melody came with lyrics that are somewhat creepy now about the seduction of a girl who didn't know much about love but does when the song is over. The arrangement featured the wandering trombone of Bill Harris Also recorded that day was Love Is a Simple Thing, a song with a bouncy melody that had had its debut months earlier in New Faces of 1952, a popular Broadway revue.
Soon after Nina Never Knew was released, the song became a jukebox hit, reaching #13 on the Billboard charts by December. The song would be the orchestra's second biggest seller after Midnight Sleighride, which had peaked at #12 that August.
Mooney returned to the studio on November 18 to record Hit the Road to Dreamland, a mid-tempo tune that leaned heavily on novelty instrumentation but had a gorgeous arrangement.
After touring with the orchestra for several months, Mooney and the band went back into the studio on April 6, 1953. The first tune recorded that day was Time to Dream, with female vocalist Florence Fogelson singing wordless soprano mood notes. The next track recorded that day was, Pale Moon, featuring Fogelson alone, without Mooney.
A third track was recorded that day—It's Mutual—a lovely tune Mooney co-wrote. This third track was something of an anomaly. For one, recording sessions typically captured an even number of tracks to complete sides of singles. For another, there was no choir arranged behind Mooney. Which leads me to believe that It's Mutual might have been a demo or try-out to show RCA executives what Mooney could do as a lead singer on his own.
In 2009, I spoke to Stanley Cooper about these recordings. Stan was one of my favorite 1950s music-industry sources. A retired Brill Building executive, Stanley worked for Redd Evans Music and later Barton Music as a song-plugger, pitching tunes the music publishers owned to pop singers Stan believed could make them hits. When I called Stan to ask him about Mooney and the Sauter-Finegan sessions, I was shocked. Stan replied in his Runyonesque New York accent: "Did I know Mooney? I was the one who brought Nina Never Knew to RCA's attention in 1952 and requested that Mooney sing it." Pay dirt! [Photo above of Joe Mooney]
Stan's story below, in his words, sheds some light on Mooney's It's Mutual, a song that was issued only once in 1956 on a Sauter-Finegan LP and to this day has never appeared on CD. Here's Stan:
"Back in '52, I was a fan of Joe Mooney's. I knew his work well. He had a great sound. Soft, but smart. When Redd Evans of Redd Evans Music picked up the rights to Nina Never Knew, he asked me to find a singer who could make it a hit. The first person I thought of was Nat [King Cole]. Nat was the nicest guy in the world. But when I asked him to record the song, he initially turned it down. Nat said he didn't like the name Nina. I have no idea why. Maybe he once had a girlfriend named Nina or something. I don't know. [Photo above of Nat King Cole by William P. Gottlieb]
"So I shopped Nina Never Knew around to different A&R men. When I reached Dave Kapp, the head of A&R at RCA at the time, he loved the song right away. Most music publishers who went to Dave brought along sheet music and demos by the pound. I never did that. When I went to see him, I brought only two songs, and usually just one. Dave knew that if I had a song I liked, he could figure out fast whether or not he liked it and which of his artists should record it. So he liked me. [Above, an ad for the single in Billboard in November 1952]
"Dave said the best he could do was have the newly signed Sauter-Finegan Orchestra record it. I said fine, but the song had to have a vocalist. Dave asked me who I thought would be ideal. I said. 'Joe Mooney.' I chose Joe because he had a voice that was closest to the singer I originally wanted—Nat King Cole. The song needed that savvy, jazzy, relaxed sound. Dave liked the idea and sent for Joe.
"When Mooney came into the RCA studio that day, he and I spoke briefly. I told him how much I liked his voice and why I wanted him for the date. He thanked me. He was a very pleasant guy. Then I went into the [engineer's] booth with the A&R men and my boss, Redd Evans, to listen to the recording. [Image above of Billboard's "Disc Jockey Pick" chart the week of December 6, 1952]
"When the band started and Mooney began to sing, I couldn't believe my ears. As soon as I heard the first four bars, I knew right away that I was right about matching Mooney with Sauter-Finegan and that the song had a real shot. It was like being in a trance listening to that sound. I recall that Mooney [who was blind] went off-mike a few times so they had to start again and bring him back in. But that's all I noticed with my eyes. My attention was my ears. Listening to that sound for the first time was amazing.
"I don't know why Mooney never recorded more with Sauter-Finegan or on his own with RCA. It was a natural fit. I do know that RCA offered him a multi-record deal with the label and that there was some disagreement over money. Dave Kapp was the kind of guy who made an offer and if you didn't take it, he never came back to you with it. A lot of people didn't like him because he was a cold fish. I liked him because he was a good music man. He truly liked music people. I guess that's what happened with Joe. It's a shame really. They sounded perfect together. The Sauter-Finegan band was easy-going but square. Joe was easy-going and hip. He gave them a little more edge. I can only imagine how great the music would have been had they recorded more sides together.
"If you listen to Sauter-Finegan's recordings from the early 1950s, the orchestra was way ahead of its time. It was in the same league as Boyd Raeburn's band of the mid-40s, in terms of experimentation. Joe warmed them up tremendously. And I have no idea why It's Mutual was never released. I'm listening to it with you now for the first time and it's wonderful. I didn't even know the track existed someplace. It's clearly a beautiful record." [Photo above of Eddie Sauter and Bill Finegan]
Shame on Dave Kapp for not seeing the value in Joe Mooney's vocal with the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra. Or, shame on Kapp for being a jerk about the offer. It's hard to imagine Mooney wanted that much more than Kapp was willing to shell out. Or Kapp stupidly may have viewed Mooney's blindness as a pop and touring limitation. I, for one, could dig another 20 songs like these five, and Mooney's inclusion may well have made Sauter-Finegan a bigger popular success.
Eddie Sauter died in 1981; Bill Finegan died in 2008; Joe Mooney died in 1975; and Stanley Cooper died in 2016.
JazzWax tracks: Here are the five sides Joe Mooney recorded with the Sauter-Finegan Orchestra in the early 1950s, including the rare It's Mutual. The arrangements are delightfully smart, and Mooney's singing is pure ear candy:
Here'sNina Never Knew recorded November 3, 1952...
Here'sLove Is a Simple Thing recorded November 3, 1952, with a drop-dead arrangement...
Here's Hit the Trail to Dreamland recorded on November 18, 1952...
Marc Myers writes regularly for The Wall Street Journal and is author of "Anatomy of a Song" (Grove) and "Why Jazz Happened." Founded in 2007, JazzWax is a three-time winner of the Jazz Journalists Association's best blog award, including 2018.
