JazzWax

Perfect Album: Horace-Scope

Two of the most dominant and successful hard bop groups of the 1950s were Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers and the Horace Silver Quintet. One wasn't better than the other. Their differences were a matter of flavors and hues. Blakey's group tended to be mightier and bluesier. Silver was funkier and more lyrical, largely because he composed and arranged many of the songs with a jaunty bop feel. [Photo above of Horace Silver by Francis Wolff]

Of Silver's vast catalog of exceptional albums, Horace-Scope has always been a cut above in terms of its flawless execution, brightly written songs and warm instrumental choreography. Recorded on July 8 and 9, 1960 at Rudy van Gelder's studio in Englewood Cliffs, N.J., Horace-Scope showcased Blue Mitchell (tp), Junior Cook (ts), Horace Silver (p), Gene Taylor (b) and Roy Brooks (d). The track list features the plucky mid-tempo Strollin', the bouncy Where You At?, the ballad Without You, the upbeat Horace-Scope, the minor-major glider Yeah!, the cakewalk-y blues Me and My Baby and the barn-burner Nica's Dream.

When I interviewed Rudy Van Gelder in 2012 for the Wall Street Journal, I brought with me just one CD—Rudy's remastered Horace-Scope. And when Rudy and I were done with the interview, I asked him if we could listen to a track off the album. Rudy obliged. In short order, out of those astonishing monitor speakers in the booth leapt Strolln'. As the song flooded the space, I stared out into the studio through the glass, imagining the music being created live in 1960 in Rudy's sauna-like wood setting with cathedral ceilings. Turning to Rudy, I raised my eyebrows twice. He seemed nonplussed—as if I had forced a baker to eat one more eclair. As I recall, he smiled, leaned back and said something like, "All in a day's work."

Nevertheless, I think of Rudy every time I listen to Horace-Scope and how he managed to capture all of that nuanced energy and fire with his magically placed microphones.

Horace Silver died in 2014; Rudy Van Gelder died in 2016.

JazzWax tracks: You'll find Horace Silver's Horace-Scope here or at Spotify.

Jazzwax clip: Here's the complete album...

Here's the Horace Silver Quintet in 1958, featuring Blue Mitchell (tp), Junior Cook (ts), Horace Silver (p), Gene Tailor (b) and Louis Hayes (d)...

And here's the Horace Silver Quintet in 1974 playing Liberated Brother, with Tom Harrell (tp), Bob Berg (ts), Horace Silver (p), Mike Richmond (bass) and Willian Goffigan (d)...

Gigi Gryce + Richard Williams

Last week, I posted on composer-arranger and alto saxophonist Gigi Gryce and his Jazz Lab partnership with trumpeter Donald Byrd in 1957. I also mentioned that that their union came to an end when Byrd went off to Paris for six months starting in July 1958. Upon his return in December, Byrd began recording as a leader for Blue Note, starting with Off to the Races. Today I want to pick up with the Gryce storyline. [Photo above of Gigi Gryce by Esmond Edwards/CTSIMages]

In the year that followed Byrd's European trip, Gryce spent much of 1959 playing as a sideman and arranging. His album dates included Dizzy Gillespie's The Greatest Trumpet of Them All, Betty Carter's Out There With Betty Carter, Jimmy Cleveland's Rhythm Crazy, Curtis Fuller's Sliding Easy and Buddy Rich v. Max Roach.

Eager to resume a leadership role, Gryce formed a New York quintet in the fall of 1959 that featured trumpeter Richard Williams and pianist Richard Wyands. The quintet recorded three studio albums in 1960 for New Jazz, a subsidiary of Prestige—Sayin' Something (March), Hap'nin's (May) and Rat Race Blues (June). In addition to these, Gryce and Williams recorded Reminiscin' in November.

Then in 2011, Uptown Records put out Doin' the Gigi, featuring three previously unreleased Gryce sessions. Two of them were with Williams—one an unissued studio session in 1960 and a Birdland broadcast in 1961.

Overall, Gryce and Williams were a superb match. As Gryce noted in the liner notes of one of his albums, "Richard Williams is our trumpeter. He is a student at the Manhattan School of Music. He has been with me for over a year. He is one of the sincerest musicians and individuals I know. I have the same regard for him as I had for Clifford Brown."

Williams had an open tone that crackled with warm power and confidence, and he hit high notes with ease. But he also knew how to take his foot off the gas and leave space around his notes, giving the listener's ear a chance to catch up. In this regard, he was a perfect mate to Gryce's fluid, high-register alto sax. As you'll hear, Gryce and Williams were exceptional together and as soloists. [Photo above of Richard Williams, second from right, in the driveway of Rudy Van Gelder's Englewood Cliffs, N.J., studio with the rest of the musicians on Oliver Nelson's Screamin' the Blues recording session in late May 1960]

After these quintet recordings, Gryce's jazz career and personal life went into a rapid tailspin. Highly sensitive but determined, Gryce seemed to suffer from anxiety and emotional exhaustion given the pressure he was under to record and tour, raise a family and tend to his publishing companies—Melotone Music and Totem Music.

In the liner notes to Doin' the Gigi, Noal Cohen and Michael Fitzgerald write: "In the early 1960s, many of the composers who had placed their music with Gryce's companies were now leaving, presumably under pressure from record companies. Gryce became more and more withdrawn and fearful, and while his countenance could be seen adorning reed advertisements, his performing activities decreased dramatically. By late 1963, Gryce's bizarre and irrational behavior had reached the point that [his wife] Eleanor felt compelled to take their children and leave her husband for good. This was also the year his publishing companies were dissolved."

Gryce turned to public-school teaching for the balance of his career He died in 1983 at age 57; Richard Williams died in 1985 at age 54.

JazzWax tracks: You'll find the albums mentioned above by the Gigi Gryce Quintet and the Gryce "Orchtette" at Amazon, Fresh Sound and Spotify. Fresh Sound offers four of the albums on one two-CD set (go here).

JazzWax clips: Here's Sonor from Doin' the Gigi...

Here's Nica's Tempo from Hap'nin's...

And here's Boxer's Blues from Rat Race Blues...

A special thanks to David Langner and Peter Coppock.

JazzWax note: Richard Williams' daughter, Rebecca, hosts a blog, Confessions of a Bathrobe Blogger, here.

JazzWax pages: For more on Gryce, see Noal Cohen and Michael Fitzgerald's Rat Race Blues: The Musical Life of Gigi Gryce, which came out in paperback in 2014 (go here).

Birth of American Bossa Nova

One of America's first champions of Brazilian bossa nova was Felix Grant (above). A jazz disc jockey in Washington D.C., Grant hosted The Album Sound on WMAL. His voice had a soft, sophisticated on-air sound that caught the ear of listeners. Among those tuning into his show in 1960 was Dr. João Oliveira Santos, an economist and head of the International Coffee Agreement, a Brazilian trade group. A fan of Grant's show, he introduced Grant to his brother, Paulo Santos, a disc jockey in Rio de Janeiro.

Paulo Santos was in Washington in July visiting his brother shortly after attending the 1960 Newport Jazz Festival. The event had been a disaster. A sizable young crowd descended on the Rhode Island port town and became unruly when learning that the outdoor concert venue was sold out. The National Guard was called in to restore order. Paulo had brought along records by João Gilberto and may have expected to meet with festival producer George Wein with hopes of persuading him to include Gilberto and other bossa nova artists in the following year's event.

Enthralled by Paulo Santos after being introduced to him a week later in Washington, Grant invited him on his WMAL show. Grant had him play selections from his Gilberto albums on the air, and the two talked about Brazil's new music sensation. After Santos returned to Rio, he and Grant stayed in touch and swapped albums, most likely through trade groups that traveled back and forth. In Washington, Grant increasingly featured bossa nova recordings by Brazilian artists on his show. And that's where it would have ended if the political climate hadn't shifted.

In early 1961, relations between Brazil and the U.S. began to become problematic. Two years had passed since Fidel Castro's Cuban Revolution, and the State Department was increasingly worried that Communism would take hold among people in economically strained Latin and South American countries. To make matters even more complicated, Brazil's newly elected president, Jânio Quadros, was trying to seek a delicate balance in trade relations between the U.S. and Eastern Europe. [Photo above of Rio in 1961]

In January 1961, when Quadros assumed power, Brazil faced skyrocketing inflation and ballooning foreign debt needed to modernize its economy. To remain independent, Quadros kept his distance from the U.S., a move that set the State Department and CIA on edge. Other South American countries were taking a similar stance. In an effort to avoid confrontations with governments in the Southern Hemisphere and win over populations to American-style democracy, the State Department arranged a 12-week tour of those countries by performing jazz musicians as part of a cultural exchange program.

Musicians spread good will, which in turn made the U.S. look more inviting as dominant trade partners and business investors. Dave Brubeck was invited but his recording and tour schedules prevented him from going. Guitarist Charlie Byrd took his place, accompanied by bassist Keter Betts and percussionist Buddy Deppenschmidt. Also on the performance tour were Kenny Dorham, Curtis Fuller, Zoot Sims, Al Cohn, Herbie Mann, Ahmed Abdul-Malik, Ronnie Ball, Ben Tucker, Dave Bailey, Ray Mantilla and others who also performed on the trip.

When the tour ended, Byrd, Betts and Deppenschmidt returned to the states loaded with Brazilian bossa nova albums and plans to record a jazz-samba LP. When Byrd approached Creed Taylor, the new head of Verve, Creed suggested that Byrd add Stan Getz, who had just returned from years in Sweden. The result was the recording of Jazz Samba in February 1962, an album that featured Desafinado, which became a huge U.S. pop-chart hit. Later that year, the State Department dispatched another group of musicians on a six-month tour of 23 countries in South America. Paul Winter and Herbie Mann were among them, and each recorded important bossa nova albums in Rio that year.

Here's how the bosssa nova's popularity exploded in the U.S. in 1962, launching a sizable invasion of Brazilian artists:

Here is Desafinado from João Gilberto's 1959 album, Chega de Saudade, which started it all. Recorded in Brazil for Odeon, it is considered one of the first pure bossa nova albums...

Here's the Dave Brubeck Quartet in January 1962 recording Vento Fresco from Bossa Nova USA...

Here's Stan Getz and Charlie Byrd recording Desafinado from Jazz Samba in February 1962...

Here's Herbie Mann recording One Note Samba from his Brazil, Bossa Nova & Blues in late 1961 or early '62...

Here's Herbie Mann recording Voce E Eu from Do the Bossa Nova With Herbie Mann in October 1962...

Here's Paul Winter recording Journey to Recife in 1962 from Jazz Meets The Bossa Nova...

Here's Shorty Rogers recording Chega de Saudade in 1962 from Shorty Rogers and His Giants: Bossa Nova...

Here's Bud Shank in September 1962 recording Joao from Bossa Nova, Jazz Samba...

On November 21, 1962, the first bossa nova concert was held at Carnegie Hall. It featured all of the major Brazilian stars of the music who came up from Brazil. Many would remain here for a period as part of the U.S.-Brazil cultural-exchange program and record for American labels. Which in turn led to a wave of pop singers and instrumentalists to embrace the addictive beat.

By Christmas 1962, the bossa nova was a full-blown rage, and U.S. recording studios were booked with artists recording jazz samba albums. On the jazz side, these included Bossa Nova Carnival: Dave Pike Plays the Music of Joao Donato, Gene Ammons's Bad! Bossa Nova, Ramsey Lewisis's Bossa Nova, Charlie Byrd's Bossa Nova Pelos Passaros, Laurindo Almeida's Viva Bossa Nova and Ole! Bossa Nova, Ike Quebec's Bossa Nova Soul Samba, Lalo Schifrin's Piano, Strings & Bossa Nova, Zoot Sims's New Beat Bossa Nova Vols. 1 and 2, Eddie Harris's Bossa Nova, Charlie Rouse's Bossa Nova Bacchanal, Cannonball Adderley's Cannonball's Bossa Nova and George Shearing's Bossa Nova.

Like the blues—an emotional and expressive folk construct from the American South too generic to copyright—the bossa nova beat also was easy to pick up and free from royalty restrictions. The gentle and addictive romantic beat became a backdrop to thousands of recordings, including those by rock artists. For example, in late 1963...

 

As for poor Brazil, Quadros resigned in the summer of 1961 and João Goulart, his vice president, assumed power. On April 1, 1964, the Brazilian military launched a coup d'état against Goulart's left-leaning government, and a military dictatorship ruled Brazil until March 1985.

JazzWax clip: Here's a 1963 radio interview by Felix Grant on WMAL with João Gilberto that I stumbled upon yesterday and that set this post in motion...

JazzWax note: For more on the bossa nova, visit the Bossa Nova Project (go here).

Bob Freedman (1934-2018)

Robert M. Freedman, a jazz pianist, saxophonist and Grammy-winning arranger who orchestrated for artists ranging from Sarah Vaughan and Harry Belafonte to Maynard Ferguson and Paul Simon, and scored theme music for TV shows, including ABC's Monday Night Football, died on Dec. 22, 2018. He was 84.

Bob was a long-time JazzWax reader and an avid email correspondent, particularly whenever I posted on Ferguson or Pomeroy. I was informed late last year that Bob might have passed away, a fact I relayed to Bill Kirchner who reached out to Bob's wife, Tori, in Scottsdale, Ariz., over the weekend and confirmed his death.

Bob's Grammy was shared with Quincy Jones for their arrangement of The Wiz Main Title: Overture Part One in 1978. He also was nominated for three additional Grammys. During a phone call a few years ago, Bob admitted, with a laugh, that his jazz low point came in the mid-1950s, when he arranged and played alto saxophone on Music to Strip By, a jazz album of bump-and-grind songs that included Night Train, Shangri-la and One Mint Julep. But even on such an album for Boston's Surprise Records, which Bob noted was owned by someone with a broken nose, the group was top-notch and included trumpeter Herb Pomeroy and a few members of Pomeroy's band.

Bob excelled at big band writing, and he counted as his finest moment his composition and arrangement of And We Listened, recorded by Maynard Ferguson on A Message From Newport in 1958. Bob also was very proud of his arrangements for Herb Pomeroy's band.

Born in Mount Vernon, N.Y., Bob grew up in Wollaston, Mass. When he was 12, his family moved to Cranston, R.I., where he began studying the clarinet and soon added the piano. His first brush with arranging came when he bought Glenn Miller's Method for Orchestral Arranging. His first professional playing job came at 14. In the Army, Bob was stationed in Arizona, where he encountered an enlisted Chet Baker and played with him on local Army gigs.

Bob's first album was Piano Moods for Savoy in 1953, withi Joe Reichgott on bass and Bob Gibson on drums. Bob also knew pianist Dick Twardzik well in the early 1950s.

For more, here are my JazzWax interviews with Bob on Maynard Ferguson (go here), Dick Twardzik (go here) and Grover Washington, Jr. (go here).

Here are 10 favorite Bob Freedman clips plus two bonus clips:

Here's The Wiz Soundtrack: Main Title (Overture, Part One)...

Here's Bob and the trio in 1953 on Piano Moods playing Sophisticated Lady...

Sophisticated Lady

Here's Bob's arrangement of A Foggy Day on Margie Anderson's The Blues album in the mid-1950s, featuring Varty Haroutunian (ts) and likely Herb Pomeroy on trumpet. Bob was on alto sax...

Here's Bob's composition and arrangement of And We Listened for Maynard Ferguson from a clip Bob sent me some years ago of the band at Birdland between 1959 and '61...

And We Listened (live at Birdland)

Here's Bob's arrangement of Broadway and Seventh in 1963 by the Bill Berry Combo, on which Bob is playing piano, Berry is on trumpet, Alex Cirin Jr. is on bass and Alan Dawson is on drums. The album's original title was Jazz and Swinging Percussion...

Here's Bob's arrangement of Night Time Is the Right Time for Joe Williams and the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra in 1966...

Here's Bob's gorgeous arrangement of Alfie for Sarah Vaughan in 1967...

And here are three that Bill Kirchner sent along:

Here's Construction of the Raft from Bob's The Journeys of Odysseus in 1969, produced by Gary McFarland and narrated by Terry Currier...

Here's Bob's arrangement of Grady Tate singing Hooray from Tate's album Feeling Life in 1969...

And here's Bob's arrangement of Je crois entendre encore from Les Pêcheurs de Perles from Grover Washington Jr.'s Aria album in 1999...

Bonus 1: Two more from me—first, here's Bob's piano and arrangement of Deep Purple for Jerry Donato on his It's a Cool Heat album recorded in Arizona in 2004...

Bonus 2: And second, Charles Fox may have composed ABC's Monday Night Football theme in 1972, but "Bob" of "Bob's Band" was Bob Freedman and his arrangement and orchestra. Here's the theme....

Jenifer, Alice and Howard

In The Wall Street Journal this week, I interviewed actress-singer Jenifer Lewis for my "House Call" column in the Mansion section (go here). Jenifer talked about growing up poor in Kinloch, Missouri, which at the time was one of the oldest all-black, self-governing municipalities in the country, dating back to 1890. Her childhood story was harrowing but how she broke through and triumphed is amazing. [Photo above of Jenifer Lewis at home in Sherman Oaks, Calif., by Shayan Asgharnia for The Wall Street Journal]

Here's Jenifer on The Daily Show last November...

SiriusXM. If you missed me on SiriusXM's Feedback last week, Nik Carter, Jim Sherer and I talked about the Doobie Brothers' What a Fool Believes (1978) and how Michael McDonald and Kenny Loggins teamed up to write it. Here's a Soundcloud of the show...

More Alice Darr. Following my posts on Alice Darr here and here, Bruno Vasil uncovered the name of the restaurateur to whom Darr was engaged or wound up marrying:

"Good evening Marc. I put your your latest info into the search bar at Ancestry.com. I’ve been on Ancestry for more than 10 years and have discovered nearly 1,300 family members, most far afield from the core family. I didn't find much on Darr. However, I did find an old newspaper article that mentioned the gentleman she was to marry—George Klabanos."

If you know who Klabanos was in the New York club and restaurant scene in the early 1960s, shoot me an email. The mystery continues!

Jane Hall. Following my post last week on Jane Hall's album, With a Song in My Heart, and my conversation with her about her long and loving marriage to guitarist Jim Hall, Brett Gold sent the following [photo above of Jim Hall and Bill Evans]:

"Dear Marc, thank you for bringing to my attention Jane Hall's wonderful album. I was first made aware of her when I bought Jim Hall's album LP Commitment in the late '70's, in which she sang When I Fall in Love. I remember being taken aback then by the heartfelt sincerity of her singing. It was obvious that she was not a trained vocalist, but something about it (maybe the obvious loving relationship between the two being reflected in the music and performances) haunted me for years. I had never heard any more of her singing (that's more than 40 years of just knowing her work from just that one song) until your feature today. Thanks, as usual, for your work.

Here's Jane singing When I Fall in Love on Jim's album Commitment in 1976...

Eric Dolphy. Last week, Matt LeGoulx sent along the following video of Eric Dolphy in Stockholm in 1961 with trupeter Idrees Sulieman, pianist Rune Owferman, bassist Jimmy Woode and drummer Sture Kallin...

Don Shirley. Anthony Weller sent along a note last week: "The Los Angeles Times ran my op-ed Sunday about the late, great pianist Don Shirley, who's portrayed (somewhat) in the current movie Green Book. I knew him pretty well (go here).

Anthony Newley. Fresh Sound's Jordi Pujol shared a favorite version of Pure Imagination from Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, as sung by Anthony Newley in 1971. Newley wrote the film's music and Leslie Bricusse wrote the words...

Howard McGhee radio. This Sunday, February 10, radio rajah Sid Gribetz will feature five hours of trumpeter Howard McGhee on his "Jazz Profiles" special from 2 to 7 p.m. (EST) on WKCR-FM in New York. You can listen from anywhere in the world on your phone or computer by going here. These in-depth shows by Sid are a wonderful education if you're unfamiliar with an artist or you just want to listen to what else that artist recorded. Jazz radio, the way it used to be. [Photo above of Miles Davis at the piano admiring Howard McGhee, by William P. Gottlieb]

What the heck. Here are the Beatles lip-syncing Ticket to Ride in a video in 1965. The intimacy and innocence of the the Fab Four, before facial-hair and feuds robbed them of their charm and youth. Pure joy...

TV tip. I don't have much time to watch TV, but when I do, I try to escape from Law & Order episodes as often as I can. Most of the time I'm successful. Recently I raved about My Brilliant Friend (HBO) and Eight Days That Changed Rome (Smithsonian). Last week I caught Broad City on Comedy Central. Really funny. I know I'm late to the party. The sitcom is in its final fifth season. You also can watch past episodes online here.

Oddball album cover of the week.

The Al Sack Concert Orchestra? Sounds like Joe Bazooka's String Quartet. And based on our model's expression, the album could have been re-titled Music for Throwing Yourself Off a Bridge.

Doc: Ben Webster in Europe

In this 31-minute documentary of Ben Webster in Europe in 1967, there are whimsical moments and moments of great artistry. In '67, Webster moved to Amsterdam for a year, where director Johan van der Keuken captured him on film between March and June. The mid-length film is a vastly humanistic portrait that showcases Webster's sense of humor and his enormous skill on the tenor saxophone. A special thanks to Gerard Sikma in Rotterdam for sending along the link. For more on the director, go here.

Johan van der Keuken died in 2001; Ben Webster died in 1973.

Here's Ben Webster in Europe (1967)...

Art Farmer on Prestige: 1953-'55

Much attention by jazz fans has been paid to the Blue Note label, and deservedly so. But the first half of the 1950s really belongs to Bob Weinstock and Prestige. While Prestige's 10-inch album covers weren't as beautifully designed as those by Paul Bacon at Blue Note, the music released on Prestige between 1951 and 1955 was arguably far more significant. 

The early 1950s was the dawn of the long-playing 33 1/3 record. The format was invented in 1948 by Columbia without any proprietary claims. Columbia encouraged other labels to adopt the new speed. The thinking was the more labels that use it, the more accepted worldwide 33 1/3 would become. And that would be good for business all around.

At first, in 1950, the 12-inch size was used only for classical recordings, with a few exceptions. Classical music needed more room and was the record industry's big money-maker. But more important, classical didn't require labels to shell out on royalties, since the likes of Beethoven and Tchaikovsky predated ASCAP and BMI. There was no copyright on the War of 1812 Overture. By contrast, pop music recorded by singers and jazz artists did require payments to ASCAP and BMI composers and was a big expense.

So for the first seven years of the LP era, from 1949 to 1955, pop and jazz appeared on 10-inch albums. The smaller 10-inch size meant fewer songs (and fewer royalty payments). On the jazz side, Prestige recorded a vast stable of top-notch jazz musicians, from Miles Davis and Sonny Rollins to Stan Getz, Thelonious Monk and the Modern Jazz Quartet.

One musician who stands out during this 10-inch era on Prestige was trumpeter Art Farmer. Between 1953 and 1955, Farmer released seven 10-inch LPs, and each is a masterpiece. Many were recorded with Gigi Gryce, but taken together, the albums are a mix of great musicians from the period. I listened to all of them again yesterday while writing, and the music remains astonishing.

Among the song highlights are Work of Art, Up in Quincy's Room, Soft Show, Confab in Tempo, I'll Take Romance, Evening in Paris, Elephant Walk, I've Never Been in Love Before, Forecast, Sans Souci, Evening in Casablanca, Satellite and so many more. I had planned to make this a Perfect Album post, but there's simply too much great Art Farmer on Prestige during this early period to single out any one LP.

Farmer's 10-inch LPs were:

• Art Farmer Septet (1953)
• Art Farmer Quintet (1953)
• Art Farmer and Clifford Brown (1953)
• Art Farmer Plays (1954)
• Work of Art (1954)
• Art Farmer Quartet (1954)
• Art Farmer Quintet Featuring Gigi Gryce (1955)

Art Farmer died in 1999.

JazzWax tracks: The songs on these 10-inch LPs were reissued on 12-inch LPs starting in 1956. Simply check Amazon, Fresh Sound and Spotify for Art Farmer and Prestige albums.

JazzWax clips: Here's the 12-inch Art Farmer Septet album first released in 1956...

Here's Art Farmer Plays, the 10-inch LP...

And here's the 12-inch album of When Farmer Met Gryce...

Jane Hall: A Song in My Heart

Jane Hall's first and only album, With a Song in My Heart, was released in 2017. The songs were recorded originally in the 1980s as a gift to her husband, the great jazz guitarist Jim Hall. I first heard about the recording a couple of weeks ago, when Devra Hall Levy, Jim and Jane's daughter, told me about it. The music is gorgeous—with Jane's breathy, Blossom Dearie-like phrasing and guitarist Ed Bickert's sublime framing and chord voicings. [Photo above of Jim and Jane Hall, courtesy of Jane Hall; photo by Bob Pesce]

The album is lovely on several levels. First, Jane has a beautiful, natural singing voice free from pretension. Second, she is backed only by Bickert. Third, she originally recorded the songs as a personal surprise valentine for her late husband as a birthday present.

Curious about the tender love story behind the album's conception and recording, I gave Jane a call yesterday:

JazzWax: Tell me about your background as a singer?
Jane Hall: There’s nothing really to tell (laughs). I don’t have a background as a singer. I just sang with Jim at home or in our car. He liked my voice. When we went on our first date, he knew I liked music and asked if I wanted to sing a song. 

JW: Where did you and Jim meet?
JH: In 1960, we both lived in Greenwich Village, a couple of blocks from each other. He was renting [pianist] Dick Katz’s apartment on 12th Street. I lived on 10th Street.

JW: How did you know Dick Katz?
JH: We were friends. Nothing serious. One night the two of us were going to have dinner together. Dick said he had to stop first at a bar to meet Jim Hall.

JW: Did you know Jim then?
JH: No. And I didn’t know much about jazz. Dick and I stopped in at the Van Rensselaer bar in the Van Rensselaer Hotel on E. 11th. There was Jim at the bar. I remember being surprised he wasn’t Edmond Hall, the jazz clarinetist. That’s who I thought Dick said he was meeting.

JW: After meeting Jim, did you and Dick head off for dinner?
JH: We invited Jim to join us. We ate at Sayat-Nova, an Armenian restaurant that was on Charles Street then. Little by little, I found myself focusing on Jim (laughs).

JW: What was so special about Jim?
JH: He had an aura of kindness about him. At dinner, he mentioned he was leaving the next day for California to attend his brother’s wedding. He mentioned he wouldn’t be back for a month. I had a nice time that evening. The next day I went about my business. [Photo above of Jim and Jane Hall with Django, courtesy of Jane Hall]

JW: How did Jim get back in touch with you?
JH: Dick must have given him my number. One day, the phone rang. Jim was on the other end. He said he was back in New York and would love to get together. I was a little flustered, since I was caught off-guard by Jim's call.

JW: What did you do on your first date—without Dick Katz?
JH: (Laughs) Jim asked if I wanted to come to the club where he was playing. It was a little club that’s no longer around. He was performing as a duo with Lee Konitz. I remember they were playing opposite a comedy duo—Dick Libertini and McIntyre Dixon.

JW: What did you think of Jim’s playing?
JH: I thought he was great. I was really impressed and loved the music. It was a hard gig. Lee was very moody, and Jim was suffering a bit.

JW: And after?
JH: A few days later, Jim invited me up to his apartment, the one he was renting from Dick. That’s where I first sang for him. He took out his guitar and I sang I’ll Remember April and Gone With the Wind. Years later he teased me: “I wanted to see if you were musical.” [Photo of a sticker on Jim Hall's guitar, courtesy of Jane Hall]

JW: When did you two marry?
JH: It took us five years (laughs). We started living together first in 1962 or ‘63. Jim was wary of getting married because his parents had divorced. We finally married in 1965. We were married for 48 years, up until Jim's death in 2013.

JW: Where did you two live?
JH: I found us an apartment on the 7th floor of a building on 12th Street. Fortunately, the building had an elevator. Jim practiced every day. He said my singing in the apartment helped his practicing. I’d sing with him for an hour or so, and we’d often sing together in our car. [Feature above from the Morning Journal in Daytona Beach, Fla., in 1972, courtesy of Jane Hall]

JW: If you didn’t know much about jazz, what did you sing?
JH: Show tunes. My parents had taken me to all the musicals as a kid. I was very musical. Jim didn’t know a lot of those songs. He used to think that Body and Soul was great because of Coleman Hawkins’s famous recording. I’d argue that the song was great because it was written in 1930 and was a standard. Every night before we fell asleep, I’d sing Jim a different song.

JW: What was the idea behind your album, With a Song in My Heart?
JH: Funny, it wasn’t supposed to be an album. Jim was away on tour in Europe at some point in the 1980s. I wanted to surprise him with a tape recording of me singing and give it to him around his birthday in December. I wanted him to be able to take my singing voice with him on tours. [Photo of Jane and Jim Hall courtesy of Jane Hall; photo by K. Abe]

JW: How did you pull that off?
JH: I had met Canadian jazz guitarist Ed Bickert years earlier. Jim and Ed were close. Ed loves songs. We talked about the idea for a while. At some point, I went up to Toronto to visit with Don and Norma Thompson. Don was Jim’s bassist. I had become very friendly with them. Ed lived in Toronto and suggested we record at a little studio in the city. Ed and I sang a few songs. It worked out, so we decided on 12 songs.

JW: What did people in the studio's control booth think?
JH: Ed and I did it just for fun. After we finished, the engineer suggested we put it out commercially. But neither of us had the wherewithal or the ambition to do that. We just put it on a cassette, and I gave the tape to Jim. [Photo above of Jane Hall, courtesy of Jane Hall]

JW: What did Jim think?
JH: Jim adored it. The tape made him smile all the time. And he loved Ed’s playing. Ed is a wonderful accompanist.

JW: Why didn’t you release it back then?
JH: I was working as a psychoanalyst. I didn’t want to be a singer. At some point, Jim was afraid the tape would wear out or become damaged. So he went to pianist Fred Hersch’s house with the cassette. Fred had a studio there. They copied the cassette onto a master reel.

JW: How did the tape wind up being released in 2017?
JH: Brian Camelio, Jim’s long-time producer, heard me playing the tape after Jim died. Brian is the founder of ArtistShare, the record company. He urged me to let him put it out. I said OK. After Brian put it up on ArtistShare, we sold a lot of copies right away and were able to pay off the cost of producing it. [Photo above of Brian Camelio courtesy of Twitter]

JW: Which songs on the tape did Jim love most?
JH: My Funny Valentine and ‘Round Midnight. He was always impressed by the way I sang that song. He also loved my voice on With a Song in My Heart.

JW: Where did you give Jim the tape?
JH: In the living room of our summer house in Garrison, N.Y. I said, “Sit down,” and I put it on. He loved the tape and played it all the time.

JW: Does hearing the CD now still remind you of Jim?
JH: I always think of Jim. He’s always in my thoughts. Whenever I hear the CD, I remember his delighted expression the first time I played him the cassette. [Recent photo of Jane Hall courtesy of Jane Hall]

JazzWax tracks: You'll find Jane Hall and Ed Bickert's With a Song in My Heart (ArtistShare) here and here.

The album also is available at Spotify.

JazzWax note: To read my 2010 three-part JazzWax interview with Jim Hall, go here, here and here for the three parts. In Part 3, Jim talks about his Jane's musical side. 

JazzWax tracks: Here's Jane Hall and Ed Bickert on'Round Midnight...

'Round Midnight

Here's Jim Hall playing 'Round Midnight in Toronto in 1975...

Here's Jim Hall playing Jane Hall's superb composition, The Answer Is Yes, from Jim's Concierto (1975)...

And here's Jane singing When I Fall in Love backed by husband Jim Hall on his album, Commitment...

Gigi Gryce: Jazz Lab

The year 1957 was a bountiful one for Gigi Gryce. The alto saxophonist teamed with trumpeter Donald Byrd and formed the Jazz Lab, a group that allowed Gryce to record and perform his compositions and those by other artists with a singular feel that was outside of the jazz styles common then. From February to September 1957, Gryce and Byrd recorded Jazz Lab albums for five different labels—Columbia, Riverside, Verve, Jubilee and RCA. Despite the many attempts to gain traction for their new sound, the Gryce-Byrd experiment was short-lived.

Gryce, like Tadd Dameron, Quincy Jones, Benny Golson and Horace Silver, was a prolific, sexy writer and arranger with a distinctly arch, romantic sound that capitalized on sophisticated melodies and lush harmonies. His many jazz standards include Nica's Tempo, Blue Concepts, Minority, Wake Up!, Capri, Smoke Signal, Social Call, Satellite and An Evening in Casablanca, among others.

The Jazz Lab had less to do with experimentation in the avant-garde and was more concerned with amassing a large library of works and arrangements by a range of artists that fit its new jazz vibe and vision. As you listen to the Jazz Lab's recordings, you realize that their approach was unlike any other jazz style at the time.

The Jazz Lab didn't employ the bombast or unison horns of hard bop, the dryness of cool or nonchalance of West Coast jazz. Instead, the group had a pretty feel without being commercial. Melodies were lyrical, while background instruments functioned as sections of a band, supporting themes with complex harmony figures. As Gryce said back then, "We want to reflect all of the language of jazz and get into everybody's heart. And we're trying to develop another quality within ourselves."

In addition to Gryce's writing and arranging, he was a beautifully honest alto saxophonist with a determined urgency who favored the upper register. He was remarkable. In 1957, Byrd hadn't begun to record yet as a leader for Blue Note. That would follow in 1958 with Byrd's Off to the Races. Interestingly, his move to the label effectively ended the Jazz Lab collaboration. For eight brief months, Gryce and Byrd were on to something special.

Albums recorded by Gryce and Byrd's Jazz Lab:

• Jazz Lab (Columbia)
• Gigi Gryce and the Jazz Lab Quintet (Riverside)
• At Newport (Verve)
• New Formulas from the Jazz Lab (RCA)
• Jazz Lab (Jubilee)
• Modern Jazz Perspective (Columbia)

Gigi Gryce died in 1983; Donald Byrd died in 2013.

JazzWax tracks: You'll find the Complete Jazz Lab Studio Sessions Vol. 1 here, Vol. 2 here and Vol. 3 here. Or at Fresh Sound for less here, here and here.

Jazz Lab (Columbia) and At Newport (Verve) are at Spotify.

JazzWax clips: Here's Smoke Signal...

Here's Capri...

And here's Geraldine...

Alice Darr: Feature Story

In January, I posted about an obscure singer named Alice Darr who recorded her first album in 1962. While researching another subject recently, I came across a feature article with a bit more information about the singer in the Cumberland News (Cumberland, Md.), from January 31 1963. The headline was "Local Singer to Record Second LP Album Soon." It's hard to understand why Darr wasn't a bigger name except that labels had shifted to rock and soul, leaving her stranded in jazz.

Here's the article...

Alice Darr, who won a local amateur contest at the age of seven and was playing piano and singing professionally at 17, is now a success—and the pride of her parents, Mr. and Mrs. James Darr, 342 Davidson Street.

Miss Darr's long-play album, I Only Know How to Cry—Music for Lovers and Losers, is now selling well and she has another in preparation.

Cumberlanders will remember Miss Darr's piano-and-vocal performances at the old Cadillac and at the Alibi, later Al's Chateau and now a parking lot. Miss Darr played the two night spots for more than a year, alternating with out-of-town professional acts.

She's been singing in New York, Florida, Chicago and Mexican supper clubs for the past six years and has been at The Toast (1068 First Avenue) in Manhattan for a total of about two years, with a time out for an eight-month engagement at The Left Bank.

An unusual feature of Miss Darr's career to date is that she hasn't been out of work since her first New York booking. The clubs keep asking her to come back.

Her present album (on Charlie Parker label PLP 811), takes its title from the lead-off song composed by Joan Moskatel, who wrote or co-authored four of the 12 numbers. Arrangements are by guitarist Mundell Lowe, who also co-authored four of the songs and supplies background along with bassist George Duvivier. Both men are widely known and respected in the jazz field.

As the album's subtitle indicates, all the numbers are new and blue. Miss Darr's mother said Alice, primarily a "pop jazz'"singer, found making the album a challenging experience. Her next, still to be titled, will have six new songs and six standards with Alice fronting a full band.

Miss Darr, who never had a formal singing lesson, came by her talent honestly. Her father was well known in local musical circles for nearly 30 years as a banjo player, bassist and saxophonist with the Black Diamonds, the Original Bellhops and other bands and combos. His brother, John, who died last year, was a singer and violinist.

Alice, the second of the Darrs' three daughters, began singing with her sisters when she was a first-grader. With help from their dad, the girls learned to sing in harmony before they could read.

By the time she took her first piano lesson at about the age of 10, Alice already was a veteran performer, having won $50 in an amateur contest, and having been billed as the "star" of any number of school and church functions afterward.

At 17, she was a full-time professional with a contract in Pittsburgh. Then began the climb to bigger and better-paying club jobs in various parts of the country and finally in New York itself.

Her parents, justly proud and happy about her success, are hoping for "that one chance" on television that could some day make their daughter a top-ranking star.

Bonus: I found the following in Jet magazine from 1961: The next big interracial marriage will involve singer-pianist Alice Darr and a Greek New York night club owner, who has planted a $3,500 ring on her finger.

Here's a second album Darr wound up recording around 1972...