“MAY I SWING YOU A SONG?” DAVE STUCKEY and the HOT HOUSE GANG at the REDWOOD COAST MUSIC FESTIVAL: DAVE STUCKEY, MARC CAPARONE, NATE KETNER, CARL SONNY LEYLAND, WALLY HERSOM, JOSH COLLAZO, DAWN LAMBETH (May 10, 2019)

Dave Stuckey knows how — how to put together a hot congenial swinging band, how to sing in a convincing heartfelt Thirties style that engages an audience, how to find rare material . . . how to put on a show that doesn’t require his dad’s barn (although he will work in barns for the right offer).  He is comic without being jokey, and his friendly approach to the band and to us is heartfelt, not a series of ad-libs.  He’s having fun, and we feel it also.

He showed off all these talents with the Hot House Gang at this year’s Redwood Coast Music Festival — the Gang being Josh Collazo, drums; Wally Hersom, string bass; Carl Sonny Leyland, piano; Nate Ketner, reeds; Marc Caparone, cornet; Dawn Lambeth, vocal.  Here are seven tunes — count ’em, seven! — from the Gang’s first set.

Here’s melodious Dawn to sing a rare tune I associate with Henry “Red” Allen, which is always an asset, I’LL SING YOU A THOUSAND LOVE SONGS:

In the wrong hands, EXACTLY LIKE YOU can sound overfamiliar and thus dull, but not in these hands — those of Dawn and the Gang, helped immensely by Father Leyland’s righteous groove:

I confess that I’ve heard many versions of WHAT A LITTLE MOONLIGHT CAN DO that made me mutter to myself, “Not much,” but this performance gets at the heart of the ebullience of the Billie Holiday records of the Thirties, thanks to glorious playing by the band as well as Dawn’s choice to sing the song rather than the record.  Those riffs, those riffs!

Hoagy Carmichael’s love song to New Orleans, of the same name, wistfully sung by Dave and eloquently by Marc:

Father Leyland’s rocking bouquet for IDA, which is so much music packed into three minutes:

The new dance they’re doing uptown, TRUCKIN’:

and, to close the set, the joyous affirmation of collective swing, a song that brings together Ivie Anderson and the Marx Brothers as well as the Hot House Gang.  Who would complain?

If  you learn that Dave Stuckey and the Hot House Gang are coming to your city, toss the dogs some dry food, break into the birthday fund, give up those plans to make the kitchen floor shine, and go.  Joy like this is rare and not to be disregarded.

Thanks to Mark and Valerie Jansen of the Redwood Coast Music Festival for their generous embrace of soulful music.  Be there May 7-10, 2020 . . . !

May your happiness increase!

 

“A TRULY LOVING PERSON”: DAN MORGENSTERN REMEMBERS LOUIS ARMSTRONG (May 24, 2019)

I’ve had many beautiful experiences in my life, but being able to hear Dan Morgenstern talk about Louis Armstrong — the man, seen at close range — is one of those I treasure now and will always treasure.  We spent an early afternoon a few days ago, sharing sweet thoughts of our greatest hero.  I invite you to join us for tender memories and some surprises.  I have intentionally presented the video segments here without annotation so that viewers can be delighted and surprised as I was and am.

These segments are emotionally important to me, so I saw no reason to wait until July 4, July 6, or even August 1 to share them with you.

And just a small matter of chronology: Dan will be ninety on October 24, 2019.  Let us start planning the parades, shall we?

a relevant musical interlude:

Part Two:

some life-changing music:

Part Three:

Dave and Iola Brubeck’s SUMMER SONG:

Part Four (and before one of the JAZZ LIVES Corrections Officers rushes to the rescue, I am sure that the funeral Dan refers to as the ideal was Ellington’s):

Part Five:

The blessed EV’NTIDE:

A very brief postscript, which I whimsically began by telling Dan I was going to throw him a curveball, which he nimbly hit out of the park:

SUN SHOWERS:

Dan and I owe much to the great friend of jazz and chronicler, Harriet Choice, who encouraged us to do this interview.

And a piece of mail, anything but ordinary:

 

Early in the conversation, Dan said that Louis “made everyone feel special.”  He does the same thing, and it comes right through the videos.  That we can share the same planet with Mister Morgenstern is a great gift.

May your happiness increase!

CHOOSING TO SWING: NIRAV SANGHANI AND THE PACIFIC SIX

I don’t have grandchildren*, but I can imagine myself gathering the younguns around and telling them, “Younguns, Grandpa knew Nirav Sanghani when he was only a swing dancer, before he began to lead a band!” They would be properly awestruck.  As I am by Nirav’s debut CD, its pretty cover displayed above.

Some facts: the CD is immensely danceable music, the tracks at righteous groovy tempos, with a mix of classic standards and riff-based originals.  Nirav is one of the young musicians mentored by Clint Baker, so you know that he has taken all the right impromptu classes and scored high on the real-life exams (in front of audiences).  And he understands rhythm guitar (rather than attempting to become a Famous-Solo-Guitarist-Clone) and playing for the band.  The band is a compact sextet of wise individualists, and they rock in solo and ensemble.  Beautiful sound . . . . and a digital download costs $8.  I am sure that Elders like myself could also buy a physical disc from Nirav at any of the swing events he and the Pacific Six adorn.

The band: Justin Au, trumpet; Jacob Zimmerman, clarinet and tenor saxophone; Rob Reich, piano; Nirav Sanghani, guitar; Jen Hodge, string bass; Riley Baker, drums; Clint Baker, trombone (on BAKER BOUNCE only).

The songs: BAKER BOUNCE / DOODLE RHYTHM / MARIANAS / BLUE (And Broken-Hearted) / IRRATIONAL BLUES / SOMEDAY SWEETHEART / WHO’S SORRY NOW? / LULLABY OF THE WAVES / WHISPERING.  arch 26, 2019

Recorded August 19, 2018 at Community Music Center, San Francisco, CA.

From the first notes, the band floats on a well-connected four-piece rhythm section: Reich, Sanghani, Hodge, and Baker have listened hard to the great small groups of the Forties and the wartime Basie influence is so happily evident (although none of the cliches are).  I noticed happily that more than a few of the tracks began with a rhythm-section introduction, reminiscent of the great small groups and also clearly setting the tempo for dancers.  (Incidentally, that rhythm section has its own delicious quirky approach: hear the opening chorus of WHISPERING to get at it: hilarious and completely effective.)  IRRATIONAL BLUES is beautifully evocative of the 1938 Kansas City Six, with a guitar introduction by Sanghani.

And the horn soloists (Zimmerman switching from clarinet to saxophone on some tracks; a terse, lyrical Au — with the impassioned Clint Baker, jazz parent, adding huge trombone sounds on the first track) are wonderfully idiomatic but never imitative.  Eddie Condon would surely admire their interplay on BLUE and on SOMEDAY SWEETHEART.  The jazz fans in the audience might think of 1946, of Savoy Records, of swing-to-bop; the dancers will be too busy dancing to consider such erudite matters.

Nirav’s originals are made of familiar materials but each has its own little surprises, and the arranging touches are well-shaped but never overfussy.  I know that if I heard this on the radio or on a DJ’s playlist, I might not immediately call each of the players by name but I certainly would insist on knowing about the band and buying a few copies of the disc.

I propose that people who enjoy this CD pass along copies of it to dance organizers who might be out of touch with the best Bay Area jive so that we can spread the swinging word(s).

My only complaint about this disc is that it isn’t a two-disc set.

Here is the band’s Facebook page, and here, perhaps even more important, is the Bandcamp page where you can hear the sounds and download the music.

If you have a swing dance event coming up, this would be one of the many fine bands to hire.  If, like me, you don’t, you surely will want to have the music in your home, your ears, your car . . . the possibilities are endless, and gratifying.

*Because I don’t have grandchildren, I am expecting like-minded younger JAZZ LIVES readers to visit us in assisted living, bearing new CDs, organic fruit and vegetables.  I think that’s not too much to ask.

May your happiness increase!

THE KING’S SWINGLISH (Part One): CARL SONNY LEYLAND, JACOB ZIMMERMAN, MARTY EGGERS, JEFF HAMILTON at MONTEREY (March 3, 2019)

Those new to jazz performance may find improvisation a wondrous mystery.  “How do they know how to do that without music?” they ask.  It’s a fair question: how do you play soccer without the rulebook in your hand?  Is there some magic volume, known only to the favored few, that those versed in the secret craft have memorized?

The marvel that is improvisation results from practice, study, scholarly labor, trial and error — difficult to explain simply, but an analogy comes to hand.

With a few exceptions, we are born with the power of speech: we can form words and sentences and make ourselves understood,  That, for the jazz musician, would be mastery of her instrument, skill, technical proficiency, the ability to execute ideas in pleasing logical sequence.  Never as easy as it looks.

But there’s more, much more.  How does anyone have something to express, “things to say”?  That mastery, subtler and deeper, comes through communal exercise and learning from those who know the great wisdoms.  In everyday life, you know the basic vocabulary, but what do you say to someone who is mourning a death?  No thesaurus can teach us the right thing to say, the most appropriate thing to utter, but we can learn by saying the wrong thing and then doing better, or by being in the company of people who express themselves beautifully and learning from them.

Since music is a kind of speech, what jazz artists have is a common knowledge and common language — I’ve invented a whimsical term for it above — a series of conventions that have been internalized.  Not only does the experienced musician know the melody of YOU TOOK ADVANTAGE OF ME, but he knows the verse, the lyrics, the standard key, which tempos lend themselves to which approach; he might know the Whiteman and Bud Freeman recordings.  He might know several sets of harmonies; he might know the common errors he and others make.

With a solid foundation of such experiential knowledge, a musician gains the courage to sing an individual song, listen to, and add to the other songs being created on the bandstand.  The craft is a matter of tens of thousands of hours of practice among friends, colleagues, mentors . . .  listening intently to live performance and to recorded ones.

The results are unmistakable: an ease, an assurance, the kind of skill that lets warm personal improvisations happen, not only in solo, but also in ensemble.

The four musicians who took to the stage without fanfare on March 3, 2019, at the Jazz Bash by the Bay in Monterey, California, are masters of this conversational and inspiring art.  Three of them — pianist / singer / composer Carl Sonny Leyland, string bassist Marty Eggers, and drummer Jeff Hamilton — have worked together as a trio for years, and they are as close as family.  Or closer.

Jacob Zimmerman, of the Pacific Northwest, who plays clarinet and alto sax, writes and arranges, was new to the group.  But these four players fell into delicious harmony easily, and what music was made!  I’ve left in (more than usual) the little conversations that were prelude to each number, because they illustrate “the King’s Swinglish” well, to my eyes and ears.

They began with a lovely old tune, not played as much as it should be — the WABASH BLUES.  Groovy!

Then, a sentimental song that I think no one else does (I hear Bing’s version in my ears), IF I HAD MY WAY.  I love the performance, and I also urge people to watch Jacob intently learning the song from Sonny’s clear exposition.  And how they swing!

And, for the last Musical Offering (four more will appear in a second post), BOOGIE WOOGIE.  You’ll hear Sonny announce it as SOMETHING KIND OF BOOGIE-WOOGIE-ISH, but that title was too long for YouTube:

You’ve heard articulate people praised with the words, “She always knows the right thing to say.”  These four musicians always know the right thing to play.

May your happiness increase!

UP IN THE CLOUDS (Part Two): THE JONATHAN DOYLE SWINGTET at the REDWOOD COAST MUSIC FESTIVAL: JONATHAN DOYLE, GORDON AU, CHARLIE HALLORAN, JAMEY CUMMINS, ALEX BELHAJ, SAM ROCHA, JOSH COLLAZO (May 12, 2019)

Jonathan Doyle, 2015

I think I first took notice of Jonathan Doyle — clarinetist, tenor saxophonist, later bass saxophonist, composer, arranger — when he was a member of the Thrift Set Orchestra some six years ago, then working with Hal Smith, leading his own groups, in combos with Ray Skjelbred, part of the Fat Babies, with Hal’s Swing Central, and more than I am no doubt leaving out.  By the time I met him in person, possibly at the 2014 San Diego Jazz Fest, I was already dazzled.

What Jonathan has and shares with us is a special emotional-spiritual energy, as if he’s connected to electric current, no matter how lazy the tempo might be.  I’ve never seen him coast or fall back on formula: he is fully present and fully engaged.  I offered these two splendid performances by his Swingtet at the Redwood Coast Music Festival (with Jacob Zimmerman, Charlie Halloran, Kris Tokarski, Jamey Cummins, Steve Pikal, Hal Smith) here and they deserved all the enthusiastic prose I could write and all the accolades from audience members.  A day later at the RCMF, Jonathan assembled a slightly different Swingtet: Gordon Au, trumpet; Charlie Halloran, trombone; Sam Rocha, string bass; Josh Collazo, drums; Jamey Cummins, Alex Belhaj, guitars.

I love this music dearly.

First, Jonathan’s original A SYBARITE’S DREAM, featuring Gordon, musing and soaring, in the fashion of an Ellington mood-piece but purely Doyle:

Then, an utterly captivating romp on Benny Carter’s KRAZY KAPERS, inspired by the 1933 Chocolate Dandies recording — a line on DIGA DIGA DOO.  Watch Gordon’s face as Jonathan solos: it tells you all you need to know.  And if you’d been sitting near me, you would have seen my even more dramatic look of astonished delight as Jonathan announced the song . . . as if I’d been given a lovely present.  I haven’t changed my mind at all since then:

Such remarkable passion, allied to an irresistible swing.  Bless Jonathan and his musicians, and Mark and Valerie Jansen for creating such a splendid space for beauties.  (The 2020 Redwood Coast Music Festival will be next May 7-10, and it will be a doozy, a honey, or a blast: you pick.  I think it will be all three.)

May your happiness increase!

“YOU’LL GET THE EASY TERMS YOU WANT”: A QUARTER-HOUR WITH LOUIS, 1950

Sometimes the treasure box opens to reveal riches both unimagined and breathtaking.

For the full story behind this 1956 photograph, read here.

Everything in this blogpost is thanks to the kind, diligent archivist Maristella Feustle, the unchallenged expert on broadcaster and innovator Willis Conover.  She’s uncovered rare and previously unknown music and words: “The University of North Texas Music Library is now digitizing the 16-inch radio transcription discs in its Willis Conover Collection. These are in addition to the reel-to-reel tape recordings we digitized under a Grammy Foundation grant in 2015-2016. There are more of these in the pipeline, but the initial set alone has been a highly satisfactory set of unique and unreleased material.”

“Highly satisfactory” indeed.  What follows is a fifteen-minute recording, circa 1950, of Louis Armstrong taking over Willis Conover’s radio microphone before going off to perform with his band at a club called the Blue Mirror, which seems to have been in Washington, D.C..

I know there is a proliferation of Louis to be heard, but this quarter-hour is remarkable and beyond . . . as he reads advertising copy for Philco Balanced Beam television sets and has fun talking about custom reupholstery.  We hear once again, what a fine impovising actor he was.

And!

Louis sings three songs, I MAY BE WRONG, I SURRENDER, DEAR, and BODY AND SOUL to the recorded accompaniment of Billy May (beautiful in itself).  Something to cherish: he never recorded I MAY BE WRONG and improvises some of his own words for the bridge, then scats the second time.  His verbal improvisations are just as much fun.  I won’t explicate more: listen for yourselves.  Here’s the link.

I don’t have a wide-screen television set, but Louis is making me rethink my decision.  Blessings on him, as always, on Willis, and on Maristella.

Postscript: to learn more about the inspiring and influential Willis Conover from someone who knew and admired him, here is my interview of Dan Morgenstern in June 2018.

May your happiness increase!

IN SWING WE TRUST: CANDY JACKET JAZZ BAND: “UNSTUCK IN TIME”

Yes, another wonderful new CD.  But remember: I told you to save your spare change, to make coffee at home instead of going to Starbucks, that there would be great pleasures in store.  But enough of that.  The four-minute video that follows might make prose superfluous: watch and listen to the end:

Josh Collazo is a magnificent jazz drummer: I had a great deal of gleeful first-hand evidence at the Redwood Coast Music Festival a short time ago to reinforce what I already knew.  He listens, he makes thrilling sounds, he leans forward into the beat so that any band he’s part of levitates.  But better than that, he has a huge imagination based in swing and melody, in danceable new music.  This is an elaborate prelude to say that his new CD, UNSTUCK IN TIME, by the organization he calls the CANDY JACKET JAZZ BAND, is an unerring delight.

This was no surprise: here is my delighted reaction to the CJJB’s first disc.

But let us return to whimsical-completely serious video:

Facts?  Eleven original swing compositions by Josh, Dan Weinstein, Albert Alva, and Seth Ford-Young alone or in combination; a lovely small band of Josh, drums, vocal; Seth Ford-Young, string bass; Jonathan Stout, guitar; Chris Dawson, piano; Dan Weinstein, trombone, vocal; Corey Gemme, cornet; Albert Alva, tenor saxophone; Nate Ketner, alto saxophone, clarinet; arrangements (and they’re important, since UNSTUCK IN TIME is not a jam session) by Albert, Dan, and Josh.

And a few words about this disc’s glorious antecedents.  For me, one of the unheralded peaks of jazz happened while the official “Swing Era” was no longer at its apex: the period between 1942-7, more or less, that coincided with the more dramatic recording ban.  Because of that ban, small record companies had their pick of jazz artists — think Keynote, Blue Note, Comet, Savoy, Regis, Jamboree, HRS, Jazz Record, Musicraft, Black and White, Apollo, Sittin’ In, and a dozen others.  The music as passed down to us on recordings, loosely defined, moves from Art Hodes to early bebop, but the middle ground is what attracts me: small groups with a few horns, ample space for solos, but intelligent arrangements.  Why do I write of this?

Simply, because UNSTUCK IN TIME by the Candy Jacket Jazz Band seems to my ears a glorious extension of the best Keynote sessions.  I will even write that were someone able to narrow the sound and add some surface noise, many of the tracks on this CD could pass as previously-unheard and intensely refreshing Forties gems that had been overlooked.  It’s just that warmly idiomatic, sweetly rhythmic, and full of improvisational delight.

And the title is more than a verbal two-bar tag.  Josh and the band value time highly in the sense of knowing where “one” is, in keeping the rhythm going in the nicest ways (did I point out how splendid this CD is as dance music?) but they are not tied down by clock and calendar: this disc is not a poker-faced science experiment in the Jazz Lab, bringing 1944 forward by cloning it, but rather a blend of present and past swinging into the future, free to groove without concerns of “repertory” or “authenticity.”  I think of Golden-Era science fiction, full of alternate universes: “What kind of tune would Johnny Hodges like?”  And that spirit — to honor a Hodges-universe — lifts the music in performance after performance, honoring the innovators by refusing to imitate them except in exuberant playful ways.

I’ll stop here, so that you can get to pleasure as quickly and directly as possible.  You can hear the music here.  You can buy a digital download or CD here.  You can hear the CJJB’s first CD here.

I’m so grateful this light-hearted free-wheeling yet level-headed band exists.  Their inventive music is the very heart of what I hold dear.

May your happiness increase!

THE SECOND PART: “AT 91, TED BROWN CONTINUES TO BREATHE MUSIC: TARDO HAMMER, PAUL GILL, RAY MACCHIAROLA, JEFF BROWN (75 Club, March 23, 2019)”

Ted at the 75 Club: photograph by Seth Kaplan.

You can find the first part of this rare and delicious performance here — eight songs created by the esteemed tenor saxophonist Ted Brown, with Tardo Hammer, piano; Ray Macchiarola, guitar; Paul Gill, string bass; Jeff Brown, drums — at the 75 Club (75 Murray Street, New York), on March 23.  Here’s the rest of the evening’s music, six selections.

But before you immerse yourself in the floating inquiring sounds created that night, just a word — perhaps tactless but necessary.  Ted is having some financial trouble and would welcome your assistance.  Click here to see what it’s all about.  “Every nickel helps a lot,” reminds the Shoe Shine Boy.

Now to music.  Ted’s repertoire his broad, his approach melodic, lyrical, quietly surprising.  But you knew that.  Or you will learn it now.

A classic Forties pop, famous even before Bird took to it, SLOW BOAT TO CHINA:

For Lester and Basie, BROADWAY:

and more Lester and Basie, LESTER LEAPS IN:

The gorgeous Irving Berlin ballad, HOW DEEP IS THE OCEAN?:

Perhaps in honor of Ginger Rogers, her hair a crown of shampoo turned white, THE WAY YOU LOOK TONIGHT:

and Ted’s own JAZZ OF TWO CITIES, with no apologies to Dickens:

I bow to Mr. Brown, who creates such lasting beauties.

May your happiness increase!

TALENT DESERVING WIDER RECOGNITION: “SHE’S FUNNY THAT WAY,” WITH VOCAL REFRAIN

To me, and I admit it’s a hugely subjective judgment, women ballad singers outnumber their male counterparts.  I’ve thought for the past decades that if I wanted to hear, let’s say, SKYLARK, sung tenderly, I’d have a better chance hearing it from a woman.  Reverse sexism, you say?  No, just observation.  Follow along with me, and save the quibbles for later.

I’d almost given up on male singers. But that was before a friend — who keeps his hand in — shared this brief compelling video of an unidentified singer with me.  I haven’t yet tracked down the singer, but his rendition of SHE’S FUNNY THAT WAY went straight to my heart.  His inherent drama.  His unerring pitch.  His breath control.  His deep emotions.  The pure pathos.

I realize that the singer’s unusual appearance might put some viewers off at the start, but put your preconceptions away for some of the finest heartfelt singing you will hear, this year or any other.  And don’t let the pseudonym unsettle you: I believe he is under restrictive legal contracts, characteristic of the music business, so his name must be hidden for the moment.

The performance is brief, so put down your water bottle, coffee cup, or tuna wrap to hear and admire.

I’ll keep doing the detective work of “Who IS this phenomenon?” to uncover the facts, and I will keep admiring this performance.  I hope you share my enthusiasm.  Young singers, take note.  Or notes.

May your happiness increase!

AT 91, TED BROWN CONTINUES TO BREATHE MUSIC: TARDO HAMMER, PAUL GILL, RAY MACCHIAROLA, JEFF BROWN (75 Club, March 23, 2019)

One of the many pleasures of my jazz endeavor is that I have been able to shake hands with the Masters: Joe Wilder, Jim Dapogny, Bob Wilber, Marty Grosz, among others: people who have given us beauty and musical wisdom for decades.

Starting in January 2011, I have had the honor of hearing, meeting, and recording the lyrical and intense tenor saxophonist Ted Brown.  Here he is with Ethan Iverson, Putter Smith, and Hyland Harris, performing THESE FOOLISH THINGS in December 2012, when Ted was a mere 85, at the much-missed Drawing Room.

March 23, 2019: photograph by Seth Kaplan.

On March 23 of this year, I was able to be awestruck by Ted — at 91 — playing among friends at the 75 Club: Jeff Brown, drums, Paul Gill, string bass, Ray Macchiarola, guitar; Tardo Hammer, piano.  What music he and they make!  I could write about Ted’s connections to Lennie Tristano, Warne Marsh, and Lester Young, but I’d prefer — as does Ted — to let the music sing, muse, and soar for itself.  Here is a substantial helping of searching beauty with a swinging pulse . . . and more to come.

Bird’s blues, RELAXIN’ AT CAMARILLO,

I think Sigmund Romberg would approve of this LOVER, COME BACK TO ME.  Or if he didn’t, I certainly do:

Lennie Tristano’s musing line on OUT OF NOWHERE, 317 EAST 32nd STREET:

An energized THE SONG IS YOU:

A pensive STAR DUST, which Ted starts all by himself, gorgeously:

Sweet and tart, TANGERINE:

Ted’s own SMOG EYES, celebrating his first time in Los Angeles:

Asking the eternal question, with or without comma, WHAT IS THIS THING CALLED LOVE?:

Remarkable news: Ted is offering lessons via Skype.  Even those who don’t play tenor could all take a lesson from him.  You can find him here on Facebook.

This is also seriously relevant here.

And thanks to George Aprile and Gabriele Donati of the 75 Club, which is becoming one of my new homes: even R1 dropped in for cake and music, so you know it’s a place to visit.

May your happiness increase!

UP IN THE CLOUDS (Part One): The JONATHAN DOYLE SWINGTET at THE REDWOOD COAST MUSIC FESTIVAL: JONATHAN DOYLE, JACOB ZIMMERMAN, CHARLIE HALLORAN, KRIS TOKARSKI, JAMEY CUMMINS, STEVE PIKAL, HAL SMITH (May 11, 2019)

Jonathan Doyle, 2015

 

It’s lovely to have heroes, and the man in the photograph is one of mine.  The only problem with the photograph is that it’s a still picture, and he is rarely still, but the videos below will remedy that.

When I was fortunate enough to chat with clarinetist Frank Chace on the telephone (now more than twenty years ago), he remembered that he and Marty Grosz had listened, rapt, over and over, to Pee Wee Russell’s solo on SWEET SUE with the Muggsy Spanier Ragtimers on Commodore. Marty’s comment was, “Well, if that doesn’t scrape the clouds . . . !” which is as good a summation of what artistic bliss feels like.

Those words kept coming back to me all through my weekend immersion in joy at the Redwood Coast Music Festival: I listened, quite amazed, at the wonderful music I was privileged to hear.  I’m still in a state of blissful amazement: feelings shared by those around me.

One of the reasons for this unearthly happiness has to do with reedman / composer / arranger / imaginative-phenomenon Jonathan Doyle, a rare source of  renewable energy in our time. Here ‘s where you can find him on Facebook as well.  Spiritual electricities course through him without harming him or us, and they come out as the most beautiful surprising patterns of notes, tones, and rests.  He never coasts; he never parodies anyone or himself.

Jonathan was a stimulating presence all through the weekend: with Charlie Halloran’s Calypsonians, leading several sets of his own and with Jacob Zimmerman (one a Walter Donaldson tribute with Doyle on bass sax), as lead horn in Hal Smith’s Swing Central, with the extravagant Western Swing Party co-led by Hal and Dave Stuckey.  (He was also one-third of the double tribute to composer-players Gordon Au and Josh Collazo, but by that time I had collapsed as if I’d been made of damp cardboard.  I’ll do better next year, I hope.)

Here are four uplifting performances from the first set of Jonathan’s Swingtet, a glorious affair consisting of Doyle, Jacob Zimmerman, alto; Charlie Halloran, trombone; Kris Tokarski, piano; Steve Pikal, string bass; Jamey Cummins, guitar; Hal Smith, drums.

BLUE DRAG (a nod to 1934 Django):

CHICAGO (he’ll show you around!):

THE FED HOP (Jonathan’s irresistible original):

DICKIE’S DREAM (Basie 1939, anyone?  Because of sudden battery demise, I lost the first ensemble chorus and Charlie Halloran’s delicious solo, but what remains is very satisfying):

When you’re through admiring the solo work and the overall joyous bounce of these four performances, I urge you to listen again to Jonathan’s arrangements, their sweet surprises, their dynamics and voicings.  He’s not just a great player and composer: he’s a wonderful orchestral visionary who makes his dreams and ours come true in swing.

More to come from my hero JD and his friends.

May your happiness increase! 

“A PACKAGE OF SUNSHINE AND FLOWERS”: MARC CAPARONE PLAYS LOUIS ARMSTRONG at the REDWOOD COAST MUSIC FESTIVAL: MARC CAPARONE, CLINT BAKER, JACOB ZIMMERMAN, DAN WALTON, SAM ROCHA, JEFF HAMILTON (May 12, 2019)

My own periodic table of the essential chemical elements has a space for OP, or optimism, the substance that has carried me and others through darkness — the organism needs it in regular doses.  (Under my breath, I say, “Especially these days.”)

Next to it, of course, is the element LA, for Louis Armstrong, who conveyed more optimism than any other human being.

I grew up deeply in love with the music of Louis’ last quarter-century, with the most played jazz record in my tiny childhood collection the Decca sides with Gordon Jenkins; the second in line, TOWN HALL CONCERT PLUS, which I played until its grooves were a soft gray.  (My original copy disappeared in a period of marital acrimony, but I found another one for solace.)

 

Here is William P. Gottlieb’s famous photograph of that band, that place, and even hints of that fortunate 1947 audience:

But we are in 2019, where I can magically share a passionate new performance of a song very important to Louis — coming from the 1936 film in which he was billed alongside Bing Crosby, PENNIES FROM HEAVEN — created by Marc Caparone, cornet; Clint Baker, trombone; Jacob Zimmerman, clarinet; Dan Walton, keyboard (which he makes sound like a piano); Sam Rocha, string bass; Jeff Hamilton, drums. Uncredited dancers and irrelevant conversation free of charge.

All this goodness took place at the 2019 Redwood Coast Music Festival (thanks to Mark and Val Jansen) in Eureka, California, a musical weekend that made me extremely happy and fulfilled.  More about those joys as I share videos of this and other bands.

On the original performance at Town Hall in 1947, Louis was accompanied by “little Bobby Hackett” on cornet, playing magnificently.  Marc hints at both Louis and Bobby while sounding like himself.  When the group makes their CD, we will bring back George Avakian to do his magical multi-tracking, so that Marc can play cornet filigree to his own vocal.

By the way, if you are one of those lopsided souls who believe that Louis had little to give the world after 1929, I encourage you to read this book, slowly and attentively:

And there are two pieces of good news.  One is that there is more from this Louis tribute; the second is that Ricky Riccardi has completed the second volume of what may become a Louis-trilogy, HEART FULL OF RHYTHM, covering the period 1929-1947.

Blessings on all the musicians, Mark and Val Jansen, Ricky, and all the optimists we have the good fortune to encounter.

May your happiness increase!

“AND NOW, WE TAKE YOU DIRECT TO BERLIN”: DAWN LAMBETH, PAOLO ALDERIGHI, SAM ROCHA at MONTEREY (Jazz Bash by the Bay, March 1, 2019)

JAZZ LIVES is not taking you to a wartime Edward R. Murrow broadcast, nor to the capital city of Germany, but to the imperishable songbook of the unequaled Irving Berlin as performed by three hero-friends: Dawn Lambeth, vocal; Sam Rocha, string bass; Paolo Alderighi, piano — at the Jazz Bash by the Bay in Monterey, California:

and another song with strong connections to Fred Astaire and Ginger Rodgers:

What a lovely group!  I hope to see them again and would gladly buy their CD.  Or a boxful.

Incidentally, I am embraced by a wonderful synchronicity: I write this post from my hotel room at the astonishingly rewarding Redwood Coast Music Festival, where I heard Dawn yesterday and will hear Sam today . . . talk about being in the right place at the right time.

May your happiness increase!

GOOD MEN AND TRUE (July 6, 1952)

 

 

 

 

 

Written in between sets at the 2019 Redwood Coast Music Festival.

For some jazz fans, however one defines that slippery term, it remains fashionable to look down on Benjamin David Goodman, hot clarinetist. He was popular and prolific, prosperous and famous; he didn’t suffer (except for severe back pain); he lived a long time, was pale in complexion and Hebraic at birth.  Some thought his press-agentry (“the King of Swing”) was both inaccurate and insulting to other monarchs.

And the overwhelming evidence of his music has had, for some, a flattening effect: those who don’t listen closely might find that one version of AVALON runs into the next, high-speed crowd-pleasing set pieces.  (However, I notice that few raise the same objection with Charlie Parker’s returning to his controlled repertoire.)

But he was not only an extraordinary musician; he was a hot improviser who had splendid taste in his colleagues.  This post is for Kati Powell, daughter of the delightful and always-surprising pianist / composer / arranger Mel Powell, pictured above, whose work brightens every recording he ever made.

Here is a new lovely discovery, brought to us by the generous “Davey Tough” — whose YouTube channel is one marvel after another.  Listen, savor, and be transformed.  These three men are not going through the motions, and their hot virtuosity has yet to be equaled, both in solo and in ensemble:

Play that again.  Three minutes more out of your busy life will be rewarded by beauty.  And give thanks to the unknown recordist, who made marvels permanent rather than evanescent.

May your happiness increase!

RUNNING WITH SWINGERS: JEFF BARNHART, CLINT BAKER, NATE KETNER, ANDY REISS, STEVE PIKAL, DICK MALEY (Stomptime, 4.27.19)

I am sure you’re not supposed to run on a cruise ship — dangerous, that.  And RUNNIN’ WILD would be frowned upon even more.  But a small group of swinging, daring musicians pulled it off in the opening set of the STOMPTIME Eastern Caribbean cruise just concluded.

I knew this song — nearly a century old — because of Vic Dickenson’s and Benny Goodman’s recordings — but I didn’t know it had been portrayed as an EBONY JAZZ TUNE, nor that the verse and choruses were about the singer, male, whose “gal” had treated him with disrespect . . . and now he was enjoying the pleasures of being solo.  You could look up the whole narrative for yourself.

But here are the loose-limbed pleasures of April 27, 2019, created and recorded somewhere between Miami and Puerto Rico.  The creators are Jeff Barnhart, piano; Steve Pikal, string bass; Dick Maley, drums; Nate Ketner, reeds; Andy Reiss, guitar; Clint Baker, trumpet.

More to come.  Not only on this blog, but in STOMPTIME’s June 2020 Alaska cruise.  You could look that up, too.

May your happiness increase!

NINE BLOSSOMS ON THE BOUGH: RAY SKJELBRED, JACOB ZIMMERMAN, MATT WEINER IN CONCERT at KENYON HALL, SEATTLE, WASHINGTON (April 20, 2019)

I’m thrilled that there are some people I know and hold dear who are doing what I do — documenting the jazz scene with video cameras and a respect for the music and musicians.  I may leave someone out, but first among them, Laura Wyman of Wyman Video and Eric Devine of CineDevine, and my esteemed California role model, Rae Ann Hopkins Berry.

To this list I now add the brilliant string bassist and very effective videographer Matt Weiner.  I’d heard and admired his playing on Jacob Zimmerman’s MORE OF THAT and I got to see him on video in a January 2019 performance here.  He may be mildly shocked by being the center of attention, but once you see the evidence you will understand why he deserves the bright lights and bouquets.

Going back a bit, I don’t recall seeing this announcement for a trio performance at Seattle’s Kenyon Hall:

My ignorance was all to the good, because I would have whined and sulked, “I can’t be there to hear or video this music.  How can they do this to me?” But Matt rescued me — and now you — from such dolorous utterances by not only recording nine selections by this wondrous trio but sending them to me, and thus to us.

Hence, delights.  If you don’t know the Masters here, Skjelbred and Zimmerman, you have fallen behind on your blog-homework and will be sent to blog-detention.  Matt is a noble member of this trio.  The videos below should unfold as a set of glories: lyrical, tender, hot, wise, and heartfelt.  A rare and lasting gift.

Blessings on these three fellows.  And gratitude.

May your happiness increase!

“NOONE KNOWS”: The CHICAGO CELLAR BOYS at the JUVAE MINI-FEST: ANDY SCHUMM, JOHN OTTO, PAUL ASARO, JOHNNY DONATOWICZ, DAVE BOCK (March 30, 2019)

More of the good stuff, Jimmie Noone’s Apex Club Orchestra-style, by the Chicago Cellar Boys: Andy Schumm, clarinet, cornet, and tenor saxophone; John Otto, alto saxophone and clarinet; Paul Asaro, piano and vocal; Dave Bock, tuba; Johnny Donatowicz, banjo and guitar . . . recorded at the delightful one-day jazz extravaganza put on by the Juvae Jazz Society in Decatur, Illinois.

A tune all the musicians in the world like to jam (more fun than brother Ted’s AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY), Paul Dresser’s MY GAL SAL:

and that Oriental romance, SAN:

and another I-want-to-go-home-to-the-Southland song:

finally, the rousing Youmans I KNOW THAT YOU KNOW:

Postscript: I originally entertained thoughts of calling this post NOONE CARES, but realized that would be wrong on so many levels: these musicians care deeply, and I am sure that you — if you are reading this post — do, too.

May your happiness increase!

WHEN TECHNOLOGY IS METAPHOR AND OTHER GROOVY MATTERS: CARL SONNY LEYLAND’S HOUSE PARTY, with ANDY REISS, MARC CAPARONE, STEVE PIKAL, DANNY COOTS (Stomptime, April 29, 2019)

When Big Joe Turner recorded TV MAMA in October 1953, television sets were smaller than they are now and although middle-class families had them, they were hardly as ubiquitous as they became later.  So Joe’s stated wish for an amply proportioned companion was much more plausible than it is now, when it is possible to buy a flat-screen television that is more than six feet across.  The television set below is from 1947, I understand.

But I digress.  You haven’t wandered into a graduate seminar on modernism or popular culture.  Unless I am mistaken, you are here for the music, which is what I can and will provide, as well as prose.

I am still on the inaugural STOMPTIME cruise, as happy as a mortal can be without anything illicit being provided — all thanks to Brian and Amy Holland and a double handful of my friends and heroes, musicians who are dear friends both new and old.

Some of them took the stage on April 29 for the final set of the evening, Carl Sonny Leyland’s House Party.  Carl is a house party in himself — piano, vocals, a totally entertaining line of jive that is also wise and deep — and here he was joined by Danny Coots, drums; Steve Pikal, string bass; Andy Reiss, guitar; Marc Caparone, cornet.  And Carl led us all into Big Joe’s desire for a companion who would be larger-than-life, but not too large to love.

How they rock!

Join us for the next SYOMPTIME improvisation in delight — their seven-day Alaska cruise (June 12-19, 2020): I’ll have more details when I’m on land.  Until then, savor the joy that this House Party provides.

May your happiness increase!