LYRICAL BRILLIANCE, or A GATHERING OF GIANTS: BOBBY HACKETT, BENNY CARTER, TEDDY WILSON, LARRY RIDLEY, DAVID LEE, Jr. (Nice Jazz Festival, July 18, 1975)

Jazz festivals, by their very nature, lean heavily on all-star groups of musicians who don’t work together often — sometimes resulting in a gathering of brilliant names that is less than the sum of its parts. This set, nearly an hour, is an exception. Benny Carter and Teddy Wilson had associations going back to 1933; Bobby Hackett appeared memorably on a few of Teddy’s recording dates in 1938. Larry Ridley was a versatile player, often called in for such gatherings (he supported Benny, Bobby, and Teddy at the Newport Jazz Festival in New York for a jam session at Radio City Music Hall). Sometimes his bass is not caught well by the microphones, but when it is, it is lovely.

Those four players did not travel in the same orbits in the Seventies, so it is a wondrous thing that they were caught together, not only in performance, but for posterity by French radio.

I’ve left the drummer, David Lee, Jr. (1941-2021) for last, because initially he seems distant from the rhythmic feel of the other players, even though his working associations were with Dizzy Gillespie and Sonny Rollins, who understood swing, if in their own idiosyncratic ways. But Lee adapts himself more as the session continues and his hi-hat, initially relentless, is less distracting.

In 2023, only Larry Ridley (born 1937) survives. Bobby would die of a heart attack less than a year later. Note that Bobby, always gracious, calls a Carter composition for his feature. Easy medium tempos and arching lyrical solos are consistent beauties here.

The details.

Bobby Hackett, trumpet (or cornet?); Benny Carter, alto saxophone; Teddy Wilson, piano; Larry Ridley, string bass; David Lee, Jr., drums. Grande Parade du Jazz, July 18, 1975. Broadcast on French radio: audio only.

I MAY BE WRONG / LOVER, COME BACK TO ME / CAN’T WE BE FRIENDS? / ON GREEN DOLPHIN STREET / BLUES IN MY HEART (Hackett) / BODY AND SOUL (Carter) / WHAT IS THIS THING CALLED LOVE?

I’m not sure that great art ever points the way to a “moral,” but two occur to me. One is to bless these adaptable musicians, so sweetly durable. Their lyricism did not age and will not. The second is to tip our hats in the direction of Thomas Edison’s lab in New Jersey . . . and bless all recording equipment. Yes, “recording” brings us TikTok, but it also made these notes and tones eternal, undying.

May your happiness increase!

“TRIBUTE TO JEAN GOLDKETTE,” also BIX, TRAM, and BILL CHALLIS: The New York Jazz Repertory Company at the Nice Jazz Festival, July 14, 1976.

Here is the music from New York Jazz Repertory Company’s half-hour “Tribute to Jean Goldkette”: Jimmie Maxwell, Bernie Privin, trumpet; Dick Sudhalter, possibly cornet; Eddie Bert, Al Cobbs, trombone; Bob Wilber, Johnny Mince, clarinet, alto saxophone; Budd Johnson, Eddie Barefield, clarinet, tenor, baritone saxophone; Dick Hyman, piano, transcriptions, arrangements; Bucky Pizzarelli, guitar; Milt Hinton, string bass; Bobby Rosengarden, drums.

SUNDAY / ‘WAY DOWN YONDER IN NEW ORLEANS / I’M GONNA MEET MY SWEETIE NOW / IN A MIST (Hyman) / CLEMENTINE (From New Orleans) / SINGIN’ THE BLUES [with vocal break at 17:45!] / CLARINET MARMALADE [Solos abound, with wild Hyman and reed section trades] //

French radio broadcast from the Nice Jazz Festival, “Grande Parade du Jazz,” July 14, 1976:

Beautiful music, splendidly played: simultaneously historical and timeless.

May your happiness increase!

VIC’S NICE FRIENDS: EDDIE “LOCKJAW” DAVIS, HARRY “SWEETS” EDISON, JONAH JONES, WILD BILL DAVISON, JOHNNY MINCE, BOB WILBER, EDDIE “CLEANHEAD” VINSON, CLAUDE GOUSSET, HELEN HUMES, HANK JONES, GERRY WIGGINS, PIERRE MICHELOT, MAJOR HOLLEY, OLIVER JACKSON, J.C. HEARD, BOB FIELDS, JEROME DARR, IVAN ROLLE, CLYDE LUCAS (Nice Jazz Festival, July 7-13, 1978)

Vic Dickenson has been a hero of mine for decades and continues to be one. I’ve tried to chase down everything he recorded, which is a substantial amount — so I was very pleased to encounter music of the highest quality, recorded under ideal circumstances, that I’d never heard before. By “ideal circumstances,” I mean live — not in the studio — among musicians of his caliber, and at leisure.

The peerless Black and Blue record label recorded many performances both during the Grande Parade du Jazz (informally, the Nice Jazz Festival) and in the studio, when visiting musicians could be brought together. A CD series devoted to July 1978 Nice performances has been issued yet elusive. Vic appears on CDs headed by Harry “Sweets” Edison, Helen Humes, Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis, and Jonah Jones. A few days ago, these CDs were shared — complete — on YouTube, and I can now present those performances on which Vic is, properly, given time to shine. Details, in brief, below.

BYE BYE BLACKBIRD (Sweets Edison, Lockjaw Davis, Vic, Gerry Wiggins, Major Holley, Oliver Jackson):

TANGERINE (and the two following selections: Sweets, Jaws, Vic, Hank Jones, Major, J.C. Heard):

STOMPIN’ AT THE SAVOY:

ROMPIN’ WITH J.C.:

IF YOU’RE A VIPER (Helen Humes, Paul Bascomb, Wiggins, Holley, Oliver Jackson):

BILL BAILEY (and the four following: Jonah Jones, Wiggins, Pierre Michelot, Jackson):

DO YOU KNOW WHAT IT MEANS TO MISS NEW ORLEANS? / POOR BUTTERFLY (mislabeled):

HELLO, DOLLY!:

ALL OF ME:

ST. LOUIS BLUES:

YOU MADE ME LOVE YOU (Jonah, Vic, Wild Bill Davison, Claude Gousset, Johnny Mince, Bob Wilber, Bob Fields, Jerome Darr, Ivan Rolle, Clyde Lucas):

ROYAL GARDEN BLUES (as YOU MADE ME LOVE YOU):

Even if you’re not a viper, these are remarkable performances. Those who have heard hours of “festival jazz” or “jazz party jazz” know that it is always expert — these people are professionals beyond dispute — but sometimes with an air of “Well, I guess we have to play INDIANA for the millionth time. You go here, I’ll go there, and eventually we can relax offstage.” But these performances show Vic and others, energized, no matter how familiar the chosen repertoire.

Bless Vic Dickenson and his lovely friends is what I say. And thank you, unknown YouTube benefactor, for these gifts.

May your happiness increase!

SEVENTY MINUTES WITH GERRY MULLIGAN, HARRY “SWEETS” EDISON, VIC DICKENSON, MARIAN McPARTLAND, DAVE SAMUELS, PERCY HEATH, ALAN DAWSON (Nice Jazz Festival, July 15, 1976)

People who draw “jazz history trees” love to create categories that are often divisive, at best restrictive. For those so inclined, whether critics, journalists, or “fans,” the art form is defined as discrete sections, painted lines in an aesthetic shopping-center parking lot.

The musicians laugh about such dopiness, and not only talk to their friends but play alongside them. Happily.

Here’s a passionate interlude that refutes such categorization, from the Nice Jazz Festival of July 15, 1976. The set was called “Jeru and some friends,” “Jeru” being the baritone saxophonist Gerry Mulligan, who made himself at home with musicians “from different schools” where and whenever he could, including Count Basie, Jack Teagarden, Pee Wee Russell, and Joe Sullivan — and I am sure that is only a fraction of the friendly gatherings he participated in.

I love the fact that the common language is “the three B’s,” or in jazz terms, “Basie,” “the blues,” and “ballads.”

Nice Jazz Festival (audio only); “”Grande Parade du Jazz,” July 15, 1976.

Gerry Mulligan, baritone saxophone; Harry “Sweets” Edison, trumpet; Vic Dickenson, trombone; Marian McPartland, piano; Dave Samuels, vibraphone; Percy Heath, string bass; Alan Dawson, drums. I FOUND A NEW BABY / NIGHT LIGHTS / WHILE WE’RE YOUNG (Marian, solo) / I’LL BE AROUND (Mullgan-Marian) / YESTERDAYS (Sweets) / TEA FOR TWO / SHINY STOCKINGS.

Miraculous to me, but common friendly practice to these wise feeling players:

“Ain’t that something?” to quote Bill Robinson.

May your happiness increase!

MEMORIES OF EUBIE, or THE MAN IN THE WHITE SUIT (1975, 1978)

This one’s for the Honorary Mayor of Scotia, New York, and his pianistic pals.

I saw Eubie Blake a number of times in New York City between 1972 and a decade later: a Sunday-afternoon session at what used to be Nick’s, playing a barely tolerable upright; as guest artist at an outdoor concert, and at several Newport in New York concerts. To say that he was “a star” in inadequate; he was the whole show, exuberant, declamatory, his playing rhapsodic, sly, bombastic, hilarious. In short, unforgettable — and not because of his age, but because of his enthusiasm, his pure joy, his delight in making music.

Here are two performances: one, a single song, the other, nearly an hour, performed at the “Grande Parade du Jazz,” the Nice Jazz Festival. MEMORIES OF YOU, the Sissle and Blake composition, was performed on July 18, 1975, and broadcast on French television as part of an anthology of piano performances by Teddy Wilson, Earl Hines, Dorothy Donegan, and their groups. Eubie stood alone:

What follows I think few people have seen: recorded in July 1978 (I don’t know the exact date) but never broadcast. “It’s like having Eubie in your living room,” my friend Sterling says, and who would disagree? The songs are RUSTLE OF SPRING / RAGTIME SCARF DANCE / PILGRIM’S CHORUS (in E major) / THE MERRY WIDOW WALTZ / MEMORIES OF YOU / Excerpts from RHAPSODY IN BLUE and THE MAN I LOVE / CHARLESTON RAG / “Shuffle Along” Medley: BANDANA DAYS – LOVE WILL FIND A WAY – GYPSY BLUES – I’M JUST WILD ABOUT HARRY / MAPLE LEAF RAG — and Eubie sings on the Medley:

Endearing, versatile, rocking, lyrical: a wonderful spectacle Eubie was.

May your happiness increase!

KENNY BURRELL and FRIENDS: JIMMIE ROWLES, BUCKY PIZZARELLI, REGGIE JOHNSON, SHERMAN FERGUSON, DIZZY GILLESPIE (Nice Jazz Festival, July 8, 1978)

Kenny Burrell at the Nice Jazz Festival, July 1, 1978. (Photo by David Redfern)

People are known by the company they keep. Kenny Burrell, superb on his own terms, is here surrounded by the finest of them all: Jimmie Rowles, piano; Bucky Pizzarelli, guitar; Reggie Johnson, string bass; Sherman Ferguson, drums, for a brisk HAVE YOU MET MISS JONES? (Why the cinematographer aims everywhere but at Rowles during the piano solo is mysterious; perhaps a technical reason?) And please pay special attention to Bucky, playing splendid solos as well as his usual rhythm:

then, a Rowles feature, one of the finest versions of MY FUNNY VALENTINE I know, questing, mobile, curious, with Scottish whimsy free of charge:

and Diz drops in! Notice how NOW’S THE TIME becomes a playful BAGS’ GROOVE, toying with the harmonies. He mugs for the camera, and goes off. Priceless:

More than Nice, I say. Thanks to the indefatigable jazz-film scholar Franz Hoffmann for the elusive source material.

May your happiness increase!

GIANTS PLAY NICE: BENNY CARTER, GEORGE BARNES, RUBY BRAFF, MICHAEL MOORE, VINNIE CORRAO, RAY MOSCA (La Grande Parade du Jazz, July 25, 1975)

An hour of sustained multi-faceted brilliance.

Festival producers often throw together dissimilar artists to see what happens, but sometimes the unusual gatherings of masters produce art completely unexpected and delightful. Here at the 1975 Nice Jazz Festival we have Benny Carter, alto saxophone — whose place in jazz is beyond discussion — joining a version of the magical quartet George Barnes, electric guitar, and Ruby Braff, cornet, had for too short a time, with the quartet’s usual rhythm section of Moore, string bass, and Corrao, rhythm guitar, augmented by drummer Ray Mosca.

A constellation of giants, lyrical ones for sure.

This hour-long set was broadcast on French radio, and we are surely grateful. And if I may privilege one artist over another, I urge listeners to pay most careful attention of the astonishing guitarist George Barnes, casually tossing magic everywhere. If you share my enthusiasm for him, be sure to visit the GEORGE BARNES LEGACY COLLECTION. You’ll be enthralled.

WRAP YOUR TROUBLES IN DREAMS / JUST YOU, JUST ME / MEAN TO ME / TAKE THE “A” TRAIN / I CAN’T GET STARTED (Carter feature) / SUGAR (Carter out) / LOVER, COME BACK TO ME:

But wait! There’s more!

WRAP YOUR TROUBLES IN DREAMS:

JUST YOU, JUST ME, MEAN TO ME, and TAKE THE “A” TRAIN:

I CAN’T GET STARTED and LOVER, COME BACK TO ME:

Documentation of such creativity — a blessing!

May your happiness increase!

GUITARS FOR BIX, or GEORGE LEAPS IN: GEORGE BARNES, DICK SUDHALTER, JOE VENUTI, MICHAEL MOORE, RAY MOSCA (Nice Jazz Festival, July 23, 1975, audience-recording)

A poster from Nice 1974

Usually in tributes to Bix Beiderbecke, the cornetist gets the bright lights and paparazzi, and this is not to take anything from the brilliant and much-missed Richard M. Sudhalter — but the star here, for me, is George Barnes, whose love of Bix shines through every lucent phrase, every intent hornlike line, every nickel-bright chordal accent. Hear him leaping in on SUNDAY, dressing SWEET SUE in blue, jousting with Signor Joe and giving no quarter, becoming a supportive orchestra on SINGIN’ THE BLUES and then bending notes in his solo the way a master sculptor would, creating an audacious double-time break worthy of young Louis, shining the way on SAN (and chording delightfully behind Marty!).

The fidelity is low but the music is glorious.

The heroic Mister Barnes

Thanks to Derek Coller, the great biographer and enthusiast, we have a precious audience-recording from the Nice Jazz Festival (Grande Parade du Jazz) July 23, 1975: Dick Sudhalter, cornet; George Barnes, electric guitar; Joe Venuti, violin; Marty Grosz, guitar; Michael Moore, string bass; Ray Mosca, drums. SUNDAY / BLUE RIVER (Sudhalter-Grosz) / SWEET SUE (Barnes, Venuti, Grosz, Moore, Mosca) / SINGIN’ THE BLUES / SAN:

If this is your first introduction to the many worlds of George Barnes, learn more and hear more at https://georgebarneslegacy.com/. You’ll be charmed and amazed.

May your happiness increase!

SO VERY NICE: JONAH JONES, BUD FREEMAN, JEROME DARR, IVAN ROLLE, BOB FIELDS, CLYDE LUCAS (Grande Parade du Jazz, July 8, 1978)

Jonah Jones, 1962. Photograph by the beloved Duncan Schiedt.

Today I present two seriously undervalued musicians: Jonah Jones, trumpet; Bud Freeman, tenor saxophone, playing a brief set with Jonah’s working band — Jerome Darr, guitar; Ivan Rolle, string bass; Bob Fields, piano; Clyde Lucas, drums, at the Grande Parade du Jazz, July 8, 1978.

AT SUNDOWN / the first part of ROYAL GARDEN BLUES:

ROYAL GARDEN BLUES (concluded) / ON THE STREET WHERE YOU LIVE (closing theme):

Wonderful musicians, but oh so neglected.

Jonah was typecast as a muted-trumpet-for-easy-listening, even as his audiences loved him. He was successful and steady, which goes against the stereotype of the jazz musician as suffering outsider-rebel. Popularity seems a millstone around the neck: “If it sells, it can’t be good.”

And Bud . . . was typecast as a “D——-d” stalwart, someone stuck in the past, where in reality he was a superbly creative and idiosyncratic player, truly with his own style.

If you think I exaggerate, look for them in the books that pretend to delineate the Jazz History Canon.

Here they are, completely mature players with decades of experience behind them (Bud was 72, Jonah 69) showing that swing is not just a young person’s art. They had recorded together only once, a 1954 session under George Wettling’s leadership, featuring other underrated pleasures: George Barnes, Milt Hinton, Dave Bowman, so to me this little session is especially precious.

As an extra gift, here’s a 1982 interview that our friend Loren Schoenberg did with Bud — a remarkable historical gift then and now:

May your happiness increase!

TRIBUTE TO BIX: DICK SUDHALTER, GEORGE BARNES, JOE VENUTI, MARTY GROSZ, MICHAEL MOORE, RAY MOSCA (Grande Parade du Jazz, July 23, 1975)

Since I’ve been collecting recordings of jazz music in every conceivable form for over fifty years, I don’t always know what I have — which makes for a certain disorganization. (Some people I know have spreadsheets, indices, notebooks of their holdings: not me.) But it also makes for delirious surprises, one of which I will share with you.

The eminent (and generous-spirited) jazz writer and historian Derek Coller was at the 1975 Nice Jazz Festival, an experience I envy. But he also brought along a portable cassette recorder, and sent me copies for me of the tapes he achieved. Wonderful gifts. The sound isn’t recording-studio, and there is talk from enthusiastic fans, but the results are priceless.

Here is the last set of July 23, 1975: Dick Sudhalter, cornet; George Barnes, electric guitar; Joe Venuti, violin; Marty Grosz, guitar; Michael Moore, string bass; Ray Mosca, drums, paying tribute to the dear boy from Davenport, Iowa. Everyone is in wonderful form — even though Joe is characteristically a little overbearing — but the hero of this set is George Barnes, leaping in at wonderfully odd angles, honoring a musician and an inspiration.

JAZZ ME BLUES / SUNDAY [a few measures missing, possibly the tape being turned over] / BLUE RIVER (Sudhalter-Grosz) / SWEET SUE (Sudhalter out) / SINGIN’ THE BLUES / SAN //

Somewhere, Bix is grinning, because these noble creatures had the right idea: follow their impulses, and who knows what’s coming next? — rather than bowing down to the past. I hope you agree.

May your happiness increase!

A MAN OF VIOLENT ENTHUSIASMS: EARL HINES PLAYS FATS WALLER (Nice, July 22, 1975)

In his sixty-year performing career, Earl Hines was never characterized as a timid improviser. No, he was daring — that he had a piano in front of him rather than a machete was only the way the Fates had arranged it. Dick Wellstood called him, “Your Musical Host, serving up the hot sauce,” and that’s apt. Whether the listener perceives it as the freedom to play whatever occurred to him or a larger musical surrealism, it was never staid.

Later in life, Hines had (like his colleague Teddy Wilson) various medleys and tributes that could form a set program for an evening, but he improvised, even within set routines. The listener was in the grip of joyous turbulence, and Hines’ showmanship was always part of the show. Here, first solo and then accompanied by Harley White, string bass, and Eddie Graham, drums, he plays music composed by and associated with his friend Fats Waller. Make sure your seat belt is low and tight across your hips before we start.

Photograph by David Redfern

The songs are BLACK AND BLUE / TWO SLEEPY PEOPLE / AIN’T MISBEHAVIN’ / JITTERBUG WALTZ / SQUEEZE ME / HONEYSUCKLE ROSE . . . and each of them has its possibilities examined, shaken, stirred, and offered to us in the most multi-colored way. And, yes, my mixing of metaphors is an intentional bow to the Fatha:

Hines told more than one interviewer that his flashing “trumpet style” of playing — octaves and single-note lines exploding like fireworks — was born out of necessity, his desire to be heard over the band. He kept to that path even when no band was present, and it’s dazzling.

May your happiness increase!

ASKING QUESTIONS for TRIO and QUARTET: LEE KONITZ, JIMMIE ROWLES, RED MITCHELL, SHELLY MANNE (Grande Parade du Jazz, July 7, 1978).

Fifty years ago I would have backed away from this music, finding Konitz too angular, his tone too vinegary, Rowles too unpredictable, Mitchell and Manne too wayward. But we can expand our horizons of pleasure and understanding, and in the same way I now love Sichuan peppers and vindaloo — food that terrified the child-self.

And if this music does not speak to you in a familiar tongue, waste no energy disdaining it. It’s there for you to delight in. Others will revel in it. Every note has its own life, lyrical and seeking.

Coincidentally — I only learned this after this post had been published — today would have been Lee’s 94th birthday. I don’t think he would have wanted cake and fussing, but he would have liked to be remembered.

MINOR BLUES (Konitz out) / STAR EYES / THE PEACOCKS (Konitz out) / SWEET GEORGIA BROWN // Lee Konitz, alto saxophone; Jimmie Rowles, piano; Red Mitchell, string bass; Shelly Manne, drums. Grande Parade du Jazz, July 7, 1978. Originally broadcast on French radio.

It bears close listening and re-listening.

May your happiness increase!

FESTIVALS MAKE STRANGE BANDFELLOWS: LEE KONITZ, EDDIE “LOCKJAW” DAVIS, JIMMIE ROWLES, BUCKY PIZZARELLI, RED MITCHELL, SHELLY MANNE (Nice, July 9, 1978)

Note: the first version of this post was completely in chaos: the audio was Konitz and colleagues but the video was the World’s Greatest Jazz Band — enough to make anyone race for Dramamine. I was informed by several attentive readers, withdrew everything for repairs, and hope it is now brought into unity. Apologies! Barney Bigard’s hand gesture at the start of the video (the last seconds of his set) conveys my feelings about technical difficulties.

“Strange bandfellows?” you say. I think some festival producers operate on the principle of the one Unexpected Element creating a great Chemical Reaction, that if you line up seven musicians who often play together, you might get routines. But add someone unusual and you might get the energy that jam sessions are supposed to produce from artists charged by new approaches. Or, perhaps cynically, it could be that novelty draws audiences: “I never heard X play with Y: I’ve got to hear this!”

Here are Lee Konitz, alto saxophone; Jimmie Rowles, piano; Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis, tenor saxophone; Bucky Pizzarelli, guitar; Red Mitchell, string bass; Shelly Manne, drums, placed together at the Grande Parade du Jazz on July 9, 1978.

I’m not ranking these remarkable musicians, but this is a group of players who hadn’t always been associated in the past: yes to Konitz and Rowles, Rowles and Mitchell; Bucky and Shelly played with everyone. But Lockjaw comes from another Venn diagram.

I can imagine Lee, who was strong-willed, thinking, “What am I supposed to do with this group?” and I wonder if that’s why he asked Shelly to improvise a solo interlude, why he chose to begin the set with a duet with Bucky — rather than attempting to get everyone together to play familiar tunes (as they eventually do). At times it feels like carpooling, where Thelma wants to eat her sardine sandwich at 8 AM to the discomfort of everyone else in the minivan. But sets are finite, and professionals make the best of it.

And if any of the above sounds ungracious, I know what a privilege it was to be on the same planet as these artists (I saw Bucky, Lee, and Jimmie at close range) and how, forty-plus years later, they seem surrounded by radiance.

The songs are INVITATION Lee – Bucky / WAVE / THE VERY THOUGHT OF YOU Bucky, solo / IMPROVISATION Shelly, solo / COOL BLUES, which has been shared in whole and part on YouTube, but this, I believe, is the first airing of the complete set.

All of them, each of them, completely irreplaceable.

May your happiness increase!

“WHAT DID YOU BRING US?”: MICHEL BASTIDE’S PRICELESS MEMORY-GIFT: July 1974

I know Michel Bastide as the slender, bespectacled hot cornetist of the Hot Antic Jazz Band, a very earnest, gracious man and musician.  Here he is leading a small incendiary group at the 2010 Whitley Bay Jazz Party, “Doc’s Night Owls.”  The “Doc,” incidentally, is because M. Bastide’s day gig is as an ophthalmologist.  But before this week, I didn’t know that he was also an early member of my guild of jazz archivists, and my admiration for him has soared.  I stumbled across his priceless half-hour memory tour on YouTube, was immediately thrilled, and I suggest you will feel as I do.  

Monsieur and Madame Bastide went to the 1974 Grande Parade du Jazz.  It was one year before any of the proceedings were broadcast on television, so although some recordings were made, the active life of the festival was not documented.  Perhaps Doctor Bastide has a deep spiritual respect for the powers of the eye, of visual acuity and visual memory, or he simply could not bear going home without some tangible souvenirs that could be revisited and cherished once again.  He brought a color 8mm film camera, which was the technology of the times, and his wife carried a small cassette recorder that got surprisingly clear audio fidelity.

Perhaps because of the inertia and tedium that are the gift to us of Covid-19, eleven months ago M. Bastide began the difficult, careful, and no doubt time-consuming work of attempting to synchronize music and image.  The results are spectacular and touching: he is quite a cinematographer, catching glimpses of the musicians hard at work and having a wonderful time.

I’ll offer some a guided tour of this impromptu magic carpet / time machine, beginning at the Nice airport on July 14, 1974: glimpses of Claude Hopkins, Paul Barnes, Vic Dickenson, Beryl Bryden, Lucille Armstrong;

An ad hoc sidewalk session for Lucille with Michel Bastide, Moustache, Benny Waters, Tommy Sancton;

Dejan’s Brass Band in the opening parade, July 15;

Cozy Cole, Vic Dickenson (talking!) and Arvell Shaw;

Lucille Armstrong unveils a bust of Louis with Princess Grace of Monaco in attendance (how gorgeous she is!);

STRUTTIN’ WITH SOME BARBECUE, with Wallace Davenport, Wild Bill Davison, Bill Coleman, Jimmy McPartland, Barney Bigard, Budd Johnson, Vic Dickenson, George Wein, Arvell Shaw, Cozy Cole;

Eubie Blake talks and plays;

Moustache All-Stars with George Wein;

Preservation Hall Jazz Band, with Kid Thomas Valentine, Emmanuel Paul, Louis Nelson, Alonzo Stewart, Joseph Butler, Paul Barnes, Charlie Hamilton;

World’s Greatest Jazz Band, with Yank Lawson, Bob Haggart, Bennie Morton (in shirtsleeeves!), Bob Wilber, Kenny Davern, Jimmy McPartland, Joe Venuti, Marian McPartland;

a glimpse of Claude  Hopkins, Buddy Tate, Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis;

the Barney Bigard – Earl Hines quartet;

Buddy Tate signing an autograph;

Milt Buckner, Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson, Tiny Grimes, Jo Jones;

Cozy Cole, to the side, smoking a substantial joint, watching Jo;

George Barnes, Ruby Braff, Wayne Wright, Michael Moore;

Kid Thomas Valentine and Alonzo Stewart signing autographs; Tiny Grimes walking to the next set; Claude Hopkins; Arvell Shaw waving so sweetly at the camera;

Earl Hines solo;

World’s Greatest Jazz Band with Lawson, Haggart, Wilber, Morton, Ralph Sutton, Bud Freeman, Gus Johnson;

Benny Waters;

Vic Dickenson joining the WGJB for DOODLE DOO DOO;

Preservation Hall Jazz Band performing TIGER RAG with Barney Bigard off to the side, joining in.

Wonderful glimpses: to me, who looks happy in the band; who takes an extra chorus and surprises the next soloist; adjusting of tuning slides; spraying oil on one’s trombone.  Grace Kelly’s beauty; Arvell Shaw’s sweet grin.  Just magic, and the camera is almost always focused on something or someone gratifying:

Monsieur and Madame Bastide have given us a rare gift: a chance to be happy engaged participants in a scene that few of us could enjoy at the time.  I was amazed by it and still am, although slightly dismayed that his YouTube channel had one solitary subscriber — me.  I hope you’ll show him some love and support.  Who knows what other little reels of film might be in the Bastide treasure-chest for us to marvel at?

May your happiness increase!

“CREOLE LOVE CALL”: BARNEY BIGARD, KENNY DAVERN, BOB WILBER, EDDIE DANIELS, DICK HYMAN, JACK SEWING, J.C. HEARD, and a brief DAVERN INTERLUDE (Nice, July 15, 1977)

Writing about Kenny Davern and sharing people’s memories of him have left me wanting to share more, so I thought I might share this wonderful on-the-spot piece of musical architecture with you. The participants are Barney Bigard, Kenny, Bob Wilber, and the rather idiosyncratic Eddie Daniels, clarinet; Dick Hyman, Jack Sewing, string bass, and J.C. Heard, drums. It was performed at the Grande Parade du Jazz — known to its friends as the Nice Jazz Festival — on July 15, 1977.

CREOLE LOVE CALL is thematically as plain as you could want, but the simplicity becomes a beautiful freeing place from which to soar, to sing individual songs, to moan dark feelings and reach for the stars in the space of a chorus. This performance, for me, is intense and intensely melodic: a triumph of understanding, leaving Mr. Daniels aside for the moment.

The video also catches Kenny amusing himself and attempting to amuse the crowd — for once, without success. I know that the audience might not have had a preponderance of English-proficient people, but their absolute silence after Kenny’s patented jape is a little unnerving (surely they’d heard those names before?) and his annoyance is palpable . . . but I am glad this exchange is captured for posterity, for it summons up the whole of the much-missed Mr. Davern. But, the music. The music!

May your happiness increase!

https://syncopatedtimes.com

THE GROOVE, SO NICE: ERSKINE HAWKINS, JAY McSHANN, CLAUDE “FIDDLER” WILLIAMS, VIC DICKENSON, BUDDY TATE, JIM GALLOWAY, GENE RAMEY, GUS JOHNSON (July 12, 1979)

Here’s a classic jazz festival / jazz party set (or at least the second part of one): it could have been a completely disconnected group of stars doing their feature numbers, but they are unified by The Groove.

And it helps immensely that Jay McShann, piano; Gene Ramey, string bass; Gus Johnson, drums, were having a little reunion of the original McShann rhythm section.  The band is in a Kansas City mood, even though none of them hails from that city: Erskine Hawkins, trumpet; Vic Dickenson, trombone; Buddy Tate, tenor saxophone; Jim Galloway, soprano saxophone; Claude “Fiddler” Williams, violin.  (Alabama, Ohio, three from Texas, Scotland, two from Oklahoma, should you wonder.)

This video begins with Hawkins’ hit — recorded almost forty years before to the day, TUXEDO JUNCTION, then the song Vic featured with the Eddie Heywood band and also the band Ed Hall led in Boston, PLEASE DON’T TALK ABOUT ME WHEN I’M GONE, and a slow raunchy BLUES featuring Buddy and McShann.

Erskine didn’t record after 1971, but he had a rewarding steady gig, well-remembered by our friend Hank O’Neal in this lovely portrait of the man and the musician who got people on the floor to dance, wherever he was:

Perhaps this will send people back to hear Erskine’s Bluebird and Victor recordings — entertaining documents of a danceable swinging band.  This post, by the way, is for my friends Nick Rossi and Michael Gamble, among others, who know The Groove when it enters the room.

May your happiness increase!

 

THE PERFECT JAZZ REPERTORY QUINTET: DICK HYMAN, BOB WILBER, PEE WEE ERWIN, MILT HINTON, BOBBY ROSENGARDEN (Nice Jazz Festival, July 9, 1978)

Truth in advertising.

The PERFECT JAZZ REPERTORY QUINTET actually was.

It was one of those bands that actually lived up to its bold title, whether the front line was as it was here, or the variation that I saw in Morgan Park in Glen Cove, so many years ago — Joe Wilder and Phil Bodner (with Dick Hyman, Milt Hinton, and I think Ronnie Zito).

Under Dick Hyman’s astonishing leadership, the Quintet chose to concentrate on jazz before the Second World War, but the result was timeless, full of improvisational brilliance and energy, even though there were many manuscripts on those music stands. One of the pleasures of the video that follows is seeing members of the quintet, professional in every detail, taking their music off the stands at the end of the set.  But I have doubt that a Quintet performance concentrating on the music of Tadd Dameron, Charlie Parker, and early Miles Davis would have been compelling music also.

Here we have their first manifestation: Dick Hyman, piano; Pee Wee Erwin, cornet; Bob Wilber, clarinet, alto and soprano saxophones; Milt Hinton, string bass; Bobby Rosengarden, drums.

The video that follows captures a performance at the Grande Parade du Jazz, made for French television but apparently not broadcast and certainly not trimmed-down for time limitations.

Setting up [for the impatient, the “music begins at” 5:55] / CAKE WALKIN’ BABIES FROM HOME / I’M GONNA STOMP MR. HENRY LEE [at a lovely swaying tempo] / MY MAN’S GONE NOW (Wilber) / OLD MAN BLUES / SOPHISTICATED LADY (Hyman, Hinton, Rosengarden) / JUST BEFORE DAYBREAK (Erwin – Hyman) / DOOJI WOOJI / DOWN IN HONKY TONK TOWN / a few seconds of packing up //.

The late reedman Leroy “Sam” Parkins told me, more than once, that great art was in the balance between passionate abandon and expert restraint.  The Quintet embodies that in every note.

A very happy P.S.  I posted this video early on Friday, February 20, and mid-afternoon Mr. Dick Human himself (he will be 94 this March 8) commented on the video:

dickhymanpianist7 hours ago

I am so glad that Michael Steinman posted this performance. I had no idea that we were documented at the time. Everyone was at his best, and I am grateful that he released it.—Dick Hyman

It’s a real thrill to know that your heroes are paying attention to what you do.

May your happiness increase!

“SALUTE TO DUKE”: ILLINOIS JACQUET, BARNEY BIGARD, VIC DICKENSON, RUBY BRAFF, JIMMIE ROWLES, SLAM STEWART, SHELLY MANNE (Grande Parade Du Jazz, Nice, France, July 7, 1979)

It’s so Nice.

Here’s a group of musicians you would only see at a festival, playing “the music of Duke Ellington”: Illinois Jacquet, tenor saxophone; Barney Bigard, clarinet; Vic Dickenson, trombone; Ruby Braff, cornet; Jimmie Rowles, piano; Slam Stewart, string bass; Shelly Manne, drums. Take a moment to let those names sink in.

Sometimes these groups don’t coalesce: they are the musical equivalent of a soup made with the contents of the refrigerator, and even in this case the closing “Ellington composition” might seem like the lowest common denominator, but it works wonderfully — thanks to the experience of the soloists and the splendid rhythm section.  And if you look closely, you will see Vic Dickenson mutely ask to be left alone while he’s soloing — he didn’t like horn backgrounds — but he’s eloquent even when annoyed.  Any chance to see Jimmie Rowles at the piano is exquisite, and I feel the same way about watching Ruby and Vic together.

The two selections — the end of a longer set which, alas, I don’t have on video — are ALL TOO SOON (Jacquet and rhythm) / C JAM BLUES (ensemble).  They were performed at the “Grande Parade du Jazz,” July 7, 1979, and broadcast on French television.

May your happiness increase!

BOBBY SHINES HIS LIGHT: BOBBY HACKETT, ART HODES, PLACIDE ADAMS, PANAMA FRANCIS (Nice Jazz Festival, July 21, 1975)

I saw Bobby Hackett perform a half-dozen times in the early Seventies, and he impressed me as a reserved, modest man — someone who didn’t want to take the first solo, someone for whom two choruses were enough.  He wasn’t loud; he didn’t assert his right to the spotlight.  But his modesty was balanced by the sweetness and quiet passion he created when he played.  He loved the melody, but he also delighted in the harmonic melodies he could invent while getting through a one-bar passage between two possibly ordinary chords.  And his sound.  And his architectural sense: his playing seemed logical, thoughtful, but every note vibrated with warm love — of the melody, of the song, of the messages he could send to us.  A vibrating serenity full of emotion.

Bobby and Vic Dickenson at Childs Paramount, October 1952.  Photo by Robert Parent

I write all this as prelude to a performance he did late in life (he didn’t live a whole year after this) that was blessedly captured on film.  It’s from the Nice Jazz Festival, July 21, 1975, a six-minute exploration of SWEET LORRAINE with Art Hodes, piano; Placide Adams, string bass; Panama Francis, drums.  I have posted it before, but as part of a much longer “Dixieland” anthology where it was one of the few quiet moments.  I urge you, even if  you have seen and heard it before, to take time for beauty, the beauty Bobby so open-heartedly gave us.  These moments are, as Bobby’s friend Eddie Condon said, “too good to ignore”:

Last night, the astronomers captured photographs of Jupiter and Saturn in the night sky, something that they say happens every eight hundred years.  I offer this performance by Bobby as a cosmic marvel in its own way.  There was no one like him, and he hasn’t been equaled or replaced.  Nor will he be.

May your happiness increase!

 

MASTERS OF ART: RUBY BRAFF, HARRY “SWEETS” EDISON, JOE NEWMAN, JOHNNY GUARNIERI, MICHAEL MOORE, RAY MOSCA (Nice Jazz Festival, July 26-27, 1975)

Ruby Braff

This musical interlude is an absolute triumph — not a cutting contest, but a jovial conversation among three brass legends (Braff, cornet; Sweets and Joe, trumpet) with a thoroughly congenial modern-swing rhythm section (the splendid virtuosi Johnny Guarnieri, piano; Michael Moore, string bass; Ray Mosca, drums).

Harry “Sweets” Edison

Ruby, Joe, and Sweets are vehement individualists with roots in the same earth that gave us Louis and Basie.  You’ll hear florid declamatory phrases, side-of-the-mouth whispers and in-jokes, loud blasts and half-valve things a gentleman does not say in company.  They live in 1975 yet are completely aware of the half-century of music that came before.  And they live now, thirty-five years later.

Joe Newman

The songs are ROSETTA, JUST FRIENDS, CAROLINA SHOUT (Guarnieri, solo), TAKE THE “A” TRAIN, all performed at the Nice Jazz Festival, July 26 and 27th, 1975.  Heartfelt thanks to Tom Hustad, who made all this possible:

What gifts these magicians gave us.  What gifts the music continues to give us.

May your happiness increase!

MARY LOU WILLIAMS and JOHN LEWIS IN DUET at the NICE JAZZ FESTIVAL (Grande Parade du Jazz, July 12, 1978)

John Lewis and Mary Lou Williams certainly knew and admired each other, but this is the only documented evidence I know of them in performance.  They were strong personalities, born only a decade apart, spiritually connected.  I hear two artists with expansive imaginations, their improvisations based in the blues and always showing deep respect for melody and swing.  Her playing is percussive; his, much more assertive than his work with the Modern Jazz Quartet — but it’s a dialogue, not a tussle.

The recording of this set — happily longer than thirty minutes — begins with the television crew and sound people setting up — you can  hear Mary Lou asking, “Aren’t they ready yet?”  Then the two pianists embark on deep explorations of the most familiar territory, making it vivid at every turn: I’LL REMEMBER APRIL / BODY AND SOUL / BLUES / THE MAN I LOVE / COTTON TAIL.

Let no one say that the standard repertoire is exhausted.  I feel this concert doesn’t require annotation.  It does inspire reverence.

May your happiness increase!

PLAY NICE: MILT JACKSON, JIMMIE ROWLES, BUCKY PIZZARELLI, SLAM STEWART, DUFFY JACKSON (Grande Parade du Jazz, July 13, 1979)

Some jazz groups “have history”: that is, the intuitive understanding that comes from playing often, even if not night after night, together.  (In the dating world, it’s called “chemistry.”) Other collaborations — by whatever circumstance — emerge when people who don’t ordinarily work together are asked to play for the public.  I don’t know whether the producer of the Grande Parade du Jazz, colloquially called the “Nice Jazz Festival,” decided it would be interesting to mix it up, or whether Milt Jackson said, “Here are the people I’d like to play with.”  I suspect the former.

But, for almost an hour, we have a set of music from Milt, vibraphone; Jimmie Rowles, piano; Bucky Pizzarelli, guitar; Slam Stewart, string bass; Duffy Jackson, drums.  I would guess that Milt and Jimmie might have encountered each other as far back as the mid-Forties in California; Bucky and Slam worked as a duo and in many rhythm sections at this time; Duffy, the youngest of the group, had experience as Basie’s drummer.  Being a Rowles-devotee, my overpowering first reaction was, “Goodness!  Nearly on  hour of Jimmie in a different context, on video!”

Preparing this post, I looked in Tom Lord’s discography for any evidence that this quintet — or a near-relation — had recorded, and found none.  But Milt, Jimmie, and Ray Brown (and perhaps others) had performed a year earlier in Sao Paulo as part of the Montreux Jazz Festival tour, and here’s photographic evidence.  I certainly would like to hear this:

Milt, someone with great awareness, treats the repertoire as he would if presiding over a jam session, and calls songs that no one could get lost in — THE MAN I LOVE / STARDUST / BLUES / DISORDER AT THE BORDER / SOMETIMES I’M HAPPY / BAGS’ GROOVE //.  I don’t know, if when the set was over, the players said to each other, “Well, we got through that.  Did you see all those television cameras?  Damn, people are going to be watching this?  I need to lie down,” or if the general reaction was, “What a triumph!”

2020 criticism of 1979 joys will be discouraged.  I think this is a priceless hour, and am thrilled it exists.  I hope you feel the same way.  And I am able to share this with you through the generous kindness of A Good Friend.

May your happiness increase!