Larry Kart

Almost buried on my shelves, I found this 1958 big band album which is notable for several reasons. First, all the tunes are composed by one Richard Allen, who in addition to the title piece wrote "There's No Place Like) Home for the Holidays", and Everybody Loves a Lover." Second, every tune and chart is more or less organically "catchy," though not in a cheap way -- I'm reminded of some of the work that Neal Hefti did at this time for Epic. Third, all the solos are on the short side. with Richie Kamuca in especially fine form. Fourth, on the cover a blond model provocatively pushes her tightly sheathed rear end out at Shorty as though she wanted him to insert his flugelhorn where the moon don't shine. Fifth, Joe Mondragon's well-recorded bass lines are a gas. Sixth, Shorty uses Paul Horn''s flute in unison with Gene Estes' vibes as a section in itself at times. Seventh, Mel Lewis' near omnipresent fills are so locked into Shorty's charts that one or both of them (i.e. Mel and Shorty) must have sat down beforehand and scoped that out. All in all, aside from my faint memory of one of Hefti's Epic albums of that time, it doesn't sound quite like anything else I've heard. Finally, the trumpet section is something else: Don Fagerquist, Pete Candoli, Conte Candoli, Ollie Mitchell, Al Porcino, and Ray Triscari -- though only Shorty solos.

In a similar vein, I really like "With the Wind and the Rain in Your Hair."

A good one.

Very disappointing. Works strike me as bland and mechanical. That may be because they were left in incomplete shape and were put together for performance by various would-be Skalkottas "experts." First time anything by NS has let me down this way.

First chronologically by era, beginning with Medieval music, then within each era by country/culture (then within that by composer) - thus all French Baroque together, chronologically then, within that bag, Lully, Charpentier, Couperin, Rameau, etc; likewise then by era and country until the end, with reasonable subgroups, e.g. if a country/era has a good-sized batch of avant-garde works or styistically similar organ music , I group those together within that country/era's overall grouping (thus Debussy/Ravel will be together within French 20th Century, followed by, say, Poulenc, Honneger, etc, while Boulez, Barraque, etc, will be together in latter day French 20th Century. It can get quite detailed but always logical. I often find the the desire to listen to, say, one Scandinavian or German or Italian modernist or avant garde composer leads me to another. That reminds me that I like to keep 19th Century Italian opera composers in one section. In English modern music Britten beds down with Lennox Berkeley (which sometimes may have happened in real life), both them well apart from Brian Ferneyhough. Finally all American classical music goes together at the very end in chronological order, with certain (to me) logical subgroups (e.g. at the very very end, John Cage and Morton Feldman). Don't think I've left anything out. Or have I? I've got a lot of classical CDs and LPs, maybe 3,000 in all, maybe many more. Classical LPs are organized the same way as Classical CDs are. Jazz CDs and LPs are organized in a roughly similar manner, but there the eras are broader -- Early Jazz, Swing Era, Modern, Avant Garde, Vocalists, Blues, and alphabetically by artist within eras.

I'm pretty sure it was just an odd error. The man was a lyricist, not a composer, and without any apparent jazz associations to boot. I'd always heard that "Four," like "Tuneup," was a Vinson creation.

It's fairly well known that two tunes often attributed to Miles Davis, "Four" and "Tune Up"," were in fact written by Eddie "Cleanhead" Vinson.But listening to a recording of "Four" by Lennie Niehaus I noticed that the tune was attributed to one Clarence Gaskill, a lyricist best known for the lyric to "I Can't Believe the You're in Love with Me." I assume that the credit to Gaskill for "Four" is just an odd mistake.

Reposting this after listening to most of Niehaus' Contemporary albums, in an attempt to resolve my puzzlement/confusion: Niehaus may have the (pardon the expression) "whitest" rhythmic sense of any modern jazz musician whose playing arguably is excellent. An updated Frankie Trumbauer? Listen to where his accents fall and/or don't fall. At times things are almost unbelievably close to being backwards or inside out (albeit fluent and graceful in their own right) versus, say, Bird's rhythmic sense or even that of Lee Konitz (a seeming possible point of comparison). Lennie's harmonic choices are perfectly in tune with this, and when and where the hell does he breathe? (Often he doesn't for alarmingly long stretches of time and then where you'd least expect him to.) I agree with Brownie about the recent Fresh Sounds Niehaus albums. Any thoughts on Niehaus, positive or negative?

You're right. Sorry to have misled you.

Solos and compositions -- both great but different; Also, solo work early on and later differ from each other.

Love that Christina Fong/ Morton Feldman record.

There are more than a few tracks that make me curl my toes in delight and awe. "The More I See You" is one that I recall. Wish they could have recorded Morton Feldman's "Rothko Chapel."

thanks Allen and Jim.

Down Home Rag -- wow! The drive is fabulous but is it really swinging, in that it's all breathless drive, little or no relaxation? Recommend some Reese Europe CDs, please.

Was led back to the Oliver sides by Thomas Brothers' recent Armstrong bio "Louis Armstrong: Master of Modernism" -- second volume, takes us from Oliver to the early '30s, of what promises to be a multi-volume work. Pretty good so far, certainly better than the Teachout and Bergreen's bios. Scholarly but not off-puttingly so, it play the race cardd a bit too much for my taste. Without doubt racism played a big role in shaping Armstrong's life/career, but was contending with it at the heart of his musical greatness? I also didn't care for the putdown of the Fletcher Henderson Orch. as a "dicty" outfit, shaped by a desire to emulate white bands. I listened to some early Henderson alongside contemporary sides by Isham Jones. and Henderson didn't sound very dicty to me. I felt that Brothers just wanted to put down the so-called "talented tenth" and the sort of music that he thought represented their approach to life. BTW, I've long wondered about the relationship in semi-pure musical terms, plasticity of rhythm and phrasing especially and thus sheer swing, between the great country blues singers and early jazz. Of course if you're working with just a guitar and your own voice rather than a wind instrument, you have more control over the final results, but I'd say Charlie Patton or, to skip ahead some ways, Robert Johnson arguably were more "advanced" in those aforementioned respects, plasticity of rhythm/ohrasing, than all but Bechet and Armstrong. Or does it make no sense to make such comparisons? Also what of the playing in those respects of the great stride pianists? No, it's not a race, but who in effect was "ahead," what fed on what, if you bring, say, James P. Johnson into the picture? Or, to switch things around, Bessie Smith? ?

IIRC Hogan's set is nicely tuned up, a bit higher in pitch that most guys.

King Oliver on the great transfers that Archophone put out a few years ago. There's so much there.

Thanks. Those two gather together what's on "The Art of the Trio" and the all 45s date album "Blues in the Night." Some fine Clark. I particularly like on "Blues in the Night," the second version of the title track and "All of You," which has a delicious "tipping light" feel.

Hope I'm wrong, but it looks like the tracks on this Blue Note LP (Japanese in origin I believe -- the number is GXK 8157) are not on CD. It consists of three excellent alternate takes from ""The Sonny Clark Trio" date, with Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones, and six tracks with Jymie Merritt and drummer Wesley Landers that Blue Note released as 45s, aimed at the juke box market. Of the alternate takes "Two Bass Hit" is a particular gem, the opening phrase of Clark's solo is jaw-dropping, and while the aimed-for-the-juke box tracks ("Ain't No Use," "Black Velvet" et al.) are lower key and all soulful in mood, Clark's inspiration doesn't let up.

Hugo Wolf's string quartet. Kathryn Cok's "Pavane" -- where she plays Sweelinck and Peter Phillips.

The "Showboat" album? The Jazz Prophet two-fer.

yes, 1958. I was in high school then. Gotcha. I'll try to listen to it from the perspective.

I have that one. In what respect are you studying it?

Shoot-- I already have 4 CDs of this set. Otherwise, I'd be your man.

Despite the promising personnel, "Jazz Contrasts" never came off IMO; "Blue Spring" has good KD and Cannonball, but seems rather flacid overall.