Mark Stryker

A zillion stars. Desert Island music.

Should be here: https://www.detroitjazzfest.org/live/

Thanks for the heads up. Great stuff.

I just need to co-sign this. Duke was a fucking brilliant and original pianist, both as a soloist and as an accompanist. Anyone who thinks otherwise is either misinformed or hasn't done the listening. And while I'm at it, Basie was a great pianist too. When I think of folks who play "composer's" or "arranger's" piano, I think of people like Tadd Dameron, Gil Evans, and MANY cats I know who play other instruments but can sit down at the keyboard and comp changes in time and perhaps even solo too, some well enough to play gigs, but with limited technique and a narrow expressive range compared to "real" pianists (like Duke and Basie).

Just jumping to say that this is a fantastic set and I listen to it constantly. Truly some of the best Stitt on record -- "Sonny Stitt and the New Yorkers" (1957) might be the greatest single Stitt record of them all --and all the early dates are gems, especially "Plays the Arrangements from the Pen of Quincy Jones" (1955). The early Roost sides are fairly difficult to find. Highly recommended.

Hindal Butts (note first name spelling with one "l" is correct) was on the scene in Detroit for decades. As near as I can tell, he died just a couple of years ago at 91, but I never met him and never heard him play, so I don't know what his scene or health was like in the last 20 years. His heyday was the 1950s and '60s but he was definitely active in the '70s. In the 1950s, he worked extensively with Kenny Burrell in the guitarist's various groups, including Kenny's band The Four Sharps with Harold McKinney on piano and Paul Chambers on bass. and bassist Paul Chambers. At one point, Tommy Flanagan replaced McKinney, who was drafted in 1954, and Elvin Jones eventually succeeded Butts as drummer. There's a 1953 club ad for "Kenny Burrell and his Sharps " reproduced in Bjorn and Gallert's "Before Motown" that lists the personnel as Burrell, Frank Foster, McKinney, Chambers, and Hindel (sic) Butts. Kenny's first record as a leader, a 78 single on the JVB label c. 1954-55 consisting of "My Funny Valentine" (a Burrell vocal) and Kenny's Sound" (the latter is a 32-bar tune based on I Got Rhythm with a Honeysuckle Rose bridge and an A-section melody that's a direct ripoff of "Dexter Digs In." Yusef Lateef play flute and tenor of these sides , Billy Burrell is on electric (!) bass, and the vibraphonist is almost assuredly Abe Woodley (aka Nasir Hafiz). I used to think it was Butts on drums, and that was Kenny Washington's guess when I played him these sides; but I've come to think more recently that it's Elvin on drums based on the beat and the way the player slaps the brushes on "Kenny's Mood." (The Tom Lord discography lists this session as c. 1950 and says Tommy Flanagan is on vibes: That's incorrect.) One of Joe Henderson's first jobs in Detroit was as part of a Butts-led quartet in 1957. In "Before Motown," Butts is quote as saying that it was drummer Johnny Cleaver -- that's Gerald Cleaver's father -- who first told him about Joe. In the '60s during Aretha Franklin's Columbia days, Butts toured and recorded with her. He's the drummer on her jazz-oriented "Yeah" taped in 1965. The rest of the all-Detroit group behind Aretha here is Burrell, Teddy Harris Jr. (piano), and James (Beans) Richardson (bass). A few tracks with Butts are also Franklin's "Take It Like You Give It." The Lord discography lists Butts on a 1956 Louis Jordan session on the Bear Family label taped in New York. He's also listed as the drummer on Betty Lavette single on Atlantic cut in 1962 ("You'll Never Change"/"Hear I Am"). I've seen Detroit newspaper ads where he's listed as working the clubs in Detroit in the early '70s backing up folks like Jimmy Witherspoon. I don't really know much more about his later life and career. I regret that he was not on my radar screen in my early days in Detroit when I might have been able to meet him and forge a relationship.

https://www.arts.gov/news/press-releases/2024/announcing-2025-nea-jazz-masters

All -- thanks for the enlightening responses.

I have always read that Don Pullen played organ/piano with Arthur Prysock and wrote arrangements for him -- but I had never found any recorded examples of this until today, when I found Prysock's 1969 LP "Where the Soul Trees Grow" (King Records) at Peoples' Records in Detroit. Pullen is listed as the arranger in the credits, but no other personnel is given. Of course, the record is on YouTube. Pyrsock sounds great on this record and I dig the soulful vibe of the charts and some surprising repertoire choices. While we're on the subject, does anyone know other recorded examples of Pullen as an soul/R&B sideman?

I knew James well -- #JazzFromDetroit -- an earnest, super-positive spirit with a bit of the religious revivalist in his aura and an eccentric streak who would refer to himself in interviews in the third person. He would say things like: "I said, 'Tatum,' what you need to do is write a piece called "Rise Up Detroit!" Whenever I asked how he was doing, he might say something like, "Well, Tatum is 75 and still vibrating." He was a Southern transplant, who made his career as public school music teacher in Detroit but also also a jazz pianist and composer. He made things happen, most notably creating the James Tatum Foundation for the Arts in 1987, which would eventually grant some $500,000 in scholarships to roughly 500 Detroit-area students who went on to study music, dance, theater, etc. in college. The biggest annual fundraiser for the foundation was a sprawling concert he would produce at Orchestra Hall in Detroit. Often he would write a new large-scale piece for the performance. Not sure if this particular Mass was originally written for such an occasion, but but I do remember it being performed at one of the concerts I attended. He died in 2021 at the age of 90.

I believe his wife is French and a non-native English speaker so this may have something to do with what sounds like odd sentiment and syntax.

The first two I would search for are Max Roach +4 (with Rollins/Dorham) and The Max Roach 4 Play Charlie Parker (Dorham/Mobley or Coleman). These are both tremendous records with everyone in peak form. "Jazz in 3/4 Time" is not as strong or consistent overall, though Rollins plays his ass off, especially on "Valse Hot," where he's wilder and more creative than on the original version on his own record a year earlier.

There was only one of those. R.I.P.

Cool podcast series about the history of jazz concerts at the Museum of Modern Art. https://www.moma.org/magazine/articles/1066?sc_src=email_6099927&sc_lid=604885617&sc_uid=aS5gTmJNVc&sc_llid=41242&sc_eh=6b33ec2e2398ebc11&utm_source=Emarsys&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=MSHIP_Engagement_Roundup_20240628_All+active&&mi_u=119402927&mi_ecmp=6099927

See Lewis Porter's Coltrane biography, pages 98-99. Some measured negative comments about Coltrane from Nat Hentoff in a Downbeat review of the quintet's first LP on Prestige. Quotes from Sy Johnson also provide context.