The real session leader's name isn't on the spine

[Rooster_Ties]

Having just ordered "The Max Roach Trio, Featuring The Legendary Hasaan" -- I thought it might be fun to start a thread about sessions where the real leader of the date (however you want to define the term "leader"), wasn't the name that got on the session when it was released.

(In the case of the Roach album, every tune was by Hasaan, so by any definition, Hasaan was the real leader on this date.)

And even dates that only fit this definition about 75% of the way, count for the purposes of this thread. So, for instance, Bobby Hutcherson's "Dialog" is arguably really an Andrew Hill album (or nearly so) --- and I've occasionally even filed it in with the rest of Hill's BN output.

What are some of your favorites?? And in each case (or at least where it's interesting to discuss), why didn't the real leader's name get on the spine of the record jacket??

(Yes, I know there are probably hundreds of such albums. Still probably a good topic for a thread, no??)

Edited August 31, 2004 by Rooster_Ties

[Guy Berger]

Duke Pearson's Idle Moments

[Noj]

Would this fit the bill? In a recent Hubbard discussion it was said this could well have been a Tina Brooks date.

[P.D.]

" Is that what you wanted, Alfred."

[JSngry]

Re: the Hasaan album: Max was under contract to Atlantic at the time, Art Davis was Max's bassist at the time, and from what I hear, Hasaan was too "eccentric" to either land a deal himself OR assume full "leadership" role in a studio setting, which entails more than just writing material.

I think that Max should be considered co-leader, and the billing more or less reflects this, at least within conventional "record company" parameters.

[jazzbo]

I view Miles as a sort of coleader at least on Cannon's Blue Note.

[Michael Fitzgerald]

I find most of this kind of talk just b.s. speculation.

The fact that someone wrote tunes (a lot of tunes, most tunes, all tunes) for a session doesn't make him the leader.

If so, maybe we could call Gigi Gryce the leader of the 1954 Blakey Emarcy date. He wasn't.

People have talked about how Monk was the leader for the 1955 Gryce Signal date. He wasn't.

And Tom McIntosh wasn't the leader for James Moody's 1963 Argo date Great Day.

Re: the Max album - Art Davis was not Roach's bassist in 1964. 1958, yes.

Re: the Cannonball album - if that's supposed to be a Miles album, why does it have very little in common with the Columbia things under his name? Yes, Miles has a strong influence as a player, but I wouldn't make anything more of it than that. Miles had been around longer than Cannonball. I don't read anything into the fact that Miles made that comment at the session.

You want some for real? How about the Art Pepper session released under Milcho Leviev's name. Or another: the Pete LaRoca album "Turkish Women At The Bath" released under Chick Corea's name as "Bliss". Or those various reissues (mostly Black Lion) of dates led by Dave Bailey, Willie Wilson, Rocky Boyd, etc. for Jazztime.

Mike

[RDK]

Or another: the Pete LaRoca album "Turkish Women At The Bath" released under Chick Corea's name as "Bliss".

As luck would have it, I'm listening to this right now in fact...

Had no idea it was at one time released as a Corea album...

[jazzbo]

Mike part of that session DOES sound like Miles at Columbia to me about as much as it sounds like Cannon at the time, it's sort of a fusion of their styles to me. However you hear it is fine with ME, that's sort of how I've come to hear it.

[JSngry]

Re: the Max album - Art Davis was not Roach's bassist in 1964. 1958, yes.

Who was, Eddie Khan?

It would no doubt have been more appropriate to state that Davis had been on Max's Impulse albums from a few years earlier and had been in the Roach orb for some time, unlike Hasaan.

Edited August 31, 2004 by JSngry

[Michael Fitzgerald]

Either Eddie Khan or Jymie Merritt, I'd say. (Outside chance of Larry Ridley). But Art Davis wasn't in anyone's band because he didn't want to give up the studio work. I think the only bands he was really in were Max and then Dizzy. He did make a tour with Lena Horne and played a long NYC engagement with Gigi Gryce, but from about 1962 to 1966, when he took time off, Davis was a free agent, playing gigs and making records with a wide variety of folks.

As for Hasaan's being in anyone's orb - dunno. From talking to Odean Pope and Kenny Barron, Hasaan was a world unto himself. People were in *his* orb.

Mike

[Shawn]

Duke Pearson's Little Johnny C

Ike Quebec's Born To Be Blue

[P.D.]

I find most of this kind of talk just b.s. speculation.

.

Re: the Cannonball album - if that's supposed to be a Miles album, why does it have very little in common with the Columbia things under his name? Yes, Miles has a strong influence as a player, but I wouldn't make anything more of it than that. Miles had been around longer than Cannonball. I don't read anything into the fact that Miles made that comment at the session.

Mike

I read this somewhere, that as Miles being under contract to Columbia could not be the leader, but essentially the date was his. But then you can't always believe what is written

Yes it could be speculation.. either way it's a good session and that's what really counts

[robviti]

sorry r.t., but i have to agree with mike on this one. just because a musician has a prominent role on a date as a composer, arranger, or instrumentalist doesn't make him the leader. i think of the leader of a recording date as an employer, a foreman, or a facilitator, i.e., the guy who was given the opportunity or responsibility to get things done. he might not be a composer or arranger, but that doesn't mean he can't lead a date, does it? he often chooses the personnel for the date and decides what roles those artists will play. if one player's compositions or arrangements are featured more than others, it's probably the leader's decision to do so. that's what makes him the leader.

still, i like the basic idea of this thread. imo, the idea to release or reissue a recording under another artist's name has largely been a business decision, i.e., put a more popular name on the cover to sell more units, even if he was a "sideman." here are a few of my favorites. interestingly, all of them involve the black lion label:

rocky boyd's ease it

is also

dave bailey's bash

later becomes

and my favorite:

is the same as

but the real leader of that date is trombonist willie wilson! this may have been his only recording and it has never been released under his name.

Edited September 4, 2004 by jazzshrink

[JSngry]

Now, howsabout that WEARY BLUES date w/Langston Hughes, where the Mingus band (w/Mingus) is credited as being led by Horace Parlan?

[Chas]

Here's one that belongs in this thread.

Nominally a Specs Powell album on Strand, the music is actually from a Kurt Edelhagen big band session done for German Polydor. Powell doesn't play on the date, so how his name came to be on the cover is something of a mystery.

[Dave James]

FWIW, I have one of the mid-80's purple spine/yellow text Savoy CD's by The Hank Jones Trio that credits the session to The Kenny Clark Trio on the spine.

Here's a picture of the cover:

[Chuck Nessa]

[paul secor]

[GA Russell]

I can think of two Art Pepper dates, where Art was contractually prohibited from being listed as the leader of the date.

The first is the Hollywood All Star Sessions box.

http://www.amazon.com/Hollywood-All-Star-Sessions-Pepper/dp/B00005CCBI/ref=wl_it_dp_o?ie=UTF8&coliid=I3QQPK8XGD3OH8&colid=RVSBV717YT9

The second is the Ronnie Scott's 1980 date Blues for the Fisherman which was issued under Milcho Leviev's name.

http://www.amazon.com/Blues-Fisherman-Milcho-Leviev/dp/B000001HLA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1307497265&sr=1-1

The complete recordings of this session will be released by Laurie Pepper Tuesday.

[Unk]

Anyone else consider Louis Smith's "Here Comes..." a de facto Buckshot La Funke date?

Edited June 8, 2011 by Unk

[Chuck Nessa]

Not me.

[flat5]

Chas, Mr. Powell may have been the producer. He is presenting.

[AndrewHill]

Joe Henderson's Our Thing always felt more like a Andrew Hill date than a Henderson date.

[Big Beat Steve]

Here's one that belongs in this thread.

Nominally a Specs Powell album on Strand, the music is actually from a Kurt Edelhagen big band session done for German Polydor. Powell doesn't play on the date, so how his name came to be on the cover is something of a mystery.

That's the one I was immediately thinking of when I saw the title of this thread (which I hadn't seen the first time around as I was not aware of Org. yet in 2004). In fact the secondhand copy of this I bought in London in the 90s had a handwritten correction on the back cover that stated the actual identity and lineup.

Chas, Mr. Powell may have been the producer. He is presenting.

No doubt Specs Powell was nowhere within earshot of that studio in Cologne (Germany) where that music was recorded in 1957. And what could his involvement with that Strand BUDGET label possibly have been at a time when he was a studio musician? BTW, my (U.K.) Fidelio label pressing of the same record (with the same front cover) clearly says "Specs Powell and his Band" on the back cover (which of course if b.s. and does not hint at anything like a producer's or presenter's role ).

Otherwise, I'd have to agree with what Michael Fitzgerald wrote earlier. Being a leader means more than "just" arranging tunes or being given ample solo space.

As for eligibility to this thread, would reissue packagings (the above Strand LP was one too, BTW) of material originally released on 78 rpms or very early in the LP era qualify too?

There were/are plenty of these where the original leader credits were all jumbled around just because someone else in the lineup had come to prominence in the meantime.

This would be one classic case:

The leader actually was trumpeter Hall Daniels and the record was originally issued as such as a 10-incher on the Jump label in 1955.

Edited June 8, 2011 by Big Beat Steve