AOTW Dec.26

[couw]

Since those benenfits [of the varitone] pertained almost exclusively to the social aspects of the music (and make no mistake - Stitt spent the vast percentage of his career playing social music), I don't expect a lot of today's fans to automatically be aware of, understand, or appreciate them. After all, it's now a much different time, place, and vibe. But the comments of certain critics, people who should know better (if not necessarily differently) play right back into the longstanding tradition of dismissing organ music and the entire milieu from which it sprang and flourished for reasons that might best be described as culturally condescending and at worst as flat-out, if probably unknowingly, racist.

My only point is that it's entirely possible to not like what one is listening to and at the same time be aware of and understand/appreciate what it is that one is not liking. It's not necessarily necessary, but I do think it's desirable. That's all. In Stitt's case, one can not like the Varitone, for sure, but I think it neat to understand more of what what the Varitone really was for him and his mucic of the time.

so it's like 70s Abba disco then?

[Brad]

Here's a little history of the Varitone. There doesn't appear to be too much on the web about them.

[mikeweil]

'Nuff said about the Varitone, IMHO - let's marvel about the inspired intercation between Stitt, Patterson and James instead.

And anybody wanting to hear Stitt (mostly on unaltered alto, two tracks on tenor), Patterson and James in the natural, might go for The Boss Men, which has a complete session spread over three different LPs, two of them originally released under Patterson's name.

Patterson is so underrated - this discussion might be further proof if we fail to take a different direction.

Edited December 27, 2004 by mikeweil

[mikeweil]

More Patterson/Stitt collaborations are on these CDs:

SONNY STITT/BOOKER ERVIN/DON PATTERSON

Soul People

Prestige PRCD-24127-2 ~ $16.98

Soul People, Sonny's Book, "C" Jam Blues, Medley (I Can't Get Started/The Masquerade Is Over), Flyin' House, Tune-Up, There Will Never Be Another You

with Vinnie Corrao, Grant Green, Billy James

SONNY STITT/DON PATTERSON, vol. 2

Legends of Acid Jazz

Prestige PRCD-24210-2 ~ $16.98

Ratio and Proportion, Airegin, Little Angie, My Man String, Funk in 3/4, It’s You or No One, All the Things You Are, Lover Man (Oh, Where Can You Be?), P.S. I Love You, Stella by Starlight, Bye Bye Blackbird, Over the Rainbow, Candy, Strike Up the Band

with Charles McPherson, Pat Martino, Billy James, Billy Butler

SONNY STITT

Legends of Acid Jazz: Low Flame

Prestige PRCD-24236-2 ~ $16.98

Low Flame, Put Your Little Foot Right Out, Cynthia Sue, Donald Duck, Close Your Eyes, Silly Billy; Baby, Do You Ever Think of Me; Fine and Dandy, My New Baby, Misty, Soul Food, Shangri-La, Mama Don't Allow, The Eternal One

with Paul Weeden, Don Patterson, Billy James

[danasgoodstuff]

OK, so here it is Boxing Day and, as promised, here's my blow by blow on the AOTW:

"Brothers 4": Sometimes Don P. is too much the Bebop organist for my tastes, but here he's just a crisp, clean, lean, mean swinging machine. I really don't hear much vari-ance from Stitt's usual tenor tone here. I do hear him reaching all the way back before he heard Bird to his roots in swing era sax and meeting Grant Green there doing his Charlie C. thing. Them they take it forward together.

"Creepin' Home": Kinda calypso, like "Matilda" in 2(?) Nice "Country Gardens" quotation by Don. Love to see girls in fringey dresses and go-go boots dancing to this! Good, clean fun nonetheless.

"Alexander's Ragtime Band": Surely no one's idea of 'hip' in '69? Except that transforming unlikely material is always hip and they make this work without (too) much irony, hip but fun. Who was it who said that the overlooked element in 'hard bop' was swing? Coulda been talking 'bout Stitt's bit here.

"Walk On By": Grant Green, of course, did this in '66 with Stanely T. on the latter's unjustly maligned Rough & Tumble, but this has it's own groove. If Hank M. had done this tune it woulda been like this, a continuation of his play with tension and release like on "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" and "Going Out of My Head".

"Donny Brook": Not surprisingly, grant's on original here is the one 'standard issue boogaloo'. But even here the sound is more in keeping with his earlier grooves like Got a Good Thing Going than with then contemporarious ones like Love Bug, Carryin' On, etc. One factor is Billy james nicely loose drumming, compared to the prototypical 'arae groove' thing of Egrigious Muhammud. Grant gets his groove on in typical fashion by starting with a repeated figure. I know this sort of thing bugs some people. but not me, 'cause getting his groove on is what let Grant get to his other stuff. He had to get in the groove first, then... More than any late period Grant I've heard, i.e. most of it, this is the one that bridges the gap back to where he left off, IMHO.

"Mud Turtle": Now this is some seriously down shit. Peoples, peoples, peoples, if you can't get next to s-l-o-w blues like this "You Don't Know What Funk Is". Green was one of the few jazz guitarists who could get right down to it with the likes of the Three Kings or, dare we say it, Pee Wee Crayton. Sonny knew the blues as well as Bird or anyone. And Don and Billy play with the kind of dynamics that make the rankest cliches sparkle like they was brand new.

"St. Thomas": Some more calypso, by way of Sonny Rollins. Wanna bet Grant picked this?; he was a huge Rollins' fan, see Going West or his versions of "oleo" and "Doxy".

"Good Bait": Totally hip classic bop, but also sing-songy good fun. Hear the way Stitt plays with the phrasing on the head before giving a lesson on form and style. GG and DP show that the point of knowing all that good shit is to go on and have fun with it. Couple of goofy quotes/allusions from Don I'll leave to you to catch.

"Starry Night": Old radio show theme, a soap opera maybe? This performance is certainly overwrought enough. OK, what kind of drugs were they on? It's Don P. all the way to weirdsville. Maybe it was their idea of psychodelic...

"Tune Up": This is Stitt's one original contribution to the date, if you believe that he wrote it and not Miles. Also his one appearance on (unaltered) alto. Not surprisingly, it originally appeared apart from the rest of its session mates.

It may seem perverse to focus (fixate?) on Grant when it's Don's album and he and Sonny and Billy James played together all the time. But it was Grant's presence that made me pull the trigger on this one despite having been not that impressed by the DP/SS Acid Jazz CD w/Idris M. (rote bebop over rote funk) and an LP I heard years ago in a class where the instructor tried to sell it by pointing out that Sonny was just applying his standard licks to whatever material was at hand. Now that I have and dig this one I will have to go back and reconsider the other DP/SS collaborations in a new light.

I hope that our resident B-3 players will shed some light on just how DP wrestles those sounds from the mighty hammond.

In closing, I feel this is groovey social music played by exceptional but still functionally 'working musicians'; not elevated above its context, but making that context a work of art in itself (?). The only recent albums that have this good clean fun/workaday genius vibe to the same degree for me are some of Barbara Dennerlein's, Maceo Parker's Roots Revisited (with Don Pullen on organ) and Sco's Hand Jive with that other transgressor of the varitone, Eddie Harris. All a good decade or more ago.

ENJOY!

[danasgoodstuff]

Hey! This is my week, so UP...

[Soul Stream]

Hey,....great choice!!! I haven't checked the AOW in quite a while, so I hope you'll forgive my tardiness.

I think Dana did a great job on the blow by blow, songwise. So I'll not go there. Just a few general comments. First off, this is one of the greatest organ quartets ever recorded. Obviously Stitt, Patterson and James were a unit. And, as we all know, Grant was organ-guitarist number one. So this is quite a combination to say the least.

Patterson.... What can be said about this guy that we don't already know? Not much. He's just simply Jimmy Smith's only TECHNICAL equal. Technique, Patterson has it more than anyone sans Jimmy. And from the stories I've heard from other organists, only used 3 fingers on his right hand for soloing (thumb, forefinger, middle). However he did it, it's amazing to hear that kind of velocity on the organ.

Also, I've heard he was one of the few organists that actually "ghosted" all the bass notes on the pedals. However I say it, it's clear that Don was in TOTAL command of that mighty beast. And I mean at all times. As a listener, it's clear that he has great ability, even to novice ears. But to organ players like myself, he's the guy that really blows your mind!

This CD is special because of this Patterson/James/Grant/Stitt combination. Other than that, it's just run of the mill "greatness" that we come to expect from Don.

A few highlight for me from an album that's packed with them...

Don's FULL ORGAN (meaning all stops pulled out) solo on "Starry Night." Don was a master of this and, to me ears, really did it better than anybody (sorry Jimmy).

Tune Up....Don in full bebop mode, blazing.

Just Friends...I love Don and Sonny's interplay on the head. Also, this is just textbook organ, as good of jazz that cam be played on the instrument. He's SO damn concise. Much like Sonny, Don's SO good it becomes to sound too perfect to the human ear. Not mine, he's BURNING AND BEAUTIFUL here.

Good Bait...great tune that should be done by organists more. John Patton used to play this as well. Don's basslines are perfect here as usual. Something Don doesn't get credit for that much. He had "perfect" basslines...crisp, logical and solid, and always musical.

Donnybrook...it's cool to hear Don get funky. He wasn't the FUNKIEST organist like say a Leon Spencer Jr., but I DIG his brand of funk. Real cool.

[mikeweil]

A few highlight for me from an album that's packed with them...

Don's FULL ORGAN (meaning all stops pulled out) solo on "Starry Night." Don was a master of this and, to me ears, really did it better than anybody (sorry Jimmy).

Nice to see someone raving about Don as much as I would if I were an organist ...

Starry Night is a high point for me, too! Noone did these ballads like he did!

[JSngry]

Starry Night is a high point for me, too! Noone did these ballads like he did!

Jimmy Noone played like Don Patterson at one time?

Damn, you DO have an extensive collection!

Edited January 4, 2005 by JSngry

[mikeweil]

To tell the truth, I thought of Jimmy Nobody .....

[Soul Stream]

Yes, people most think of Don as "The Bebop Organist." Which is certainly true. However, he may also be THE best ballads organists as well. (Although most acknowledge Johnny Hammond Smith as the "best" in the ballad department.)

That all said, like Jim mentioned earlier in another thread, "The Good Life" is certainly a high water mark for organ balladry. As is "Starry Night" imho.

[Adam]

up for no particular reason

[mikeweil]

That all said, like Jim mentioned earlier in another thread, "The Good Life" is certainly a high water mark for organ balladry. As is "Starry Night" imho.

Agree on Patterson's supreme ballad artistry. Got a vinyl copy of Soul Happening last week, which includes another ballad masterpiece, Love Letters.

[king ubu]

Hope you weren't referring to me  .  I was just quoting what the writer said, although I was obviously using his writing to embellish my dislike for the thing.

No, the blow was towards ubu - some fun exchange.

"darstardly" is too harsh a word to use. But each to his own taste.

and obviously it took me two months to notice...

[mikeweil]

and obviously it took me two months to notice...

Jahre später fand man seine Leiche ....

[Jim Alfredson]

You never hear Don Patterson's name but he's such a bad cat!

You hear it all the time around these parts!!!

I can't believe this thread devolved into a rant for or against the Varitone. Christ, people, get over it.

Sometimes I think people don't actually listen to the music being presented. Sonny Stitt could play a damn plastic $5 recorder and the shit would be soulful.

[mikeweil]

Sometimes I think people don't actually listen to the music being presented. Sonny Stitt could play a damn plastic $5 recorder and the shit would be soulful.

[Brad]

You never hear Don Patterson's name but he's such a bad cat!

You hear it all the time around these parts!!!

I can't believe this thread devolved into a rant for or against the Varitone. Christ, people, get over it.

Sometimes I think people don't actually listen to the music being presented. Sonny Stitt could play a damn plastic $5 recorder and the shit would be soulful.

Unless it was electrified. There's a darn good reason why this gadget wasn't loved universally but let's not restart the debate. When listening to Sonny's work, this isn't the first cd I'd reach for.

[JohnS]

I didn't know I had this!!!

Patterson's name doesn't normally come to he mind first when I think about organists (Big John Patton and JOS usually come first) and the varitone would normally be a big turn off for me. However Stitt sounds good to me here, varitone or not. The big plus is Green, his guitar really sings. Patterson is tasteful and doesn't overplay but his feature "Starry Night" is somewhat overblown.

I'm gonna have to check out some more of this.

[Soul Stream]

I didn't know I had this!!!

Patterson's name doesn't normally come to he mind first when I think about organists (Big John Patton and JOS usually come first) and the varitone would normally be a big turn off for me. However Stitt sounds good to me here, varitone or not. The big plus is Green, his guitar really sings. Patterson is tasteful and doesn't overplay but his feature "Starry Night" is somewhat overblown.

I'm gonna have to check out some more of this.

Yes, this is a great session! Green takes a bit of the bop edge normally associated with the Patterson/Stitt/Marino lineup. Green has really loosened up by now and is into his more funk bag at this point. So that takes Don out of his normal thing a little bit. Mud Turtle and stuff like that...hearing Patterson play funky is pretty interesting.

GREAT record, and Walk On By is killer on this....