Ralph J. Gleason

[BFrank]

Here's a very interesting retrospective on the life of Ralph Gleason in today's SF Chronicle - the newspaper he wrote his columns for.

Don't let the tweed jackets, trench coat and pipe fool you

-- Ralph J. Gleason was an apostle of jazz and rock with few peers

[bertrand]

So who's going to e-mail Selvin to tell him who the unidentified man in the Miles photo is?

[brownie]

Very nice paper on RJG. Thanks for posting it, BFrank!

I read his articles in Down Beat and in Rolling Stone.

There is no equivalent to those articles nowadays

[MartyJazz]

Here's a very interesting retrospective on the life of Ralph Gleason in today's SF Chronicle - the newspaper he wrote his columns for.

Don't let the tweed jackets, trench coat and pipe fool you

-- Ralph J. Gleason was an apostle of jazz and rock with few peers

Thanks for the link. One item not mentioned in it is the fact that he hosted what I believe was the best televised jazz program of the '60s, "Jazz Casual". I have all of the ones issued on VHS, 14 of them, and they are superb not only for the music but for the commentary and interviews conducted by Gleason. Highly recommended as I know a few of them, e.g., the show with John Coltrane, have been reissued on DVD.

[Michael Fitzgerald]

All (?) the Jazz Casual shows are now on DVD as part of a 8-disc boxed set.

http://www.ejazzlines.com/store.cfm?d=3017...77615&do=detail

I seem to recall mention that some shows had been lost - can anyone supply further info on that?

Mike

[JSngry]

My "enthusiasm" for Gleason has waned somewhat as the years have passed, but I gve him highest props for his willingness to be (or attempt to be) as "in the moment" of his appreciation of the music as the players were in making it. In retrospect, a lot of what he wrote seems gushy/mushy/gee whizzy to me today, but the guilessness of the writing remains striking, and that still "matters" to me.

[BFrank]

So who's going to e-mail Selvin to tell him who the unidentified man in the Miles photo is?

If Tony were alive today, he would be wondering the same thing

[sheldonm]

I love these old shows! I also like the Jazz Scene USA shows with Oscar Brown JR. He's a little cheeeeesy, but they're still pretty cool!

Mark

[Leeway]

First, thanks for the link. I've admired Gleason for the way he advocated for the rock music of the psychedelic era (among other things). he was a pivotal figure in the history of rock.

Perusing the linked article, I came across this passage, in which the author apparently laments the way music critcism has developed. Do you agree with the author?

Music critics are a dime a dozen these days. Virtually everyone who can score advance CDs from the labels seems to be out there hawking commentary in print or on the Internet.

But there was a time, not that long ago, when there were only a few and they all knew each other. Today's pop music critics, who cut their teeth on Pearl Jam and Nirvana, will never have the chance to leave behind a legacy like Gleason's. In an age of the information superhighway and media overload, the era of E! Television and Entertainment Weekly, how do you explain one lone writer working for a daily newspaper in a provincial backwater changing music history?

[cannonball-addict]

Provincial backwater? I dunno about that......

[MartyJazz]

All (?) the Jazz Casual shows are now on DVD as part of a 8-disc boxed set.

http://www.ejazzlines.com/store.cfm?d=3017...77615&do=detail

I seem to recall mention that some shows had been lost - can anyone supply further info on that?

Mike

Thanks for the link but it's somewhat daunting to realize that there are twice as many shows now available on DVD (i.e., I count 28) than I have on the complete VHS series. Collecting can be a curse!

[ejp626]

Wow. I had no idea they had so much new material, relative to the VHS tapes. I've seen a few of these (Basie, Coltrane, Gillespie), and thought they were pretty great. I guess I will get this a bit later in 2005.

Was Ellington ever invited and/or make an appearance? Obviously, if he did make an appearance, the tape didn't survive or they would have issued it, but I would certainly have thought he might have appeared with a small group like Basie did.

[BFrank]

From today's SF Chronicle "Letters to Datebook":

Editor -- Joel Selvin's delightful and thoughtful reminiscence did a wonderful job of re-creating some of the many special qualities of Ralph J. Gleason, and of recalling the creative ferment of the Bay Area music world in the decades after World War II. To so many of us who were involved in creating and/or appreciating in those days, Ralph's rare combination of knowledge, literacy and intelligent enthusiasm was of tremendous value.

I had produced jazz records in San Francisco on several occasions since 1959, but I first became a resident late in 1972, when I was invited to run the rapidly expanding Fantasy Records jazz program. Thus I was briefly fortunate enough to be at that company at the same time as Gleason.

I can quickly think of several reasons for considering this to be my good fortune. To begin with, when I arrived at the office for my first morning, I thought my sports jacket was properly casual California record-company attire, but I quickly realized that Ralph and I were the most formal men in the building. By the next day, Gleason was back to his unique status as the one and only Fantasy jacket wearer.

Second, I had taken the job on very little notice, and the rest of my family was still in New York. But in a warm human gesture that I intend never to forget, Ralph and Jean Gleason insisted that I have Thanksgiving dinner in Berkeley as part of their family in that very friendly sprawling house on Spruce Street.

Third, I quickly developed a pattern of beginning each working day by stopping at Ralph's office for what I described as my daily Ellington fix -- he had an anecdote or recollection or comment for me about Duke or one of his many great musicians, and I swear he never repeated a story.

Less than two years later, Gleason was a major mother-hen throughout my recovery from a heart attack, scolding me for indiscretions like taking the stairs two at a time ("Slow down; you're not in New York anymore"). Then, without warning (other than the fact that he was a diabetic who stubbornly insisted on living in the late-night world of jazz and folk and rock people), he had his own heart attack and was gone.

The jazz world in which I have spent most of my time is known for early deaths, so over a working life of more than 50 years I turn out to have outlasted a great many friends and colleagues. But few if any of them remain so vividly in mind, and perhaps none possessed the enviable quality of somehow being mentor and scholar and -- far from least -- fervent fan, all at the same time. And he was one of the most readable entertainment columnists I have ever encountered. Thanks for all that, Ralph, and much gratitude to Joel Selvin for reminding a great many people in this city of how rewarding it was to read and/or know Ralph Gleason.

- ORRIN KEEPNEWS

San Francisco

[Christiern]

That's so typical of Orrin, How many "I"s are there in that letter?

[Randy Twizzle]

That's so typical of Orrin, How many "I"s are there in that letter? 

Hell it's New Year's Eve and it's not like I have anything better to do: I counted 15 "I's" the first and third time I counted, and 16 on my 2nd attempt.

[Michael Fitzgerald]

And I got 15 for either "Ralph" or "he" (meaning Ralph).

Mike

[BFrank]

That's so typical of Orrin, How many "I"s are there in that letter? 

18

[Christiern]

So it's:

• Ralph 15
  
• Orrin 18
  

[AllenLowe]

The "I's" have it - and let's not forget that the night has a thousand eyes -

[Cornelius]

Two thousand if you count both songs.

[Swinging Swede]

And now it's once again time to mention Grachan Moncur III...

[Christiern]

But only in passing.

[Guy Berger]

My "enthusiasm" for Gleason has waned somewhat as the years have passed, but I gve him highest props for his willingness to be (or attempt to be) as "in the moment" of his appreciation of the music as the players were in making it. In retrospect, a lot of what he wrote seems gushy/mushy/gee whizzy to me today, but the guilessness of the writing remains striking, and that still "matters" to me.

And for what it's worth, I guess it's pretty cool to have a critic who gushes about something unapologetically once in a while. I mean, isn't that part of what loving music is all about.

I'm not a huge fan of all his writing, but I've always enjoyed his liner notes to Bitches Brew. Very cool.

Guy

[JSngry]

And for what it's worth, I guess it's pretty cool to have a critic who gushes about something unapologetically once in a while. I mean, isn't that part of what loving music is all about.

Yeah, it is. But sometimes Gleason could get REALLY gushy, and I'm by nature not too big of a fan of gushiness, in spite of just having awoken from a dream about a exploratory oil drill being made in the yard of the house across the street from my parents' house.

[alankin]

I'm by nature not too big of a fan of gushiness, in spite of just having awoken from a dream about a exploratory oil drill being made in the yard of the house across the street from my parents' house.

What would Dr. Freud have to say?