Zoot Sims & Dawn

[Son-of-a-Weizen]

AMG advises those who're interested in the Dawn material to bypass the 10 track 'Rare Dawn' cd in part because it doesn't include September in the Rain, etc -- in favor of the two Dawn LPs ('One To Blow On' and 'The Big Stampede') that'll get you all 16 tracks.

I've seen the 'One To Blow On' Lp on eBay...which seems to be the same as this Japanese one:

....but haven't seen 'Big Stampede'. Is this one floating around out there under another name in Europe or in Japan? Better to pick up the cd and one of the Lps...or best to take AMGs advice and go for the vinyl? Thank you.

[jazzbo]

I have all the Dawn material on Blue Moon cds, and where I can compare the Moon Dawn material to Biograph cds, the Biographs sound like muffled compressed transfers. . . . I would recommend the whole series of Blue Moon Dawn cds available, and my guess would be if you are going to go vinyl, avoid Biograph.

[Swinging Swede]

Yes, what jazzbo said. Blue Moon's Dawn series has good sound, reproduces the original cover art and liner notes, and has plenty of bonus tracks from the same sessions.

Here's the content of the Sims CDs:

Zoot Sims (ts), Bob Brookmeyer (tb), John Williams (p), Milt Hinton (b), Gus Johnson (d)

Tracklisting:

1. September In The Rain

2. Down At The Loft (J.Williams)

3. A Ghost Of A Chance

4. Not So Deep

5. Them There Eyes

6. Our Pad

7. Dark Clouds

8. One To Blow On

9. When The Blues Come On (Bonus Track)

10. Buried Gold (Bonus Track)

Recorded in New York City, 1956

Zoot Sims (as), Jerry Lloyd (tp), John Williams (p), Bill Anthony (b), Knobby Totah (b), Gus Johnson (d)

Tracklisting:

1. You´re My Girl

2. The Purple Cow

3. I´ll Wind

4. The Big Stampede

5. Too Close For Comfort

6. Jerrys Jaunt

7. How Now Blues

8. Bye Ya (Bonus Track)

9. I Cover The Water Front (Bonus Track)

10. Blues For The Month Of Day (Bonus Track)

11. I Should Care (Bonus Track)

12. Mixed Emotions (Bonus Track)

13. How Do I Love You (Bonus Track)

14. Knotty Pine (Bonus Track)

Recorded in New York City, 1956

[Son-of-a-Weizen]

Appreciate the helpful advice, gents. Apperently there's still a relatively inexpensive japanese cd (in-print) version of the 'Modern Art' over at Amaz.Jp...but since that Blue Moon has the extra couple of cuts, that's clearly the way to go.

[Chuck Nessa]

I've heard rumors about Zoot and Dawn for years but dismissed it. Now that it has surfaced, I think all involved need to "bare their souls" and email Mrs Sims.

[DTMX]

& Dawn?

[JSngry]

I've heard rumors about Zoot and Dawn for years but dismissed it. Now that it has surfaced, I think all involved need to "bare their souls" and email Mrs Sims.

Christmas cards!

[Larry Kart]

But seriously -- am I the only admirer of Sims who feels that he was seldom as fresh and inventive a player after the period that the Dawn "Modern Art" and his wonderful Argo album probably epitomize? By 1960 or so, maybe even a bit earlier, it sounds to me like Zoot starts playing Zoot-like solos, at least by comparison to his '56 self; the lines are more short-breathed, the melodic content of too many phrases is arguably too "punchy-swingy-jazzy" rather than having that great back-and-forth balance between floating lyricism and gliding swing, etc. If so, perhaps this parallels what some of us feel happened to Phil Woods at about the same time, though self-stylized Zoot (if that's what happened) never grated on me like most post-'57 Woods does.

[JSngry]

Larry, I've often felt that Zoot Sims & Fathead Newman were brothers in paralell universes, and the way you describe Zoot's playing pretty much mirrors how I feel about Fathead's. Different contexts, to be sure, as well as different tones (at least until you dig deeper within the tone), but that whole putting it in where it belongs like it was already there and by doing so not creating but highlighting the natural beauty of what it was that was already there quality is something I find irresistable in both men's work.

[Joe]

But seriously -- am I the only admirer of Sims who feels that he was seldom as fresh and inventive a player after the period that the Dawn "Modern Art" and his wonderful Argo album probably epitomize? By 1960 or so, maybe even a bit earlier, it sounds to me like Zoot starts playing Zoot-like solos, at least by comparison to his '56 self; the lines are more short-breathed, the melodic content of too many phrases is arguably too "punchy-swingy-jazzy" rather than having that great back-and-forth balance between floating lyricism and gliding swing, etc. If so, perhaps this parallels what some of us feel happened to Phil Woods at about the same time, though self-stylized Zoot (if that's what happened) never grated on me like most post-'57 Woods does.

I think that this does apply to some of the later Zoot on tenor I've heard, but I do think his soprano playing is -- pardoning the unpardonable reference -- another kettle of fish altogether.

The more I listen, the more it seems to me Sims excelled most in that mid-50's Mulligan Sextet (alongside Brookmeyer and Don Ferrara or Jon Eardley).

[brownie]

The same things that are being said about Zoot Sims in this thread could be said about so many of the jazz greats. Louis Armstrong to start with.

Pops was creative until the early '30s. That does not make any of his later recordings less than remarkable.

I'll take any of the post-Dawn Zoot Sims music over some of the very creative musicians that appeared later on the scene!

[Larry Kart]

Brownie -- I'd extend Armstrong's golden age of creativity longer than the the early '30s. His 1938 big band version of "Struttin' with Some Barbecue" (Decca) might be the greatest solo he ever recorded, and it's not only not the only great Armstrong solo from that period, it's also a bit different in flavor from his previous work in some hard to define (for me at least) way -- fiery and powerful as hell when he wants to be, he also seems to be absolutely regal, secure, and wise, as though all the fruits of his labor were ripe and right at hand.

[brownie]

Larry, I'm sold on those late '30s Armstrong. And later ones too! The Armstrong/Oscar Peterson album has some of the most cutting trumpet playing I know.

But this does not make it less true that Armstrong was pretty often on automatic drive in his later years. I'ld be the last one to blame him. Automatic or manual-drive, there was none greater!

[jazzbo]

Yes, those late thirties recordings seem to show a change in Armstrong, he seems so goddamned confident and effortlessly rhythmic, as if he finally realized he was THE SHIT!

[Brad]

Yes, it's true that this could be said of many artists that after that intial burst of inventiveness they put it on automatic pilot or at least stopped taking chances. Not an apology but sometimes 85% of somebody (Bird, Bud, Sonny Stitt, etc.) is a lot better than 100% of others.

[AllenLowe]

well, listen to Armstrong at that Ellington session - eg; It Don't Mean a THing - complete re-birth -

I'm in agreement on Zoot, who I always admired but never really LIKED all that much - but than there are many players like that - also, can't stand Phil Woods's playing - too much on automatic - like a bebop windup toy -

[garthsj]

I cannot let it rest without noting that ANY of the Zoot Sims albums on Pablo with Jimmy Rowles, as well as the one on soprano with Ray Bryant, is just about as good as it gets in the world of jazz. And I do agree that many Sims, and Phils Woods albums do seem to be on auto-pilot at times. As I indicated in a previous post, I believe that Woods seems to be rejuvenated for some reason, although he does suffer from respiratory problems, and is playing better right now than he has done at any time in the last 20 years.

[jazzbo]

Yes Garth, I certainly agree about the albums by Zoot with Rowles. The Lizard sure adds an awful lot to those sessions and I wouldn't call Zoot's playing on these "rote" by any means.

Sometims Rowles seems the perfect jazz pianist to me!

[Larry Kart]

I agree with Garth and others that some of those Pablo Zoot albums are lovely, not rote at all. But perhaps I didn't frame, or think through, the question properly. When I asked if others felt that something had happened to Sims and Woods in around '56 or '57 or '58, such that mature (or at least well-established) principles of freshness in their music began to give way a bit (or a lot in Woods' case) to what I called "punchy-swingy-jazzy" playing, what I wonder is why on earth why? Were not talking about winded, grizzled veterans after all; Sims in 1956 was only 31; Woods was just 26 in 1957 when, it could be argued, his time of freshness (or better, "reality") as a player was just about at an end. (Terry Martin, who feels the same way about Woods as I do -- a great admirer of the Woods of "Pot Pie" and the like, but then either Phil (or we) take a left turn -- dates the last really good Woods on record as his playing on Red Garland's "Sugan," from 1957.) So if I'm not making all this up or am just plain wrong, what happened? The only common ground I know of is that Sims and Woods became New York studio regulars in '57 or so, but could recording a lot in busy commercial contexts mess with your living jazz identity that swiftly?

A lot of other players were on that scene at that time and seemed to stay relatively fresh and themselves. I've been told that Zoot did a lot of drinking, and Lord knows that can catch up with you overnight.

About what Garth said about recent Woods sounding rejuventated, despite his respiratory problems, here's a story that I might have told here before. Woods came into Chicago fairly often when I was reviewing regularly there -- from 1977 to 1988 -- and each time I found myself writing much the same review, deploring the (to me) artifical, jazzy hotness of his current playing, contrasting it with the IMO remarkable quality of his early work, and wondering why that change had occurred. I know I was tried of writing the same damn review each time, and I'm sure Woods was tired of reading them (if in fact he did). Then there came the first set of the next Woods engagement, and to my surprise the usual jazz circus act was nowhere to be found. Woods sounded marvelously relaxed, there was none of that muscle-flexing, pumped-up, bouncing-on-trampolines-and-off-of-walls hotness, etc. Delighted, I was ready to leave and go back to the paper and write, when Woods ended the first set with the announcement that he and the band were completely exhausted because horribly bolloxed travel plans had prevented them from getting any sleep the night before and that therefore he had to apologize for that lame first set we'd just heard. But stick around, he said, we'll get it together for the next one. So I stuck around, and in the second set the jazz circus came to town.

[JSngry]

Were not talking about winded, grizzled veterans after all; Sims in 1956 was only 31;

And a veteran of how many years on the road? And how many more years on the road were to come (and a lot of them with Benny Goodman!)?

After a while, some guys erect a bulletproof musical shield around themselves, just to keep going in a functional manner. Not saying that's what Zoot did, necessarily, but I've seen it happen more than a few times, and Zoot at 31 had a LOT of miles under his belt, figuratively and literally.

Plus, I wonder what part the realization that his type of playing was slowly but surely becoming "passe" (to use an overly broad word, but not as it applies to the popular taste of the time) played in whatever retrenchment, such as it was, that happened. He had to sense that his musical "youth" was over, and that does wierd things to people sometimes, too.

As for Woods, I have no excuse, and neither the need or inclination to look for one. But as I've stated elsewhere, I think he remained an involving player until roughly around the time he returned from Europe. A DIFFERENT player, to be sure, but an involving one nevertheless, one in whose playing I hear a lot of tension and inner turmoil, not doubt not a little of it coming from the musical double life he was leading and how that played off of what he no doubt started out wanting to be. But after he came back from Europe and accepted his position as "Great Jazz Altoist" and cut out all the musical tension in his career, I think he got just plain silly.

No comments on the Fathead/Zoot similarity? It struck me when I was listening to Zoot's solo on "On The Alamo" from the Benny Goodman Moscow album a few years ago. Their phrasing impulses (which is what I call how, when, and where, a player decides when and how to begin, end, and shape a phrase) seemed quite similar, and the more I thought about it, the more I heard it in other places.

[AllenLowe]

With Woods I wonder if it's a kind of warped technical mastery - sometimes you can play so much that you lose your editing capability. Another possibility might relate to something Barry Harris said to me once, which was that when Bird died a lot of players seemed to lose their way musically (and otherwise), so dependent were they on Bird and on his the next record, and so rudderless did they feel without him (we were talking specifically about Al Haig's 1950s problems, but Harris thought they applied to quite a few musicians) - I think there very well may be something to this, given the timing of Woods's decline.

[jazzbo]

I think there's something to that with Bird's death; in some ways if a player didn't moved towards a harmelodic or sheets of sound or other trends that slowly grew out of the second half of the fifties and the first years of the sixties they may seem to be becoming dinosaurish and decades later seem to be past their best by a mile in comparison to the growth of many another. . . .

[Larry Kart]

"...so dependent were they on Bird and on his the next record, and so rudderless did they feel without him -- I think there very well may be something to this, given the timing of Woods's decline."

Not only that, Woods married Bird's widow, Chan!

On the other hand, one of the things that was so attractive about early Woods was that he wasn't as Bird-dependent as a lot of guys his age, having worked out a simpler (especially from a rhythmic point of view) way of playing that left lots of room for relatively unfragmented, shapes-poised-against-shapes melodic thinking -- not unlike Monk actually, allowing for the difference in instruments and profundity. But then, on the third hand, I can see where Bird's death might have messed up a guy who had heard a lot of Bird and more or less gone his own way, especially if he was being touted as a potential successor. I can't recall for sure but think that might have been the case in some quarters; certainly Cannonball's name was being thrown around that way at that time.

Jim, I confess I don't have enough Fathead in my memory bank to make the comparison.

[JSngry]

I also wonder what being married to Chan was like for Woods, at least early on. Think about it - you're an alto player/Bird disciple, and here you are ****ing Bird's ##### not TOO terribly long after the body went cold. Even if it was pure love (and I have no reason to think otherwise) that would HAVE to be some wied shit, at least early on. like the Lenny Bruce line about "yeah, man, I got Bird's axe", only a LOT heavier.

I mean, not only are you now competing with Bird's PLAYING...

TOO wierd.

[Larry Kart]

And Phil didn't seem like a weird guy either, although his buddy Gene Quill reportedly was a trip.