Roscoe Mitchell & Dave Sanborn ?!

[paul secor]

I was just reading John Litweiler's liner notes to the Art Ensemble's 'The Spiritual' album, and he makes mention of the Philip Wilson's leaving the Roscoe Mitchell Art Ensemble to join the Paul Butterfield Band. He also mentions Gene Dinwiddie (whatever became of him?) and "a self-confessedly Mitchell-inspired altoist, the very fluent Davey Sanborn." I have no reason to doubt Mr. Litweiler's words, but Dave Sanborn surely took his inspiration in another direction. (I wonder if he shared a little of the green with the man who inspired him? B-))

Mr Litweiler also mentions that Philip Wilson joined the Butterfield Band after losing his gig with "a well-known Chicago blues singer". Anyone know who that was?

[JSngry]

Mister Nessa (or Mr. Litweiler himself) can fill in all these details quite nicely when they get a chance.

But I've been telling anybody who'd listen (although not too aggressively...) that Dave Sanborn can freakin' PLAY. Never mind the "production" that too often surrounds him, listen to HIM. The cat can play his instrument QUITE well, and not just technically! Amongst living players, his command of tonal nuance alone is damn near as good as you can get.

I could go on, but I've got to protect whatever jazz cred I might still retain...

[paul secor]

I guess you've got ears and a sensibility like Bird had. Supposedly, he could find some musical good in everything he heard. I Wish that were the case with me.

[7/4]

Mister Nessa (or Mr. Litweiler himself) can fill in all these details quite nicely when they get a chance.

But I've been telling anybody who'd listen (although not too aggressively...) that Dave Sanborn can freakin' PLAY. Never mind the "production" that too often surrounds him, listen to HIM. The cat can play his instrument QUITE well, and not just technically! Amongst living players, his command of tonal nuance alone is damn near as good as you can get.

I could go on, but I've got to protect whatever jazz cred I might still retain...

What he said.

Remember when he was on Night Music? Sitting in with Sun Ra!

[Michael Fitzgerald]

I stayed up watching all those Night Music shows and there were occasional flashes of quality, but Sanborn for the most part did NOT fit in with the guests. I give him credit for trying and for supporting the Hal Wilner eclectic booking, but more often than not I was wishing that someone else were there who had a bit more taste. Who? I don't know. I mean, it's not like Sanborn had any screen personality, so it could be anybody.

Best Night Music show was the first one: James Taylor, Milton Nascimento, Nana Vasconcelos. After that it became a circus with just one act after another. The first show took pains to get a set of guests that worked well together - Milton singing backup for James and vice versa, breaking down into duets, etc.

I do enjoy the occasional Sanborn performance - the earlier the better, I guess - Gil, the first few Warner Bros. albums (when he was hanging with Victor Lewis and Don Grolnick). His contribution to McLaughlin's Electric Guitarist album isn't too bad, either.

Mike

[bertrand]

I thought the Sonny Rollins/Leonard Cohen match-up worked pretty well.

I saw the Santana/Shorter band on this show as well, doing 2 pieces. I have no clue what they were. This band cancelled their D.C. show, and the CD remains unissued (I've been told a CD DVD or both is on the way - I'll believe it when I see it). Anyone have any clue what they played?

Bertrand.

[Michael Fitzgerald]

I want to say "Afro Blue" - but am I thinking perhaps of another Santana/Shorter TV appearance (and wouldn't you have recognized that)? I have just about all the stuff on VHS somewhere around here - let's hope the tapes haven't aged as badly as Mr. Marcello's in another thread.

I should clarify about the "best Night Music show" - I mean *as a show* - there were a number of wonderful individual performances (mostly *sans* Sanborn), but I'm talking as a whole program together.

Leonard and Sonny did nothing for me, fwiw.

Mike

[relyles]

Sanborn seemed to fit comfortably on Tim Berne's Diminuitive Mysteries.

[JSngry]

I guess you've got ears and a sensibility like Bird had.

I wish!

But tell you what - take a Sanborn performance like "Try A Little Tenderness" off of PEARLS, listen to it not as "creative music", or as "great jazz", or anything like that, just listen to it as an interpretation of a melody, and then listen to the sheer detail that Sanborn gives to his reading of it, the colorizations, nuances, and "vocal" qualities he gives to a fairly straight reading of the melody, just listen to it like that (because that's all it is, really).

Then, if you don't like it, no big deal. but if you can't hear the musicianship (and I'll go so far as to call it artistry) involved in doing something like that, well, you'll still be my friend, , but I would respectfully suggest that you keep listening until you hear it.

Sanborn gets no significant props from me as an improvisor (although he's no slouch in that department), but as a pure conveyor of instrumental melody, I think he's one of the outstanding proponents of that art playing today, although more often than not, he doesn't tackle material worthy of his abilities.

PEARLS is a good example, though, and although about a quarter of it sheer dreck, the rest of it is excellent for what it is - a lush album of "standards w/strings" that ordinarily would be the province of a vocalist. Sanborn's such a gifted interpreter of melody in this setting that I'd be hard pressed to name a living singer whou could to the job as well as he does.

Although, there's a cameo by Jimmy Scott on "For All We Know" that puts that theory to the test!

[Michael Fitzgerald]

And I want to say that he played with Hemphill's saxophone sextet - but I don't see this in the discographies. Maybe it was a live show I saw? Or something live on the radio?

Mike

[JSngry]

Back in the 70s, Peaches Records (remember them?) opened up a store in Dallas, and their "jazz guy" was a transplant from St. Louis, who told stories of a younger Sanborn practicing w/Oliver Lake, showing up at BAG shows, etc. I took those stories w/a grain ofsalt, neither accepting nor dismissing them out of hand.

Later "stories" from people I can trust more than some guy in a record store, though, give credence to the portrait of a young Mr. Sanborn having a significantly more varied musical pallate than that of the Smooth/Studio one with which he is commonly associated, and to my mind, goes a long way towards explaining the whys & hows of the finer points of the art that he brings to music which often makes no demands for any.

Edited February 28, 2005 by JSngry

[chris olivarez]

The lineups of his last couple of Verve albums haven't been all that bad. I liked the Night Music show because even with all it's imperfections it was better than a lot of musical variety shows which were just total rubbish.

[AmirBagachelles]

A man's got to eat. Sanborn obviously has talent to entertain several audiences. I say good for him if he has found a way to earn a real living with his music. I really enjoyed that Berne CD, I will play it again this eve.

[Larry Kart]

I'm no Sanborn scholar, should there be such a thing, but I recall once catching a performance on the radio like "Try A Little Tenderness" (it may even have been TALT), and it was so damn riveting along just the lines that Jim mentions that I stayed in the car for some time after I got to where I was going in order to find out from the DJ who had played that thing.

[Michael Fitzgerald]

Indeed, TALT appears on the DS album Pearls. Kenny Barron appears on that and one other selection.

Mike

Wow - until this second I missed the post from Sangrey at 8:14 PM while I was sending my own post. I agree completely - Sanborn can be a great interpreter. Problems involve: bad material not worthy of interpretation and responsibilities that go past interpretation.

Edited March 1, 2005 by Michael Fitzgerald

[RDK]

FYI... a Santana/Shorter recording just went up on easytree a few days ago. Haven't heard it yet though...

[AllenLowe]

I tend to agree with Mike on this - Sanborn certainly has command of the horn, but I got a similar impression from those Night Music shows (boy that was a great show - Ivo Papasov, weird Ukranian rock and roll groups, etc). All of this makes me quite nostalgic, because I saw that Butterfield band in Central Park ca. 1969, Sanborn and Dinwiddie were the horn players; I don't remember about the drums but that was a fantastic group - (Buzz Feiten on guitar) -

Edited March 1, 2005 by AllenLowe

[johnlitweiler]

When I interviewed David Sanborn for the Chicago Tribune in 1989, I asked him about any possible Roscoe influence -- David, an extemely nice guy, said none, but in his apprentice days in St. Louis he had been friends with fellow apprentices Oliver Lake, Julius Hemphill, etc. and had probably absorbed some of their ideas.

/

Sanborn was part of probably the most hilarious thing I've seen on TV in the last 20+ years. It was over the closing credits of a Night Music broadcast -- Screaming Jay Hawkins sang, very slowly and in a perfect William Warfield voice, the first strain of Old Man River; Sanborn and John Zorn then did a 2-alto sax freakout. It is probably on a Hawkins CD.

[7/4]

When I interviewed David Sanborn for the Chicago Tribune in 1989, I asked him about any possible Roscoe influence -- David, an extemely nice guy, said none, but in his apprentice days in St. Louis he had been friends with fellow apprentices Oliver Lake, Julius Hemphill, etc. and had probably absorbed some of their ideas.

/

Sanborn was part of probably the most hilarious thing I've seen on TV in the last 20+ years. It was over the closing credits of a Night Music broadcast -- Screaming Jay Hawkins sang, very slowly and in a perfect William Warfield voice, the first strain of Old Man River; Sanborn and John Zorn then did a 2-alto sax freakout. It is probably on a Hawkins CD.

That must be the program where Zorn & Sandborn were playing the Ornette/Spy vs Spy material (am I imagining this?). I know they did a gig together with that material in NYC around that time.

[Man with the Golden Arm]

Sanborn was part of probably the most hilarious thing I've seen on TV in the last 20+ years. It was over the closing credits of a Night Music broadcast -- Screaming Jay Hawkins sang, very slowly and in a perfect William Warfield voice, the first strain of Old Man River; Sanborn and John Zorn then did a 2-alto sax freakout. It is probably on a Hawkins CD.

That must be the program where Zorn & Sandborn were playing the Ornette/Spy vs Spy material (am I imagining this?). I know they did a gig together with that material in NYC around that time.

That line up sounds very fun!.

Sure wish I'd seen that Spy vs Spy live w/ Sanborn and Berne along for the front line making it a menage a trio of sorts. Have not played my only Sanborn record, "Another Hand", in quite some time but that was a good group at top of game on there.

My only recollection of the Night Music show was a one featuring Arto's Ambitious Lovers. Never got to see them live either. Sorry, but that 'Greed' album is still in my top ten!

This thread kind of parallels that smoov jazz one in so far as artists who've taken another route but have the chops to drop it all and come back and play stuff we'd like!

[DTMX]

My only recollection of the Night Music show was a one featuring Arto's Ambitious Lovers.

That's the only episode of "Night Music" I ever saw. Zorn on television? Damn - missed it.

[Miles251]

I stayed up very late as well to catdh Sanborn's "Night Music" show....caught some very interesting music and mix of musicians.

One of my favorite moments from this show was a short clip of Miles before a cut to commercial. Miles, in his gravelly hoarse voice said, "I've had a sore throat for 25 years...."

[paul secor]

Sorry that I haven't added much to the thread that I began.

This seems to have become a forum for comments on Dave Sanborn, which wasn't my intention, but things will go where they will. I thought that it was interesting that Roscoe Mitchell took one path (and has remained on it), while Dave Sanborn took another, quite different, path. Also, I thought that it was interesting that Philip Wilson returned to the music that he had played with the AACM, after he left the Butterfield Band.

I did listen to some of Sanborn's playing on the CD Jim mentioned, and heard what Jim wrote about. He certainly has facility (I prefer that term to technique) and control over what he plays. That said, his music doesn't hold much interest for me - I'd much rather listen to Otis or Charlie Rich sing "Try a Little Tenderness" than hear him play it. For me, he comes off as a kind of modern day Earl Bostic. What I mean by that is that Earl Bostic was a musician who was respected by many fellow musicians, especially saxophonists, for his facility and control over his horn. I've never been able to connect with his records, try as I may, because when I listen to music I don't listen primarily for those aspects of it. For me, facility and control are just parts of the technique of bringing the emotions and ideas of sound to an audience. I'm giving Dave Sanborn more credit than he deserves - if I had to choose - and I don't - I'd rather listen to Earl Bostic than listen to him.

That said again, if there are those who dig him (or Earl Bostic) - have a ball. There's enough music around for everyone to enjoy whatever they choose.

Just a couple of unanswered questions from my initial post, if anyone knows:

Whatever happened to Gene Dinwiddie?

And who was the blues singer Philip Wilson played with in Chicago?

[Michael Fitzgerald]

Re: Dinwiddie - have you looked at the dreaded allmusic site? If not, why not?

Mike

[Chuck Nessa]

After a prompt from Sangrey, I will post about this.

I first met Davey (as he was called then) in the mid sixties when some musician friends convinced him to transfer from Northwestern to the University of Iowa. The reason for the transfer was to replace JR Monterose (soon to depart) in the local club band.

I later ran into Davey in St. Louis at a Mitchell Quartet concert at Washington University, Graham Chapel. The concert was on Saturday, March 25, 1967. Davie was "freakin'". I know his early influnces were Hank Crawford, Oliver Lake, (most importantly) Julius Hemphill and lastly RM. That is what he told me.

For Gene Dinwiddie, I'll rely on my memories.