Late Posted June 20, 2003 Report Posted June 20, 2003 (edited) I was wondering if anyone here has this album, and what they think of it. It looks good on paper. Here's the AMG review. Edited February 26, 2023 by Late (image update) Quote
brownie Posted June 20, 2003 Report Posted June 20, 2003 This is a must have album from a musician who remained in the shadows during his too-short career. It's much better than good. He should have had one-tenth of the fame that surrounded Chet Baker's playing at the time. Fruscella may not have been as romantic and as pretty at Baker in the '50s but he was the one with the unique tone and the masterful phrasing. His Atlantic album is his best record (they are very few albums under his name). And you also get a chance to hear Allen Eager - another unrecognized great - who just passed away. I keep a CD of this album in my car and play it when I'm in the right mood. Quote
Michael Fitzgerald Posted June 20, 2003 Report Posted June 20, 2003 I have a complete Tony Fruscella discography done by Jonathan Kutler. It may go back online in the future. Mike Quote
Kevin Bresnahan Posted June 20, 2003 Report Posted June 20, 2003 This is a truly great disc. I remember when this CD came out. My buddy Rob bought it and played it for me "blind". I was guessing all these trumpeters but I could never really pick up enough to nail it down to one. After several guesses, Rob dropped the CD into my lap. "Tony Fruscella"?? I had no idea. I picked the CD up myself and I play it often. I have thought about that Fresh Sounds/Jazz Factory set a few times but I never got around to it. This thread has me wondering again.... man, so many CDs, so little $$. Later, Kevin Quote
DrJ Posted June 20, 2003 Report Posted June 20, 2003 Wow, I have completely missed out on Fruscella so far. Will have to remedy that soon based on the accolades here. Quote
Larry Kart Posted June 20, 2003 Report Posted June 20, 2003 Excellent album, wonderful player. Fruscella was part of a loose-knit school of coolish East Coast trumpet lyricists, sort of bebop by way of Bobby Hackett guys. Among the others were the remarkable Don Joseph (if you can, find his fine Uptown LP with Al Cohn and check out his unearthly solo on Mulligan's big band recording of "All The Things You Are" on the Columbia album "The Arranger"), Tristano student Don Ferrara, Dick Sherman (who crops up on the Al Cohn-Zoot Sims album "From A To Z"), and Phil Sunkel. Jon Eardley might be belong with this crowd, too. There may be others that I'm forgetting. All these players had veiled, mellow tones, as though they were playing through felt beanies or were using cornets. Joseph, in fact, was a cornetist. Quote
Clunky Posted June 20, 2003 Report Posted June 20, 2003 This isn't a bad album by any means but I was a little less than overwhelmed by it . Perhaps my expectations were too high but I found it to be a pleasant enough date but not one filled with much brio. Perhaps I will have to listen again. Quote
The Mule Posted June 20, 2003 Report Posted June 20, 2003 Wow, I have completely missed out on Fruscella so far. Will have to remedy that soon based on the accolades here. Tony, you can catch up with just about everything Fruscella recorded by picking up the very reasonably priced TONY FRUSCELLA: THE COMPLETE WORKS, STUDIO AND LIVE RECORDINGS (4 cds) reissued on The Jazz Factory label (division of the dreaded "disconforme"/Definitive company). Here's the AMG entry: TONY FRUSCELLA: THE COMPLETE WORKS Quote
DrJ Posted June 20, 2003 Report Posted June 20, 2003 Thanks Jim, will definitely check it out. (and good to see hanging 'round these parts!) Quote
Trumpet Guy Posted June 21, 2003 Report Posted June 21, 2003 I LOVE Fruscella and Don Joseph!! Lawrence Kart is speaking the truth!I have much(almost all) Fru and Joseph,a few Sunkel records,quite a bit of Don Ferrara but NO Dick Sherman!Who???! I'd love to jump into the "wayback" machine to the Open Door Club circa 1953. Collectors!!!Anyone have that unreleased Fru/Brew Moore studio date for Atlantic,that was lost in a fire? Or a tape of Don Joseph with Fred Stoll? Anyone??? I'm trying to get a recording of Mulligan/Fruscella live Newport Jazz Fest 1954 from a collector... Quote
Michael Fitzgerald Posted June 21, 2003 Report Posted June 21, 2003 I am told the Atlantic session with Moore does still exist on a private tape. Mike Quote
Trumpet Guy Posted June 21, 2003 Report Posted June 21, 2003 Yeah but who's got it? I heard Ira Gitler. That Fred Stoll tape...I heard Loren Shoenberg(?)has it... C'mon--share these gems!Don't take em with you! Quote
Michael Fitzgerald Posted June 21, 2003 Report Posted June 21, 2003 I think it was Gitler, too. I know *I* don't have them! I'm just glad they weren't destroyed. There's still hope for the future. Mike Quote
Larry Kart Posted June 22, 2003 Report Posted June 22, 2003 Trumpet Guy, if you feel that way about Fruscella and Joseph, I've got to check out your own stuff. Don't know much about Dick Sherman, except that he's on 10 tracks of the 1957 RCA Al Cohn-Zoot Sims album "From A to Z." Can't find it right now for some damn reason, but I believe he's also on "Elliott Lawrence Plays Gerry Mulligan Arrangments" (OJC) from the same period and solos on at least one track. He definitely was one of those guys, though based on what I've heard not at the level Fruscella and Joseph reached -- mellow, soulful, and, perhaps like all them, a bit saxophonish in conception, a la Lester Young. Ferrara was maybe the most extreme in trying to bring to the trumpet a conception from another instrument -- the piano as played by Tristano (or so it seems to me) -- but then Tristano's conception, or a big part of it, came from Pres too. Quote
Late Posted June 22, 2003 Author Report Posted June 22, 2003 Another trumpet player that seems to fit into the group being discussed (Ferrara, Sherman, Eardley, et al.) is yet another Don: Don Fagerquist. Granted, Fagerquist is usually recognized as a "West Coast" trumpet player, but his melodic sense fits the boppish to cool sensibility. His own VSOP session is superb, and his work with Dave Pell is just as remarkable. One of the purest tones around, with meticulous articulation to boot. Come to think of it, Dick Collins seems to fit this mold too. His RCA sessions (particularly Horn of Plenty) are beautiful. And the bands that are on them ... pity that those discs aren't in wider circulation. Quote
Trumpet Guy Posted June 22, 2003 Report Posted June 22, 2003 (edited) Fagerquist is great.I LOVE his "8 by 8"record.BUT, he had WAY too much chops to be in the Fru/Joseph school. Lawrence Kart-VERY Interesting stuff.Thanks! Ferrara's still alive right? You've heard the "outakes" of "Very Cool"?And the Getz/Fru jam session 54'? I might have a taste of these guys in my playing,but its not front & center... Edited June 22, 2003 by Trumpet Guy Quote
Larry Kart Posted June 22, 2003 Report Posted June 22, 2003 Trumpet Guy, this is from a 2001 post on rec.music.bluenote by Ron Hearn: "There is a great article on Don in the June, 2000 issue of Jazz Journal. Don lives in California, just north of San Diego. He teaches his students via cassette." All I have of "Very Cool" is the old LP. I've been hoping for a Mosaic Complete Lee Konitz on Verve set some day, but I guess I should spring for the "Very Cool" CD -- an import I assume? It was a nice surprise when Peter Ind put out more material from "The Real Lee Konitz" engagement with Ferrara. Don't know of the Getz/Fru jam session 54, just the few tracks they recorded for Clef or Verve, about half an LP. Quote
Michael Fitzgerald Posted June 22, 2003 Report Posted June 22, 2003 Is that Getz/Fru thing the Fort Myers tape from December 10, 1954? Info I have looks like this is a gig, not a jam, but I've not heard it. I'm just about ready to go online with this Fru discography (about half again as many sessions as appear in the Tom Lord CD-ROM), but I'd like to get the OK of the original compiler first. Mike Quote
Trumpet Guy Posted June 22, 2003 Report Posted June 22, 2003 Yeah Michael that's the one.I hear no clapping--led me to the Jam theory.Some of the BEST FRU period.Up there with "I'll Be Seeing You"! There's a Brooklyn Jam 52' cd--crudely recorded at Gene DiNovi's pad. That Fru w/ Bird,mentioned in Cutler discography is bogus?? Lawrence--The "Very Cool" extras & outakes was given to me--I don't know that its available...I also have "Jazz From The 50's-Wave Cd-Midway Lounge---Is that the extras for The Real Lee Konitz you mentioned? I gotta pull out my Phil Sunkel's now:Jazz Concerto Grosso & Sunkel's Jazz Band... Quote
Larry Kart Posted June 22, 2003 Report Posted June 22, 2003 Trumpet Guy, "Jazz From The 50's-Wave Cd-Midway Lounge" is the additional material from the Pittsburgh engagment that "The Real Lee Konitz" was drawn from. As you probably know, Ferrara's solos on"The Real Lee Konitz" for reasons Lee explains in the liner notes, were edited out of most the performances on "The Real Lee" -- in fact, if memory serves, there isn't a single solo by Ferrara left there. As for "Jazz From the '50s," again if memory serves, all the performances on that disc are different from the ones on the "The Real Lee" rather than being, in some cases, "Real Lee" takes with Ferrara's edited-out choruses restored. Quote
Larry Kart Posted June 27, 2003 Report Posted June 27, 2003 Further thoughts about Fruscella-related trumpeters: Definitely one of them, and perhaps among the progenitors of the style, was John Carisi. Of course better known as a composer-arranger, Carisi could really play, though examples aren't abundant. Best to my knowledge, and a fine showcase for his writing too, is the previously unissued 1956 date on 1988 RCA CD "The Arrangers," which includes new settings of "Israel" and "Lestorian Mode" and the first versions of "Springsville" and "Barry's Tune." As for Don Joseph, a must for his admirers is the reissue of Chuck Wayne's 1957 VIK album "String Fever" (on Fresh Sounds, I think, and, with valuable alternate takes, on Euphoria!). Joseph solos on more than half the tracks and is in particularly fine form on "Embraceable You" and "Lover Man." Nice quote from drummer Sonny Igoe in the Euphoria! liner notes: "[Don Joseph] became a legendary trumpet player, but he was only a legend on Staten Island!" Quote
sidewinder Posted June 27, 2003 Report Posted June 27, 2003 Just listening to a French RCA 3-LP set called 'From West Coast to East Coast' that has quite a bit of music in this vein, recorded under the 'Jazz Workshop' heading. A four-trumpet line-up called 'Cool Gabriels' that I haven't come across before. Conte Candoli, Nick Travis, Don Stratton and Bernie Glow. Also some work by the aforementioned John Carisi under the leadership of Tony Scott, Nick Travis with John Benson Brooks and Don Joseph with Chuck Wayne's group. Dick Collins also has a track on there with 'The Winter of My Discontent'. Nice stuff .... and a good introduction to some fairly obscure material. B) Quote
brownie Posted June 27, 2003 Report Posted June 27, 2003 Didn't realize the 'Cool Gabriels' date was on that West/East Coast anthology. Have been looking for that rare session for years. The original RCA LP had a cover by Andy Warhol which turned this rarity into a megabucks item on the market. The LP anthology shows up off and on. Will be looking for it now. Quote
Joe Posted June 27, 2003 Report Posted June 27, 2003 As for Don Joseph, a must for his admirers is the reissue of Chuck Wayne's 1957 VIK album "String Fever" (on Fresh Sounds, I think, and, with valuable alternate takes, on Euphoria!). Joseph solos on more than half the tracks and is in particularly fine form on "Embraceable You" and "Lover Man." Absolutely. The Euphoria label has done an excelent job with this release. Quote
sidewinder Posted June 27, 2003 Report Posted June 27, 2003 Didn't realize the 'Cool Gabriels' date was on that West/East Coast anthology. Have been looking for that rare session for years. The original RCA LP had a cover by Andy Warhol which turned this rarity into a megabucks item on the market. The LP anthology shows up off and on. Will be looking for it now. Came across my copy of the anthology by a bit of a fluke, Brownie. It was marked at £9 in a s/h store and they gave me discount with selling price of £6. Pretty well mint too ... :rsmile: Quote
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