Valerie Wilmer on John Gilmore in THE WIRE

[erhodes]

Also looking for a copy of the Halfnote broadcast when Gilmore was with Blakey. Anyone know of any others?

There are two Half Note broadcasts of the edition of the Messengers that included Bartz, Gilmore, Hicks, and Sproles.

May 14, 1965

On the Ginza

A Nightingale Sang In Berkley Square

The Sidewinder

Buhania's Delight

June 11, 1965

On the Ginza

I Can't Get Started With You (feature for Bartz)

One By One

Theme

These are Alan Grant's broadcasts...I'm thinking "Portraits In Jazz"...the same series from which the Coltrane Half Note broadcasts come. Grant has the tapes...or at least had them several years ago. He is the source of the stereo masters that Impulse released of the Trane material, as opposed to Boris Rose's mono recordings of the same broadcasts. To release them one would presumably have to negotiate an agreement with Grant. I am aware of at least 39 broadcasts that were preserved in his archive, not including the Coltrane sessions. But this information is old. I don't know if the tapes still exist or what his position currently is with regard to possible commercial releases.

...and I figure the "Nightingale" title is probably a ringer for something more familiar.

[ghost of miles]

how is that elmo hope "rikers island" thing?

Agreed w/Chuck about the rhythm section--another fave is "Monique," which features only them & Gilmore. I played a fair amount of RIKERS on the Night Lights "Resolution: Jazz From Rehab" show, if you want to hear some of it online.

Some previous discussion about Riker's in this Elmo Hope thread.

Edited October 5, 2006 by ghost of miles

[Lazaro Vega]

Is Alan Grant still alive?

[Guest youmustbe]

Gilmore's solo on Riker's Tunisia is terrific.

I don't have Half Note photos developed.

Can't let videos out of my possesion...one day I'll get another Beta, maybe....

I wonder if Gary has Half Note tapes...have talked to a couple of collectors and they don't have them either. Funny, I never heard that band live and didn't really want to. For some reason I never cared for Blakey's Messengers, great as Art was and everyone that came thru the band. I did make it to Five Spot in 65 to hear his new pianists Keith Jarrett though. It's like Lee's quintet which played around same time at Slugs', maybe that's why he left Art, I don't know...but the quintet with Mobley, Walton, Chambers and Higgins was some sad ass shit in 65 when you compare it with everything that was going on...Trane, Cecil, Albert, Archie et al. still feel that way after all these years, but am sorry I didn't go to Half Note, since I lived a few blocks up, even though I hated the place, to hear John.

But then he went with Ra and I would go just to hear his free rev up which was about the second or 3rd tune, and then split.

As for Lee, the band with Maupin, Mabern, Merritt and Roker WAS the shit! Went there to Slugs consistantly until I got mugged outside in between sets going to hear Tolliver, with Cowell, McBee and Brooks at the Port Of Call up the block...never went back to Slugs' again.

[marcosaurelio]

Also looking for a copy of the Halfnote broadcast when Gilmore was with Blakey. Anyone know of any others?

There are two Half Note broadcasts of the edition of the Messengers that included Bartz, Gilmore, Hicks, and Sproles.

May 14, 1965

On the Ginza

A Nightingale Sang In Berkley Square

The Sidewinder

Buhania's Delight

June 11, 1965

On the Ginza

I Can't Get Started With You (feature for Bartz)

One By One

Theme

These are Alan Grant's broadcasts...I'm thinking "Portraits In Jazz"...the same series from which the Coltrane Half Note broadcasts come. Grant has the tapes...or at least had them several years ago. He is the source of the stereo masters that Impulse released of the Trane material, as opposed to Boris Rose's mono recordings of the same broadcasts. To release them one would presumably have to negotiate an agreement with Grant. I am aware of at least 39 broadcasts that were preserved in his archive, not including the Coltrane sessions. But this information is old. I don't know if the tapes still exist or what his position currently is with regard to possible commercial releases.

...and I figure the "Nightingale" title is probably a ringer for something more familiar.

Thanks for the info Ed! That's incredible. Have you actually heard these tapes before? Anyone have any contact info for Alan Grant?

[marcosaurelio]

Gilmore's solo on Riker's Tunisia is terrific.

I don't have Half Note photos developed.

Can't let videos out of my possesion...one day I'll get another Beta, maybe....

I wonder if Gary has Half Note tapes...have talked to a couple of collectors and they don't have them either. Funny, I never heard that band live and didn't really want to. For some reason I never cared for Blakey's Messengers, great as Art was and everyone that came thru the band. I did make it to Five Spot in 65 to hear his new pianists Keith Jarrett though. It's like Lee's quintet which played around same time at Slugs', maybe that's why he left Art, I don't know...but the quintet with Mobley, Walton, Chambers and Higgins was some sad ass shit in 65 when you compare it with everything that was going on...Trane, Cecil, Albert, Archie et al. still feel that way after all these years, but am sorry I didn't go to Half Note, since I lived a few blocks up, even though I hated the place, to hear John.

But then he went with Ra and I would go just to hear his free rev up which was about the second or 3rd tune, and then split.

As for Lee, the band with Maupin, Mabern, Merritt and Roker WAS the shit! Went there to Slugs consistantly until I got mugged outside in between sets going to hear Tolliver, with Cowell, McBee and Brooks at the Port Of Call up the block...never went back to Slugs' again.

Agreed, Gilmore's playing on Ryker's is great especially on Tunisia. His rhythmic use of false fingerings is always great to hear. You know, he had a lot in his bag but he never overused his stuff or showed all his cards in one place, a very disciplined player. Speaking of which, no one I have spoken with has any knowledge of Gilmore having had a drug problem at any time. On the contrary, people seem to know him for being straight as an arrow. In addition to that sort of behavior not being tolerated in the Ra band, there's an article on Gilmore (can't recall which one at the moment) where he talks directly about having steered clear of drugs (smack, I assume) starting in the early days in Chicago after seeing people he knew falling victim to their addictions.

Speaking of guys playing at that time, do you know if Joe Henderson was checking out Gilmore? I had always assumed that Gilmore had that overtone/harmonic thing happening a bit earlier than Joe.

Oh yeah, perhaps we could pitch-in to buy you a Beta machine? Do you recall what tunes were done in the French TV footage?

[Guest youmustbe]

Joe was a Junior Cook clone, but better at it, that's why he replaced him with Horace, after Junior introduced him to Horace.

The video was from Paudras, the Bud Powell guy...if I remember, The Egyptian and Blues March and then cuts off.

[Noj]

This thread title should be read in the voice of the Swedish Chef.

[marcosaurelio]

Joe was a Junior Cook clone, but better at it, that's why he replaced him with Horace, after Junior introduced him to Horace.

The video was from Paudras, the Bud Powell guy...if I remember, The Egyptian and Blues March and then cuts off.

What did happen with the Paudras collection? I'm surprised that no film of this Blakey band from the Japan performances has turned up.

[Guest youmustbe]

Good question...I know he had Trane 61 with Dolphy Scandinavia among all the other stuff...he had access to INA archives.

[marcosaurelio]

Good question...I know he had Trane 61 with Dolphy Scandinavia among all the other stuff...he had access to INA archives.

I guess this stuff just gets put away in a dark place somewhere. It's a shame, he must have had the motherload.

Any other Gilmore footage out there? I wonder if all the footage from that Mingus film has survived? I'm very curious as to how often Gilmore played with Mingus.

[erhodes]

Thanks for the info Ed! That's incredible. Have you actually heard these tapes before? Anyone have any contact info for Alan Grant?

No, I have not heard them. I have seen a list of tapes that Grant presented to a record producer several years ago in anticipation of having them released commerically. The producer auditioned some of the tapes, though I don't know if he auditioned the Blakey-Gilmore material. The information I gave is from the tape list.

I believe Verve had contact with Grant prior to the Coltrane-Half Note release. That's as much as I know.

[erhodes]

Speaking of guys playing at that time, do you know if Joe Henderson was checking out Gilmore? I had always assumed that Gilmore had that overtone/harmonic thing happening a bit earlier than Joe.

There's a quote...I can't find the reference now...from Henderson in which he responds to a question about the tenor players he thought highly of by saying that Gilmore was the one to listen to "when he got it going" or something to that effect. It may be a second hand quote...somebody giving an account of Joe's feelings on other tenor players.

Not clear what you mean by "overtone/harmonic thing". Gilmore played ringer for the Shorter-Henderson generation on a few of his 60's sideman recordings - the Hubbard, Hill, and Tyner dates come to mind - but it's probably more accurate to think of him as a contemporary of Trane...someone with an established hard bop resume in the 50's, albeit almost entirely with the Arkestra...rather than part of the post-Trane 60's crew.

Gilmore is, among other things, a parallel influence with Trane, a source of some of the things that became common in the 60's, though I hear his influence more explicitly in the players who were known for their free playing - e.g., Pharoah, Kalaparusha - than in the work of Shorter, Henderson, or Coleman (George). Joe was certaily aware of him, though. Shepp was also someone who was hearing Gilmore, though Gilmore's influence there, like many of Shepp's other influences, is buried in the Hawkins-Webster thing and that fragmented phrasing, what someone referred to back then as a "pointilliste approach".

[Guest youmustbe]

Yeah,

Having heard Archie with Bill Dixon and then Gilmore with Bill, both of course without piano, it seemed 'logical'.

Pharoah was a cipher back then. Not until he hooked up with Leon thomas did he start to happen a little bit. but even though I started to to dig him a little, and later booked him, after all these years, he still strikes me as a cipher.

Some years from now, everyone will realize that Joe Henderson was THE Man! after Trane!

[Chuck Nessa]

Some years from now, everyone will realize that Joe Henderson was THE Man! after Trane!

[Guest youmustbe]

For Good or Bad!!! But that's what all the young ones hear, whether they realize it or not. Just easy to improvise in that style, especially if you're going to a school.

[erhodes]

Pharoah was a cipher back then. Not until he hooked up with Leon thomas did he start to happen a little bit. but even though I started to to dig him a little, and later booked him, after all these years, he still strikes me as a cipher.

Some years from now, everyone will realize that Joe Henderson was THE Man! after Trane!

The three most important tenor players after Trane - the ones who had the most to do with moving the music forward - were Ayler, Gilmore, and Pharoah. Joe Henderson, Wayne Shorter, George Coleman, Booker Ervin, Rahsaan....Clifford Jordan....Dewey Redman, Sam Rivers...all beautiful players with important things to say. But the ones who really ran with it were Gilmore, Albert, and Pharoah.

If you want to talk about who influences the current generation of faceless tenor clones, you might as well say George Coleman...though that's something of an insult to George, who had his own sound, even if the new jacks don't have theirs.

The Leon Thomas gig was when Pharoah began to lose his edge...or concede the point. Prime Pharoah is '64 to '68. Cipher? Half the world is still trying to figure out how to play like that. What did Spellman say..."the damndest tenor player in the English language"...that's damn sure what I saw and heard.

[Lazaro Vega]

The three most important tenor players after Trane - the ones who had the most to do with moving the music forward - were Ayler, Gilmore, and Pharoah.

And Roscoe?

[Guest youmustbe]

Pharaoh was the sax player in the JC Moses Quartet in 67 at Slugs'...with Lonnie Liston Smith and Norris Jones..circa early 68, it was a regular Sunday afternoon gig, Leon was there and next week it was the Pharoah-Leon gig...It might have been Roger Blank on drums...That combination got Pharaoh over the top...good for him...I always liked him personally even though he was very 'country'.

But after all these years, and I first heard him as Farrell Saunders at a Sunday afternoon McDougal Street pass the hat with Don Cherry in 62?...he really ain't anything.

Once again, good luck to him, but he's been very lucky, first with Trane (can any of you actually listen to his 'solos' from then?) and then Leon.

[clifford_thornton]

Keep those '60s gig lineups coming - they are the stuff us young'uns' dreams are made of!

[clifford_thornton]

I don't really spend my days "thinking" about Pharoah, but I do like a lot of the records.

He seemed like a pretty engaging hybrid of influences during the run of mid-60s dates, such as the ESP and his work with Don Cherry et al. Again, I do like those records as well. As far as going in a certain direction with "out" tenor playing, I'd say that he certainly was a starting point for more feral honkers like Arthur Doyle, and his music was certainly influential, even if only through a "vibe" or a way to incorporate "modal," vamp-heavy tunes with very free playing. For example, the late '60s/early '70s Noah Howard records on Freedom share a lot with Pharoah's aesthetic, though of course Noah's got his own thing entirely (and which I've been guilty of finding cipher-ish also).

Roger Blank and JC Moses are good analogs - very fleet post-Philly Joe stylists for the free set. God love 'em both.

[erhodes]

Pharaoh was the sax player in the JC Moses Quartet in 67 at Slugs'...with Lonnie Liston Smith and Norris Jones..circa early 68, it was a regular Sunday afternoon gig, Leon was there and next week it was the Pharoah-Leon gig...It might have been Roger Blank on drums...That combination got Pharaoh over the top...good for him...I always liked him personally even though he was very 'country'.

But after all these years, and I first heard him as Farrell Saunders at a Sunday afternoon McDougal Street pass the hat with Don Cherry in 62?...he really ain't anything.

Once again, good luck to him, but he's been very lucky, first with Trane (can any of you actually listen to his 'solos' from then?) and then Leon.

I was at that Slug's gig and several others before Pharoah hooked up with Leon. I remember one of them Tyrone Washington was sitting in. I was looking recently at a Tyrone Washington thread and reading...I think it was Jim Sangry's thoughts about him. I liked that first Blue Note record but in person he was no where near as strong as he sounded in Van Gelder's studio.

I remember Monty Waters sitting in with Pharoah around the same time and turning the place out. Matter of fact, Pharoah didn't really take any solos that night and Monty was the closest thing to Arthur Jones I ever heard. And I remember when J.C. was playing drums and some amateur sax player sat in and J.C. chased him off the stand after he started trying to play...I think it was "My Favorite Things".

I figure youmustbe is about 10 years older than me. I started going to Slugs in '66. I was there for many of those Sun Ra...I think it was Monday night sets...including one of the ones where they marched out into the middle of 3rd Street at 2-3 in the morning. I saw most of the Sunday afternoon sets...Sam Rivers with Herbie Lewis and Steve Ellington, the "New Conception" band...Sam, Benny Maupin, and Bill Barron as a tenor saxophone trio (w/ rhythm section)...Dewey Redman's trios with Rashied Ali, one of which had Larry Young on organ. I saw Gato Barbieri and Arthur Jones sit in on Sundays...I think different ones. Hip as I was...I asked Arthur if he was Byard Lancaster. I saw Cecil's band with Sam and I saw the one with Frank Wright that preceeded it. And I saw folks like Bobby Hutcherson, Freddie Hubbard, James Spaulding...and Pharoah, both before and after Leon.

Youmustbe is very glib with his dismissals from. The Arkestra was "amateurish", Shepp had no talent, Pharoah "ain't anything". I was there. I don't know what he is talking about.

I think Pharoah's solos with Trane...particularly "Seattle", "Om", "Meditations", the version of "Naima" on "VV Again", and the version of "Ogunde" from the Olatunji concert...are tour de forces. I listen to that stuff all the time. I think there was a period...brief...from '64 to '68...where Pharoah was the strongest thing out there. I saw Pharoah with Trane three times...twice at the Village Theater. I remember people were jumping out of their seats when he soloed at the December '66 concert. There was a cat that just got out of the service who kept on shouting, "That's BAD!"...Pharoah was playing a silver colored sax, probably a rented horn.

Everyone's got their own ears...lord only knows... I suppose if someone thinks Pharoah's solo on "Evolution" from the "Seattle" lp "ain't anything" we're just from different planets.

The Gilmore connection...I realize this isn't a Pharoah thread...is important because Gilmore's influence on Pharoah was, IMO, substantial...more so than his influence on Trane. A lot of people copied elements of Pharoah and some of them ended up sounding like Gilmore because that's what happens when you subtract the high frequency multiphonics from some of Pharoah's mid 60's lines. What I heard back then was, e.g., that Benny Maupin was listening to Pharoah. And Maupin sounded a bit like Gilmore at the time though I think the influence was indirect...I'm talking about pre "Tender Moments" Maupin...though come to think of it that solo on "Mode to John" sounds a bit like Gilmore.

...I just put that record on...

You can't make any real sense out of Gilmore if you ignore his free playing. He's not just a ringer for the 60's Blue Note crew...someone who could fill Wayne's shoes on a Freddie Hubbard record. But...then...when you start to deal with...Gilmore's decidedly post-Coltrane aspect...then Pharoah comes into the picture and the dispersal of certain stylistic elements...I mean...some of what Gato copied from Pharoah, Pharoah got from playing with the Arkestra...and I suspect that Gato absorbed it from Pharoah without knowing very much about Gilmore or the Arkestra.

The most interesting piece may well be Gilmore's relationship with Ayler. They overlapped...and actually played together in Paul Bley's band circa early '64. I probed Bill Dixon about this once but he sort of deflected the question(s)...though there was an answer buried in there.

..."Tender Moments" is a bitch...

Benny Maupin, John Stubblefied, Joe Rigby (remember him, youmustbe? played with Milford for a quick minute), George Adams, Michael Brecker, Kenneth Terrode, Gato, Evan Parker...all of them leaned on Pharoah...picking up his stuff before he stopped using it with Leon.

You cannot talk about the evolution of the tenor sax after Trane without squarely addressing Gilmore...and Pharoah.

[erhodes]

i also agree w/Pharoah = cipher. does anyone have a sense of the man/artist behind the crypto-spiritualism & muftis?

re: Roscoe, as multi-instr & conceptualist/composer, few even think of him as tenor man...

(izzit ok if i like Clifford Jordan a lot more?)

Roscoe's an alto player. He's also an innovator but not as a saxophone soloist. He' just a bad mf.

Viz. CJ, like who you wanna. I like Clifford, too. I like Pharoah more.

A sense of the man? Pharoah is a down to earth guy. Met him when he was still playing with Trane. I think he's spiritually sincere but my feelings about his playing have little to do with that. A lot of sincere people can't play a lick. I don't see anything crypto about it. Just Impulse's take on how to sell some records. But Pharoah the hell raiser is Pharoah pre "Tauhid". I don't care for that record or any of the other Impulse sides, though I think the soprano solo on "Journey In Satch..."...however you spell that cat's name...is on...like the kind of thing Wayne did when he started playing the little horn.

But the solo on "Evolution"...cipher? Huh!

[Chuck Nessa]

He's also an innovator but not as a saxophone soloist.

We part ways here Ed.

[Larry Kart]

Speaking of Pharoah, does anyone know what happened to (as in whatever, if anything, became of) the pianist on his ESP album, Jane Getz?