The Jose Loa fraud

[slide_advantage_redoux]

Years ago at the U of North Texas, a couple of jazz majors decided to pull a hoax on DownBeat magazine. One of the guys had just returned from a cruise ship contract. Somehow he had ended up with a copy of a crew member's ID. The ship employee's name was Jose Loa - he was not a musician by the way.

Anyway, these guys (no, I had nothing to do with it!) concocted a bogus musical bio for Jose. Accordint to said bio, Jose was from Argentina and was an extremely talented young alto sax player. He was studying with Phil Woods and Jackie McLean (I may have these names wrong, but you get the point) and would be attending Berklee in the following semester.

He was also the recipient of Argentina's "Peron Award" for musical excellence. (is there such an award? )

The guys submitted the picture along with the bogus bio to Downbeat and yes they printed it in the back of the magazine....where they used to feature young talented up and coming musicians.

I don't know the year and month of that issue, but I would love to have a copy. I do remember reading it.

A couple of years afterwards, Downbeat learned of the hoax and they were none too pleased.

Edited June 13, 2007 by slide_advantage_redoux

[Kalo]

I didn't go to school with Jose Loa and I don't remember what a promising player he wasn't.

[AllenLowe]

he was no Grace Kelly -

[MoGrubb]

I wonder if Berklee gave Jose a scholarship?

[Ken Dryden]

You'd be surprised how many musicians fell for my 4/1/2005 CD reviews:

Michael Bolton Sings the Duke Ellington Songbook

+

Yanni: A Tribute to Art Tatum

Somedays people just aren't looking for gags...though I thought Cyrus Chestnut was trying to pull my leg when he said he had recorded a bunch of tunes associated with Elvis Presley for his upcoming CD.

[7/4]

too cool.

[Kalo]

You'd be surprised how many musicians fell for my 4/1/2005 CD reviews:

Michael Bolton Sings the Duke Ellington Songbook

+

Yanni: A Tribute to Art Tatum

Somedays people just aren't looking for gags...though I thought Cyrus Chestnut was trying to pull my leg when he said he had recorded a bunch of tunes associated with Elvis Presley for his upcoming CD.

Wasn't he on that Pavement tribute record with James Carter?

[kenny weir]

Yup I got sucked in big time by the Bolton/Ellington review! Good job, Ken, although I reckon you were aided by the fact that Bolton doing such an album would hardly surprise.

[jdw]

Here is the complete quote;

September 1987 Downbeat "auditions" section

Jose Loa, 17-year-old saxophonist, was born in Lima, Peru, and now lives in Denton, TX, where he will be enrolled at North Texas State University this fall. Loa gained invaluable guidance from his father, Jorge Loa, a bandleader and clarinetist in Peru. He began piano and ear-training lessons at age four, then heard Charlie Parker on "Cool Blues" and decided to switch to sax. Last summer he spent time in New York City studying the instrument with Arthur Blythe and Joe Henderson.

Loa has won the Allegre Award (roughly equivalent to the Louis Armstrong Jazz Award) at the Lima Jazz Festival, and he has performed with his father's orchestra, The Cruzan Kings. He now plays with various bands in Dallas, including the salsa band La-Forza. Loa, who credits his friend and fellow saxist James Farnsworth with encouraging him to move to the US, practices a minimum of eight hours a day.

- end quote -

I've only got a grainy photocopy of original article, so the Jose Loa Downbeat photo probably wouldn't be worth scanning and posting here. But he looks pretty angry in the photograph.

And my first organissimo post in four years has nothing to do with Ellington, Coltrane, or Shorter, but saxophone legend Jose Loa!

Viva Jose!

[JSngry]

Jose Loa was a fraud. The real talent in that competition was Poddy Pahpah, but Down Beat in those days was not above accepting sexual favors in return for positive consideration, so that's how that all went down.

[Tony Pusey]

I remember seeing Poddy at the Roundhouse in London, didnt find him more that a run of the mill tenor player, but for some reason his name stuck in my mind.

[JSngry]

Probably that omnipresent, beaming smile of his. The jazz world is poorer without it.

[Tony Pusey]

.....and he was a snappy dresser, not too many zoot suits were seen in Camden Town back then, a true fashion icon.

[JSngry]

And cheeks the size of Sophia Loren's breasts. No wonder that smile captivated all who knew him!

[Trumpet Guy]

This reminds me of my college Jazz pranks!

My buddy (jazz drummer/"singer") and I(trumpet player) sent in to Downbeat, for their yearly competition of School bands and individual soloists, a recording for the college division jazz vocal category. I had won for high school the year before, so we thought let's try the college one--except we recorded our songs over an Aebersold record--mixed to sound like they were our band. Now my friend was an excellent drummer, for his age, but his singing was funny---to awful...We gave him the name of Snorts Malibu and sent off the audition tape to Down Beat for their Dee -BEE Awards(?)...His style was to imitate a jazzy violinist w/ banter w/ his players...

So a bit later we learn that Downbeat has chosen our boy Snorts Malibu as best college vocalist in the US!! Unfortunately they called our teacher(Fred Berry--original tpt in Art Ensemble of Chicago) informing him of his student's honor--Fred--said Sh*&^&, I don't have no student named Snorts Malibu! End of honor...

[Tony Pusey]

We are talking about the same Poddy? The Albino one?

[JSngry]

We are talking about the same Poddy? The Albino one?

No man, that was his cousin, Paulie Pahpah. They were often confused. I should have caught that when you said tenor player. Poddy was a pure alto man.

Poddy was the one who was of a height that sort of defined where the exact border between being just really short and actually being a midget was. That short height, those bosomy cheeks, that one-of-a-kind-smile, the hair that he claimed wasn't modelled after the Kip's Big Boy (even though nobody believed him), and that tone that combined the acridity of Sonny Criss with the folksiness of Ace Cannon, well, it's no wonder that many seeked to ride on his coattails, to the point that when it came time for he himself to ride on them there were none left.

But right now, I'm listening to his VarVay album Sweedish Snaps, and I tell you, this is what it's all about, at least this part of it anyway.

[Tony Pusey]

Actually dont care too much for that Swedish Snaps album, much prefer the fourth volume in the series, Grappa for lovers, but all 17 volumes are worth aquiring.

[Shawn]

and that tone that combined the acridity of Sonny Criss with the folksiness of Ace Cannon

[umum_cypher]

That tone thing doesn't really come through on the Lonehill airshots CD.

The (uncredited) announcer cracks me up though. Does anyone recognise the voice?

[JSngry]

The (uncredited) announcer cracks me up though. Does anyone recognise the voice?

H. B. Kaltenborn

[Bill Nelson]

Otherwise known to millions by his stage name, 'Foghorn Leghorn'.