Tubby Hayes/Jimmy Raney-Attila Zoller Duo

[Larry Kart]

Parts of that Hayes-Nistico interview are very poignant, if I can use that word. It's hard to be jazz musician, especially when, like these two guys, you were real good when you were young and now you've been doing that thing for a good while.

Also I love Sal's last phrase in this exchange:

HAYES: Right So you’ve always played a Conn, eh?

NISTICO: Well, before that I had a Buescher. Which is a good sound but boy, it’s a big feeling in the fingers, getting around it The Conn is the same principle blowing–wise -- like, you blow and it feels like the metal is spreading.

[JSngry]

Parts of that Hayes-Nistico interview are very poignant, if I can use that word.

I've long been aware of that interview, and poignant is exactly the right word, especially where Sal talks about getting away from the "big band tenor soloist" role. Knowing how his life played out post-Herman ("not pretty" is all that needs to be said, and yeah, thanks to "the usual suspects"), it's like he had done that "thing" for so long that it had burned something into his psyche that he couldn't lose, but that he never wanted to accept either, and as a result he spent the rest of his life trying to run from something from which there was no hiding, musically and personally.

There is one side, an Enja thing from 1988:

where Sal seems to finally have found that "center" within himself that has nothing to do with the countless (literally) nights he spent standing up and running rhythm changes faster than hell on "Apple Honey". blues changes faster than hell on "Caledonia", and in genral just having to pop up and blow energy on demand no matter what might have been (or not have been) going on inside him. Here, he finally sounds as if those demons (real or imagined) aren't puirsuing him any more, and "poignant" it is, and in no small measure.

Thing is, he was really, really good at that Big Band Tenor thing. Really good. But maybe too good for his own good. Looking at him in that picture (that's him in the center) is as potentially upsetting as Woody Shaw's cover photo on the Muse LP of Setting Standards.

[Larry Kart]

This latish (1988) Nistico album, Empty Room, with a very good Italian rhythm section, also sounds like Sal finally found that center within himself:

http://www.amazon.com/Empty-Room-Sal-Nisti...t/dp/B000000G4T

Samples can be heard.

[JSngry]

Yeah, I got that one, and it's good like you say, but that Porter-Praskin thing is something else entirely, trust me.

[Chuck Nessa]

Guess I not really suprised this thread "went the tenor way" BUT the Raney/Zoller stuff is wonderful. Thanks.

[Larry Kart]

Guess I not really suprised this thread "went the tenor way" BUT the Raney/Zoller stuff is wonderful. Thanks.

I wondered why Free For All and Joe G. were about the only ones who responded to it. When I die, if I go to heaven, I'll be listening to Raney/Zoller.

[Larry Kart]

Yeah, I got that one, and it's good like you say, but that Porter-Praskin thing is something else entirely, trust me.

Just ordered it.

[JSngry]

Guess I not really suprised this thread "went the tenor way" BUT the Raney/Zoller stuff is wonderful. Thanks.

I wondered why Free For All and Joe G. were about the only ones who responded to it. When I die, if I go to heaven, I'll be listening to Raney/Zoller.

Around these parts, the "wire choir" sound is one that seldom (never?) reaches this level, whereas tenor players, hey, we've had some damn good tenor players.

It's cold & rainy here, and I be hongry (soon to be remedied). Them tenor thing the "comfort food" right now, and truthfully, usually. The other thing...just not in the mood for that much "rumination" right now. Certainly not the "fault" of Mssrs. Zoller & Rainey.

[Chuck Nessa]

Elsewhere, things be different.

I thought this was about "music".

[JSngry]

"music" it is.

[Chuck Nessa]

Well EXCUSE ME.

[JSngry]

[Chuck Nessa]

Not really good enough.

[Guest Bill Barton]

Zoller ran a summer jazz camp up in Massachusetts back in the late 1980s, as I recall; I stopped in once to see Bob Mover when he was doing some teaching there - Zoller was a very nice man, and could really play; a few years later I was working in a "free" quartet that had Steve Goldberg on trumpet, I was on alto, Andy Shapiro on synth, this guy Gagnon on something or other (funny, I can't remember what he played) - Zoller heard us and was very interested in having us play somewhere with his group, he even talked about touring, so I called him up; he was perfectly nice in generalities, as soon as I tried to ask about specific dates he got very strange, accused me of "hustling" him, and hung up on me - I had no idea what I had said -

ahhh, I love the music business -

Attila Zoller was also, as I recall, involved with The Vermont Jazz Center. When I was living in Vermont I unfortunately only got a chance to hear him live once, with Don Friedman, Fred Haas & ?. He was indeed a superb player and is greatly missed.

Steve Goldberg? I'll be darned. Used to hear him all the time when I lived in Burlington... And it's always nice to see Andy Shapiro getting a mention; the man is a legend in Vermont. Was it maybe Bob Gagnon on guitar?

I'd been very busy with other things for a few days and only now got a chance to check out this thread. Wow! That Raney/Zoller duo is phenomenal!!!!! It's like two guys, twenty fingers and one brain.

Thank you very, very much for that link, Larry.

Edited January 24, 2008 by Bill Barton

[Niko]

Zoller ran a summer jazz camp up in Massachusetts back in the late 1980s, as I recall; I stopped in once to see Bob Mover when he was doing some teaching there - Zoller was a very nice man, and could really play; a few years later I was working in a "free" quartet that had Steve Goldberg on trumpet, I was on alto, Andy Shapiro on synth, this guy Gagnon on something or other (funny, I can't remember what he played) - Zoller heard us and was very interested in having us play somewhere with his group, he even talked about touring, so I called him up; he was perfectly nice in generalities, as soon as I tried to ask about specific dates he got very strange, accused me of "hustling" him, and hung up on me - I had no idea what I had said -

ahhh, I love the music business -

Attila Zoller was also, as I recall, involved with The Vermont Jazz Center. When I was living in Vermont I unfortunately only got a chance to hear him live once, with Don Friedman, Fred Haas & ?. He was indeed a superb player and is greatly missed.

Steve Goldberg? I'll be darned. Used to hear him all the time when I lived in Burlington... And it's always nice to see Andy Shapiro getting a mention; the man is a legend in Vermont. Was it maybe Bob Gagnon on guitar?

I'd been very busy with other things for a few days and only now got a chance to check out this thread. Wow! That Raney/Zoller duo is phenomenal!!!!! It's like two guys, twenty fingers and one brain.

Thank you very, very much for that link, Larry.

googling because my student didn't come

seems like there are musicians Bob Gagnon and Bill Gagnon in Vermont

http://www.vermontmusicshop.com/catalog/vmls-catalog.htm

both are on this list, but bill is listed for a duo album with steve goldberg... bill plays cello and bass, bob guitar as it seems...

and then there's this guy in Massachusetts

http://www.bobgagnon.com/

"When you call Bob Gagnon plumbing and heating you get Bob Gagnon"

Edited January 24, 2008 by Niko