Rod Levitt

[Larry Kart]

If you like Rod Levitt, you might want to check out Lyle Murphy. I have two of his albums on my i-Pod, "Gone With the Woodwinds" and "New Orbits in Sound". Murphy is not as "off plumb" as Levitt, but I find him to be pretty interesting, much in the manner of Levitt. There's some echoes of both Gil Melle and George Russell in each of their compositions.

Up over and out.

By "echoes" you might not have meant anything about who came first, but Murphy (b. 1908) was a prominent arranger in the 1930s for the likes of Benny Goodman and Glen Gray -- when Russell and Melle and Levitt were in kneepants. BTW, I myself don't mean that Murphy influenced them.

[Teasing the Korean]

I had "Solid Ground" on RCA, and while I thought it had its moments, the arrangements overall really didn't grab me. I ended up burning an exotic sounding number onto a CD-R though before I unloaded it.

[JSngry]

Finally got around to checking out Rod Levitt this week, had long had The Arrangers and was intrigued, but just never went there. No good reason, just never did.

But this week, checked out the Riverside/OJC and the EuroMusiPorn 2-fer (paid for with store credit/trade in, so...I didn't really BUY that, did I?......?

Anyway, wow. Holy shit wow. For real. The detail in this writing is...profound. Choices made that only the guy writing it would have had to have heard for anybody to think of, if that makes any sense. No genericisms, or very, very arch use of them if/when they occur, commentary, not coasting. Meaningful, purposeful, specific statements. To make an at best incomplete analogy, if Billy May in the 50s wrote like he was getting paid by the note, Rod Levitt wrote like he was getting paid by the idea, and oh yeah, no small bills or loose change, please.

And I kinda get the above points about the lack of strong soloists, but also kind don't find that a problem there, because the pieces aren't really presented like that's the object of the game. So, yeah, on the one hand, the whole traditional jazz is an improvior's art thing, and on the other hand, writing is, in theory, as personal expression as anything else so, which one trumps? AFAIC, fuck it, that's not a choice I'm going to make. Music either speaks clearly in a personal voice or it doesn't. Period. And shit, did Rod Levitt's writing speak in a personal voice.

Beside, Rolf Ericson gets off some things on the RCA material that kinda come out of nowhere as far as what "Rolf Ericson" means to me. And the bass/drum tandem swings at ALL times, deeply and truly.

As for the writing itself, yes, Ellington seems to be the primary motivator, but I also hear some sounds of other writers of the time, Thad Jones, Oliver Nelson, and Slide Hampton, sometimes very explicitly. I never take this as "copying" but rather "observing", as if Levitt might have been working at Radio City, but he was one of those guys for whom a gig like that kept his ears open to stay alive rather than closing them to keep from dieing..I totally get that, and I totally get that a band like this gives this music a lot more organic voice than would the same charts played by The Usual Suspects. Not that I find fault with the latter group, they were masters at going into a studio, reading the shit down, and giving an expert voice all its/their own, but I think that Levitt wanted a different voice than that, a quieter and perhaps less "cocky" voice, and lord knows he got it out of this band.

Also, a personal trip to see/hear Gene Allen on this...I first came to know Gene Allen on the Glen Miller AAF RCA box, my folks had that, and I knew about it before a LOT of things. and then, one of the very first 10 or so jazz LPs I bought, Benny Goodman Moscow side, again with Gene Allen on bari. So I'm thinking, Gene Allen JAZZ STAR, and all that, only soon to find out blahblahblah...but hearing him here, one helluva musician, as are all the players in this band. sometimes people look at people like this and say oh yeah, highly competent player but...and NO, not at this level, its more than that, people who keep the discipline and do the work to get THIS kind of good...minimize that and you minimize human dignity, I think, and there's too much of that as it is.

Along those same lines...Bill Crow in the booklet for the EuroMusiPorn disc kinda...rankles with his tone, he's talking about how he first met Levitt at his college, and they hung out/jammed in Seattle and so far so good, but then:

I kept hearing about Rod, but when he came to New York, he didn't hang with the same people I was interested in at that time. Whenever we crossed paths, we had a nice reunion, and he called me to play on a couple of his projects, which I enjoyed very much. I like his playing and his writing, and always appreciated his sunny disposition.

Honest enough (very honest, I think), and not at all negative, but also, that's the problem with music as a "profession" right there - too often, and especially as the stakes get higher, curiosity devolves into the tunnel-visioned interest that derives from hanging out with your peers, who are, of course, the people you work with all the time. On the one hand, natural tribalism based on common experiences, but on the other hand, dammit, I think about a cat like Lew Sollof (RIP) and you'd never tell where he'd turn up, but you can bet that he came to PLAY, no matter who it was with or where it was, and no matter the social/professional ramifications. It seems like he was proactive about staying in a lot of different loops, not to keep working (although that) but also, just because, to keep playing, to keep himself fresh and frisky. It would not have surprised me at all to see Lew Sollof in a Rod Levitt band, if the chronology would have allowed for that.

Anyway...

Yes to Rod Levitt, please, and the one album left is 42nd Street which is maybe scaring me a little because it was his last for the label and is all show tunes...was this a bit of a "last go" with the music adjusted for a little commercial buzz in hopes of keeping it going, or is this more of the same beautifully idiosyncratic onmiviewiousness as before?

[sgcim]

Rod was a big influence on me as a kid. I played in a kid's big band that was sponsored by the County, and led by a guy, who was a good friend of Rod's.

He got the County to commission pieces by guys like Rod and Manny Albam for performances at County sponsored concerts.

He wrote a great piece for the band called, "Babylon" which was similar to Tickle Toes. I wrote a tune based on the sax soli in it.

He showed up for the concert with his blonde bombshell wife, and seemed to be having a great time, laughing his head off.

He made a lot of money writing the theme song for Irish Spring soap.

"42nd St" is as good as the other LPs, and it even features a short vocal by RL at the end, bellowing out, "About a quarter till Nine!!!"

It comes out of nowhere, so it's pretty funny.

[Larry Kart]

Irish Spring Soap. Cool. I'll have to track down that jingle.

BTW, my father-in-law played the major role in the creation of the Pillsbury Dough Boy.

[JSngry]

Oh, two more influences I hear in Levitt's writing - George Russell and Raymond Scott.

[jlhoots]

Couldn't resist.

Bought the 2-fer CD.

[tomatamot]

Couldn't resist.

Bought the 2-fer CD.

I couldn`t resist these 4 Lp`s about 25 years ago. And I`m still love to play it.

[jlhoots]

Couldn't resist.

Bought the 2-fer CD.

I couldn`t resist these 4 Lp`s about 25 years ago. And I`m still love to play it.

Sold my vinyl long ago.

No more turntable.

[Larry Kart]

Lowdown on the creation of the Pillsbury Doughboy:

http://www.nytimes.com/1994/01/10/nyregion/chronicle-832219.html

A guy named Rudy Perz nabbed the credit (Perz was on the creative team at Leo Burnett that was working on the account), but my wife recalls seeing her Dad draw the Doughboy from scratch one night and saying the Manhattan equivalent of “Eureka!”

Actually that cry of discovery would have been uttered not in Manhattan but in Chicago, where my father-in-law worked for Leo Burnett for several years, but he is a totally NYC guy.

[clifford_thornton]

have all but 42nd Street, it seems. Revisiting Insight now - neat record.