Dave Madden, Gail Madden, Bob Graettinger and Mulligan

[sgcim]

10 hours ago, JSngry said:

No, I'm pretty sure that's not her, either...

[JSngry]

Might be her daughter, though. Or niece.

[sgcim]

14 hours ago, JSngry said:

Might be her daughter, though. Or niece.

On 7/26/2019 at 2:25 PM, JSngry said:

No, I'm pretty sure that's not her, either...

I'm also pretty sure her kind probably didn't reproduce, but a niece is a possibility...

[sgcim]

I'm 169 pages into Carol Easton's "Straight Ahead: The Story of Stan Kenton", and the portrait she paints of Greattinger, from the quotes of Bill Holman, Kenton,Jan Rugolo, and especially Art Pepper, is fascinating. Graettinger didn't use music staff paper to write his scores, he used large pieces of graph paper(!), with tiny squares; 100 to the square inch, the top representing Maynard Ferguson, and the bottom representing the baritone sax player. "In many of the squares, he drew infinitesimal numbers, letters, circles, squares and hieroglyphics. decipherable only to himself. But the bulk of the squares reflected his life-long preoccupation with color; varying intensities of blue, orange,violet,red,green and yellowformed abstract pictures of sounds."

Kenton's presentation of City of Glass at the Chicago Civic Opera House in 1948, is worthy of Citizen Kane."When the last dissonant, nerve-jangling notes died away, the capacity audience sat thereas though turned to stone- baffled, confused, silent. After a long, frozen moment, Stan jumped up from the piano, gestured for the musicians to take a bow, and turned to the audience with both armshigh in the air, indicating that what they'd heard was something great, and it was over. Obediently, they stood and cheered."

Kenton is quoted as saying (about Graettinger's music): "His music is great! I know it's great! No doubt in my mind!" But he'd confess to friends, "I don't know if his music is genius, or just a bunch of crap."

[JSngry]

The Easton book, if it's the one I'm thinking about, also describes how Graettinger subsisted soley on raw eggs or some weirdass shit like that, and never slept. "You can sleep when you're dead", supposedly.

Graetinger's music holds up, imo, holds up very, very well. (i think it's the Easton book where somebody talked about how Graettinger drew a tree, and by god,, it ended up sounding like a tree...take that for what it's worth, but everytime I hear it, I hear structure, direction, intent, all that good stuff, trees be damned).

But imo, that reaction by Kenton is an indicator of where Stan Kenton (the individual, not the brand-name or the organization) really stood musically. He didn't know, and he didn't really care. He just got tickled by the spectacle he was enabling.

[sgcim]

1 minute ago, JSngry said:

The Easton book, if it's the one I'm thinking about, also describes how Graettinger subsisted soley on raw eggs or some weirdass shit like that, and never slept. "You can sleep when you're dead", supposedly.

Graetinger's music holds up, imo, holds up very, very well. (i think it's the Easton book where somebody talked about how Graettinger drew a tree, and by god,, it ended up sounding like a tree...take that for what it's worth, but everytime I hear it, I hear structure, direction, intent, all that good stuff, trees be damned).

But imo, that reaction by Kenton is an indicator of where Stan Kenton (the individual, not the brand-name or the organization) really stood musically. He didn't know, and he didn't really care. He just got tickled by the spectacle he was enabling.

I'm 169 pages into Carol Easton's "Straight Ahead: The Story of Stan Kenton", and the portrait she paints of Greattinger, from the quotes of Bill Holman, Kenton,Jan Rugolo, and especially Art Pepper, is fascinating. Graettinger didn't use music staff paper to write his scores, he used large pieces of graph paper(!), with tiny squares; 100 to the square inch, the top representing Maynard Ferguson, and the bottom representing the baritone sax player. "In many of the squares, he drew infinitesimal numbers, letters, circles, squares and hieroglyphics. decipherable only to himself. But the bulk of the squares reflected his life-long preoccupation with color; varying intensities of blue, orange,violet,red,green and yellowformed abstract pictures of sounds."

Kenton's presentation of City of Glass at the Chicago Civic Opera House in 1948, is worthy of Citizen Kane."When the last dissonant, nerve-jangling notes died away, the capacity audience sat thereas though turned to stone- baffled, confused, silent. After a long, frozen moment, Stan jumped up from the piano, gestured for the musicians to take a bow, and turned to the audience with both armshigh in the air, indicating that what they'd heard was something great, and it was over. Obediently, they stood and cheered."

Kenton is quoted as saying (about Graettinger's music): "His music is great! I know it's great! No doubt in my mind!" But he'd confess to friends, "I don't know if his music is genius, or just a bunch of crap."

Yeah, but all this shit would make a great Coen Brothers movie. 

[JSngry]

Indeed it might!

[Larry Kart]

1 hour ago, JSngry said:

The Easton book, if it's the one I'm thinking about, also describes how Graettinger subsisted soley on raw eggs or some weirdass shit like that, and never slept. "You can sleep when you're dead", supposedly.

Graetinger's music holds up, imo, holds up very, very well. (i think it's the Easton book where somebody talked about how Graettinger drew a tree, and by god,, it ended up sounding like a tree...take that for what it's worth, but everytime I hear it, I hear structure, direction, intent, all that good stuff, trees be damned).

But imo, that reaction by Kenton is an indicator of where Stan Kenton (the individual, not the brand-name or the organization) really stood musically. He didn't know, and he didn't really care. He just got tickled by the spectacle he was enabling.

"Graetinger's music holds up, imo, holds up very, very well."

I agree. 

[sgcim]

I finally hit pay dirt when Bill Crow sent me this picture today of Gail Madden with Mulligan in NYC, when he couldn't afford to rent out a rehearsal studio, and decided to hold the rehearsal outdoors in Central Park. She's the woman standing closest to Gerry, quietly observing the band, trying to decide at which point in the arrangement her Maracas would be most effective.

Bill remembers her as a normal looking woman, but very strong-willed, as she tried to put together the Jazz Junkies Hospital, with Bird as her first client.

The picture is very blurry, even when you blow it up:

[JSngry]

Mulligan sure looked like his mother!

https://www.gerrymulligan.com/autobiography/

[Quasimado]

10 hours ago, sgcim said:

The picture is very blurry, even when you blow it up:

 

No pic

[JSngry]

 

That's what I see here.

[sgcim]

6 hours ago, JSngry said:

 

That's what I see here.

I right clicked on the image Bill sent me as an e-mail and clicked on 'copy image', and then pasted it here. What should I have done?

[JSngry]

First, save the image, then upload it here. Do that by selecting "My Attachments" from the dropdown that comes from your login name/profile. Mine's in the upper right of the page, but on your phone, it might be elsewhere.

After that, click the "Insert other media" button in the open posting box & engage the "insert existing attachment" process.

It's not the simplest process in the world, but without a URL for the image, that's how it works.

Let me know via PM if you'd like further assistance. It would mean sending me the photo to upload here, but I'm a safe, decent guy, some perceptions to the contrary!

[sgcim]

22 hours ago, sgcim said:

I finally hit pay dirt when Bill Crow sent me this picture today of Gail Madden with Mulligan in NYC, when he couldn't afford to rent out a rehearsal studio, and decided to hold the rehearsal outdoors in Central Park. She's the woman standing closest to Gerry, quietly observing the band, trying to decide at which point in the arrangement her Maracas would be most effective.

Bill remembers her as a normal looking woman, but very strong-willed, as she tried to put together the Jazz Junkies Hospital, with Bird as her first client.

The picture is very blurry, even when you blow it up:

Let me know if that worked. see above.

[JSngry]

Yes, that worked!

[JSngry]

That picture looks like what so much of Mulligan's writing sounds like. Marvelous photo!

[Larry Kart]

40 minutes ago, JSngry said:

That picture looks like what so much of Mulligan's writing sounds like. Marvelous photo!

Also like what Brookmeyer's "Open Country" sounds like. Always found that line dangerously catchy and very representative of the early Brookmeyer's melodic and rhythmic traits.

[Big Beat Steve]

Sadly, that photograph is so tiniest of tiny (at least the way it displays here) that that lady could be just anybody ...

 

 

[JSngry]

and you could be anybody, so could I, so could we all!

Large thoughts, from Fred Small.

I believe that Gayle Madden left a lot of maracalove behind when she's was done, so measure twice, cut once!

[sgcim]

2 hours ago, JSngry said:

and you could be anybody, so could I, so could we all!

Large thoughts, from Fred Small.

I believe that Gayle Madden left a lot of maracalove behind when she's was done, so measure twice, cut once!

Yeah, she brought the maracas to a whole new level. There are Maracas clubs all over the world today, thanks to Gail. Bill said he heard she was last in Seattle; that would account for the proliferation of Jazz Junkie Hospitals and Maracas Clubs reported there.

It's a shame you can't really make out her face; she could be either a beautiful woman (she did work as a model and one of those camera girls in clubs in NYC), or she could be a very nerdy-looking woman. Bill said she was normal looking. She let her freak flag fly when she got back with her friends in California, Carol Easton said she would dress up like a man, wear two different types of shoes,- an early version of a hippie freak.

[Niko]

https://jazzprofiles.blogspot.com/2022/01/gale-madden-randy-l-smith.html?m=1

No time to read this now myself but it looks interesting

[romualdo]

9 hours ago, Niko said:

https://jazzprofiles.blogspot.com/2022/01/gale-madden-randy-l-smith.html?m=1

No time to read this now myself but it looks interesting

just read it & a truly fascinating (& thorough) article - still difficult to say if she really was a fabulist (an impressive one at that, if so) or how much truth lies in her amazing anecdotes

[Randy L. Smith]

Quote

I knew Gail Madden and interviewed her in 2002. I wrote a long piece on her that is included in my book, Talking Jazz: Profiles, Interviews and Musings from Tacoma to Kansai. Fascinating story! Book is available on Amazon. Randy L. Smith

 

[sgcim]

On 12/12/2022 at 7:51 AM, Randy L. Smith said:

 

Wow! When I started this thread, I knew it was going to be interesting, but not on the level of Randy's fascinating article. I read the whole piece in absolute amazement. Is there any further information on the unbelievable Gail Madden (McNulty?) in your book "Talking Jazz..." that isn't in that amazing piece Niko posted from "Jazz Profiles". or is it a condensation of that piece?

That photo of her with Terry Gibbs and Manny Albam is much better than the one I got from Bill Crow, and gives a better idea of what type of person she was. She comes off as a woman who was no shrinking violet, and who probably did do at least some of the things she claimed to do. Also, she was no 'music whore' like Ralph J. Gleason, who just shook off jazz as soon as rock offered him a bigger paycheck and larger role in the youth culture, even though she was not a music journalist. She seemed to be a serious jazz/blues lover, and musician. It seemed a little eerie when she started to talk about music being related to Pythagoras, whom Judee Sill listed as one of her strongest musical influences, as well as Ray Charles(!) and Bach.

However, we have Sill's recordings as proof of her musical talent, and we have only maracas for Madden...LOL