Jazz with Wordless Vocals - Choruses or Single Voice

[Teasing the Korean]

I am a sucker for late 50s/early 60s jazz that uses a wordless vocal chorus.  It is such a hip sound.  It conveys a swinging-young-couple-in-the-city kind of vibe.

Here are some examples.

 

 

 

Edited July 27, 2021 by Teasing the Korean

[Teasing the Korean]

 

[Rabshakeh]

I am not 12, so I am not going to post Scatman John. But know that it took some self restraint.

Edited July 25, 2021 by Rabshakeh

[Teasing the Korean]

1 minute ago, Rabshakeh said:

I am not 12, so I am not going to post Scatman John. But know that it took some self restraint.

Don't know that, but it sounds like I should avoid it.

[Rabshakeh]

16 minutes ago, Teasing the Korean said:

Don't know that, but it sounds like I should avoid it.

It was a playground favourite in the 1990s in the UK, to the extent that people in their 30s and 40s still shout the chorus at you if you say you enjoy jazz even now.

[Teasing the Korean]

19 minutes ago, Rabshakeh said:

It was a playground favourite in the 1990s in the UK, to the extent that people in their 30s and 40s still shout the chorus at you if you say you enjoy jazz even now.

Thanks.  It sounds like I should listen to it once on the InterTubes, but will I ever be able to un-hear it?

[Rooster_Ties]

Keith Jarrett probably sings along with choruses, and not just verses — and he’s most assuredly wordless.

Edited July 25, 2021 by Rooster_Ties

[Teasing the Korean]

Just now, Rooster_Ties said:

Keith Jarrett probably sings along with choruses, and not just verses — and he’s most assuredly “wordless”.

I'm talking about professional singers providing an air of sophistication and elegance, not angry goats getting in the way of the music!  

[Rabshakeh]

14 minutes ago, Teasing the Korean said:

Thanks.  It sounds like I should listen to it once on the InterTubes, but will I ever be able to un-hear it?

I cannot guarantee anything. Time heals most wounds, but in my case, not Scatman John. That takes 40 years of Jungian therapy and some pricey Ayahuasca minibreaks.

[Teasing the Korean]

15 minutes ago, Rabshakeh said:

I cannot guarantee anything. Time heals most wounds, but in my case, not Scatman John. That takes 40 years of Jungian therapy and some pricey Ayahuasca minibreaks.

OK, I will avoid it, and express my gratitude for your sacrifice.

[JSngry]

 

[mikeweil]

There are two tracks with a choir on Milt Jackson's Vibrations LP:

 

[JSngry]

A better quality air:

 

[jlhoots]

Donald Byrd: A New Perspective

 

[danasgoodstuff]

44 minutes ago, jlhoots said:

Donald Byrd: A New Perspective

 

And his Tryin' to Get Home.  It was a BN thing for awhile.

Journeyman - YouTube   Freddie Roach, All That's Good

 

[Teasing the Korean]

3 hours ago, mikeweil said:

There are two tracks with a choir on Milt Jackson's Vibrations LP:

 

I have this, and forgot about it.  Thank you!

[sgcim]

How could you possibly forget the score you posted a month or two ago TTK? Taken from a Robert Sheckley short story, with Marcello and Ursula Undress:

Gabor Szabo recorded this one, and though it's not a chorus, it's got wordless vocals (like a lot of Gary McFarland things). I made up lyrics to it a long time ago about a swingin' 60s couple running into trouble, because the woman just couldn't get hip to the swingin' 60s decadent lifestyle:

 

[sgcim]

I do

Don't know if there are words to this one, but if there are, it's in French, and it might as well be wordless to me:

Then the SU came up with this one:

 

[Teasing the Korean]

4 hours ago, sgcim said:

How could you possibly forget the score you posted a month or two ago TTK? Taken from a Robert Sheckley short story, with Marcello and Ursula Undress:

Forget?  I just posted it the other day in the Euro Modernism thread in misc. music.  But yeah, let's add it here!

This one doesn't have that swingin'-young-couple-in-the-city jazz sound, as it dates from a few year's later, but it is a nice example of the Now Sound with wordless vocals.

 

13 hours ago, jlhoots said:

Donald Byrd: A New Perspective

Yes, and that album cover!

4 hours ago, sgcim said:

Gabor Szabo recorded this one, and though it's not a chorus, it's got wordless vocals (like a lot of Gary McFarland things). I made up lyrics to it a long time ago about a swingin' 60s couple running into trouble, because the woman just couldn't get hip to the swingin' 60s decadent lifestyle:

Which Gabor Szabo track are you referring to?  The video you linked is an entire two-album set.

[JSngry]

And then there's the Basie album with the Alan Copeland singers (a name we should all know, btw). It combines the wordless air of sophistication with a delightfully oppositional whaft of worded bullshit, resulting in a really unique physics that proves that even if the downbeats are the in the same place. the notes in between are from where the swing emanates, and two different worlds can exist on the same record without swinging at all by being in two totally incompatible places. BUT - it works when it does by recognizing that if notes are held instead of moved, the is no conflict in swing, which means that you can have totally groovy harmonies sung in an expert manner, especially when there's a female singer who sounds like she also did time with the Ray Conniff singers, and I don't men that in a bad way. She's a voice (well, actually they all are, collectively) that was pretty much omnipresent for a decade or two, and dammed if I know her name.

So, this record exists and is really annoying until it's not, and then it is splendid. But it doesn't quit while it's (barely) ahead, so I can't recommend it to anybody except really specialized specialists. But for them, hey, Basie, Green, Duvivier, and Ed Shaunessy lock it in and down, and are mixed up high enough (and the singers reverbed enough) that, yes, Bob Theile produced it for ABC-Paramount, and the lead track made something like #29 on the Billboard Easy Listening Singles chart, so...mission accomplished.

Oh, two Lockjaw solos at the end of the record!

TTK - you should probably drink a highball and sit in a meshnettingstriplawn chair for this one, but you can upgrade if you are able to tell me the name of the woman who takes lead on so many of these cuts...or of any of these other singers, really. They are definitely top-shelf and probably got rich as a result, because they did that in a time and a place where what they did was valued.

[Teasing the Korean]

2 hours ago, JSngry said:

And then there's the Basie album with the Alan Copeland singers (a name we should all know, btw). It combines the wordless air of sophistication with a delightfully oppositional whaft of worded bullshit, resulting in a really unique physics that proves that even if the downbeats are the in the same place. the notes in between are from where the swing emanates, and two different worlds can exist on the same record without swinging at all by being in two totally incompatible places. BUT - it works when it does by recognizing that if notes are held instead of moved, the is no conflict in swing, which means that you can have totally groovy harmonies sung in an expert manner, especially when there's a female singer who sounds like she also did time with the Ray Conniff singers, and I don't men that in a bad way. She's a voice (well, actually they all are, collectively) that was pretty much omnipresent for a decade or two, and dammed if I know her name.

So, this record exists and is really annoying until it's not, and then it is splendid. But it doesn't quit while it's (barely) ahead, so I can't recommend it to anybody except really specialized specialists. But for them, hey, Basie, Green, Duvivier, and Ed Shaunessy lock it in and down, and are mixed up high enough (and the singers reverbed enough) that, yes, Bob Theile produced it for ABC-Paramount, and the lead track made something like #29 on the Billboard Easy Listening Singles chart, so...mission accomplished.

Oh, two Lockjaw solos at the end of the record!

TTK - you should probably drink a highball and sit in a meshnettingstriplawn chair for this one, but you can upgrade if you are able to tell me the name of the woman who takes lead on so many of these cuts...or of any of these other singers, really. They are definitely top-shelf and probably got rich as a result, because they did that in a time and a place where what they did was valued.

Don't know this record!  Was it a New York or Hollywood session?

[JSngry]

I'm thinking New York?

LP copies are plentiful-ish and cheap. Of course, I blogged mine, because free seemed about as much as I wanted to pay.

But you know this session singer stuff, pocket aside, this is a really good group singing here.

[Teasing the Korean]

1 minute ago, JSngry said:

I'm thinking New York?

LP copies are plentiful-ish and cheap. Of course, I blogged mine, because free seemed about as much as I wanted to pay.

But you know this session singer stuff, pocket aside, this is a really good group singing here.

I would have guessed New York, as a lot of ABC Paramount records from that era were done in New York.  For vocal session work, singers tended to work only in New York or only in LA, unless they moved.

Vocal sessions in those days generally relied on a pool of available singers.  Each group leader had his A list and B list, and a lot of it came down to who was available on that particular day.  I will have to listen to this album to see if I can identify the singer you refer to. 

[JSngry]

Not on you Tube, but on some off-brand Roku station there's an episode of a Dinah Shore S&H Green Stamps show from 1962(?) where Dinah sings "Everyday I Have The Blues" backed by a vocal group that replicates the Basie arrangement (was it Ernie Wilkins, I forget...) in large part, with a featured female singer doing a high note trumpet thing that is just CRAZYMAD skills..."swing" is besides the point at this level. and she sings a lot like the same singer here. But who knows.

Those type skills, I enjoy them for the skills. Top-level, hardcore skills. Usually don't enjoy the music as much as the skills, but sometimes music isso NOT the point of it for me. the skills are.

[Teasing the Korean]

One of the best albums along these lines is an obscure - can't find it on YouTube - album of Mancini tunes by George Wilkins and Group I.  It is an RCA album from the mid-1960s, but it sits squarely in 1959 stylistically.   I don't know if they ever did anything else like it.  

Russ Garcia - Wow! (literally)

 

Armando Trovajoli - Seven Golden Men

 

Kenyon Hopkins from Mr.  Buddwing:

 

Bob Thompson's three RCA albums generally fit into this vibe.  Like a jazzier version of Ray Conniff: