Frank Foster

[Teasing the Korean]

[JSngry]

What a great story! What an odd book, it looks like?

[Teasing the Korean]

1 minute ago, JSngry said:

What a great story! What an odd book, it looks like?

Not sure where it is from.  It looks like some sort of introduction to jazz kind of book, but it is hard to tell from one page! 

We should probably move this to the "Jazz in Print" sub-forum.  If you agree, feel free to move it.

[Peter Friedman]

10 minutes ago, Teasing the Korean said:

Love it !!!!

[JSngry]

Wondering who that "young tenor player" might have been...if it was the Loud Minority band, that's one thing. But if it was a small group, why would Frank Foster hire a tenor player?

Also wondering what "avant-garde" movement it was that started in the "early fifties" that was "so eager" to no longer play changes? Who was that, exactly?

Sorry, but a great story and a true story are not the same thing, so....forensics, ok?

[Teasing the Korean]

It apparently is something that Wynton Marsalis wrote.  I guess a broken clock is right twice a day.

[JSngry]

But not if it's broken in such a way that the hands keep aimlessly moving and the cuckoo is always blabbering.

[Teasing the Korean]

3 minutes ago, JSngry said:

But not if it's broken in such a way that the hands keep aimlessly moving and the cuckoo is always blabbering.

Haha!

[JSngry]

Still, great story, if possibly apocryphal...

I mean it doesn't have to be Frank Foster, it doesn't have to be a young tenor player, it doesn't have to be on the Jazzmobile in Harlem...it could be anybody anywhere at any time. It's variant on the Jo Jones throwing the cymbal at Bird story, only that one seems to be true, probably.

The whole "avant-garde" movement it was that started in the "early fifties" that was "so eager" to no longer play changes  thing...if I was a police investigator, that one would get me on the case right away. Who the fuck is he talking about?

He's not a confused man, but he is a pseudo-educated man, at least when it comes to the music he pays himself to "defend".

 

[Rooster_Ties]

Far as Frank Foster goes, I sure am fond of Manhattan Fever — along with it’s previously unreleased sister-session also for Blue Note (the bonus material on the CD reissue of Manhattan Fever). And I seem to recall Garnett Brown really shines on a few tracks on the original album.

But I have to confess that those are the only Frank Foster leader-dates I have, or have ever heard. But on paper, it looks like The Loud Minority is maybe the next most obvious choice for me at some point.

Edited September 18, 2021 by Rooster_Ties

[mjzee]

I have some forgettable Frank Foster - Frank Wess albums.  I always thought of him as an "older-style" musician, a little stiffer, more like a Basie soloist.  Was always surprised to see his association with Elvin Jones.  I guess they were friends from Detroit, but still, Elvin's use of Foster meant the guy was on the ball.

[Teasing the Korean]

2 minutes ago, mjzee said:

I have some forgettable Frank Foster - Frank Wess albums.  I always thought of him as an "older-style" musician, a little stiffer, more like a Basie soloist.  Was always surprised to see his association with Elvin Jones.  I guess they were friends from Detroit, but still, Elvin's use of Foster meant the guy was on the ball.

But can you rock a turtleneck and love beads as well as Frank Foster can?

[JSngry]

I read an interview with Foster somewhere where he talked about the shock he fet when coming off the Basie gig after all those years. It was a very cocooned existence, so getting off the bus and into reality and hearing everything that had changed since the last time he really paid attention was a pretty big shock to his system. ESPECIALLY Coltrane, he said it was like, oh shit, I gotta start all over now...so he did. He did the work and figured out the math. I have a lot of respect for him, because of that. He didn't have to, he had a name, a rep, a brand, he could have just rode that of into the sunset, but he decided to do some more work, some new learning.

[Daniel A]

Foster with George Coleman in Elvin Jones' group:

 

[mjzee]

2 hours ago, Teasing the Korean said:

But can you rock a turtleneck and love beads as well as Frank Foster can?

No one can.

[JSngry]

Except Norman Rockwell.

[Teasing the Korean]

29 minutes ago, JSngry said:

Except Norman Rockwell.

Norman Rockwell doing poster art for Italian giallos?!?

[JSngry]

I know, brave new world, right?

[Ken Dryden]

I’ve read that Jazzmobile story somewhere else, maybe Jazz Anecdotes?

[HutchFan]

On 9/18/2021 at 5:03 PM, mjzee said:

I have some forgettable Frank Foster - Frank Wess albums.

Wow.  That surprises me, mjzee.

Are you referring to these?!?

If so, "forgettable" would be the last word I use to describe them.  I love these records. 

Admittedly, I think Foster was/is always interesting, throughout his career.

Just my 2 cents, of course.   

 

 

On 9/18/2021 at 5:29 PM, JSngry said:

I read an interview with Foster somewhere where he talked about the shock he fet when coming off the Basie gig after all those years. It was a very cocooned existence, so getting off the bus and into reality and hearing everything that had changed since the last time he really paid attention was a pretty big shock to his system. ESPECIALLY Coltrane, he said it was like, oh shit, I gotta start all over now...so he did. He did the work and figured out the math. I have a lot of respect for him, because of that. He didn't have to, he had a name, a rep, a brand, he could have just rode that of into the sunset, but he decided to do some more work, some new learning.

I like that ... and it makes complete sense because you can hear it, how Foster's sound evolved on record. 

He grew and changed but he was still distinctly himself.

 

 

On 9/19/2021 at 8:42 PM, Ken Dryden said:

I’ve read that Jazzmobile story somewhere else, maybe Jazz Anecdotes?

Yeah, I've come across it somewhere before too.  ... Crow's book sounds like a likely candidate. 

 

Edited September 20, 2021 by HutchFan

[Rooster_Ties]

On 9/18/2021 at 4:29 PM, JSngry said:

I read an interview with Foster somewhere where he talked about the shock he fet when coming off the Basie gig after all those years. It was a very cocooned existence, so getting off the bus and into reality and hearing everything that had changed since the last time he really paid attention was a pretty big shock to his system. ESPECIALLY Coltrane, he said it was like, oh shit, I gotta start all over now...so he did. He did the work and figured out the math.

SO, how can we find that interview?? I’d be curious to see it, the section you cite in particular.

Have to confess, I think other than those two sessions for Blue Note — and most of the bunch of side-man work he did with Elvin Jones — I don’t think I’ve heard much else by or with Foster, and I’ve probably (mostly) slept on him, I’m afraid.

Edited September 20, 2021 by Rooster_Ties

[JSngry]

29 minutes ago, Rooster_Ties said:

SO, how can we find that interview?? I’d be curious to see it, the section you cite in particular.

Have to confess, I think other than those two sessions for Blue Note — and most of the bunch of side-man work he did with Elvin Jones — I don’t think I’ve heard much else by or with Foster, and I’ve probably (mostly) slept on him, I’m afraid.

It was in some hyper-local NYC jazz street paper that I picked up in 1979(?). I still have it, but the paper was so cheap and is now so brittle that I'm loath to pull it out to scan.

[Kevin Bresnahan]

1 hour ago, Rooster_Ties said:

SO, how can we find that interview?? I’d be curious to see it, the section you cite in particular.

Have to confess, I think other than those two sessions for Blue Note — and most of the bunch of side-man work he did with Elvin Jones — I don’t think I’ve heard much else by or with Foster, and I’ve probably (mostly) slept on him, I’m afraid.

I really liked that Frank & Frank session "Two For The Blues" but my favorite leader date would be "Leo Rising" on the Arabesque label from 1997. I've never seen their Concord recording, "Frankly Speaking", on LP or CD. Strangely, it appears to have only be released on CD in Japan one time back in the late 80's and never since.

I tried catching Frank live for several years but he didn't seem to come through Boston.

[HutchFan]

7 hours ago, Rooster_Ties said:

Have to confess, I think other than those two sessions for Blue Note — and most of the bunch of side-man work he did with Elvin Jones — I don’t think I’ve heard much else by or with Foster, and I’ve probably (mostly) slept on him, I’m afraid.

Rab,

I think a lot of people have overlooked Frank Foster, including me! -- until I "discovered" him while I was working on my 70s jazz project.  

If you're up for suggestions, my highly subjective list of Foster essentials would include:

- Count Basie - April in Paris (with Foster's biggest hit, "Shiny Stockings") and Chairman of the Board

- Frank Foster's Loud Minority Big Band - Well Water (Piadrum), which includes Foster's wonderful composition, "Simone"

- Frank Foster's Living Color: Twelve Shades of Black - For All Intents and Purposes (Leo)

- Mickey Tucker - Mister Mysterious (Muse)

- Horace Parlan - Frank-ly Speaking (SteepleChase) - with Foster and Frank Strozier

- Frank Foster & Frank Wess - Frankly Speaking (Concord)

- Frank Foster - Leo Rising (Arabesque)

 

Great enjoyment awaits you.   

 

Edited September 21, 2021 by HutchFan
misremembered the name of an LP

[Rooster_Ties]

1 hour ago, JSngry said:

It was in some hyper-local NYC jazz street paper that I picked up in 1979(?). I still have it, but the paper was so cheap and is now so brittle that I'm loath to pull it out to scan.

Schrodinger's jazz article.