Hank Mobley… middleweight champion of the tenor

BY BENSON IDONIJE
WHEN the great critic, Leonard Feather described Hank Mobley as “the middle weight champion of the tenor,” he did not mean it in a pejorative sense. It was not intended to rubbish Mobley’s musicianship, neither was it intended to denigrate his efforts. It was a mere metaphorical phrase to describe the quality and situation of Hank Mobley’s tenor saxophone in relation to the others.
As a critic, Leonard Feather was only trying to paint a vivid picture as a means of expressing himself. Yet, it has come to be construed implicitly as meaning lightweight in both sound and content. And this is sad, considering the legendary stature of Mobley on the instrument.
Feather dubbed Mobley the middleweight champion of the tenor because his tone fell between that of Rollins at the heavy end and Lester Young at the other. All of these musicians have their brilliant qualities, depending on the ideas driven into the saxophone. True, the intensity of the sound and its tonal concept are important, but these qualities appeal to people in different ways. Paul Desmond of the Dave Brubeck Quartet had a light tone on the alto saxophone and was admired by many people.
Maybe this is carrying the argument to a ridiculous extreme, but let’s come to terms with the tenor saxophone where Mobley was rated highly, ranking shoulder to shoulder with some of the tenor giants.
It would be wrong however to compare Mobley with Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders and the likes as tenor titan, but he could certainly hold his own alongside pretty much anyone else. His tone was lighter than any of them including Lester Young, yet it was substantial enough for his purposes. In a number of respects, it was similar to early ’50s Rollins, though it was round rather than big, self possessed rather than assertive, warmly smooth rather than brightly burnished.
Lacking in opinion of their own, several critics have denied Hank Mobley a place in the company of tenor greats. In my opinion, Mobley is one of the most lyrical saxophonists I have ever heard. I have been listening to him from the days of the Jazz Messengers when he occupied the tenor saxophone chair with Horace Silver on piano; Jackie McLean, alto saxophone and Donald Byrd on trumpet. He created brilliant phrases as a soloist. He sang into his horn.
In addition to the misconception that Feather created with the metaphorical expression, Miles Davis, who was difficult to please, also contributed to this unfair assessment of Hank Mobley who was one of a series of caretakers of the saxophone post in Davis’ quintet after the departure of John Coltrane. There was the often-reported occasion on which, during one of Mobley’s solos, Davis peered out at the audience and announced, “Any time Sonny Rollins shows up with his horn, he’s got the job.” Davis was quoted as saying in later years in his auto biography, “the music was starting to bore me because I didn’t like what Mobley was doing in the band, he didn’t stimulate my imagination.”
I guess this says more about Miles Davis than Mobley, who successfully stimulated the imagination of devotees like me and fellow musicians such as Benny Golson, the great composer of I remember Clifford, a tribute to the trumpeter Clifford Brown and a song that has become a classic. Mobley was greatly admired by a host of other musicians including the trumpeter, Donald Byrd who rated Mobley alongside Rollins. Mobley was also adored by the management of Blue Note, for whom he made numerous fine albums as both leader and sideman.
Never the most patient of men, Miles Davis was always in the process of reaching out restlessly to higher levels of creativity, an obsession which in fact almost blinded him to the reality of the authentic jazz played by his sidemen. He was also still bitter about John Coltrane who had left to form his memorable quartet of himself on tenor and soprano saxophone; McCoy Tyner, piano; Jimmy Garrison, bass; Elvin Jones, drums. It is likely that the depression and dissatisfaction with the music created a vicious spiral, and Mobley got sucked and spat out by it.
Hank Mobley, one of jazz’s tenor giants, came into the limelight in the ’50s, when, after working with many established up-coming figures, he spent 1954 with Dizzy Gillespie. By the time of his last recording with Gillespie in September 1954, he was preparing to join pianist Horace Silver’s new quartet for an engagement at Minton’s.
Soon after, Silver was asked to put together a quintet for a Blue Note session, and brought Kenny Dorham and Art Blakey to join Mobley and Dong Watkins from the Minton’s group. They first went into the studio on November 13 and cut Room 608, Creepin’, Doodliln’ and Stop Time. Four more tracks – Hippy, To whom it may concern, Hankerin and The Preacher were made on February 6, 1955.
Initially issued under the banner of the Horace Silver Quintet, all eight would eventually appear on LP under the title… and the Jazz Messengers, an album widely regarded as an canonical document in the genesis of hard bop.
Between the Messenger’s sessions, Mobley recorded with sextets led by Durham and Julius Watkins. Then, on March 27, 1955 came the first session under his own name, a quartet comprising the Messenger’s rhythm section: Silver, Watkins and Blakey.
Mobley played alongside Coltrane on a number of occasions, and whilst Coltrane was the stronger voice, he by no means eclipsed Mobley. He had to compete with a ravishingly beautiful solo by Coltrane, and did so effectively with a lighter-toned, less voluptuous but elegantly-phrased and well-constructed solo. If Mobley hadn’t yet established a unique personal sound, his solos were fluent, bristling with enthusiasm and interesting ideas. This was in 1956.
Mobley held his own in 1957, when in April, he appeared as part of the Johnny Griffin Septet sessions for Blue Note issued as Blowing Session, with a frontline of Lee Morgan, trumpet; Johnny Griffin, tenor saxophone; John Coltrane, tenor saxophone. Mobley’s mature sound was now developing and there were further strong hints of his later, more oblique manner of phrasing in relation to the beat.
I started admiring Hank Mobley from his stint with Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers, but my admiration became heightened with his membership of the Miles Davis quintet and the two albums recorded at San Francisco’s Blackhawk Club in April 1961. These sessions are among my favourite Davis efforts on account of Mobley’s contribution as a soloist of no mean feat. As a contrast to Coltrane’s long winding choruses which could sometimes be boring, Mobley’s well instructed solos are refreshing.
This concert featuring Davis’ quintet in 1961 with Gil Evans Orchestra was taped secretly and against Davis’ wishes by producer Teo Macero. Davis felt that both the quintet and orchestra programme was already adequately represented on record; as well as pieces from Miles ahead and Sketches from Spain several of the quintet numbers duplicated those on Someday My Prince Will Come and the Blackhawk sessions, though the Carnegie hall versions generally have much more of an edge than the studio performances.
Mobley plays superbly on all the tracks where he is featured – Teo, Walkin’, I thought about you, No blues, Oleo.
One finds it hard to accept Davis’ criticisms as valid, especially since he was happy enough to employ Sonny Stitt before and George Coleman after. Neither of these men was any less stuck in the bop rut than Mobley.

Jimmy Smith…Organ too big to fit

BY BENSON IDONIJE
IN European music history, the organ is looked upon as the king of all instruments; and its place is the church.
To deploy the organ as a jazz instrument was seen as a mark of desecration in those days, but it took the likes of Jimmy Smith to remove the instrument from its sacred habitat and make it an accepted vehicle for the execution of jazz and rhythm and blues.
And that is why, since his death, tributes have continued to pour in for Jimmy Smith from critics and reviewers of jazz and rhythm and blues, hailing him as the king of the instrument.
This acknowledgement is further strengthened by the new trend where the distinctiveness of the organ has completely disappeared from jazz; having been shrouded in the configuration of the advanced technological device called the ‘keyboard’.
Five years have passed, and the jazz scene is still waiting for “a new organ king to step into his shoes”.
But this has proved a difficult task. While some other person can easily succeed a departed king in ordinary life, through appointment or selection, a successor to Smith would need to work hard to qualify for the position.
Smith’s shoes are awfully big to step into. He took the organ from church and situated it in the club. Smith was such a dynamic force that his death on February 8, 2005 of undisclosed natural causes at his home in Scottsdale, Arizona, United States of America, was a great shock.

SMITH started recording for Blue Note and other record labels nearly 50 years ago, and during this period, he completely transformed the jazz organ.
Through his mastery of the Hammond B-3, which was regarded with awe in those days, Smith has reduced the organ as a vehicle for jazz improvisation to ordinariness.
Perhaps, the most emotionally expressive tributes have come from jazz organists.
He paved the way for such semi-giants of the instrument today as Chris Foreman, Brother Jack McDuff, Ronnie Foster, Jimmy McGrift and Dr. Lonnie Smith whom I met for the first time at the North Sea Jazz Festival in Cape Town, South Africa recently.
They all have beautiful things to say about the different ways in which Smith influenced them.

Ironically, the people who are likely to pay genuine tributes to Smith in recognition of his organ virtuoso in Nigeria are mostly devotees and enthusiasts.
The late Sid Moss would sing Smith’s praises because he doubled on the piano and organ and adopted some jazz licks from Smith.
But the real Smith adherents were Austin Emodi, an insurance manager, who, in the 60s, provided us the avenue to hang out and dig the groove because he had all the Blue Note records; Taiwo Okupe, the mechanical engineer who also played the alto saxophone in the Charlie Parker mould and style, even though Billie’s Bounce and Now’s the time were the only tunes he always exploited; Kunle Maja who was responsible for organising the latest albums for our appreciation and listening; and of course, Bola Marquis from whom I first saw The Sermon, one of Jimmy Smiths greatest recordings for Blue Note — even though I had heard it on Willis Conover’s Jazz Hour on Voice of America.
Incidentally, like Jimmy Smith, all these admirers including Fela Anikulapo Kuti who enjoyed Jimmy Smith’s organ as a result of the background it created for Lee Morgan’s trumpet (Fela was playing trumpet at the time) have all gone to meet their ancestors.
As a matter of fact, most of our listening hours were dominated by The Sermon, which Smith recorded with all the jazz stars of that period, including Lee Morgan on trumpet; Lou Donaldson alto saxophone; Tina Brooks and George Coleman, tenor; Keny Burrell and Eddy McFadden, guitars; Art Blakey and Donald Bailey, drums.

SMITH was an advocate of ‘ funk’ the way pianist Horace Silver was.
This element characterised his organ playing but he perhaps exhibited it more copiously and forcefully on The Sermon than any other groove.
He carried the theme of this twelve-bar- blues song and sustained the mood by taking the first solo.
There were numerous other Blue Note records comprising The Incredible Jimmy Smith, House Party, Plays Pretty, At the Organ, Midnight Special, Back at the Chicken shack and others.
He established trio format always consisted of himself, a guitarist and a drummer with horn players making guest appearances. Stanley Turrentine played prominent roles in his recordings for Blue Note Records as a soloist on tenor saxophone, while he worked with such great guitarists as Wes Montgomery, and Kenny Burrell who in fact gave him the backing he was looking for.
But he also worked successfully with other guitar players like Eddie McFadden and Thornel Schwartz while at the same time enlisting the services of drummer Donald Bailey on regular basis.
Smith perhaps made a more significant impact with Verve Records where he met Oliver Nelson as a key collaborator.
The arranger put the organist in front of a big band, as a contrast to his usual combo format on such albums as Hoochie Coochie Man and enhanced his singing on the blues hit Got My Mojo Workin which became popular in Nigeria in the seventies.
Smith’s combination of standards with rhythm and blues, as well as gospel, helped create what became known as soul jazz; and he influenced virtually every organist who followed him. Few dared challenge his stature.
He modeled his melodic style after saxophonist Charlie Parker, a feat that was considered difficult for the keyboard instrument.
But he mastered the organ’s percussive switches and created the ideal shimmer on ballads, his resolute bass lines on one hand contrasting with rapid fire solos on the other.

AFEAT that characterised Smith’s playing, and an innovation that demanded extra energy was his ability to derive bass lines from the left-hand side of the organ by himself.
This ability informed the non-inclusion of a bass player in all his aggregations - either in the studio or live setting.
But a few months before he passed on, Lonnie Smith, one of the celebrated organist’s greatest disciples saw him perform at New York’s Iridium; and noticed that his friend was not looking well.
He was also surprised that he had a bass player supporting him on stage. Obviously, his energy was failing.

SMITH started out learning stride piano and dance under the tutelage of his father outside of Philadelphia.
After a stint in the United States Navy and formally studying harmony and theory, he began working in clubs when he heard organist Wild Bill Davis in the early 1950s.
Davis inspired Smith to commit himself to the instrument.
And because Smith had great talent, he immediately caught the attention of Blue Note’s Alfred Lion and Francis Wolff when he played in New York, at Smals Paradise, for the first time in 1956.
One month after, they brought him into the studio for the recordings that were released and appropriately titled, A new sound... A new star, Jimmy Smith at the organ. The seven years that Smith spent with Blue Note Records produced many classics.
Smith has his kind in every jazz instrument. At the organ, he would be comparable to Charlie Parker on the alto saxophone; John Coltrane on tenor; Wes Montgomery on guitar; Elvin Jones and Art Blakey on drums; Ray Brown, bass; Oscar Peterson, piano; Miles Davis trumpet; Jay Jay Johnson, trombone.
These men were the kings of their various instruments.
Smith was the king of the organ. And in the words of foremost disciple, Chris Foreman, “those are awfully big shoes to fill.”
benidoni@yahoo.com

Coltrane and the Indian connection

BY BENSON IDONIJE
THE soprano saxophone had been in existence since the New Orleans jazz days — with Sidney Betchet as major exponent. The instrument was later adopted in the modern jazz style and context by Steve Lacy. But it was not until John Coltrane took it over in 1959 that the it became widely known, taking Coltrane himself to a new level in his career by placing him so firmly in the public eye that he received a feature story in Newsweek, something which rarely happens to a jazz man.
The irony of the whole thing was that it all happened and began by chance, without planning for it. “Three of us were driving back from a date in Washington in 1959,” he said in that magazine interview. “Two of us were in the front seat and the other guy, a saxophone player, in the back. He was being very quiet. At Baltimore, we made a rest stop, then got back in the car; and thirty miles later, realised that the guy in the back wasn’t there. We hoped that he had money with him, and drove on. I took his suitcase and horn to my apartment in New York. I opened the case and found a soprano saxophone, I started fooling around with it and was fascinated. That’s how I discovered the instrument.”
Eventually, Coltrane got himself a soprano saxophone and settled into it. Said he. “It helped me get away — let me take another look at improvisation. It was like having another hand.”
His use of the saxophone not only brought him greater popularity, it helped make him an influence so powerful that the praises and superlatives previously heaped on Sidney Bethet were being reviewed, with all eyes now on Coltrane.

THE first Coltrane recording to employ the soprano was My favourite things. Some idea of the effect it creates is indicated by the experience of pianist Ceil Taylor, who heard Coltrane play the piece in a club and was unable to convince several young musicians present that it was a Rodgers and Hammertein song made famous by MaryMartin, rather than the East Indian musician, Ravi Shankar. Although he was not what he called “an astute observer of the music,” he had found much of what he had learned of it applicable to the sort of jazz he wanted to play. Indian music is based on ragas, Indian scales which ascend differently than they descend.
There are countless ragas, and each has a particular significance, concerned with religion, time of day, etc. Coltrane had found My favourite things could be played almost as a raga. His next soprano recording, Greensleeves, also played on the principles of the raga, was an even more eeringly hypnotic performance, Coltrane had been fascinated by the Indian water drum, essentially a drone instrument which keeps a steady tone going while others improvise around it. To simulate this, he used two bassists because he “loved music to be heavy on the bottom.” One of the bassists was virtually imprisoned while the other remained almost completely free.
Coltrane was quite pleased when he later discovered that Ali Akbar Khan, considered the greatest Indian musician liked to play Greensleeves. “I wish I could hear him do it,” was his disarming remark. “Then I’d known if I was playing it right.
“Most of what we play in jazz”, he continued,” has the feeling of just that one raga. The Indian musicians don’t play the melody, they just play their scales. But may be that’s the melody to them. But what they do with it, the little difference, that’s the improvisation.” For a time, Coltrane pursued this so far that he would call off a chord sequence for his sidemen to play on, rather than an actual tune. They would then improvise on the mood suggested by the chord sequence and the tempo. “Yeah, I did that,” he admits somewhat ruefully.
To be able to keep the feeling of the raga, but yet not play just chord changing (“I want to play tunes, he said, “want to play the feeling of the song”), he began looking through old song books for folk tunes, perhaps turning to folios rather than recordings so that he would not be influenced by another’s interpretation. He came up with Ole, based on the Spanish Folk song, Venga Jaleo.
It is a remarkable synthesis of Indian elements, ideas propounded of Spain, and a growing concern with multiples of 3/4 time. Coltrane contributes one of his most famous solos, and Art Davis plays some of the most intricate, superbly musical bass that has ever been heard on a jazz record. In another song book, he found a piece he called spiritual, which he played with the irreducible minimum of one chord.

COLTRANE’s approach may owe as much to Miles’ Davis as to India. Davis had become preoccupied with “modal” jazz, based on scales rather than chords. As he remarked to renowned critic, Nat Hentoff in 1958, “When you go this way, you can go on forever. You don’t have to worry about changes and you can do more with the line. It becomes a challenge to see how melodically inventive you are. When you’re based on chords, you know at the end of 32 bars that the chords have run out and there’s nothing to do but repeat what you’ve just done-with variations. I think a movement in jazz is beginning away from the conventional string of chords, and a return to emphasis on melodic rather than harmonic variation. There will be fewer chords but infinite possibilities as to what to do with them.” Davis thus predicted the development of both Coltrane and, to a lesser degree, the more extreme, more melodic Ornette Coleman.
Coleman, who is also interested in the music of India, had, conversely, been an influence on Coltrane. It was not surprising that Coltrane’s insatiable curiosity and insistence on fewer chords should have led him to Coleman’s music. For Coleman, who has all but done away with traditional harmony, had taken the step which Coltrane’s deeply harmonic sensibilities might not allow him to take. As the composer George Russell put it, “Coltrane, it seems to me, is just bursting at the seams to demolish the chord barrier, and because of this, he is enlightening everyone to what can happen on a single chord.”
Coltrane and Coleman were good friends, and when they were working a few blocks from one another in New York, each would leave his own club between sets to hear the other man play. Coltrane said of Coleman to French jazz writer Francois Postif, “I have only played with him once in my life; I went to listen to him at a club and he asked me to join him. We played two pieces — twelve minutes to be exact — but I think that was the most intense moment of my life.”

WHILE displaying an ever more voracious appetite for all things new, Coltrane still managed to combine commerce and art; although his playing is basically the same on both tenor and soprano saxophones.
“I think you have to have musical conviction, rather than let the instrument dictate to you”, his soprano saxophone is primarily responsible for a popularity that, in 1961, enabled him to appear at all four of New York’s major jazz clubs. He judiciously combined the elements of his success. Early in an evening, he would feature the soprano on pieces like my favourite things and Greensleeves. Afterwards, he might as to a friend, “The next set will be different. The next set I’ll play all my non hits.” The soprano disappeared, to be replaced by the tenor and long, furiously impassioned and basic blues. This was in the early ’60s, the year following his Downbeat rating as best combo and instrumentalists in 1961. The situation was different in the mid-sixties, done to his death, in 1967. He faced his art squarely, recording such furiously atrocious sounds as Ascension, infirmity and A love Supreme.
However, off the stand, Coltrane became the shy, friendly man whose cigar was the only indication that he knew he was a success. His main concern with his constant work on the road was the protracted absence from his wife, Alice who played piano in some of his last sessions alongside McCoy Tymer. “She really know me, and understands the problem I have as a leader,” explained Coltrane, who loved his wife greatly .
Ravi Shankar, named after Coltrane’s Indian teacher, Ravi Shankar, was not even two years when his father died in 1967. Ravi Coltrane is already making an impact as a new tenor voice.

The Phenomenonal Miles Davis

BY BENSON IDONIJE
TRUE, the phenomenon called Miles Davis is no longer physically with us. But his personality continues to loom prodigiously over every other in jazz history. Miles is perhaps the most influential and controversial artist in the history of the art form today.
Like Fela Anikulapo-Kuti of Nigeria with whom he has a lot in common, books have continued to be written about the multi-faceted dimensions of Miles Davis’ life, times and career by various writers who are all coming out with fresh perspectives, new revelations and exciting ideas about this extraordinary trumpet player and band leader. Miles Davis was a great showman who combined this aspect with his serious music in a bewildering manner.
When he began to combine visual arts with jazz in the ’80s, Miles looked flamboyantly weird, his hair style draping down behind him, a flowing top tightened stylishly against his slim frame. But the real showmanship was not visible. It was not physically demonstrated. It was observed and felt only in his mode of dressing and general attitude to the music; his behaviour on stage and outside of it; and his extraordinary ideas about the music and its future.
One night, during the summer of 1957, the wonderful but short-lived Thelonious Monk Quartet with John Coltrane, Wilbur Ware, and Philly Joe Jones was playing at New York’s Five Spot Café. Monk was an imposing figure, and a unique showman, but that night, only one person was watching him. A small, slim, graceful man, impeccably dressed in the continental style that was then a few years ahead of its time, leaned casually against the bar, smoking a cigarette and listening to the music that Monk was making with two of his former sidemen.
Everyone else in the audience — which was made up of collegians who, at the time probably did not know who he was — was busy watching Miles Davis watch Monk.

In acting classes, it is called “Presence.” In Hollywood, it is called “star quality.” The Madison Avenue expression is “projecting an image.” Whatever the term, Miles Davis had it.
Eventually, it became more appropriate to speak of Miles Davis as a showbusiness phenomenon than a musician. A percentage of his audience felt it had gotten full value for its money if Miles appeared in one of his famous suits.
The striking cover of one Columbia album shows Miles’ lovely wife, Frances, seated alone at a table. At the opposite side is Miles Davis, trenchcoat worn cape style, head bent to light a cigarette from the match held in his cupped hands. Photographed in black and white, it is strongly reminiscent of a still from the Humphred Bogart-Ingrid Bergman movie Casablanca (“Don’t go to the session tonight, Miles”).
The most photographed jazz musician in the world, Davis captured the imagination of a section of the public to which he appealed in much the same way Bogart did, or better still, Bogart’s successor, Frank Sinatra.

Davis once concluded an engagement at the Village Vanguard, the New York night club at which he most often appeared. At the Sunday afternoon performance held on the last day of his booking, the room was packed, and people stood along the walls. The girl singer who appeared first was no more than tolerated, reminding of the ballroom dancers and stand-up comics who, in other days, had the thankless task of filling out Sinatra’s stage shows at the Paramount. Ex-Davis sidemen Cannonball Adderley and Philly Joe Jones chatted in the dressing room.
The singer’s set finished and the lights went up, but no one left. From various parts of the room, the members of the group walked casually towards the bandstand. Davis suddenly materialised from a dark corner of the room where he had apparently been talking with the little son of his bassist, Paul Chambers.
Resplendent in a tight white suit and green sports shirt, he strolled to the piano and, cigarette in mouth, played a few chords.
A waiter handed him his trumpet. He stepped to the microphone, without any perceptible word to the other musicians, assumed the familiar introvert stance, horn pointed toward the floor, and began to play Some Day My Prince Will Come.
The tight sound that prompted British theatre critic Kenneth Tynan to refer to him as a musical lonely heart’s club was heard briefly (the cliche expression “filled the room” would be entirely inaccurate) and the audience applauded wildly. The applause had hardly subsided, when Davis left the stand.
Davis became famous for that sort of action.
When the Davis group played England, a writer complained that Davis himself was visible for no more than 15 minutes during the evening — “stage presence” describes what Miles had but not what he did. He was often not there, and when he was, he did not speak. Those hoping to hear Davis say, “And now, we’d like to play an old favourite of ours, featuring our bass player, Paul Chamber,” or something of the sort, would have a long wait. Even when Bill Evans replaced Red Garland on the piano chair, no explanation was made to an audience, which had been crazy about Garland and his block chords.
Davis gave reasons for his stage attitude — reasons which looked excellent on the face value: “I get off the stand during a set because I’m not playing,” explained Miles. “There’s nothing for me to do. It’s ridiculous for me to just stand there and make the other guys nervous, looking at them while they solo. And I don’t look at them, what’s the point of my standing up there and looking at the audience? They are not interested in me when somebody else is taking a solo. I don’t announce the numbers because I figure the people who come to hear us know everything we play. We have a new record about every three months, and they sell, so the audience must know what’s on them.”
The owner of the jazz club where Miles worked frequently had another reason: “Your jazz fan doesn’t care what the tune is.” And the manager continued by saying,” I think Miles is afraid of the audience.”
Psychoanalysing Miles Davis had, in certain circles, assured the status of a party game. It was likely that his unwillingness to remain on the stand would be construed as an act of courtesy, because, contrary to what he said, the audience would probably be interested in him to the detriment of the soloist, as if Marlon Brando was scratching his head in a corner while, center stage, a competent actor was vainly trying to arrest the attention of the audience with recitation.
It could also be argued that Miles Davis was, consciously or not, one of the great public relations men ever known. Audiences obviously loved his treatment of them, and returned for more. His fierce insistence on privacy was a challenge which many people felt they must break down. Many of them were young ladies, as might be expected. But there were others.

However, no matter what you think about Miles, his career was unique, even in its beginnings. To many young Negroes, music and sports used to represent the only ways to recognition and a decent amount of money (even though this myth has been broken with Obama as first Black President). Davis, who some qualified people thought could have been as good a boxer as he was a trumpet player, did not have that need, he was born in Alton, Illinois, on May 25, 1926. His father Miles II (trumpeter Miles Davis’ full name is Miles Dawey Davis III) was a successful dentist and dental surgeon. When the family moved to East St. Louis shortly after Miles’ birth, his father began to breed dogs, and the eventual worth of that venture was estimated at about a quarter of a million dollars.
Miles became a jazz musician almost under parental protest, a situation which was most likely to occur if the family was white. Some observers felt that parts of Davis’ public aspect stemmed from the fact that he could, if he wished, have retired whenever he chose without economic difficulty, or indeed, never had to start.
But he did start at a very early age. On his 13th birthday, he was given a trumpet by his father; and this was the beginning of a career that saw him to the top.
By the time he was 16, Miles was playing with a local band called the Blue Devils. Tiny Bradshaw came through town, and Sonny Stitt, who was playing tenor with the band, offered Miles a trumpet chair at “sixty whole dollars a week.”
As Davis later told the story in a taped interview conducted by Columbia Records publicity department, “I went home and asked my mother if I could go with them. She said no. I had to finish my last year of high school. I didn’t talk to her for two weeks. And I didn’t go with the band, either.”
But he got another chance, and this time, he took it. The Billy Eckstine band played St Louis and in it were two musicians who were to have a profound effect on Miles -- Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker.
Miles eventually left Julliard where he was studying music -- to play with Parker, becoming his roommate. It was probably the most important association, musically and personally, that Miles ever had. Some still feel today that Miles’ public manner stemmed from the laying-on-of hands feeling he had while working with Parker.

The Ballad Artistry of Gene Ammons

BY BENSON IDONIJE
THREE tenor saxophone players have become models for the exhibition of the broad-toned brilliance usually referred to in jazz history as the Ammons-Rollins-Webster saxophone tradition.
They have influenced generations of tenor players, including such Nigerians as Peter King and Laitan Adeniji, the Heavywind. And, of these three jazz giants and innovators, Gene Ammons is perhaps the most emotionally expressive and appealing because of his treatment of ballads where the essence and impact of this feeling are more effectively communicated and felt.
Gene Ammons was one of the great jazz ballad players – very capable of conveying strong emotion at slow tempos without sliding over into the syrupy side of things. Under normal circumstances, however, even the best of balladeers must restrict himself to only one or two examples per album, keeping a proper balance between the slow and the swinging, the pretty and the funky. Fortunately for Gene — and for all of us — part of his very long period as a Prestige recording artist coincided with the existence of a specialized label, ‘Moodsville’ — dedicated to albums filled with nothing but ballads. Thus, without having to pick out an anthology involving many different years and varied settings and personnel, we can come up with an impressive and unified view of “gentle” music by Gene Ammons.
The Moodsville premise was a simple one: take a soloist with the right kind of feeling, provide him with a suitable rhythm section, and turn them loose on the Great American Songbook.
This premise fitted smoothly into a basic Prestige concept. From his earliest days in the record business, Bob Weinstock (founder and — until 1971 — head of the company) felt that jazz could be best marketed by providing music of similar characteristics with its own label identity. The first of Bob’s labels (in 1949) was New Jazz; and when Prestige was started shortly thereafter, he attempted to keep their identities separate. New Jazz would be for more experimental sounds, while Prestige would represent the popular jazz mainstream of the day. Ten years later, he revived the idea for LPs, with the two main labels being joined by Swingville, Moodsville, and labels devoted to blues, R&B, gospel, Latin, and ethnic music.
Swingville, intended to be more for jam sessions than anything else, didn’t quite turn out that way. Moodsville, on the other hand, was exactly the jazz mood-music vehicle it was supposed to be. Not counting reissue anthologies, Moodsville produced 32 LPs in less than three and a half years, a respectable output which involved roster artists who also appeared on Prestige, New Jazz, and Swingville. As far as quality is concerned, the series produced — in addition to the two albums reissued here — three certified classics (Coleman Hawkin’s At Ease; Oliver Nelson’s Nocturne; and Yusef Lateef’s Eastern Sounds) and a number of top contenders. But what is of concern here is Gene Ammons and how remarkably well his individual contribution to the series stands up more than three decades after the fact.
Ammons was the ideal choice for the strictly ballad tempo Moodsville setting. He had the equipment in the form of a huge, highly personal tone and a sparsely noted, highly elastic sense of time. He had been playing professionally almost 20 years and had the musical maturity to perform ballads for their melodic content, rather than as an excuse for bravura displays of technique. By this time, he was an acknowledged master of the form.
The rhythm-only accompaniment which appears throughout these sides should receive particular mention. Gene had served with big bands and his own band (small units with or without Sonny Stitt); but from the time of his return to the scene in 1960, he went solo more often than not. There is nothing like a strange rhythm section to get a hornman straightened out quickly. Instead of being a part of an ensemble, the horn is responsible for the melody all by himself. In the two earlier volumes of The Gene Ammons Story (P.24058, The 78 Era; and P.24071, Organ Combos), Gene was in the company of other horns. Here we are exposed to his melodic gifts exclusively.
And certainly “gift” is the proper term.

GENE was blessed with perfect pitch, and his interpretative ability is legendary. Time after time he would see music for the first time at a recording session. Invariably, his reaction was the same. He would study sheet music and toy with changes in deep concentration until he felt he had learned what he needed to know. Then he would simply outline a routine for the accompaniment and play the tune as if he had written it — rarely referring to the printed music.
These recordings were made roughly 15 months apart, and there is a distinct difference between them. For one thing, Gene is clearly more inspired on the second session where he evolves his own little arrangements on several tunes. This may have been a result of more familiarity with the overall ballad-album concept; a greater affinity for an obviously superior rhythm section; or both.
Meredith Wilson’s Till There Was You, from The Music Man, is our opener.
Gene has the melody and a blowing chorus. Richard Wyands has half a chorus and Gene returns on the bridge. Nat Cole had a big hit with Answer me my love in the fifties, and after a 3/4 intro by Wyands, Gene has this one to himself. After the melody chorus, Gene plays a little, returning to the melody for the last strain. He was attracted to Nat Cole songs. Woody Herman and Nat did a cross country tour while Gene was with the band, and he got to know Nat quite well. In the early seventies, he recorded an entire session of Cole tunes.
Willow Weep for Me is one of those melodies that all great musicians get to sooner or later. Gene would record this one again a few months later in a live session with Richard “Grove” Holmes.
Little Girl Blue was a personal favorite of Gene’s. He takes this all the way. Something I Dreamed Last Night is best known in Miles Davis’s 1956 version. After Wyand’s opening, the tempo shifts to medium for Gene’s blowing.
The King and I would seem an unlikely Broadway vehicle to capture Gene’s interest; and indeed, he didn’t particularly want to record Something Wonderful. Producer Esmond Edwards brought the tune in and persuaded Gene to look it over. In retrospect, Edwards was right, since Gene gives it a warm reading.
I Remember You is an enduring standard best known in Charlie Parker’s recording. This performance has a little tempo to it, and Gene responds by tossing off an attractive break and a strong chorus. Wyands has a pleasant half chorus before Gene returns to walk it out, helped by a brief tag.
Someone to Watch Over Me is an unusual choice for Gene in that he disliked playing tunes that “everyone else does.” The melody was a special favorite of Ben Webster, who recorded several different versions.
It shouldn’t detract from this session when we say that the second is better, because it is merely a case of going from the good to the exceptional. Gene’s playing on Sides 3 and 4 is some of the best he has ever committed to record.
The rhythm section is uplifting here. Patti Bown, then a member of Quincy Jones’s band, is a great accompanist, and George Duvivier and Ed Shaughnessy are a perfect team. The session benefits from more medium tempos.
Bown and Gene prepare a little introduction for Two Different Worlds. The change from brushes to sticks for the blowing choruses was probably Gene’s idea and it obviously stimulates him.
Bown’s intro sets up But Beautiful (which has received notable performances by Teddy Edwards, Flip Phillips, and Kenny Dorham among others). Gene has all the blowing space, topped by a coda that is beautiful all by itself.
A flute-like vamp ushers in Hoagy Carmichael’s Skylark, a beautiful, classic melody. Gene obviously enjoys this one, and he negotiates the challenging changes in masterful fashion.
Three Little Words is the most aggressive performance on the album. Shaughnessy is on sticks all the way here, and after an arrangement which opens in 2/4 (and repeats for Bown’s outstanding chorus and Gene’s final theme statement), there is some strong wailing by all concerned. The ending is one of the typical tags that Gene and Sonny Stitt used to toss at each other so frequently.
With Street of Dreams, we have an opportunity to compare this performance with the famous version Gene recorded for United (now available on Savoy) almost 10 years prior. Patti Bown uses the same Tweedle Dee vamp that John Houston used on the original behind the blowing chorus. The entire arrangement is essentially the same, as is Gene’s last chorus, setting up the return to the melody. Gene, like many musicians with popular records, tended to incorporate portions of originally recorded solos into. arrangements of — requested favorites.
You’d Be So Nice to Come Home To is given a Latinized introduction before breaking into a strong four. Ed Shaughnessy’s drumming is firm and inventive, exactly like what Gene liked. Patti Bown’s chorus is a fascinating mixture of styles. Gene’s restructuring of emphasis in the melody to suit his own style is remarkable. He was as good as anyone who ever played at this.
Under a Blanket of Blue is a mellow performance, with the rhythm shifting to 2/4 for the blowing. This was an especially popular approach to ballads at the time. Jimmy Dorsey wrote I’m Glad There Is You in 1942, while Gene was still in high school, but Gene makes it his own here. Once again there is a classic Ammons coda, longer than most this time.

GENE Ammons has left two powerful albums worth of material as evidence of his continuing inventiveness and versatility in these Moodsville sides. After hearing them, anyone attempting to dismiss him as an R&B honker or relegate him to the ranks of the pure beboppers would have his case shut down.

Trumpeter, Lee Morgan’s last word

BY BENSON IDONIJE
LAST interviews in the careers of great artists are so crucial and phenomenal that they are usually treated with reverence; and preserved for posterity. The reason is that these interviews help to probe and express the minds of these artists in terms of what they represented at these last points of their lives. But in its uniqueness, renowned trumpeter Lee Morgan’s last interview served this purpose and more. It went beyond the ordinary thought process, touching on issues of injustice and discrimination in the system.
Coming in 1972 when black consciousness was sweeping across America, with violent protests from activist movements and individuals opposed to racial discrimination and injustice, the interview was hailed by adherents of black music. Even the Association for the Advancement of Creative Music, which used black music of the African type as a vehicle for driving the new jazz, embraced the interview because it was seen as a blueprint and a viable document for fighting their cause.
Lee Morgan’s views were highly respected because he had become a musician of great substance — on top of his career at the time. He was the new horn in town as opposed to such existing elders as Miles Davis and Dizzy Gillespie. Lee Morgan’s trumpet was warm and vibrant as the new extension of the Fats Navaro-Clifford Brown dynasty.
Another dimension, which makes this interview remarkabe, is the fact hat it was originally conducted for publication by Downbeat magazine in its Music 72 yearly. But Morgan’s tragic death a short time after, gave what were quite possibly his last statements to an interview. So, instead of printing the usual tributes, Downbeat magazine thought it appropriate to let Lee Morgan speak for himself once more, using the interview as a special significance.

Interviewing Lee Morgan proved easy —not simply because he was loquacious, but because he knew his mind so well he would speak it without any hesitation, and do so with great insight and passion. He spoke of many aspects of music, but always in relation to one essential subject: the dilemma of jazz in America.
To Morgan, this dilemma was two-fold, or rather two-faced: lack of respect, and a lack of proportion between black American art and the general American culture.
Regarding the first lack, Morgan condemned indifference toward the music, reinforced by media tokenism, specifically the over-exploitation of Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong as representative jazz personalities. “Duke Ellington on the Today Show with the Today house band — that is not Duke Ellington; to have Duke Ellington without Cat Anderson, Harry Carney, all the people’ you associate with Duke, his band — that is Duke Ellington. And the same thing applies to Louis, Louis is gone now, and I think one of the main reasons why Louis died, I saw him on his last engagement in New York, and he had to lay down between shows. The man had just had a heart attack; he shouldn’t have been playing.
“This is the tragedy of the black artist: just to live halfway comfortably he must keep on working! That’s not to say they don’t have any money -- I’m talking about in perspective to their talent. These people should have shrines dedicated to them, just like they have shrines in Europe to Beethoven and Bach: Louis Armstrong especially ;and Duke Ellington as well.”
About the second lack, Morgan noted the irony that jazz is revered internationally, and in fact is broadcast everywhere by the U .S. Information Agency, but is dismissed at home. “It’s black creative music, but something that’s not only black — it’s American black! That’s very important. I was reading about B.B. King. I think last year was the first time a black college ever invited him— because he played blues and blues was like the music of the devil! And over in Europe, you hear blues all day long – it’s a high art form!”
With better recognition, Morgan believed black artists might hope for a better economic perspective. In sports, Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays each earned $125,000, because they were the best regardless of black or white, But in music, such racial equality does not seem evident: Herb Alpert became a multi-millionaire in a short time with “a nice little pop group”, while great black genius has been comparatively unrewarded, even after decades of creating.
“I’m not trying to damn Herb Alpert, because it’s beautiful. I’d just like to see an equal proportion... I don’t resent nobody for what they get, as far as they are equal. Frank Sinatra is worth millions; Frank Sinatra is a hell of a singer, that I won’t deny. But at the same time, Betty Carter is starving to death -- here’s someone who’s been on the scene since the late 1940s -- because she refused to compromise, because she always wanted to sing jazz. Look at Billie Holiday and Judy Garland: they both had the same hang-ups, but one of them was singing Over The Rainbow and the other was singing Strange Fruit.
In another view of this lack of recognition, Morgan equates jazz with symphonic music in America, both in respect and in finance, “Leonard Bernstein plays an elite music; everybody doesn’t have the temperament or the ear or the talent for listening to symphonic music or opera. And I would like to feel this way, I’ve never been drug about jazz not being heard all day long banging in your ears like you hear pop music, I would like to feel that jazz is an elite music! Most people who like jazz are the intellectual type people in college, because it’s a very sophisticated music. So if you’re doing something that only appeals to a minority, then the lovers of this music have to support it.
“The symphonic orchestras have sponsors, people who give them endowments, and I think it should be the same way with jazz — because this is a national treasure! This is the only national art form that’s here, and they do everything they can to dismiss it and put it aside. It’s really a shame the way our country treats its artists. I’ve had people ask me: ‘If you feel that way, why don’t you go to Europe’ And I always tell them, ‘first of all, I like Europe, like to see it as a visitor —but this is my home! This is my culture!”

Morgan was committed to several means of awakening recognition toward jazz: as a member of a group of musicians negotiating to buy the Lighthouse Club in California, and as a member of the short-lived Jazz & People’s Movement protesting media ignorance and indifference to jazz artists — Morgan was among the first to interrupt the taping of the talk shows in 1970-71.
“Morgan was amazed by many responses to the JPM protest: that the networks considered a few black musicians in the studio bands sufficient recognition; that talk show hosts didn’t know even established artists like the MJQ or Thelonious Monk; that the programmers tried any and all ploys to avoid commitment; and most shocking of all, that so many considered the JPM actions as only a personal hype,
“We’re saying that if each show (Carson, Griffin, Cavett, Frost) committed itself to use two artists a month’, that would he eight different artists each month. And we’re not talking about Thelonious Monk sitting down at the piano with Doc Severinsen’s bass player- if you have Thelonious Monk, have Theionious Monk’s band! And then after he plays, sit down and talk to him!…
“We tried to arrange conferences; none of them would talk to us. So we went in and took over the (Griffin) show. The next day they had the chairman of the board down there to see us! But it’s unfortunate: as soon as you stop, if you don’t do it again, they go right back... The only reason Griffin came out to, see us was because we kept on blowing whistles, Rahsaan and myself. He immediately tried to divide and conquer — he offered of have our two groups on!
“I told him I couldn’t care less if he ever had me on in fact, I would insist on not going on, at least not first, because right away, people have gotten so pessimistic that not only the public, but musicians as well thought we were just out there thinking about ourselves, I don’t care if you never show me! Put Dizzy on, Horace Silver, Sonny Rollins, McCoy Tyner, Blue Mitchell, Herbie Hancock-put somebody on!
“And right away he came up with that regular thing: Louis Armstrong and Duke El1ington, And then he told me about James Brown, and right away we told him, ‘look, we’re talking about jazz!’ They insult the public, some of the stuff they put on. They spoon feed the public bullshit, and they’ve given them so much I’ve found myself humming tunes that I hate?

Whether the efforts of Morgan and others, will ever succeed, whether the music will be finally respected and granted proper due within American culture, is certainly still a question unanswered. But at least, Lee Morgan knew the power of the music, even if unrecognised — and in that knowledge was a strength.
“If it wasn’t for music, this country would have blown up a long time ago; in fact, the whole world. Music is the only thing that spans across all ethnic groups and all languages. Music is the only thing that awakens the dead’ man and charms the savage beast. Without, it this would be a hell of a world!”

Terence Blanchard... A Tale of God’s Will (A requiem for Katrina

BY BENSON IDONIJE
TERENCE Blanchard is not one of those ostentatious hornmen who would design their sessions for the sole aim of attracting attention from jazz devotees. He is not the type that would play his trumpet, choosing specific notes that would appeal to, and excite screaming audiences. Blanchard is a genuine artist who believes in expressing himself naturally.
For him, jazz is a serious matter, as serious as your life. And that is exactly why his recent recording has captured the implications of Hurricane Katrina, a natural disaster whose catastrophic effects are still being felt in America till today, for compositional idea and performance.
What immediately strikes one upon listening to a few bars of Blanchard’s improvisational progression is his thorough grounding – evidence that he has listened extensively to the masters of the instrument.
Truly evident in those flowing lines of soaring melodies and intellectually crafted compositions is great talent — regardless of the fact that the influences of Clifford Brown and Miles Davies are copiously in attendance. Without doubt, these are some of the qualities he has invested in his recent recorded release, which views Katrina as “a tale of God’s will”; a natural, but unfortunate disaster.
With recording on the BlueNote stable, Blanchard is heading a formidable sextet of Brice Winton, soprano and tenor saxophones; Aaron Parks, piano; Derrick Hodge, bass; Kendrick Scott, piano; Zach Hermon, percussion. He is however at his best on trumpet.
The album, Tale of God’s Will contains such well crafted compositions as Ghost of Congo Square Square; Levees; Wading Through, Ashe; In time of need; Ghost of Betsy; The water; Mantra Intro; Mantra; Over There; Ghost of 1927; Funeral dirge; Dear mom.

BLANCHARD is deeply touched apparently because he is a New Orleans native; and has captured the many dimensions of Katrina with solos, riffs and several other dynamics. A great composer and arranger with imagination, the various titles have been interpreted with moods and settings that are fittingly appropriate.
Listening to the entire ensemble generally, and in particular, Blanchard’s solo design, it is as if he was watching Katrina happen, and he was playing his music as the disaster took place. The high level to which he has taken this documentary in terms of commitment and creativity all show that he is proud of the city and its heritage.
Terence Blanchard used to show his friends the most beautiful architecture, the best representations of who New Orleans people were. He was, however, taken up by a friend, after the disaster, who said he did not realise that there were poor people in the city because Blanchard had never shown him the Katrina places.
This requiem makes up for whatever inadequacies. It describes New Orleans with the vividness of first hand knowledge and depicts all the highs and lows – with solos and elevated arrangements that are executed with the deepest of emotions.
Blanchard wrote the score for Spike Lees’ acclaimed 2006 documentary, When the Levees Broke, in which Blanchard appears with his mother and grandmother as they return to their flooded home. There is no connection with that piece of music and A Tale of God’s Will, but this is to show Blanchard’s concern for his fatherland and the many contributions he has made to Katrina’s memory with music.
A Tale of God’s Will, even though executed by a sextet — which in fact is a small group — is full of arrangements which portray it as a big band. And, rather than interpret this documentary with the typical New Orleans roots and heritage mix — which is likely to enhance it in terms of easy recognition and its relation to the seat of early jazz that the city is, it takes the form of an orchestrated, concert requiem.
The orchestration may sound like an all-purpose film score, all sweeping strings and long distance views, one stage removed from the human tragedy and ineptitude in the city it is meant to be commemorating. But the real feeling, the actual New Orleans heritage in relation to Katrina can be well appreciated by jazz devotees, not everybody.
The music will be well taken in by jazz musicians and ardent followers of jazz, who appreciate the essence of the music in terms of melodic exploration and inventiveness; the creativity engendered by a solo design; the beauty of tonal conception; compositional framework and phraseology.

Blanchard’s approach is in line with the best of jazz, and there is no doubt that he is one of the foremost jazz musicians on the scene today. The reference to New Orleans, its roots and heritage would be beautifully captured by the likes of Louis Armstrong who has since gone to meet his ancestors. His New Orleans Stars would have done justice to a Katrina memorial because he was the key player of New Orleans jazz.
Born in New Orleans in 1901, Armstrong died in 1971. Modernists may have taken over with the advent of ‘bop’ in the ’40s, but Louis Armstrong was the most important and influential musician in jazz history. Although he is often thought of by the general public as a lovable, clowning personality, a gravel-voiced singer who played simple but dramatic trumpet in a New Orleans styled Dixieland setting, Armstrong was much, much, more. A great ambassador of the whole of the United States of America, Armstrong helped to put New Orleans on the map. However, this article is not about Louis Armstrong. The reference to him is only an aside. The spotlight is dropping on the trumpeter, Terence Blanchard.
Listening to the ensemble of Blanchard and its interpretation of Katrina as a Tale of God’s Will, at times it overwhelms in its grandeur, smothering the sextet. And at others, it retreats into a seemingly caressing sound. All these dynamics are capturing the nature of the disaster itself and its aftermath.
The various stories which appear, as titles composed and arranged should be appreciated from the musician’s jazz points. The listener must cast his mind back to New Orleans and visualise Katrina as it wreaked all the havoc.
Compositions such as Wading through and Water really drive the point home with arrangements that depict movements and strong winds while The Ghost of Betsy mellows the music down to a brooding situation, a moment of extreme sorrow. In time of need paints the picture of extreme poverty and hopelessness with sounds that are intense in places suddenly becoming subdued.
However, whatever interpretation you give it; from whatever perspective you visualise it in the process of listening, Blanchard’s superlative playing is evident.
The undeniable fact remains that his trumpet is strong and authoritative. Always vocal, but never vociferous, his trumpet speaks as the orchestra rarely does, offering a commentary to tragedy with a soaring and painful beauty.
His open trumpet flying over a walking Ghost of Betsy is quite simply supreme, his burnished tune on Levees subdued and plaintive. Along side him, the sextet is necessarily in shadow although never less than opposite as Derrick Hodges high register electric bass is always ear catching.
Although he originally rose to prominence in the shadow of Wynton Marsalis, Terence Blanchard was one of the first young lions to develop his own sound, mixing in elements of Freddie Hubbard whose sound identity encapsulates those of Lee Morgan, Clifford Brown and Fats Navaro. He studied piano from the age of five and took up the trumpet in 1976. Blanchard was with Lionel Hampton in the 80s, replacing Wynton Marsalis in Blakey’s Jazz Messengers band during 1982–1986.
His stint with Art Blakey prepared him for the challenges of rhythm and composition. And the fact that he was a prolific pianist opened his horizon to arranging and the dynamics of flowing lines and progressions. A Tale of God’s Will: A requiem for Katrina is one of his many serious and intellectually crafted compositions.

Mark Whitfield… A chip of the old block

BY BENSON IDONIJE
OF all the young guitar players on the scene today, Mark Whitfield is perhaps the most professionally talented and rounded.
True, every soloist, including great veterans such as Wes Montgomery, Charlie Christian and even Miles Davis, Sonny Rollins and all — repeat phrases in the process of expressing themselves and articulating lines of improvisation. No one is all knowing; no one is absolutely perfect; these things don’t happen with computerised precision.
But repetition can be drastically reduced, the way it is in the hands of the great veterans if appropriate steps and measures are taken. The problem is that because they are guitarists, they believe that their entire focus and attention should be directed towards the instrument alone, instead of maintaining an open mind and adopting a holistic attitude to jazz as an artform. Whitfield is not part of this misconception.

In the last 15 years, guitarists have sounded the same in the articulation of tonal concepts and improvisational lines — all because they have refused to identify with tradition and the past. They know about the fact that Wes Montgomery is the greatest, but have never taken time out to discover the source of his technique. Instead, they have all fallen back on George Benson and Earl Klugh who, though were influenced by Wes himself, have singled out for emphasis, specific phrases and ideas that provoke instant reaction and appeal — driven by commercial motivation. Whitfield, certainly, is not part of this conspiracy.
Experience has shown that it is not enough to study the instrument– in conformity with scales and exercises. It is not enough to be able to make the changes along set patterns and progressions emanating from your own imagination.
Though this is extremely desirable, it is completely necessary to involve yourself in the knowledge of conventions and jazz history. It is important to hear from veterans who trod this path before and grappled with difficulties whose solutions have become the norm today. Whifield has gone through this experience; he has heard from the elders.
One of the attributes that puts Wes Montgomery on top of all jazz guitarists is the ability to enact chorded solos even at the octave– a feat that George Benson and Earl Klugh’s imitative approach has handed down to today’s players who, however, seem to be articulating it out of context.
A committed instrumentalist would want to know how this feat all came about; and it is its explanation that would situate it in its true context—for positive use. Chorded solos in the hands of Wes who is the boss of the instrument, is only a means to an end, not an end in itself – the way today’s guitarists are making it look like. But Whitfield is totally aware of these misconceptions.
This same feat reminds me of pianist Red Garland, a highly innovative pianist, whose spirit was killed by Miles Davis who wanted him to do exactly what he (Miles) wanted— for the shape of his band’s sound identity. Red Garland was only a sideman like Wynton Kelly, Gil Evans or Herbie Hancock — pianists who all played with him at the time. The point is that Red Garland came up with an innovative feat that was known at the time as block chords for his solo concept. I listened to a jazz pianist at Ronnie Scott’s, the new Ronnie Scott’s, London’s one time most popular jazz club, two years ago, and all he did throughout was a complete engagement in block chords. It made no sense.
However, guitarist Whitfield is a virtuoso who has great respect for conventions and tradition. Quite understandably, he counts Montgomery and Kenny Burrell -- two giants of the instrument who are what they are in jazz because their styles are miles apart as creative individuals -- among his greatest influence. In order to put his career on a genuine professional path, Mark studied both the acoustic bass and guitar, and was awarded scholarships to Berklee School of music for both instruments.
To underscore his commitment to music in general, and his choice of instrument in particular, Mark turned down an accelerated medical school programme at Georgetown University and attended Berklee School of Music on a guitar scholarship in 1983.
From Berklee, Whitfield moved to New York for professional opportunities and made the most of them, performing with such legends, as bassist Ray Brown whose acoustic version helped to create a unique identity for the famous Oscar Peterson Trio. He also played with the organist Jimmy Smith and singer Betty Carter as well as some of the top jazz artists of his own generation including Terence Blanchard, Donald Harrison, Nicholas Payton, Christian Mc Bride, and Britain’s top saxophonist, Curtney Pine.
Whitfield has released numerous recordings as a leader, including 1977’s Forever Love, which features solo guitar to full orchestral arrangements, the kind of feat Wes Montgomery accomplished with AM and Riverside Records in his life time. With his unique combination of talent and showmanship, Whitfield is truly one of the most talented jazz guitarists working today.

Louis Armstrong and perhaps Dizzy Gillespie were the first to introduce show business to jazz —without destroying the artistic essence of the music. But still, critics tried to put them down for what they thought was going to take a lot away from the music’s creativity. But it was taken over in later years by even the artists who were known for their ideological views about the music–Lester Bowie, Miles Davis and Sonny Rollins from the way they dressed. Mark Whitfield started this flamboyant stage presence in the’80s–to set the pace for guitar players.
“I think that it is very important that as an artist, when you take the stage, in any forum, that you have some sort of presence people can identify with,” said Mark Whitfield in justification of his showmanship. “I think it’s a problem if its something you have to go out and find. I think one thing I‘ve always been able to do is walk out in front of a lot of people and play music and enjoy myself. I enjoy playing for myself, and I enjoy playing for people. I’ve never really had to give much thought to putting together some sort of show. To reinforce that, you know, I genuinely really love to play and that, that comes across, the music is enough, and maybe that’s even better for people because I think they perceive it as being genuine.”
Mark Whitfield’s commitment is a source of inspiration to today’s guitar players even though most of them need to imbibe Mark’s total spirit and motivation. His advice to aspiring young jazz musicians is instructive:
“I had the benefit of a lot of really good advice, and it came from a lot of different sources. I think the most important thing a young person can do in thinking about preparing for a career in jazz music is that you have to go about it with the same seriousness and preparation that you would use for any highly specialised skill, as if you wanted to be a neurosurgeon, an astronaut, something that requires a lot of study and a lot of dedication, far beyond what is the normal call of duty. In this day and age, you have so many different avenues for information. There are tons of books and instructional videos; and I guess you can even now study over the Internet.
“And, prepare yourself before you even go to college. And when you go, you want to pick a place where you can go, and be prepared, and get the best education possible for what it is that you want to do. If you want to be a great basketball player, you don’t want to go to Berklee School of Music. I think if you dedicate a lot of time and effort and energy into it, and you love it–and you have the ability, it will pay off for you.”
Whitfield had always maintained this focus from the age of seven when he owned his guitar. He started by trying to imitate what he heard from a Lightnin’ Hopkins record, called And follows you after the blues. He tried to play the riffs and things with the songs. His parents saw his interests at that early age and got him some lessons at a local music store.
Today, he is on top, enjoying rave reviews such as “one-of-a kind” guitarist, “virtuoso” and “technician” of the guitar.

Smith, Holiday, Ella, Vaughan… Women who opened the singer’s gate

BY BENSON IDONIJE
The the jazz scene today reveals that only Cassandra Wilson, Dee Dee Bridge Water and a few young female jazz singers are currently belching out melodies from the deep recesses of their hearts. They are reaching out to audiences with their various approaches to a creative aspect of jazz that is fast dying out because of today’s preference for popular music — for commercial reasons. Like the male turf, only a few women are now venturing into jazz singing.
This is exactly why, in retrospect, veterans such as Bessie Smith, Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Mahalia Jackson among many others should be remembered not only for their pioneering efforts but also for the sense of commitment and high level of creativity they exhibited while performing jazz themes and materials in those difficult early days.

Deserving of praise and acknowledgement is Bessie Smith, the first major blues and jazz singer on record, and one of the most powerful of all time. Not for nothing did she earn the title ‘Empress of the blues’ in those early days of the music when most singers were just muddling through without laying claim to any creative performance, any definitive approach.
Even on her first records in 1923, her passionate voice overcame the primitive recording quality of that period and still communicates easily to today’s listeners, sounding as contemporary and relevant as can it be. This is not true of any other singer from that early period.
At the time the blues became exploited by almost every singer and it was impossible to differentiate a genuine singer from the rest, Bessie stood out, with a voice whose clarity went through varying inflections and chord changes. She was like today’s Alicia Keys among the thousands of hip hop stars that have inundated the scene in recent years. And to come nearer home, she would be comparable to today’s Asa in the midst of the thriving hip hop culture that has almost suffocated the Nigerian scene.
Back in 1912, Bessie Smith sang in the same show with Ma Rainey who took her under her wing and mentored her. Although Rainey would achieve a measure of fame throughout her career, she was soon surpassed by her protege.
Between 1920 and 1937 when she died, she recorded a lot of valuable material, which have continued to remain a source of inspiration to emerging generations of singers. The various albums recorded by the ‘Empress of the blues’ have today been reissued into over five (distinctively remarkable CDs as volumes, and tagged ‘The complete Recordings.’

Fifty years after her death in 1959, Billie Holiday remains the most famous of all jazz singers. ‘Lady Day’, as she was fondly called (a name she earned from Lester Young, the saxophonist who created quite a stir as soloist with the Count Bassie Orchestra), Holiday had a small voice and did not scat, like most people did to introduce some flourish to their performances. But she developed a behind–the–beat phrasing, an innovation that gave her the uniqueness that she demonstrated in all her songs. And she executed this technique with so much skill and finesse that these delayed beats did not in any way affect the smooth progression of the music; instead it introduced a high sense of musical value to her performances.
The emotional intensity that she put into her lyrical lines is one of the attributes that has continued to recommend her for critical attention.
Holiday sang with a small groups as well as big bands, interpreting most of the classics and dominating them with the own personality.
Lady Day was with the Count Bassie Orchestra during much of 1937, but because they were signed to different labels, not much was achieved by this collaboration in the area of studio recording.
She was popular with the band in live setting, and critics have continued to remember her with the Count Basie Orchestra with the same reverence and appreciation that they had for Joe Williams of Every day I have the blues fame, Helen Humes and Jimmy Rushing who were all singers with the orchestra at various times.
She died in 1959, but recorded up till 1957 such memorable hits as God bless the child, Lady in Satin, Don’t explain among many others. Her works have been extensively reissued and can now be found in the market. Among them are the Quintessential Billie Holiday, Volumes 1-9, Masters of Jazz, Lady sings the blues, Billie Holiday (1939-1940), Billies’ Blues among many others.
Bop’s greatest diva, Sarah Vaughan was among jazz and popular music’s supreme vocalists who treated her voice as an instrument, improvising and providing melodic and rhythmic embellishments to performances. She had a contralto range, which she used to make leaps and jumps; and had the ability to change a song’s mood and direction by mere enunciation and delivery.
A great singer with a unique style that identified with the best of jazz, she equally turned commonplace tunes and light pop into definitive jazz-based material. She had a distinctive swinging quality and intensity in her singing style and was also a scat singer. The great Sarah Vaughan was a dominant performer from the late 40’s until the ’80s when illness forced her to cut back her appearances.
Like Billie Holiday, Sarah Vaughan recorded extensively and teamed up with various bands, among them, The George Shearing outfit where the piano became a dominant force in the accompaniment – in combo setting. But she also sang with the famous Duke Ellington Orchestra, where she gave her own unique interpretation to such classics as Ain’t got nothing but the blues Chelsea Bridge, I got it bad, Mood Indigo among others.

Most critics name Ella Fitzgerald as the finest female jazz singer of all time, even though some vote for Billie Holiday or Sarah Vaughan.
The preference for Ella is obviously due to her dual role as a pop as well as jazz singer. Blessed with a beautiful voice and a wide range, she was a swinger and brilliant scat singer who was capable of making a composer’s song sound more like herself than the song itself. This was perhaps why she earned the name ‘First Lady of Song.’
A great performer, she recorded in live setting in collaboration with numerous groups; and one session that remains memorable for her is Mack the knife, the theme from the Three Penny Opera, first performed and made popular by Louis Armstrong. It was recorded in Berlin at Deutschlandhallen, a club, which held almost 12,000 people.
The concert generated the same enthusiastic reaction, the same eager applause, that marked some of her great shows back home in the United States of America.
She sang nine songs at this concert — including Mack the Knife, which was perhaps the show’s greatest attraction. It was the first time she was singing this song usually identified with Louis Armstrong — in the New Orleans style. And, not knowing the lyric too well, she substituted her own for what might well have been an improvement on the original.

Gospel songs are simple in structure and are almost childlike in lyric, appearing at times incapable of conveying the drama and the reality they are called upon to express. But through the history of revival meetings, house parties, church choirs and the singing of the blues, the music came into into the limelight. But the artist who introduced emotion and sincerity to the music to give it the jazz feel was Mahalia Jackson, perhaps the world’s greatest gospel singer.
Although these artists are now dead, they have their various reissues in the market from which aspiring young jazz singers can draw inspiration — if they wish.

Salute to the young

BY BENSON IDONIJE
ALTHOUGH the younger players of jazz have not brought any innovation of significance to the music over the years, some of them need to be commended for keeping the spirit of the music alive and, in essence, helping to perpetuate the true meaning and culture of jazz.
Indeed, the freshness of their approach is a clear indication that something new is bound to happen at some point. Cassandra Wilson, Joshua Redman, Terrence Blanchard, Roy Hargrove, Cindy Blackman James Carter, Christian McBride, Geri Allen, Dee Dee Bridgewater among many others are currently contributing to the development and evolution of jazz as an art form. Some of them are even receiving accolades and enjoying the confidence of devotees. It’s just that nothing phenomenal, nothing extraordinary and remarkable has happened yet.
Although her recording career has been somewhat erratic, Cassandra Wilson, one of the current top jazz singers, has succeeded in breaking the barriers of conventional jazz singing. She is a vocalist with a distinctive and flexible style who is not afraid to take chances. In live setting, the direction of her vocal style is often determined by the inspiration she gets on the spur of the moment. Her mood, phrase choices in terms of improvisation are dependent on the rapport she establishes with an enthusiastic audience.
At a recent version of the North Sea Jazz Festival, she turned out to be top of the bill whereas she was not billed to be. Her performance attracted a huge audience, which refused to move to other festival venues because the session was so sizzling and captivating.
Cassandra has a remarkable album out that has added something fresh to the development of jazz- as a result of her determination to experiment with various elements and approaches. Recorded in 1968, Loverly won a Grammy for Cassandra whose profile has become big as a jazz singer and composer.
In specific terms, the experiment that earned the Grammy for Loverly is unquestionably traceable to the introduction of African rhythms to the music through Lekan Babalola, a Nigerian percussionist whose rhythms helped to change the concept and pattern of her music, bringing about a new direction.
One of the great avant garde tenor players, Dewey Redman, the father of Joshua Redman who died a few years ago, never in all his years received any where near the acclaim that his son, Joshua Redman gained in ’90s – even though Dewey was an innovative player.
Every few years, it seems as if the jazz media goes out of its way to hype one young artist, over praising him to such an extent that it is easy to tear him down when the next season comes.
DownBeat, Jazz Times, Jazz Journal, Straight No Chaser–all of them are usually full of eulogies for these hitherto unknown artists.
In the ’90s, Joshua Redman became a media darling but in his case, it was not an empty hype, and he largely deserved the attention he got.
With a recording career that began only in 1993, Joshua Redman has quickly become one of the premier saxophonists of his generation.
Redman got his first tenor saxophone at age ten and became one of the featured soloists of Berkeley High School’s widely acclaimed jazz ensemble. In 1991, he graduated summa cum laude from Harvard College, where he also was elected membership into Phi Beta Kappa.
Setting his eyes on becoming a lawyer, he achieved a perfect score on the Law School Admission Test and was accepted to Yale Law School. Before entering law school, Redman moved to New York City with some musician friends and practised and performed regularly. He also took first place in the 1991 Thelonius Monk Institute of Jazz Saxophone Competition. And because Redman enjoyed these experiences so much, he decided to postpone law school to become a professional musician. Redman hasn’t looked back ever since.
Joshua Redman released over six recordings as a leader in just five years and each enjoyed overwhelming success. He has since come up with some albums that devotees describe as ground-breaking.
In his young career, he has performed and recorded with some of the biggest names in jazz, including Dave Brubeck whose notable quartet featured the legendary white alto saxophonist, Paul Desmond. Others are the Carnegie Hall Jazz Band, B. B. King, trumpeter Clark Terry, ex-John Coltrane pianist Mc Coy Tyner, among others.
His consistency, exuberance and fresh approach have shown that Redman is a truly gifted individual, artistically and intellectually. His quick, meteoric rise is unusual, yet well deserved.

Trumpeter Terrence Blanchard is not only one of today’s most acclaimed players of the instrument but also one of his generation’s most prolific composers. His musical heroes include Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, John Coltrane, Thelonius Monk, and Duke Ellington.
A Texas native who now lives in New York City, Roy Hargrove is one of today’s leading jazz trumpeters. He began playing cornet in his elementary school band, switched to trumpet, and began listening to such masters as Louis Armstrong, Maynard Ferguson, Clifford Brown, Freddie Habbard, Dizzy Gillespie and Miles Davis.
Hargrove has established his unique voice. With a sound equally forceful and lyrical, he has released numerous recordings, which have enjoyed critical acclaim.
Cindy Blackman is perhaps the leading female drummer on the scene today. Many have attributed her success to the fact that she is alone in a terrain that is a male turf, but the truth is that she is greatly talented and creative. She counts Tony Williams, the drummer whom Miles Davis discovered for his talent in the ’60s, as her greatest percussion influence.
Influenced early in her life by the vocalists her parents listened to around the house, Dee Dee Bridge water became a good singer. She moved to New York in 1970 and soon became the lead vocalist for the Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra, a big band co-led by a trumpeter and drummer. She also collaborated with legends such as Sonny Rollins, Dizzy Gillespie, Dexter Gordon, Max Roach and Rahsaan Roland Kirk.
The list of young musicians playing pure, straight ahead jazz is not as long as it used to be. A good number of them are being attracted to the popular groove where ‘smooth’ jazz has continued to prevail for commercial reasons. Notwithstanding, the beat goes on.