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JAZZ OF TWO DEC AJD By LEONARD FEATHER Author of the Encyclopedia of Jazz

The past few years have seen an upsurge in the interest in jazz, and in the outlets available to its expon¬ ents, that might seem completely incrediblle to any rhythmic Rip Van Winkle who had been asleep since the dark days when this music was the Cinderella of the American arts.

Probably one of the reasons jazz was forced to take refuge in the dance halls and the smoky clubs for so many years was that too few people were around who were even casually interested in bringing together the artists who made this music and the general public that remained only dimly aware of its existence. Even after Benny Goodman started the swing era, even while jazz played its happy though minor role in the boites along 52nd Street, it remains a fact, astounding now in retrospect, that through the late 1930s not a single book on jazz had been published in this country; aside from a couple rule¬ proving exceptions at Carnegie Hall, jazz had hardly ever been presented as a concert attraction; and in national publications such as the mass-circulation monthlies and the weekly news magazines, the sub¬ ject of jazz remained virtually unmentioned.

Even during the 1940s the advances were made slowly and painfully. Little by little this hitherto utilitarian art crept out of the dance halls and the bistros to find a regular place on concert stages around the country. Slowly but surely magazine editors, book publishers and miscellaneous intellectuals became aware that jazz could make good copy.

From 1950, when the long-playing record began to be established, the going was even easier and the jazz phenomenon gathered weight like a snowball—a cool snowball, rolling steadily uphill to un¬ predicted heights. Since 1953 there has been a veritable gold rush as a result of the discovery by record

company executives of a burgeoning youthful market for jazz LP’s. Today one can make the sweeping claim that any jazz artist of any talent can earn representation on records, and that the average jazz fan can find literally anything his musical heart desires in the embarrassment of riches now swamping the scene.

The present collection entitled Jazz of Two Decades shows graphically the variety of styles in which jazz has been played during the past twenty years. It shows, too, how this hardy native art form of ours moves steadily forward. f

On the first side of Jazz of Two Decades you will find six recent performances by some of EmArcy s own brilliant lineup of modern jazz stars. Obviously you will find a sharp contrast between these up-to- date items and the comparatively dated material on the other side; but fortunately the word “dated” need not be used in a derogatory sense, for these performances have earned their place as essential steps on the endless ladder of jazz achievement, and are as listenable and enjoyable Today as when they were first released—indeed, sometimes more so, because we can see and hear them now in clearer perspective.

The seven performances on the second side of this record represent a panorama of styles recorded during the middle 1940s for the Keynote and National labels and since taken over by Mercury for release on its EmArcy subsidiary. Each of the seven is extracted from a different LP recently released on EmArcy. There are ten LP’s altogether in this series, as follows: Jumping With Ventura, MG36015; / Surrender Dear (with Billy Eckstine), MG36010; Trumpet Interlude, MG36017, and the seven named below.

JAZZ OF THE 50s The Clifford Brown-Max Roach quintet eptomizes the amazing mu¬ sical, technical and inspirational strides made in jazz improvisation in the past few years. Cherokee is a wild and wonderful example of modern jazz at its best. Brown and Roach, who are Down Beat poll winners on trumpet and drums respectively, show why they are among the most imitated jazzmen on the scene today. Harold Land on tenor sax and Richie Powell on piano are also here in exciting solos; George Morrow on bass completes the personnel. This is one of the items in A Study in Brown, MG36037.

Just as Brown and Roach illustrate the forward strides taken in jazz as a direct result of the impact of bop, so may Sarah Vaughan be considered a product of the bop years. Though she is best known for her ballad performances, everything she sings reflects the influence of Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Billy Eckstine and the other key figures with whom she spent her formative years. A rare example of the direct throwback to these associations is Shulie-A-Bop, in which Sarah ad libs as if her voice were one of the great horns that helped shape her style. In addition she uses this number to introduce, with personal introduction for each, her fine accompanying trio: John Malachi on piano, Joe Benjamin on bass and Roy Haynes on drums. This is one of the numbers in Sarah’s LP Images, MG26005.

Erroll Garner reached the center of the stage aroung the same time Dizzy and Bird were attracting the limelight, but most critics regard his unique piano style as separate and distinct from the bop movement. The guitar-like strumming of his left hand, the phenomen¬ al ability to strike eight chords in a measure even at the fastest tempo, are among the matchless characteristics of this astonishing performer, born in Pittsburgh in 1921 and first prominent on the New York scene in 1944. Vve Got To Be a Rugcutter is a trifle Duke Ellington knocked off in the 1930s, used here merely as a point of departure for some typical up-tempo Garner improvisation. It is part of a Garner LP entitled Contrasts on MG36001. Erroll’s other recent Mercury LP’s include Mambo Moves Garner on MG20055, and Solitaire, MG20063.

Swahili is one of the many exciting items extracted from the Clark Terry LP on MG36007, recorded January, 1955 with the follow¬ ing personnel: Clark Terry, trumpet; Cecil Payne, baritone sax; Jimmy Cleveland, trombone; Horace Silver, piano; Oscar Pettiford, cello and bass; Wendell Marshall, bass; Art Blakey, drums. Written by Quincy Jones, this minor key composition builds up a mood of rising intensity, in which the work of Art Blakey plays the most important role. Blakey, a Pittsburgher, won the Down Beat New Star Award in 1953. Clark Terry, of course, has been a prominent featured soloist in the Duke Ellington band since 1951.

A forceful reminder of the contact jazz frequently retains with its folk-music roots can be found in the rugged and vital voice of Dinah Washington. Love For Sale, one of the numbers from the LP entitled After Hours With Miss D (MG36028) is an extraordinary example of her ability to bend a standard tune to her own requirements. Starting out of tempo, she moves with great intensity into a regular swinging beat, building up slowly as she moves into a register that reminds us of the fabulous flexibility of her range.

The Song Is You serves as a vehicle for a brand-new jazz talent, who provides us here with exciting proof that young, fresh minds are constantly awaiting a break and that no matter how many of the jazz itions of yesteryear fall by the wayside, there will always be others no less gifted to take their place. Julian “Cannonball” Adderley is an alto saxophonist who has rightly been hailed by dozens of musi¬ cians as perhaps the most likely contender for the crown of the late Charlie Parker. This sounds like the kind of claim that would be hard to live up to, but one hearing of The Song Is You should con¬ vince you that Cannonball really has something on the ball. Recorded in July, 1955 this performance features him with Nat Adderley (his brother) on trumpet; Jimmy Cleveland, trombone; Jerome Richard¬ son, tenor sax; Cecil Payne, baritone sax: John Williams, piano; Kenny Clarke, drums and Paul Chambers, bass; with Quincy Jones as arranger and director.

JAZZ OF THE 40s New Orleans

One of the hardiest perennials of jazz is the free-swinging improvisa- tional style that has been heard, in one form or another, for half a century in New Orleans, where so many of the great jazzmen were born. Irving Prestopnick, known internationally among jazz fans as “Fazola”, was among the surest and mellowest of the jazz clarinet sounds to reach out beyond his home town and lend added prestige to the phrase “New Orleans clarinet”. Born in December, 1912, he died a couple of months after his 36th birthday, but in the last decade of his life he made an impression on the jazz world that will long be remembered. _

Clarinet Marmalade was recorded in October, 1945 with the follow¬ ing personnel: Irving Fazola, clarinet; Tony Dalmado, trumpet; Julian Land, trumpet; Steve Giarrantano, tenor sax; Pete Laudeman, piano; Bunny Franks, bass; Charlie Duke, drums. This is extracted from the New Orleans Express LP, featuring the Fazola and George Hartman bands, on EmArcy MG36022.

Chicago

Born in Chicago in 1906, Lawrence Bud Freeman was an associate in the early 1920s of the celebrated Austin High School gang, among whom were Frank Teschemacher and Jimmy McPartland. A style- setter in the Chicago school of jazz soloists, he was the first tenor saxophonist to climb from this branch of the jazzz tree to a position of international renown.

The slimness of the dividing line between cities and styles may be deduced from the fact that Bud’s colleagues on this session in¬ cluded Edmond Hall, the veteran New Orleans clarinetist, and Charlie Shavers, the brilliant trumpet star from Philadelphia. Vernon Brown, the trombonist, hails from Venice, Illinois, but the only member of the Freeman ensemble here normally associated with the Chicago school is the immortal Dave Tough on drums. Completing the group are Gene Schroeder on piano and Bob Casey, bass. Inside On the Southside was recorded in December, 1954 in New York City. It is an excerpt from Midnight At Eddie Condon's featuring 12 numbers by Freeman combos on MG36013.

Kansas City

The great formative years for New Orleans Jazz were the first two decades of the century, and for Chicago jazz the years of the pro¬ hibition era, the 1920s, produced the most important developments. Chronologically later, and equally important, was the jazz that was born in Kansas City during the 1930s, when the bands of Count Basie, Andy Kirk and others soared from local to international eminence. Joe Turner and Pete Johnson were probably Kansas City’s most dis¬ tinguished jazz citizens during those years. Born in KC in 1911, Joe sang there for many years in local night clubs, most often accom¬ panied by the authoritative, vigorous pioneer boogie woogie piano style of Pete Johnson, who was also a KC native, seven years his senior. If you want to know the meaning of real Kansas City blues, no verbal definition can answer with a fraction of the eloquence of this performance. Joe and Pete surrounded themselves on Johnson and Turner Blues with such notable jazzmen as Frankie Newton on trumpet and Harold “Doc” West on drums, both of whom passed away a couple of years ago; tenor saxophonist Don Byas, a resident of France since 1946; guitarist Leonard Ware and bassist A1 Hall. Recorded in New York, February 1945, this is part of MG36014, an LP dedicated to Joe Turner and Pete Johnson.

Ellingtonia

Among the most timeless and immortal contributions to jazz are those made by the great soloists who have emerged from the Duke Ellington organization. Possibly the most famous of all is Johnny Hodges, the alto saxophonist from Cambridge, Massachusetts, who was part of the Ellington sounds from 1928 until 1951. The unique

brand of melodic inventiveness that earned Hodges countless awards from Down Beat, Metronome and Esquire as the number-one alto saxman in jazz has rarely been heard to better advantage than in Night Wind, which he recorded in New York, August, 1944, with a group under the leadership of former Ellington bassist Billy Taylor. Another famous Ellingtonian present on this date was baritone saxo¬ phonist Harry Carney. Completing the lineup are Emmett Berry, trumpet; Vernon Brown, trombone; Johnny Guarnieri, piano; Brick Fleagle, guitar and arranger, and Cozy Cole, drums. This one comes from Alto Altitude on MG36018, featuring six great saxophonists.

Swing

The swing era of the 1930s was responsible for the popularization not only of a number of great orchestras but also of countless major jazz soloists. Possibly the most famous saxophonist in the world for many years was Coleman Hawkins, who after a decade in Fletcher Henderson’s band took his tenor saxophone to Europe and toured there as one of the continent’s most attractive musical enticements for five years. Returning here in 1939, he went on still to greater triumphs during the ’40s. In January, 1944 (just four months before this Sax Ensemble was assembled) he won Esquire’s Gold Award and appeared at the first jazz concert ever given at the Metropolitan Opera House. Battle of the Saxes lives up to its name with swinging solo contributions by Hawkins and Don Byas on tenors, Harry Carney on baritone and Tab Smith on alto. In the rhythm section are Johnny Guarnieri, A1 Lucas on bass and the late Sid Catlett on drums. The order of the sax solos is: Smith, Byas, Carney, Hawkins. This is one of the many exciting items in MG36023, featuring ten top tenor men.

Bop

Undoubtedly the most maligned and ultimately the most successful jazz development of the 1940s was the style first known as Bebop, later abbreviated to bop. One of the novel approaches undertaken in the name of this music was the use of a voice as an instrument, singing in unison with a horn. The singing of the late Buddy Stewart and the tenor saxophone of Charlie Ventura carried this off most effectively in East of Suez, composed by Lou Stein, who played piano on this session. Recorded in 1947 in New York, it features an excel¬ lent Kai Winding solo and some contagious drums by Shelly Manne. Kai’s contribution earned this a spot in the Boning Up On 'Bones, MG36038.

Avant-Guard

A couple of years after bop had been firmly established, Lennie Tristano arrived from Chicago to bring something still newer to the harmonic horizons of jazz. Tristano’s lines represent a brand of hori¬ zontal thinking that requires an extraordinary foundation of harmonic knowledge. Not surprisingly, Tristano, who was years ahead of his time, was accorded a luke-warm reception when his first records were released. Today, with his influence apparent to us through the work of Lee Konitz and many other gifted disciples, the true importance of Lennie’s contributions is belatedly being acknowledged. Guitarist Billy Bauer, Lennie’s close associate during the late 1940s composed Blue Boy (based on the Fine and Dandy chord pattern) and plays on this item, with Bob Leininger on bass. The date was May 23, 1947 and the place New York City. Blue Boy is drawn from Advance Guard of the '40s on MG36016, which features seven different groups from combo to big band size.

There you have it. In these thirteen performances you will find a magnificient landscape of the . jazz scene. You will hear where this music has come from, you will pass through some of the cities and styles that have marked its peregrinations, and you may get a fairly clear perspective of where it is going. For further evidence you need only turn to the increasingly voluminous files of EmArcy’s wonderful library of jazz LP’s.

DEM-2 EmArcy ... A PRODUCT OF MERCURY RECORD CORPORATION, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS Printed in U.S.A.