A Visit to Jazzville

The "Springfield Rifles," i.e., the guys who played jazz from Springfield, Mass., circa 1946. From left are Hal Serra, Chuck Andrus, Joe Morello, Phil Woods and Sal Salvador. Photo from local802afm.org

If you tootle around eBay like I do occasionally (well, more than occasionally), and you look for jazz LPs, you've probably seen the record below offered for big money. Why? In a word, cheesecake. Collectors of genteel erotica pony up real dough for albums with over-exposed attractive young women on them. The cover of this Dawn LP is particularly sought after for that reason.

Music? Who cares about the music?

Well, I do (he said self-righteously). And so do you. So that's why I'm posting this album – because it's hard to find, and the music on it is excellent. Not that the comely Vespa jockey isn't an added attraction. But rare sides by Gene Roland and the ultra-obscure Hal Serra are the main reason we (meaning me) here at Gems do what we do.

A funny story about this record. I found it years ago at a church white elephant sale in Connecticut (when I was briefly living there) and listened to it a few times before sticking it in the stacks and forgetting it. Zoom ahead a dozen years to the mid-'90s, and I'm doing my radio show at our newly launched NPR-affiliate, WJFF. I'd pulled "Jazzville, Vol. 4" as part of the afternoon's offerings, and was getting set up for the show when I noticed the name "Dudley Watson" in the album's liner notes. Dudley was the bass player on several of the Gene Roland pieces on the record.

The remarkable Dudley Watson,
performing on WJFF's "Live from
Studio B" in the winter of 1994.
Photo by Able Rae

Dudley Watson was also the bass player on the live, in-studio jazz performance show that followed mine that afternoon.

Yeah, that's right. For about 10 years, I also co-hosted a live-jazz program called "Live from Studio B" on WJFF immediately after my record show. Every week we'd have a different group of local jazz players come by and play for an hour. That week's group included Dudley on bass. Talk about serendipity.

Dudley was an extraordinary character. A true jazz gentleman, he was from the old school, a hipster from the days of Bird and Diz. He'd been playing bass for some 50 years when I knew him, and he'd never missed a beat. He was always attired in a sport coat and tie, and invariably wore a short-brimmed fedora. Being an albino, he had to be careful of the sun and had weak eyes made huge by exceedingly thick glasses. Even so, he managed to get around with the agility of a man half his age – all the while lugging his big double bass.

So ... on the day I brought "Jazzville, Vol. 4" in to play on my show, we had Dudley Watson both on wax and live in the studio. A real treat!

These Roland tunes and those by Hal Serra are also a real treat. Serra was originally from Massachusetts' capitol city, though he'd been a New Yorker for many years. His credits include stints arranging with June Christy and Ella Fitzgerald, but he remains largely unknown to most listeners today. He unfortunately passed away about six months ago but, as you'll hear on this download, he's a fine pianist and someone well worth seeking out.

The same can be said of Gene Roland, though his music has always been a bit more in the public eye. These arrangements are real swingers, as are the tunes. It's interesting to hear Paul Quinichette outside of the usual Basie-esque setting, too.

A word about the sound quality. I have a dozen vintage Dawn LPs and, though each looks absolutely pristine to the eye, each invariably plays with a fair degree of surface noise. No degree of washing seems to help (as it often does with most noisy LPs). So be forewarned – there is a good deal of hiss in places on this record, especially in the last few Serra numbers. No pops or clicks, just "sssssss." The music, though, is well worth hearing despite the somewhat defective sound.

























Jazzville, Vol. 4
Gene Roland/Hal Serra
Dawn DLP 1122

Gene Roland, comp, arr, tp; Johnny Carisi, tp; Dick Meldonian, as; Paul Quinichette, ts; Robbie Swope, tbn; Nat Pierce, p; Dudley Watson, b; Walter Nolan, d. 
August 20, 1959, New York, NY.

1. Suitcase
2. Minor Scene

Gene Roland, comp, arr, tp; Paul Quinichette, ts; Nat Pierce, p; Freddie Green, g; Wendall Marshall, b; Sonny Payne, d. 
August 26, 1957, New York, NY.

3. Colonel Hodge

Gene Roland, arr, tp; Paul Quinichette, ts; Nat Pierce, p; Doyle Salathiel, g; Oscar Pettiford, b; Osie Johnson, d. 
August 13, 1957, New York, NY.

4. The Creeper (Pettiford)

Hal Serra, p; Bert Collins, tp (2, 4); Ernie Furtado, b (5, 9); Earl May, b (6, 8); Joe Williams, b (7); John Cresci, d (5, 7, 9); Ed Thigpen, d (6, 8)
1958, New York, NY. 

5. Everything I've Got Belongs to You
6. Why Was I Born
7. Irma (Serra)
8. Suddenly It's Spring
9. The Things I Love

Find it here: http://www.mediafire.com/?oocbdqozx1e1i4w

A Norman Granz Two-fer

In his characteristic short-crown fedora and sweater vest, Norman Granz is caught in rare repose by photographer and jazz writer Bill Gottlieb and his Speed Graphic. By the early '50s, when this photo was taken, Granz was the captain of jazz industry. Photo by William Gottlieb

I have two little EPs from the early days of the 45- and 33-rpm format and I was trying to come up with a way to post them here on Gems without forcing you, our esteemed visitor, to have to devote an entire CD to a paltry 15 minutes of music. Then an idea came to me – why not pair them under the unifying element of their producer, impresario Norman Granz? Works for me. Now you can download a more-efficient paltry 25 minutes of music.

But ... who was Norman Granz? Where to begin?

The originator of the "Jazz at the Philharmonic" concert concept, Granz was a Los Angeles native who pioneered integrated jazz shows in the forties, owned numerous successful record companies, managed top jazz talents, marketed national and international tours, and made the careers of jazz stars like Ella Fitzgerald and Oscar Peterson. A shrewd businessman in an industry rife with well-intentioned amateurs, Granz was to some a savior and prophet, to others a manipulative Machiavelli.

In the fifties, Norman would regularly buy spreads in multiple jazz publications touting his next JATP tour, or his star players' jazz poll victories, or his latest concept album ("The Jazz Scene" being the first in a series of high-priced "collector's items"). His name appended to a jazz concert usually guaranteed a capacity audience of hooting, whistling and "Go, man!"-screaming jazz maniacs. And he would frequently record the results and issue them in a never-ending series of albums (78 and 33 rpm) under the JATP rubric. With Norman, everybody made money.

The great Chicago jazz DJ, Dick Buckley, worked for a while for Granz in the mid-'50s. While he never really criticized his former boss on air, I heard Buckley more than once mention that Norman got rich while his stars wound up scuffling for nickels and dimes. I myself saw Norman as a commercializer, a guy more interested in making a buck than in making art. When Norman moved permanently to Switzerland in the early '60s, I remember thinking he probably wanted to be closer to his money.

All of which is beside the point. The guy did much to support the music and its artists, and these two EPs are evidence of the wonderful stuff that could be produced under his direction. I don't believe this music is currently available in digital form, though it was issued on several LPs back in the day.

Three of the four Basie tunes have the Count fronting a sextet featuring Joe Newman and Paul Quinichette. Quinichette is often dismissed as a Lester Young-wannabe, but to my ears he exhibits real individuality here. Lester never sounded like this. "Tippin'" is a big band performance with a nice solo from "Lockjaw" Davis, probably an Ernie Wilkins chart. This is Basie before the arrangers were brought in to make over the band, and they swing hard. That's the Redbank Kid with bassist Gene Ramey in the photo, by the way.

Bob Brookmeyer was a rising talent when this EP was issued. He'd been working with Stan Getz (another Granz property) at the time of this recording and had been in a number of top-level big bands including those of Woody Herman and Claude Thornhill. He's heard here with a West Coast rhythm section, playing perhaps a little too laid back by East Coast standards (these things mattered in the mid-'50s). Brookmeyer was unusual in that – unlike most trombonists of the day – he played a valve version of the horn. David Stone Martin thought otherwise – he shows Bob with a standard slide trombone on the cover. You can see Brookmeyer with the correct instrument in the picture.

As always, the files here were ripped directly from the originals with only a slight cleaning up of pops and clicks. Your choice as to whether the music gets filed under Basie or Brookmeyer. Or Granz, for that matter.

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The Count Basie Sextet, Clef EP 186
Count Basie, org, p; Joe Newman, tp; Paul Quinichette, ts; Freddy Green, g; Gene Ramey, b; Buddy Rich, d.
New York, NY; December 13, 1952

*Count Basie, p; Renauld Jones, Paul Campbell, Joe Newman, Wendell Culley, tp; Henry Coker, Benny Powell, tbn; Marshall Royal, as, cl; Ernie Wilkins, as, ts; Eddie Davis, Paul Quinichette, ts; Charlie Fowlkes, bar; Freddy Green, g; Jimmy Lewis, b; Gus Johnson, d.
New York, NY; July 22, 1952
 

1. She’s Funny That Way  4:10
2. Tippin’ on the QT*  2:59
3. Count’s Organ Blues  3:09
4. As Long As I Live  3:09

 

Bob Brookmeyer Plays Bob Brookmeyer, Clef EP 322

Brookmeyer, v tbn; Jimmy Rowles, p; Buddy Clark, b; Mel Lewis, d.
Los Angeles, CA; December 26, 1954

5. There Will Never Be Another You  4:23
6. Bulldog Blues  8:01

(Link fixed again!) Find it here: http://www.mediafire.com/download/cz8rr9d3km9ifuz/Norman_Granz_2-fer.rar