Big Boss Tenor – Houston Person

by | Apr 19, 2024 | Quartet/Quintet, Solo/Duo, Trio

In Texas they have a town they call “Houston.”  New York has a street named “Houston” but they pronounce it “Howstin.”  In jazz, there’s a particularly noteworthy Person, and no matter how you say Houston, he’s been playing his big boss tenor both hot and cool for more than half-a-century!  Houston Person’s musical role seems to be as a show stopper and spotlight stealer, no matter who he plays with … he can touch you and growl at you, equally well, during the same electrifying passage.  I have described his style as silk and cement, and you’ll find examples of both––and everything inbetween––in the three videos below.

Topmost is a 1998 performance of Blues Up and Down with David “Fathead” Newman and the Rein deGraaff Trio.  Below that is a tune who’s name is not listed, and which I can’t seem to identify, but Houston’s duo with John Clayton is comfortably energetic nonetheless.  Finally, At Last is a tune with Emmet Cohen (p), Kyle Poole (d), and Russell Hall (b) that has just enough silk and just enough cement to prove my point.

Recorded live in June of 2023 at the Caffe Lena in Saratoga Springs, NY.  Person and Clayton … a unique duo with a combined swinging sound will find a place in the heart of any jazz fan.

Recorded in 2021 at Emmet’s Place, in Harlem, NYC. The weekly performances are by invitation only … and they entertain only around 8 guests per show.

Kessel’s Chordal Cool

by | Mar 20, 2024 | Trio

The amazing Barney Kessel is generally ranked among the greatest jazz guitarists of all time … especially known for his knowledge of chords, inversions, and chord-based melodies. When playing chords, Kessel frequently used his fretting-hand thumb, something unorthodox for most jazz players of the day. In fact, he would regularly use it to fret both the 6th and 5th strings simultaneously, creating a type of voicing rare in jazz guitar.

Below left, Barney plays the familiar standard Autumn Leaves, with (what may be) Kenny Napper on bass and John Marshall playing drums. Below right, he joins bassist Stur Nordin and drummer Pelle Hulten on Swedish television in 1974, with Minor Mode.  At the bottom, also in 1974, Kessel swings along with the legendary pianist Oscar Peterson, and iconic bassist Niels-Henning Oersted Pedersen (NHOP) at Ronnie Scott’s Club in London, on Watch What Happens.  When you put these guys together … just watch what happens!

Fiddlin’ Around With Brown

by | Mar 9, 2024 | Quartet/Quintet

Regina Carter began taking piano lessons at the age of two but, as she grew, so did her need for broader expression.  She eventually switched to violin, because it was more conducive to her creativity.  At first she studied and played classical music … and as a teenager, played in the youth division of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. While still at school, she was able to take master classes from Itzhak Perlman and Yehudi Menuhin.  Regina was studying classical violin at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston when she decided to switch to jazz. She has become a master of improvisational jazz violin, though her work draws upon a wide range of musical influences, including Motown, Afro-Cuban, Swing, Bebop and Folk.

Reets and I is an uptempo tune featuring Carter with the Ray Brown Trio –– Ray on Bass, Larry Fuller at the piano, and George Fludas playing drums.

As with the video above, Lady Be Good is from Ray Brown’s 75th birthday concert in 2001. Again, we hear The Trio with, of course, Regina Carter swinging easily on violin.

The Legendary Bob James

by | Mar 1, 2024 | Smooth Jazz, Trio

More than a fine jazz keyboardist, Bob James was a composer, arranger, and record producer who transcended any single style of music. In the early 90s, he founded the supergroup Fourplay … previously enjoying notoriety for his composition of “Angela”, the theme song for the TV show Taxi, for which he also performed the soundtrack.  It is generally accepted that music from his first seven albums has often been sampled, and is believed to have contributed to the formation of the musical genre hip hop.  Bob started playing piano at the tender age of four, and is said to have had perfect pitch from the very beginning!

In 1962, James was a twenty-two year old college student; his trio won the Collegiate Jazz Festival and recorded his first album, “Bold Conceptions,” as The Bob James Trio. Half-a-century later, he found himself the leader of another red, hot trio … this time featuring Billy Kilson on drums, and Michael Palazzolo on bass, the same musicians performing on both of these videos.  The one [above] is Angela –– also known as the Theme from Taxi –– originally written for a character in one of the TV episodes, but so well liked by the show’s producers that it became the program’s now instantly recognizable theme song.  The video [below] is Westchester Lady, another of Bob James’ most identifiable tunes.

For more Bob James, see MOJ posts on August 10, 2018 and October 24, 2020.

The Joy of Samara

by | Jan 5, 2024 | Video, Vocal

I have only two words for you … Samara Joy.  Samara is a marvelous young jazz singer from a musical family in the Bronx New York, who has an incredibly bright future and might even out-Ella Ella one of these days!  Samara’s album “Linger Awhile,” was released in September 2022, winning the award for Best Jazz Vocal Album, and she also won Best New Artist at the 2023 Grammy Awards.

The first tune (top) is the Billy Strayhorn tune Lush life … one of my perennial favorites.  Next (middle left) listen to her impeccable phrasing on Can’t Get Out of This Mood, followed by Lady Be Good (middle right) as she channels Ella and adds a few ear-popping twists of her own.  Finally Samara’s poignant video of Guess Who I Saw Today (bottom), a song originally composed for the Broadway musical revue New Faces of 1952.  She was a new face on the jazz scene in 2021, now at the tender age of 24, if she stays on the straight-and-narrow this chanteuse is going places!  Currently, she is touring the globe.

Teacher, Musician, Legend – Barry Harris

by | May 27, 2023 | Trio

Barry Harris is part of an exceptional group of Detroit-bred jazz musicians, including Tommy Flanagan and Donald Byrd, who rose through the extraordinary arts education program in the public school system during the 1930s and 1940s.  He took piano lessons from his mother at the age of four––a church pianist, she asked him if he was interested in playing church music or jazz.  Fortunately for us, he chose jazz.

In his teens, he learned bebop largely by ear, imitating solos by Bud Powell, who along with Thelonious Monk was a strong influence on his playing.  Early on, he developed an interest in passing the torch through education.  Barry began teaching his musical theories as early as 1956, tutoring young, promising talent––all the while performing professionally with the likes of Miles Davis, Max Roach, and Lee Konitz. He has carried on the teaching tradition throughout his life.

Still going strong in 2017 at the age of 88, his arrangement of A Nightingale Sang In Berkeley Square at Dizzy’s in New York is as unique as Barry Harris himself.

Also at Dizzy’s, Blues In Bb features the trio of Barry on piano, Leroy Williams on drums and Ray Drummond playing bass.

‘Round Midnight – Chet Baker

by | Apr 29, 2023 | Quartet/Quintet

This has always been my favorite rendition of Thelonious Monk’s ‘Round Midnight … so much so, that I couldn’t resist adding my own visual interpretation of the mood it evokes. This is music for a rainy night.  Music for lonely lovers and all those others seeking shelter from the storm, needing comfort for the soul.

By request, for the first time in six years on Mark Of Jazz, I am repeating a post (May 12, 2017).  Besides Chet, the players in this set are unidentified and I’m not sure exactly where this particular performance came from, but I think it’s worth sharing one more once.

The Torme Touch

by | Mar 10, 2023 | Trio, Vocal

Although Mel Torme spent most of his career as a singer, he was also a drummer, pianist, arranger, author and prolific song writer.  Since the age of 4, when he made his first stage appearance, and for the next 60 years, he entertained worldwide audiences with a unique, finely tuned voice that earned him the nickname of “The Velvet Fog” … much to his chagrin.  As you listen to his renditions of A Nightingale Sang In Berkeley Square (L) and When Sunny Gets Blue (R) you’ll have to form your own opinion about smoooth.

Sorry, no scat singing this time. If you want to hear ‘scat’ just follow this link to our March 31, 2017 post with Mel Torme and Buddy Rich as they blow the lid off the place!  I’ve moved my 1989 interview with Mel from our Jazz Scene Podcasts page to this week’s post so you can enjoy it below.

Presenting Mel Torme

by Fred Masey | Podcast #009

Her Honey-Coated Voice

by | Mar 3, 2023 | Orchestral, Trio, Vocal

Nancy Wilson was a singer and occasional actress whose career spanned over five decades, from the mid-1950s until her retirement in early 2010.  During her performing career, she was called a singer, a consummate actress and “the complete entertainer.”  The title she preferred, however, was “song stylist”.  She received many nicknames including “Sweet Nancy”, “The Baby”, “Fancy Miss Nancy” and “The Girl With the Honey-Coated Voice.”  Proof positive of those laurels can be found in the performances below, as you listen to Nancy’s tender rendition of For Once In My Life and her energetic 1998 serenade of Quincy Jones at his 50th birthday tribute with the Ellington/Russell tune Do Nothin’ ‘Til You Hear From Me.

She walked into my studio wearing a floor length, white ermine coat.  It was real.  So was she.  Nancy Wilson was known as a singer’s singer, boasting more than 70 albums and 3 Grammy Awards.  While she has been recognized for her excellence in blues, jazz, R&B, pop and soul, for my money her greatest strength lies with jazz.  Nancy is “the complete entertainer”.  Here’s an interview from a few years back you can also find, along with many others, on our Jazz Scene Podcast page.

Meet Nancy Wilson

by Fred Masey | Podcast 005

Not Easy Being Green

by | Jan 29, 2022 | Trio

I had never really listened to Benny Green until I came across some old Art Blakey Jazz Messenger’s recordings and focused my ears past the drums.  It has been said that that “those who can’t do teach” … well, Benny Green teaches but is equally gifted as a performer, evidenced by the videos below.  Topmost, Tempus Fugit is an uptempo Bud Powell composition, recorded at New York’s Lincoln Center, that features a trio of Green at the piano, David Wong on bass and Aaron Kimmel playing drums.  Lower left is Me And My Baby.   Lower right something called Cupcake.  Both offer the trio of Benny playing piano, Ben Wolfe on bass and Carl Allen on drums.

This is Me And My Baby, a comfortably toe-tapping tune that takes Benny Green’s trio out of the concert hall and into a more relaxed clublike atmosphere.

Cupcake is a more laidback piece than the first two, keeping you in that same easy going setting.  It’s a clever arrangement that is sure to capture your attention.