The Penguin Jazz Guide (78 page)

& See also
Subconscious-Lee
(1949–1950; p. 118),
Star Eyes
(1983; p. 483)

YUSEF LATEEF

Born William Evans, 9 October 1920, Chattanooga, Tennessee

Tenor saxophone, flute, oboe, argol, other instruments

Eastern Sounds

Original Jazz Classics OJC 612

Lateef; Barry Harris (p); Ernie Farrow (b); Lex Humphries (d). September 1961.

Yusef Lateef said (1990):
‘I dislike the word “jazz” and stopped using it many years ago. I think it debases a great art form. When you look at the associations of that word – blather, rubbish – you will understand what I mean. So I reject it.’

Lateef adopted a Muslim name in response to his growing and eventually life-long infatuation with the musics of the Levant and Asia. One of the few convincing oboists in jazz, he has been somewhat marginalized in reputation as a ‘speciality’ act. Like Roland Kirk’s, Lateef’s music was cartoonized when he came under Atlantic’s wing, on albums that were enthusiastically promoted and received, but which rarely represented the best of his work. In recent years, he has concentrated somewhat on teaching, at which he charismatically excels, but he also runs his own YAL imprint and has been able to release the music that matters to him.

He worked with Dizzy Gillespie (an accelerated apprenticeship), Cannonball Adderley and Charles Mingus, but began making records of his own, for Savoy, around 1957. Like Kirk, the tenor saxophone is Lateef’s natural horn, but in his best period he made jazz (or his own version of that despised term) whatever instrument he was playing. In approach, he is somewhat reminiscent of the pre-bop aspect of Sun Ra’s long-time associate John Gilmore, working in a strong, extended swing idiom rather than with the more complex figurations of bebop. Just occasionally this spilled over into something schmaltzier. The
Eastern Sounds
session opens with ‘The Plum Blossom’, a feature for oboe and flute that immediately establishes that this will not be a conventional hard-bop date. It’s built on an interesting scale and an Eastern mode but loops its way round to something like the blues, perhaps the very best one-track representation of Lateef’s art. ‘Blues For The Orient’ confirms the direction, an extraordinary exercise in discipline for Harris, who holds the
tune together at varying tempos and with minimal chordal movement. ‘Don’t Blame Me’ is a powerful ballad that most listeners might find hard to place. Also included in the set is film music from
The Robe
and
Spartacus
, taken on flute and oboe respectively, that borders on kitsch, but the tenor-led ‘Snafu’ has a surging energy that leaves a very good band panting. One senses that Lateef wouldn’t acknowledge this as his finest musical moment, but it remains a very good record.

BOBBY TIMMONS

Born 19 December 1935, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; died 1 March 1974, New York City

Piano

In Person

Original Jazz Classics OJC 364

Timmons; Ron Carter (b); Albert ‘Tootie’ Heath (d). October 1961.

Drummer Jimmy Cobb said (1986):
‘I recorded with Bobby on
This Here
[1960/1961] and I’ve said before, he reinvented the piano on that record, with all that high-rolling, gospel, blues stuff. He was a master of that.’

‘Dat Dere’ and ‘Moanin’’ between them guarantee Timmons a bit of jazz immortality. He also gave Art Blakey a hit and probably helped secure the Messengers’ long tenure of hard bop. Sadly, Timmons was prey to alcohol and self-doubt and his life was cut short before he was 40. His characteristic style was a rolling, gospelly funk, perhaps longer on sheer energy than on harmonic sophistication. The live
In Person
is surprisingly restrained, though Timmons takes ‘Autumn Leaves’ and ‘Softly, As In A Morning Sunrise’ at an unfamiliar tempo. Timmons’s handling of more delicate material here is rather better than expected and there’s a lovely countryish roll that’s oddly prescient of what Keith Jarrett was doing. There are quite a number of recordings around, including
This Here
and
Moanin’
, titles which confirm what it was that made him famous and valued. He undervalued himself and there is an occasional throwaway element to his work, but he stands tall among the hard-bop pianists and composers.

BENNY CARTER
^&

Born 8 August 1907, New York City; died 12 July 2003, Los Angeles, California

Alto saxophone, trumpet, clarinet, voice

Further Definitions

Impulse! 051229-2

Carter; Bud Shank, Phil Woods (as); Buddy Collette, Teddy Edwards, Coleman Hawkins, Bill Perkins, Charlie Rouse (ts); Bill Hood (bs); John Collins, Barney Kessel, Mundell Lowe (g); Dick Katz (p); Ray Brown, Jimmy Garrison (b); Jo Jones, Alvin Stoller (d). November 1961–March 1966.

Saxophonist Bud Shank said (2000):
‘I think Benny is just a superior-type person. You know, when [critic and pianist] Leonard Feather was dying, and already in a coma, maybe not hearing anything any more, Benny sat by his bedside every day and played his saxophone to him, right until the end. You don’t get that kind of loyalty very often.’

This is the best-known of all Carter’s albums. Economics may have enjoined smaller ensembles, but Carter’s feel for reed voicing is such that loss is turned to gain. The added profit is a spacious but intimate sound. Carter and Hawkins had recorded together in Paris before the war in exactly the same configuration as these sides: four saxophones, piano,
bass, drums and guitar (Django Reinhardt!). Collins isn’t quite up to that standard, but he has a sure and subtle touch. All the saxophones solo on ‘Cotton Tail’, with Benny leading off and Bean bringing things to a magisterial, slyly witty close. ‘Crazy Rhythm’ is an echo of the first meeting and both the senior men quote from each other’s past solo. ‘Blue Star’ is intriguing: a complex, deceptive theme with another effective saxophone interchange. A later session (originally
Additions To Further Definitions
) came after a two-year film and TV hiatus in Carter’s jazz activities. If the intention was to duplicate the sound and success of
Further Definitions
, it pretty much worked. Mundell Lowe and Barney Kessel are in a different league from Collins, and the guitar part has a prominence far beyond the earlier date. Shank and Edwards are both in strong, individual form, and Bill Perkins is splendid on a remake of ‘Doozy’. Having the two dates together and in modern 20-bit sound is a huge plus; at more than 70 minutes, it’s a good-value purchase.

& See also
Benny Carter 1933–1936
(1933–1936; p. 48)

MILT JACKSON
^&

Born 1 January 1923, Detroit, Michigan; died 9 October 1999, New York City

Vibraphone

Bags Meets Wes

Original Jazz Classics OJCCD 240

Jackson; Wynton Kelly (p); Wes Montgomery (g); Sam Jones (b); Philly Joe Jones (d). December 1961.

Percy Heath said (1990):
‘Milt had this wonderful old gold-coloured Cadillac which we’d squeeze into on the way back from gigs. We called it the “Golden Dragon”. It suited the man, in all sorts of ways.’

Jackson was firmly ensconced in the Modern Jazz Quartet by this time, but occasional blowing dates were something he obviously enjoyed, and his association with Riverside led to some more challenging situations. This December 1961 date put together the two modern masters of their instruments in a setting that allowed them both free rein. That said, it’s a more considered record than some of this period and nothing is allowed to go on too long. ‘Stairway To The Stars’ is presented as a miniature and it seems just right at that. The quintet locks into an irresistible groove on the uptempo themes and it’s no surprise that the set-list is dominated by blues, with the opening ‘S.K.J.’ and ‘Sam Sack’ the most compelling of them. Bags would make plenty more records like this, including one with John Coltrane, but it stands out above the rest.

& See also
Wizard Of The Vibes
(1961; p. 118),
At The Kosei Nenkin
(1976; p. 432);
MODERN JAZZ QUARTET, Dedicated To Connie
(1960; p. 254),
The Complete Last Concert
(1974; p. 417)

IKE QUEBEC

Born 17 August 1918, Newark, New Jersey; died 16 January 1963, New York City

Tenor saxophone

It Might As Well Be Spring

Blue Note 21736

Quebec; Freddie Roach (org); Milt Hinton (b); Al Harewood (d). December 1961.

Saxophonist Johnny Griffin said (1989):
‘When Ike died, they closed all the clubs for the night, and I think just about everyone who was there followed his coffin.’

Blue Note’s last recording date in Hackensack and first in its new headquarters at Englewood Cliffs were both by Ike Quebec. The saxophonist – it’s pronounced ‘queue-beck’ – was a figure of considerable influence at the label, acting as musical director, A&R man and talent scout (Dexter Gordon was one of his ‘finds’). He was also an important Blue Note recording artist, making some marvellous sessions just after the war and steering the label in the direction of a more contemporary repertoire. He began his career as a dancer. He developed a tenor style influenced by Basie’s Herschel Evans. Before he succumbed to lung cancer at just 45 he put his creative thumbprint on many of Blue Note’s most distinctive bop recordings.

It Might As Well Be Spring
is pretty squarely in the tenor/organ tradition, except that Quebec has opted to record some gently expressive standards, not just the title-track but also ‘Lover Man’, ‘Ol’ Man River’ and ‘Willow Weep For Me’, as well as his own compositions ‘A Light Reprieve’ and ‘Easy – Don’t Hurt’. Digital remastering has restored a bit of detail to the sound, and Roach is the one who benefits most, a surprisingly subtle player who always has plenty to say and doesn’t sound as if he’s merely stoking up a fairground calliope. Quebec has several times teetered on the brink of major rediscovery. He is, admittedly, a limited performer when set beside Gordon or any of the other younger tenor-players emerging at the time, but he has a beautiful, sinuous tone and an innate melodic sense, negotiating standards with a simplicity and lack of arrogance that are refreshing and even therapeutic.

ACKER BILK

Born Bernard Stanley Bilk, 28 January 1929, Pensford, Somerset, England

Clarinet

Stranger On The Shore / A Taste Of Honey

Redial 546458

Bilk; strings, choir, Leon Young (dir).1961–1965.

Acker Bilk says (often):
‘ “Stranger On The Shore”? That’s my old-age pension, that is!’

The Three Bs, Barber, Ball and Bilk, were the heirs to Ken Colyer’s trad revolution. If Barber ‘prettified’ the Colyer style, Bilk brought an element of showmanship and humour, parading his Paramount band in Edwardian waistcoats and bowlers and scoring hits with ‘Summer Set’ (which also referred to his unreconstructed West Country accent) and ‘Stranger On The Shore’. Denis Preston wanted Bilk to record with strings; the clarinettist reworked a theme originally written for his daughter, recorded it with the Leon Young String Chorale and saw it picked up as theme music to a television drama. It sold two million copies, a success that led to envious disdain of a musician whose early work under Colyer had been a raw-edged George Lewis style very different from the silky, evocative murmur he cultivated in later years.

Though Acker became a television favourite and a staple of Sunday morning radio request programmes, his impeccable jazz credentials kept him credible with a live audience. Besides, only a musician of consummate artistry could play something like ‘Stranger On The Shore’ and not make it sound saccharine; the same, even more obviously, goes for ‘A Taste Of Honey’.

‘Serious’ jazz fans sneered at the fancy vests and ‘derbies’ and at trumpeter Kenny Ball’s moptop chirpiness in front of the cameras, but between them they kept jazz in the public eye all through the Beatles era. Anyone who saw either group in the flesh quickly recognized that the TV personas were simply a matter of rendering unto Caesar. We make no apology for the selection, or for favouring a crossover hit over some of the tougher Bilk material reissued by Lake. If you aren’t strangely moved by these, check for a pulse.

GRANT GREEN

Born 6 June 1931, St Louis, Missouri; died 31 January 1979, New York City

Guitar

Born To Be Blue

Blue Note 84432

Green; Ike Quebec (ts); Sonny Clark (p); Sam Jones (b); Louis Hayes (d). December 1961, March 1962.

Drummer Elvin Jones said (1990):
‘Someone asked me one time – some European journalist who was trying to be nice – asked if there was anyone, ever, who’d swung harder than me. I pretended to think for a moment and then I said: “Grant Green!” Guy hadn’t even heard of him!’

Green spent much of his career in the shadow of Wes Montgomery, but though he was less subtle harmonically, he had the ability to drive a melody-line and shape a solo as if telling a quietly urgent story. He also swung mightily and his long run of records for Blue Note is always approachable. We’ve always liked
Born To Be Blue
best of all, along with the splendid
Idle Moments
and
Street Of Dreams
. Quebec, who was Blue Note MD at the time, is still not widely admired, but he’s on cracking form, and his pitch and phrasing on ‘Someday My Prince Will Come’ should be a lesson to all young jazz players. Green has, for us, his finest hour, rippling through ‘My One And Only Love’ and ‘If I Should Love You’ with a ruggedness of emotion that goes hand in hand with the simplicity of diction. Not a note is wasted. ‘Count Every Star’ actually comes from an earlier session, but it too is judged to perfection, toned down just as it threatens to get schmaltzy. Sonny Clark, another Blue Note artist still being reassessed, is also in sparkling form, with just enough light and shade to temper his colleagues’ bluff romanticism. It’s a hefty body of work, illuminated throughout by Green’s infectiously driven beat, but along with a lot of Blue Note repertory acts, he never coasted and never repeated himself.