Cy Touff, John Klemmer on Joe Daley, Living the Jazz Life. . .
Paul B
on the Jazz Institute of Chicago website
http://www.jazzinstituteofchicago.org
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News and views
by Charles Walton
E. Parker McDougal
Jerry Coleman CD
Anite Gray-[Wardell]
Sax Mallard
Jack McDuff
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Bronzeville Conversation with Cy Touff
"I was in high school and somehow I heard of this band that was rehearsing
in the Madden Park Field house, 38th and Rhodes Avenue in the Ida B. Wells
Housing Development. Goodie Watkins was the leader. I lived 5900 North on
Rosedale and Broadway and I rode the Jackson Park 'L' to the rehearsals. I
was the only white person in the group. None of the kids belonged to the
musician's union and they all wanted to join the union. I discovered there
were two unions. A white one and a Black one. I was 15- or 16-years-old at
the time."-by Charles Walton
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John Klemmer remembers Joe Daley
"I remember my first and second lesson with Joe when I was maybe
13-15-years-old. My first lesson was to MEMORISE a six page CHARLIE PARKER
SONG and THE COMPLETE SOLO [about four pages] and be able to play it IN ALL
TWELVE KEYS, 'by next week.' I messed up some when Joe requested I play it
in F SHARP. [You wouldn't know WHAT key Joe would request or at WHAT tempo.]
I remember leaving the second lesson crying and seeing, out of the corner of
my eye, Joe smiling a little. Next lesson I DIDN'T MESS UP!" -by John
Klemmer
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LIVING THE JAZZ LIFE:
Conversations with Forty Musicians
about Their Careers in Jazz
"Ever wonder how Slam Stewart began humming along with his bass-fiddle
bowing? 'I was working with a group around Boston in a couple of clubs,'
Stewart told jazz journalist W. Royal Stokes. 'The group had a youngster
playing alto sax in it and he also doubled on violin. When he took a chorus
on the fiddle he used to sing the same note in the same register....I got
the idea of humming and singing along with my bass, right? I tried it and
found that I couldn't hum or sing in the same register that I was playing on
the bass. So I raised my voice one octave...and that's how I started....So
I've kept it all these years.' " -reviewed by Don Rose
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FAKEBOOK: Improvisations on a Journey back to Jazz
"Never having heard Richard Terrill play tenor saxophone, I have no idea how
good a jazzman he is or ever was. I get the sense he's not sure either.
Having read this somewhat disjointed autobiographical disquisition, however,
I do know he's a damn fine writer and a serious teacher. At the heart of
this mini-picaresque, wherein he wends his way from the upper Midwest to
Asia and back, giving up the music for the better part of a decade then
picking it up again, lies perhaps the best description of the actual process
of making jazz music that I have ever read." -reviewed by Don Rose
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Twisted
"I never actually know who lives in the penthouse apartment on Park Avenue
in Manhattan (after 40 years I cannot remember the exact address); possibly
a tenor player, a charter member of the 'cool school' by the name of Allen
Eager who lives with his fiancee, Peggy Remington, of the electric
razor...but she is in Paris; maybe it is a friend of the elegantly handsome
John Zucotti's father, who owns the shoeshine and the hat check at the "El
Morocco." -excerpt from a book on Al Haig by Grange Rutan, Haig's ex-wife
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Mingus Big Band Rocks Hancher-Preserves Legacy
"Unlike classical music, jazz is an art form with the emphasis primarily
upon the performer, rather than upon the composer. The rise of be-bop in
the 1940s increased the emphasis on improvisation, and further diminished
the importance of the composer. It should come as no surprise, then, that
only a handful of the most significant jazz musicians are known as great
composers. Three names stand above the rest: Duke Ellington, Thelonius
Monk, and Charles Mingus."-concert reviewed by Dr. William S. Carson
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Lou Levy 1928-2001
"Stan [Getz] and I have been together on and off with long periods of being
apart, for more than 30 years, going right back to the time with Woody
Herman in the forties. Off the stand we've been the closest friends for many
years, so it's natural that we have a musical rapport. . . You'll notice
with Stan that whenever anyone else is playing he listens. That's so rare in
most of the bands I've worked with. Things will happen on the stand when a
guy's soloing-the other musicians will talk to each other maybe even go to
the bar for a drink-I won't put up with that. I'll either tell them off
right on the band stand or I'll just get up and walk. To me that's really an
insult to the music, and also the audience doesn't go for it either. Those
are usually the guys that don't play the best." -historic interview by Steve
Voce
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Norris Turney 1921-2001
"Norris Turney passed away at about 7:45 p.m. on January 17, due to
complications of kidney disease. His wife of 41 years, Mary (Marilee), was
at his side. He was 79. He began and ended his life in the area of Dayton,
Ohio, where he had moved from New York about a decade ago. His New York City
career spanned thirty years prior to that." -by Russ Dantzler
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Lost episode from Ken Burns' 144-hour documentary, "Jazz."
"Fade up on a grainy old photograph of a man in a three-piece suit, holding
a cornet. Or a bicycle horn, it's hard to tell.
NARRATOR: Skunkbucket LeFunke was born in 1876 and died in 1901. No one who
heard him is alive today. The grandchildren of the people who heard him are
not alive today. The great-grandchildren of the people who heard him are not
alive today. He was never recorded.
WYNTON MARSALIS: I'll tell you what Skunkbucket LeFunke sounded like. He had
this big rippling sound, and he always phrased off the beat, and he slurred
his notes. And when the Creole bands were still playing
De-bah-de-bah-ta-da-tah, he was already playing Bo-dap-da-lete-do-do-do-bah!
He was just like gumbo, ahead of his time." -author unknown
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FROM RECENT ISSUES
Fakebook: Improvisations on a Journey Back to Jazz
"I've been showing up every Friday, talking to the musicians, saying how
much I've been practicing, lying a little. I've talked about the records I
like, people I played with who've made it big like Lyle Mays or Geoff
Keezer. I've answered the band members' questions: 'How's the balance?'
"Is the bass too loud?' 'Could you tell we screwed up on Night in Tunisia?'
Somehow I've convinced them I can play, even though they've never heard me.
The bandleader, the drummer, has invited me to sit in...."-excerpt from a
new book by Richard Terrill
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Interview with Milt Hinton 6/23/10-12/19/00
"There were so many good bassists at this year's Nice festival that even a
giant like Milt Hinton had trouble getting in enough playing time. Mostly he
played with Lee Konitz and Art Farmer, providing a firm base from which the
horns could launch their improvisations. It seemed remarkable to me that a
man who began his career playing with Freddie Keppard in his teens should
have the musical continuity of style to be able to play with Lee Konitz when
he was 71. Milton John Hinton, otherwise known as 'Fomp' or 'The Judge' is
such a man. . ."-historic interview by Steve Voce
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Bronzeville Conversation:
47th Street and South Park Boulevard-
Bronzeville's downtown
"On the west end of 47th Street was the Rosenwald Complex and the South
Center Building was on the east. There were movies and stage shows at the
Regal. At the Savoy, patrons danced to bands such as Count Basie, Duke
Ellington, and Jimmy Lunceford. During the week skating and boxing matches
were held at the Savoy. This, and more, made 47th and South Park a busy and
fun place to be."-by Charles Walton
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My time with Al Haig
"In the early '60s Al Haig and I were working for a couple of weeks in the
same Manhattan night club, playing solo piano and accompanying chick
singers. One of the singers was a Mexican-American girl who spoke perfect
English and sang her butt off. One night Al was accompanying her. Everybody
in the joint was listening, including a young female pianist who sat in once
in a while. She and I were discussing piano players, musicians, and singers.
Suddenly, she looked over at Al, then back at me, and said, 'It ought to be
against the law for anyone to play that much piano!' "-by Kenny Fredrickson
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