Forget the Resolutions – Live Every Day (in the Jazziest Way)

Tags

Bill Evans, dancing, ella fitzgerald, Four Freshmen, henry mancini, New Year's Eve, Petula Clark, Quincy Jones, Sonny Rollins, Thelonius Monk

Over the past few weeks, life has been full of music, parties, giving and receiving, good memories and a few melancholy moments. Now, we’re here at the last holiday of the year. Last chance to add something wonderful to your diary for 2015.

When I was younger, New Year’s Eve was a big occasion. The party. The new dress. The sparkly high heels. The champagne. The hats and horns and confetti. And the dancing – oh, the dancing. Over the years, I’ve come to enjoy a quieter celebration and more often find New Year’s Eve a time for reflection, sometimes with company and sometimes alone. Out with the old and in with the new!

In the jazz world, however, the old never gets old, and we definitely do not want to toss anything out even as we make room for the new. The jazz world is so full of a number of great tunes and artists with more coming along all the time. I’m hard put each week to make the choices I need to make to keep these little posts down to a manageable size. So much jazz; so little time. I need that on a bumper sticker.

But instead of lamenting the limited space, let’s just get on with this last post of the year. Bye bye, 2015. Helllooooo, 2016.

To set the New Year mood, I’m calling on Ella Fitzgerald to give us her take on the quintessential song of the week. If you haven’t made your New Year’s plans yet, get busy! Time’s a wastin’. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQfZTPKzRZ0

Marshall Rosenthal once wrote in Rolling Stone: “To celebrate without dancing is like eating Oreos without milk. The taste is sweet, but the wet exhilaration of a fundamental force washing the sweetness inward is missing.”

Let’s celebrate! Let’s dance! And here’s a little music for the occasion. If you don’t have a partner, it’s fine to dance alone. I do it often and I don’t care if anybody’s looking.

For openers, here’s a sweetly mellow version of a lovely old standard to get you on your feet. “More Than You Know” was penned by Vincent Youmans with lyrics by Billy Rose and Edward Eliscu, published in 1929. I have it here by Sonny Rollins with Thelonius Monk on piano, Tommy Potter on bass and Art Taylor on drums. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dd0a2bNlTOQ

Bill Evans is not particularly known for playing dance music, but when you’re with the right partner, you can dance to anything. In 1965, I slow danced to “Downtown” by Petula Clark, but I was young and in love and he was headed to Vietnam. That’s another story. Bill Evans recorded this one in the early 60s with Larry Bunker on drums and Chuck Israel on bass. It’s one of my personal favorites and I dance to it any chance I get. “My Foolish Heart” (and that’s another story, too).  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2LFVWBmoiw

The Four Freshmen are part of my musical history, the close harmony jazz vocalists that came to my attention just about the time rock and roll hit the charts – different charts. The Freshmen were unique and appealed to a different sensibility (full disclosure – some of us liked the sounds of Bill Hailey as well.) These guys – Bob Flanigan, Ross Barbour, Don Barbour and Ken Errair – were prolific and have a long list of recordings. Over time, various members of the Four dropped out and were replaced, but a cycle of Four Freshmen iterations continued. They even have their own Four Freshmen society. But enough about that – we’re talking New Year’s Eve and slow dancing. Try this one on for size. “We’ll Be Together Again.” Nice and easy… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z62ciYVJqH0

I had a jazz pianist friend a few years back who closed each gig with a beautiful tune by Henry Mancini. I figure it’s just the thing to wrap up New Year’s Eve when the champagne is gone and the floor is covered with confetti and you’ve kicked off your shoes for the last dance and people are kind of leaning on each other as much as dancing. Quincy Jones and his team play it on the Mancini tribute album and here it is just for you. It’s time for “Dreamsville.” Shhh, I think somebody’s already sleeping. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h498cka7AwE

Happy New Year, JazzBabies…I wish you every good thing this year. Forget the resolutions – just enjoy each day and those you love. It’s all we have.

Thanks for being with me this year.

Ciao,

JazzCookie

Have Yourself a Jazzy Little Christmas…

Tags

Charlie Byrd, Christmas, duke ellington, George Handel, jazz, Kay Ryan, Kurt Elling, Rascal Flatts, San Diego Gay Men's Chorus, Steve Allen, The Nutcracker Suite, Thelonius Monk

Jazz Cookie’s holiday card, 2015
(view from my front door)

We’re on a downhill run toward Christmas this week, and right behind Christmas comes the end of another year on this increasingly weary and often puzzling old planet.

With so much happening in the world recently, some of it not at all good, it’s a joy to take refuge in music. I’ve been to a couple of fine live performances in two of San Diego’s beautiful Halls of Music (they have other names, of course) and while neither of them were billed as jazz, both had jazzy touches along with more traditional holiday music.

The San Diego Gay Men’s Chorus can take a bow for offering the jazziest version of “The Hallelujah Chorus” I’ve ever heard (among other terrific numbers). Someone suggested that Handel would be spinning in his grave, but I think George just might have jumped in with a Hammond B-3 take on the whole thing.

I’ve been playing this first tune a lot lately. It’s from a holiday collection with a very cool and jazzy take on things “…from Coney Island to the Sunset Strip…” Steve Allen wrote this back in 1953 (when the jazz world was way cool, indeed), and Louis Armstrong introduced it on his album, A Merry Christmas with Good Old Satch. Jazz vocalist Kurt Elling is here to run you through the rest of Allen’s hip lyrics as he wishes you all a “Cool Yule.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xiXGBEHzS5k

How many productions or recordings of The Nutcracker Suite have you watched or heard? Of all the ones I’ve witnessed one place or another, my favorite was the New York City Ballet at Lincoln Center on Christmas Eve in 1982 as I sat amongst a bevy of tots just waiting for the big night. Magic happens, and at the end of this production, I watched Santa, his sleigh and eight tiny reindeer fly above the stage, and could have been eight years old again. Well, Tchaikovsky’s old music was transformed a few years back by another master composer, Mr. Duke Ellington, on his remarkable album Three Suites.

Ellington reworked the Nutcracker into jazz. He also reworked Grieg’s Peer Gynt Suites and did a tribute to John Steinbeck with his Suite Thursday. Ellington had some fun here, renaming the selections from the Nutcracker. Here he is with friends on “Dance of the Sugar Rum Cherry.” This may be an album you want to own. With jazz, anything can happen. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ONknTGUckKc

I’ve been a Charlie Byrd fan for more years than I care to announce here, but when it comes to falling in love, Charlie was my first. Bought his albums, saw him live twice – once at the long gone Penthouse in Seattle in 1965 and again at his “home,” the Showboat in Georgetown in the early ‘80s. Charlie was amazing right up to his last strum in 1999.  If you didn’t know this about him, Charlie Byrd was instrumental in introducing the bossa nova to U.S. audiences after he heard it on a South American tour with Woody Herman’s band in 1961. This recording is pre-bossa nova days, and just seems like a nice shift from the busy-ness and cookies and parties and carols, although it’s not a big shift –  the holidays are about love, are they not? Better love than shopping malls. Here’s Charlie Byrd with Keter Betts and Buddy Deppenschmidt from the 1960 album The Guitar Artistry of Charlie Byrd. “Taking a Chance on Love.” The odds are good. And you’ll be tappin’ your toes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VM6nUGFOrOg

I’ve been a writer since Hector was a pup, and once in a while I pick up a book of poetry or prose, fiction or nonfiction that catches me right in the mid-section. The latest mid-section grab came from award-winning California poet Kay Ryan in her book Kay Ryan’s The Best of It: New and Selected Poems which won a Pulitzer Prize in 2011. Ryan was was also awarded a MacArthur Fellowship that same year. Okay, I hear you asking out loud, “What’s the deal with poetry? We’re here for jazz.” Patience, Grasshopper. It was Ryan’s poem, “Monk Style” that grabbed me and here it is. If I’ve violated a copyright, it was unintentional, just pure admiration.

Monk Style

In practice, it took 45 minutes to get his stride.
It was hard for Monk to play Monk.
—National Public Radio

It may be that
Monk is always
playing Monk but
down the hall.

There are
long corridors
as in a school.

Monk must
approach himself,
join himself
at the bench
and sit awhile.

Then slip his
hands into his
hands Monk
style.

—Kay Ryan

Without further ado, here he is, Thelonius Monk, solo, with his hands in his hands playing “Everything Happens to Me.” How beautiful those hands are.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LzrcGrlP5g8list=PLrR6QlNIqj5kaDmjRlkdyI2_16MIOzBMc

And finally, I’m repeating one I included last year. It’s not jazz and it’s not exactly country either. It’s just lovely and speaks to the hearts of anyone who is on the road, on a ship, in a desert tent, on one coast when they want to be on the other one…everyone who is away from people they love this week. Last year that was me. This year I’m home, but I know the feeling when you’re not. For people who are not necessarily alone, but not home either, even a luxury hotel can be a lonely place. For my friends Vicki and Mike in New York for the holiday, this won’t apply to you. But for Rascal Flatts on this occasion, it did. Their close harmony is – well, rich and complex – just like the best art of any kind. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igScPXNahf0

That’s it for this week, JazzBabies. I wish you every good thing this holiday season. If you’re traveling, drive like somebody loves you. If you can’t make it home for Christmas, I wish you happy dreams of those you love. And if you can help someone less fortunate have a merrier Christmas, please let your generous jazzy self shine through.

Cheers with a lagniappe of love and blessings,

JazzCookie

JazzCookie’s List of Naughty and Nice – Mostly Nice

Tags

Bill Evans, Christmas, Dianne Reeves, ella fitzgerald, Frank DeVol, Frank Loesser, Granddad, JJ Johnson, Johnny Mandel, Kai Winding, Leroy Anderson, Lou Rawls, Steve Allen, Zoot Sims

It’s still early December, a little too early for the truly sentimental songs of the season, but the holidays are definitely here. I was assured of this last night at a family gathering that included two wee bairns (although one of the bairns is more a melt-your-heart four-year-old barn stormer). Four generations of holiday energy filled the rooms the way great jazz can fill a little club in Manhattan or a concert hall by the sea.

I’m finding that Christmas is big in San Diego. Maybe it’s to counter the lack of snow and Norman Rockwell images, or maybe it’s just an extension of the generally good-natured and happy spirit of the place. At any rate, I wandered down to Ocean Beach on Saturday to see the legendary Christmas tree in the sand. It’s not really in the sand, but a few feet away – fifty-plus feet tall and decorated with beach balls.

It’s warm and sunny in my neighborhood, but my friends in other places have let me know it’s a different story there. So, for starters, I’ve got Dianne Reeves and Lou Rawls here from the 1995 mix album, Jazz to the World, to sing about the weather news with the old Frank Loesser song, “Baby, It’s Cold Outside.” The song was written in 1944 and featured in the Esther Williams movie, Neptune’s Daughter. Despite the song’s PC criticism in recent years, I’ll go on record (33 RPM vinyl) as saying I still think it’s one of the best “call and response” songs in the repertoire. I don’t take offense quite that easily. Rawls and Reeves do it up with a bow. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H63YANDR08A

I’m not sure why this next one became an earworm over the past week, but earworm it was at odd moments of the day or night. Possibly the kid in me eagerly awaiting Santa? Steve Allen wrote this one as part of the score for a 1956 television production and the original title was just “This Could Be the Start of Something.” Not sure where or when the “big” was added, but that’s how we know it now. And here’s a swell version by Kai Winding and JJ Johnson from the 1960 album The Great Kai and JJ. The group includes not only Winding and Johnson but also Bill Evans, Paul Chambers and Roy Haynes. With that kind of talent, this could definitely the start of something – big! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-EfOnmdPiw

I’ve owned what I believe is the quintessential jazz Christmas album for lo,  a very long time. Still own it. Still play it. I’ll be including more from this album during the run-up to Christmas, but for today – from Ella Wishes You a Swinging Christmas – Leroy Anderson’s bouncy and inviting, “Sleigh Ride.” Frank DeVol did the arranging and conducting and, oh, it do swing.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmNRWQJmdFs

Given what’s been going on in the world the last few weeks, I find myself seeking comfort with the music. Maybe it’s the season and maybe it’s just reaching for a touchstone among the chaos. Whatever it might be, I landed on Zoot Sims from his Zoot Sims Plays Johnny Mandel: Quietly There album with the lovely – and comforting – “A Time for Love.” Sims is joined by Mike Wofford on piano, Chuck Berghofer on bass, Nick Ceroli on drums and Victor Feldman on percussion. Love – it’s quietly there.

And now up, Mr. Bill Evans who may never have made a list or checked it twice, but always gave us something particularly nice. In this case, the something nice is “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town.” This tune would hardly be on the list of jazz classics, but the Evans genius and sensibility could have made “Happy Birthday” a classic. The story is that when this song was introduced on the old Eddie Cantor radio show in 1934, orders immediately came in for 100,000 copies of sheet music, and more than 30,000 records sold within 24 hours. This version is from The Solo Sessions, Vol. 2, recorded by Evans in 1963. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohFNLF_8Dik

JazzBabies, a word about the selections here. I am quite aware of and honor other holidays at this time of year. But I’m a believer in “write what you know.” I know Christmas and will leave it to those who know more about the other holidays to write messages of their own. As my beloved Granddad told me when I once asked him about religion, “Everybody’s got a piece of it and nobody’s got the whole thing.”  This is my piece.

So, happy greetings of the season, JazzBabies! And cheers to you, Granddad, wherever you are!

Ciao,
JazzCookie

A Classic Is A Classic Is A Classic

Tags

Billie Holiday, Chet Baker, classics, December, Harry Connick Jr, hi-fi components, John Coltrane, Johnny Mercer, Modern Jazz Quartet, old fashioned

I hate to fall into that old, “In my day…” way of thinking, but I took a walk through a store today selling all kinds of new and exciting digital equipment – from television sets as big as my dining room table to gadgets and gizmos that leave me in the dust. I’m not a Luddite. I have my computer and a tablet and other digital equipment, but I’m well behind the curve on some of the latest and greatest electronics on the market.  And I lament the passing of a few old classics as the new toys and tools come into view.

But, a few friends remind me, vinyl is back.  I’ll say.  Vinyl may be back, but gone are the days of the $4.99 albums.  And it’s not the same vinyl, I know.  I’ll stick with the yard sales and the library book sales that always include boxes of vinyl for a buck each.

At any rate, these thoughts all put me in mind of some of the tunes and jazz musicians that I like best – the classics. One of the first to come to mind when I think “classic” is John Coltrane. Has anyone better come along since his day – I mean really? Good musicians, to be sure. Even great ones. But there’s something about Coltrane’s sound that reverberates through my cells. When I went looking for a tune for this post, there it was – just the thing: John Coltrane from his 1957 Blue Train album with, appropriately so, “I’m Old Fashioned.” This is a Jerome Kern/Johnny Mercer classic and the personnel with Coltrane are, as you might guess, Paul Chambers, Kenny Drew, Curtis Fuller, Philly Joe Jones with Lee Morgan on the trumpet. Are you old fashioned, too? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNnM2iRwHLE

The next classic in a class by herself is the one and only Lady Day. This 1936 tune is closely associated with Bing Crosby. His recording put it in the Grammy Hall of Fame, but I like Billie’s spin on it. She’s had her imitators, but nobody has ever really come close to Billie.  How could they?  Can somebody else paint like Picasso?  “Pennies from Heaven” was written for a movie of the same name, later used in a remake of the movie with Steve Martin and also as the basis for a slightly darker British series with Bob Hoskins. Billie recorded it in 1936 with Teddy Wilson, Jonah Jones, Benny Goodman, Ben Webster, Allan Reuss, John Kirby and the wonderful Cozy Cole on drums. Damn, I wish I’d been there. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxVXNWdHDq8

Those of us who travel the bumpy road down Memory Lane perhaps more often than we should, definitely relate to this classic, which has a romantic musical history sidebar. The tune was composed by Victor Schertzinger with lyrics by Johnny Mercer. It was in the 1942 movie, The Fleet’s In.  

Sidebar:The story goes that Johnny Mercer wrote the lyrics for Judy Garland and gave them to her the day after she married another fella. Now, this story may be apocryphal. I heard a similar version about Mercer and Garland and “Skylark.” But what the heck, it’s a great song and Chet Baker does a great job with it. He’s young. He’s beautiful. He sings. He plays. Talk about a classic. You’re on, Mr. Baker. “I Remember You.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fu1D2PN7Yh4

Here we are one day from December and I can’t resist including – not a holiday song, per se – a winter classic. Sleigh bells are ringing, snow is glistening (well, not in San Diego), and the world is a “Winter Wonderland” with or without icicles! This tune from 1934 has been recorded by over 200 musicians including Harry Connick, Jr. who put it on the soundtrack for When Harry Met Sally. If it’s okay with you, I’ll have what she’s having. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ng8zdQeSruI

Wrapping up this week, I’ll slide over here to The Modern Jazz Quartet and their 1956 recording of – well, this is the season for angels, right? – “Angel Eyes.” This is from their album Fontessa for Atlantic Records. Milt Jackson, John Lewis, Percy Heath and Connie Kay. The MJQ was one of the groups we all listened to back in the day on our classic hi-fi equipment, when having the best components was the way to heaven. Forget wireless, JazzBabies, we wanted turntables, receivers, speakers all wired together with sound like this drifting out into the dimly-lit room, a couple of cold toddies on the table and somebody we liked right there for a slow dance. Whew…Classic…https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dl_jQcTxVVA

The new, the old. It’s all good, JazzBabies. (But sometimes, the old is best.)  Until next time…

Ciao,

JazzCookie