Woody Herman's Big New Herd At The Monterey Jazz Festival

 

Skylark

Woody Herman's Big New Herd

At The Monterey Jazz Festival

Supervision: Nesuhi Ertegun

Recording Engineer: Tom Dowd

Cover Photo: Sam & Jim Vestal

Atlantic 1328

1960

Woody Herman - Alarinet & Alto Sax

Zoot Sims, Bill Perkins & Richie Kamuca - Tenor Saxes

Don Lanphere - Alto & Tenor Saxes

Med Flory - Baritone Sax

Al Porcino, Bill Candoli, Ray Linn & Frank Huggins - Trumpets

Bill Chase, Urbie Green, Sy Zentner & Bill Smiley - Trombones

Vic Feldman - Piano & Vibraharp

Charlie Byrd - Guitar

Monty Budwig - Bass

Mel Lewis - Drums

From the back cover: One of the most impressive things about the 1959 Monterey Jazz Festival (which was in itself a pretty impressive affair, as witness the reviews) was the Festival orchestra put together especially to function as a workshop orchestra during the week preceding the Festival and, during the actual three days of the Festival, to double as the Woody Herman Festival Herd and the workshop band (augmented  by various soloists and members of the San Francisco Symphony).

It was a long, hard week of work for the musicians. Rehearsals morning, noon and night; literally. And when the first evening concert – Friday – began with the Chris Barber band and Ottilie Patterson singing the blues, the latecomers walking down to the Festival arena passed by the rehearsal hall and heard the Woody Herman Festival Herd wailing away through the numbers heard on this album. They had volunteered an extra rehearsal "for Woody."

On Saturday afternoon the Herman band played under the blazing Monterey sun, interrupted occasionally by the roar of a low-flying civilian plane (the Air Force and the Navy gallantly re-routed their fliers but nobody could control the casual civilian). "I'm beginning to hate him," Woody remarked as the particularly annoying small plane flew over for the umpteenth time during the set.

Part of the program on Saturday afternoon and again on Saturday evening consisted of a set by the Herman Herd ("I wish I could take this band on the road!" Woody said, and everyone agreed it was one of the greatest bands Woody had ever stood before). It was recorded by Atlantic, both afternoon and evening, when the Monterey sun was replaced by the cold, foggy breeze from the Pacific and the spectators, who that afternoon were wearing Bavarian shots and sun glasses, were wrapped in blankets, ski boots and wool caps.

Saturday night the Lambert-Hendricks-Ross Trio sang out an introduction for the Herman band. Woody turned around to the 19 men and yelled, "Bow Bow! Bow! Bow!" and they roared into Four Brothers. It was the classic Herman chart written by Jimmy Giuffre for the legendary Second Herd (the one with Stan and Zoot and Serge and Herbie Steward). It's been in the books for over ten years, played practically every night. "The sheets are all dog-eared," Mel Lewis noted. But oddly enough this is only the second time Herman has recorded it. The solos this time (first time around) are by Zoot Sims, Med Flory (bariton), Bill Perkins and Richie Kamuca. Then at the end, it's Perkins, Zoot, Richie and Med. They follow the short Woody Herman bit ("After all he is our dad," Jon Hendricks wrote).

Like Some Blues Man is from the afternoon session. You'll hear Woody's high-flying friend roaring around upstairs. "He'll be gone in a minute," Woody hopefully remarked. He wasn't Vic Feldman starts this one with a vibes solo, you hear some delightful Conti Candoli trumpet, a Bill Perkins tenor solo, Urbie Green on trombone and Charlie Byrd on guitar (he was one of the hits of the Festival) and at the end the airplane buzzes the band again! The tune was written and arranged by Ted Richards whose work whose unmistakable evidence of his close collaboration in the past with Gene Roland.

Skoobeedoobee ("from the picture 'Sal Mineo in Purgatory'," Woody introduced it) is also from the afternoon session and has Vic Feldman on piano. Vic almost didn't get to play at all at Monterey. At the opening rehearsal he stepped forward to speak to Woody and slipped and fell off the bandstand and hurt his knee. Not too seriously, luckily. Zoot Sims and Urbie Green – and Woody too – have solo spots and I am particularly fond of the explosions by Mel Lewis at the end. Mel, incidentally, never worked with Woody before "although I always wanted to," he says. Most of the others had, and Conti Condoli, Urbie, Richie, Zoot, Perk and Med Flory especially were veterans of other Herman bands. Don Lanphere and Bill Chase were from Woody's most recent band. This is another Ted Richards opus.

Monterey Apple Tree got a beautifully "in" introduction by Woody. "It's a very old tune of ours," he said, "and this year we're changing the title because I feel it's only fair to the fellas that are going to play it and also the listeners – this year we're gonna call it Monterey Apple Tree." Almost everybody gets into the act on this one and towards the end there's a find exchange of statements between tenor Don Lanphere and baritone Med Flory.

Skylark, an arrangement by Ralph Burns, is a vehicle for the lyric trombone of Urbie Green and Urbie is also featured on Magpie which closed the LP. This was written by Joseph Mark, a cousin of Al Cohn who contributed so many compositions to the Herman book over the years.

These were exciting session and we're lucky they came out so well on tape and could be preserved for our enjoyment. Recording outdoors is hazardous, but this LP is one of the more successful of this sort of thing, in my opinion. It's hard to separate the memories and listen objectively to the music in a situation like this. Monterey 1959 was one of the greatest musical experiences of my life and, it would seem, that of a lot of other people. Musicians like J. J. Johnson, Mel Lewis and Woody Herman apparently feel the same way. ("I'll be back even if I'm not working it," Mel says).

The reviews were almost unanimous in praise. "This one's for jazz," Down Beat Gene Lees said and added, "Monterey... made previous jazz festivals look like grab bags, musical potpourris that do not compare with the smoothly purposeful and thought-provoking Monterey Festival. " Annie Ross commented, "It's actually inspiring to get out here and find people working like this." After reading off a list of things to be corrected next year, musical consultant John Lewis said, "It's only the best Festival ever!" Gunther Schuller wrote, "The musicians are both pleased and surprised. They are treated with respect, warm and even reverence." All of this colors my listening to this LP, I frankly admit.

Monterey was a gas for musicians and fans alike. That it was, is a tribute to the planning of Jimmy Lyons, the founder and moving force behind the Festival, and John Lewis who served  (without fee, incidentally) as musical consultant.

As for me, I was grateful to them then for the exhilarating program. I'm grateful now that Atlantic has preserved this portion of it for our future pleasure. If it gives you one tenth the pleasure it has already given me, it will be a success. – Ralph J. Gleason

From Billboard - June 6, 1960: Some of the color and excitement of the Monterey Festival is caught here in six numbers which include "Four Brothers," "Like Some Blues Man," and "Skylark." Woody has a group of fine musicians here – the group which doubled as the Festival's workshop ork during the week preceding the event. Ralph Gleason has written a set of informative notes, which also reflect the spirit of the Festival.

Four Brothers

Like Some Blues Man

Skoobeedoobee

Monterey Apple Tree

Skylark

The Magpie