Red Rodney Plays Superb With Sam Noto

 

Hilton

Red Rodney Plays Superb With Sam Noto

Dolo Coker, Ray Brown, Shelly Manne and Others

Produced by Don Schlitten 

Liner Photo: Billy Root

Recording: Ed Barton, Wally Heider)

Muse Records MR 5046

Recorded March 26, 1974

From the back cover: When I first met Red Rodney in 1948 we used to go to baseball games. He was a great fan and talked about his boyhood wish – that one common to so many American youths – of wanting to become a major league ballplayer. Projecting that fantasy I can see him as a scrappy shortstop, scampering behind second to cut off a hit up the middle; going to his right to backhand a sizzling one-hopper and throwing the man out from the hole; running out from under his car, red hair glinting in the sunlight of short left field as he veers near the fourth-line to make a on-hand grab of a twisting pop-up.

He would have been the kind of player who got his uniform dusty sliding head first into second, or grass-stained diving for a line-drive at the edge of the outfield; the kind of hitter who would have put his body in the way of a close pitch if it meant getting on base in a crucial situation. Why I'm trying to say is that the sum of these qualities can be heard in Red Rodney's music. I'm taking about heart and desire!

Red has had his heart in the music ever since he was a teenager, and the desire to play unhampered jazz has remained constantly in that heart of hearts down through the years. Neither heavy drugs, tooth implants nor a stroke, among other hardships, self-created or otherwise, have kept this bebop courier from the eventual completion of his appointed, and anointed, licks. No matter how many times it is banged and buffeted, that big heart of the red-headed firebrand comes bouncing back to sit out there, unmuted, on the bell of his horn. If you can't see it, you can certainly hear it.

In recent years the transplanted Philadelphian, who learned his craft with the big bands of Gene Krupa, Claude Hornbill and Woody Herman, and then went through the forge of the Charlie Parker quintet, has been shuttling back and forth between Las Vegas and Los Angeles. After leaving Parker in the early 1050s, Rodney had, for the most part, led his own groups, but in Las Vegas he had been working in the large orchestras that play the big shows at the gaudy hotels on "the Strip." Jazz was something to be played after the regular job and that scene was sporadic.

In LA there were studio jobs but the jazz situation was more sanguine. Then, in the spring of 1972, Red, at age 44, suffered a stroke that set back his jazz "chops" which he had been sedulously rebuilding after having new teeth implanted. The stresses that blowing jazz put on one's embouchure are quite different from the demands of cutting a show behind a singer.

In May 1973 Rodney opened at Donte's in North Hollywood with his own group and demonstrated to all in attendance that he had indeed surmounted the stroke to a great extent. That July he flew to New  York for the Newport Jazz Festival and recorded the LP, Bird Lives! In March of 1974 Don Schlitten, the producer of that album, journeyed to California to record Rodney once again.

In July Red wrote to me, enthusiastically: "I think this is my best effort on wax in my entire 'career.' It was unfortunate that my chops gave out before half the date was over, but I have learned to live with my disability as much as I hate it, and I have learned to utilize the very disabilities that prevent me from doing the things that were done so easily years ago. How funny the tricks can play on us. It took years to overcome my dental situation and when I finally regained my ability chop-wise I suffered a stroke which broke down even different muscles than the dental problem and regaining those seem much more difficult that the last."

Red went on to say that his weakened chops "embarrassed" him "even though I realized I played well and compensated for lack of strength with a much better wig." Listening to his performance make you realize that he needn't be "embarrassed" about anything he plays. Incidentally, the reference to "wig," does not refer in any way to the hair replacements for men they are pushing on TV these days, but is only a synonym for brain.

Red has always been one to boost his fellow musicians when he thought they should be heard. If the man happens to be a trumpeter there is never any professional jealousy. When Don Schlitten and I visited him in Las Vegas in 1969, he introduced us to Sam Noto and praised him to the rather expansive western skies. We had known of Sam as a power player with Stan Kenton back in the 1950s but not as a particularly outstanding jazz soloist. He played with Count Basie in 1964-65 and then returned to his native Buffalo where he and saxophonist Joe Roman had a quintet.

When we heard him in Vegas it was obvious a metamorphosis had taken place. Noto had become an all-around jazz virtuoso. Don tried to feature him on a Sonny Criss recording when Sam was visiting the East but the date fell through. When Red moved back to Vegas from LA in 1974, he and Sam got together again and the results are contained herein.

"We finally got Sam on record," wrote Red with obvious pride," and from now on I feel a great new trumpet star will be unveiled after the album is released. We hope to stay together, go out on the road and into the jazz scene, and get away from playing crappy showbiz acts anymore."

If the approval of their fellows indicates anything – and musicians are a tough audience – they should be on their way. At a recent Lad Vegas appearance in concert, all the musicians in the audience gave Red and Sam a standing ovation.

The supporting rhythm trio in this album is an exceptionally strong one. Pianist Dolo Cocker, active on the LA scene since he migrated from Philadelphia in 1960, is a righteous swinger out of the Bud Powell/Elmo Hope school. Ray Brown and Shelly Manne are among the all-time greats on their respective instruments. 'Nuff said.

The supporting horns are tenor saxophonist Larry Covelli, an old associate of Sam's from Buffalo, who has played with Harry James and Louis Bellson; trombonist Mayo Tiano, a Bellsonmate of Covelli's and Jimmy Muldore, and ex-Stan Kenton and Woody Herman reedman who has been in Las Vegas since 1964. Originally from Youngstown, Ohio, he plays alto and soprano saxophones and alto flute in this set. He is only heard in solo on Hilton, because, was the date progressed, it was decided to place the emphasis, and rightly so, on the two-trumpet format.

The chart of The Look Of Love is by Englishman Pete Meyers, a former Stan Kenton trombonist who arranges and conducts from singer Della Reese. When it comes to the trumpet routines, however – heads, interludes, etc. – that is the handiwork of Rodney and Noto.

One of the regular features Red plans to include in his repertoire is the delineation of classic solos recorded by trumpeters like Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis and Clifford Brown. Red and Sam are responsible for the first in this series, a recreation of Brownie's solo form the original version of Daahoud that Clifford did with Max Roach. After these two opening choruses, Sam comes in for two and shows a definite affinity for the Brown sound. An interlude introduces Red for two and this device is again used to launch the two horns – Sam leading off – into a series of "fours" that eventually evolves into contrapuntal chasing. Coker has an incisive half-chorus (dig Ray behind him) and then horns return with Brownie's message to close.

Dolo and Red combine to introduce Burt Bachrach's The Look Of Love. Red's muted horn is buoyant on a warn sea of sound reminiscent of the Miles Davis-Gil Evans colaboration that produced things like My Ship. Sam plays fluegelhorn and Mulidore alto flute in the ensemble, but it is Red's vehicle and he makes the lovely most of it.

Noto's Last Train Out finds the two trumpets together again, punching out the urgent theme whose changes are similar to Sonny Rollins' Airegin in places. Both horns are in a smoking groove with Sam the first to play both in the extended solos and the four-bar chase sections. Dolo cooks up a storm in an extended outing. Interludes are again put to good use.

Side B comes on buring with Fire, a staccato, stop-and-go blues by Sam and Red that equals the color of Red's hair and is a good description of the kind of heat the trumpets generate. The order of solos is as above and Dolo follows, flying along on a Powell plane. Brown picks the line right along with the horns as Manne underlines it.

Bronislau Kaper's ever-Green Dolphin Street is prefaced with a Star Eyes-type intro and then the trumpets state the theme as the rhythm alternates between Latino and 4/4. Noto's beautifully-paced and well-constructed solo is first. Then Rodney come in with Ray walking him. In Red's second chorus, Coker and Manne join in to further propel his impassioned sound and heartfelt delivery. Dolo interpolates The Man With A Horn and goes on to spin a couple of airly swinging choruses. A bright, little arranged passage frames Brown's mighty plucking which stretches into another chorus, sans arrangement. The fantastic sound and articulation of Ray's that is in such strong evidence behind the soloists, is even more wondrous when it comes to the fore. Red leads off the "fours" – two rich choruses worth – in which Sam evokes the kind of easy grace that as Fats Navarro's.

Hilton, Mulidore's minor-key, modal mysterioso – with cymbal splashers by Manne – could be a banshee's rendition of For Me And My Gal. I don't see where the ghosts would fit in at the Flamingo Hilton since no one ever sleeps in Vegas. When would they prowl? At noon?

Red has the first solo, followed by the composer on alto. Mulidore really plumbs the bizarre mood with a run a la Cannonball and some very vocal effects. Sam is next and Dolo finishes the soloing, dolorously, with some Monkish expressions. After the final march of the goblins, there is some modified freeform until Shelly's cymbal drives the final ghoul into the Hilton pool.

So, a new jazz album is released auspiciously with an old star, Red Rodney, and a new star, Sam Noto; two men who share a single mind when it comes to the kind of music they want to play. The Leblanc Company, makers of Holton and Martin instruments, are lending their support. As soon as they hear the contents of this sleeve, everyone else will pop their top for Superbop! – Ira Gitler

Superbop

The Look Of Love

Last Tain Out

Fire 

Green Dolphin Street

Hilton