Tonight Only! - Dave Brubeck & Carmen McRae

 

Weep No More

Tonight Only!

The Dave Brubeck Quartet

Guest Star: Carmen McRae

Cover Photo: Columbia Record Studios - Henry Parker

Columbia Records CL 1609

Weep No More, Briar Bush, Paradiddle Joe and Strange Meadowlark were recorded in New York City on September 9, 1960. Melanctha and Tristesse were recorded December 14, and Talkin' and Walkin', Late Lament and Tonight Only on December 15

From the back cover: Tonight Only! brings together TheDave Brubeck Quartet and Carmen McRae, performing eight compositions by Dave and two members of his Quartet, saxophonist Paul Desmond and bass player Eugene Wright, an one fine jazz standard. The collaboration points up the remarkable lyric qualities of the Brubeck group, along with Carmen's uncommon talent for revealing the meaning of a song.

Dave and Carmen worked closely on the choice of the selections. Says Dave of this artistically stimulating project, "One afternoon Carmen came to our house and obligingly ran through half a dozen songs we had picked out for her to sing. I looked at my wife in amazement. We had never dreamed our songs could sound so good. Carmen has an instinctive, intuitive understanding of a lyric. She can generate an emotional impact seldom found in a popular song."

As in the Brubeck Quartet's album with Jimmy Rushing (CL 1553/CS 8385), collaboration with another superb musician produces an especially exciting program.

The first selection, Melanctha, is a blues from an opera-in-progress by Dave and Liz Blake, based on the story "Melanctha," from Gertrude Stein's book, "Three Lives." The song opens with the cries of Negro workmen calling "Melanctha! Melanctha! Melanctha!" Dave plays the verse and then the song moves into a 12-bar blues with different chord progressions.

Dave wrote Weep No More in 1945, and played and sang the song for his fellow Gls while in Europe. The tune made its first recorded appearance in the Columbia album "Brubeck Plays Brubeck" (CL 878). At Carmen's request, Dave hunted up his old sheet music and lyrics for this program.

'Talkin' and Walkin', as the name implies, makes its communication as it walks along, featuring a bass solo by composer-Quartet member Eugene Wright.

Briar Bush is a little folk sermon, with quotations from "Proverbs." The melody first appeared as the title piece in the Quartet's album, "Southern Scene" (CL 1439/CS 8253"). Lyrics were subsequently provided by Dave and his wife Lola. Carmen's remarkable performance brings this tribute from the composer: "Carmen has added even to my own understanding of the music."

Paradiddle Joe is a dialogue between Carmen and drummer Joe Morello, a driving new version of a jazz classic. This number was included at my suggestion.

Paul Desmond's composition Late Lament reflects his own sensitive lyricism. Brubeck's haunting Tristesse is the same mood, a melancholy ballad in Dave's most reflective style.

Strange Meadowlark, based on the notes of the meadowlark call, was originally an instrumental in the Quartet's lively experiments-in-rhythm album, "Time Out" (CL 1397/CS 8192*). Lyrics, by Mrs. Brubeck, explain the plight of a poor meadowlark who had to sing the blues after her mate flew south.

Dave wrote Tonight Only in collaboration with O. (for Original) Basil Johns. Dave's original Number One fan, Johns has been a devoted listener since 1946, when Dave was playing in San Francisco clubs. Original Basil Johns used to sit as close to the keyboard as possible, reacting to Dave's playing with a bewildering mixture of grunts, groans and laughs. They became fast friends. Basil, using his own tape ma- chine, was the first to record Dave. He has been present at many subsequent Brubeck recording sessions, by Dave's request, for his contagious enthusiasm helps to ease studio tension. This number is dedicated to Basil's wife. – Teo Macero

Dave Brubeck's remarkable influence on contemporary jazz is reflected in the enthusiasm his appearances arouse throughout the world. With his Quartet, Dave has appeared every- where from Carnegie Hall (with the New York Philharmonic and Leonard Bernstein in Howard Brubeck's Dia- logue for Jazz Combo and Symphony Orchestra heard on Columbia record CL 1466/CS 8257) to open-air platforms in the Middle East, and always to overflow audiences.

A consistent poll winner, both as pianist and as leader of the Quartet, Dave is also a prolific composer. He has written many of the Quartet's most popular numbers and has demon- strated his classical studies in a ballet, a string quartet, two piano works and numerous songs. As a spokesman for contemporary music Dave is as forceful a writer as he is at the keyboard.

Dave was born in Concord, California in 1920, the youngest of three sons. His mother was one of the leading piano teachers in the San Francisco area. Her three sons have distinguished themselves in the field of music, Henry, in musical education; Howard, as a composer, conductor and teacher; Dave, as a jazz pianist and composer.

Dave entered The College of the Pacific in 1938 to become a veterinarian. The Science Building and the Music Conservatory, however were closely situated on the campus; soon Brubeck was spending free hours in jam sessions with other students, or playing piano in Stockton night clubs. With the encouragement of J. Russell Bodley, a composition student of Nadia Boulanger, Dave decided to make music his career. Following graduation from The College of the Pacific in 1942 he began private lessons with the renowned French composer Darius Milhaud.

Army service interrupted his lessons. For two years Dave played with the Army Ground Forces Radio Band at Camp Haan near Riverside, California.

Dave was sent to the European theater as an infantryman. When a Red Cross entertainment unit sent out an S.O.S. for a piano player, Brubeck volunteered. This was the first step toward organizing, writing and arranging for the Wolf Pack Band, which played for thousands of soldiers on their way to and from the front lines. In 1946 he returned to Oakland to resume composition studies with Darius Milhaud at Mills College and to study piano with Fred Saatman of San Francisco. At Mills he organized an experimental jazz group known as "The 8."

It was at a concert of "The 8" that Jimmy Lyons, KNBC disc jockey, first heard Brubeck. After the concert Lyons rushed to NBC program director Paul Speegle to make known his discovery of a new jazz stylist. NBC pianist Marie Choppin beat Lyons to Speegle's office by a few minutes to announce her discovery of a new composer. Both discoveries were Dave Brubeck.

Today, thanks to his extensive Columbia record catalog, worldwide tours in 1958, appearances at concerts, jazz festivals, and clubs, Brubeck has an international following. *Stereo

Melanchtha
Weep No More
Talkin' and Walkin'
Briar Bush
Paradiddle Joe
Late Lament
Strange Meadowlark
Tristesse
Tonight Only

Supersax Plays Byrd

 

Be-Bop

Supersax Plays Byrd
Produced by John Palladino
Executive Producer: Mauri Lathower
Recorded at Capitol Records Studios

Recording & Remix Engineer: Jay Ranellucci
Disc Mastering at Capitol Records Studios: Wally Traugott
Art Direction: John Hoernle
Photography: Rick Rankin

Capitol Records SW 71177
1973

Trumpets: Larry McGuire, Conti Candoli & Ralph Osborn
Trombones: Charley Loper, Mike Barone & Ernie Tack

From the back cover: It is a rare occurrence in contemporary music when a new group is organized whose premise, while uniquely fresh and exciting in execution, is based, on a concept deeply rooted in the best traditions of the past. Supersax is just such an instance.The premise is simple. Charlie Parker's solos, exactly as improvised while being committed to records, were of such inspired and awesome originality that they constituted de facto compositions in their own right. In other words, when Bird blew a series of choruses based on the chord pattern of some standard song, the product was a work of art worthy of being extracted from its context and expanded through the medium of orchestration.

There have been occasional isolated cases in which ad lib solos were developed in this manner. Two of the earliest were the Bix Beiderbecke solo on Singin' The Blues and Bunny Berigan's contribution to the Tommy Dorsey version of Marie, both of which were transcribed off the records and voiced for trumpet sections. Vocally, of course, the idea was picked up by a long line of singers, from Eddie Jefferson to King Pleasure to Lambert, Hendricks & Ross.

The unprecedented use of this precept as the basis for an entire instrumental library grew out of Med Flory's association with the late Joe Maini, a widely respected alto player who died in 1964. "Joe was working in a big band I had around Los Angeles," Flory recalls, "when I wrote out the Parker solo on Star Eyes for a full saxophone section. Then I did the introduction on Just Friends and Joe Maini, who had memorized Bird's solo note for note, gave me the lead line for the rest of the chart. It seemed like a great idea, but nothing came of it, and after Joe's death it was more or less forgotten. Then one night a year or so ago Buddy Clark, who'd played bass on that band with us, said 'Wouldn't it be great if we could have a whole book of Bird things like that, and play jobs with it?'

"I said, 'Fine, but who's going to write it?' Buddy said, 'Let me try it – just show me what to do.' I gave him a few hints on which way to go, and he started writing. I was busy at the time on a movie script, so I was too hung up to do many of the arrangements myself." (Flory has long led a triple life as TV actor, professional script writer and studio musician.)

A band coalesced to meet the formidable challenge of reading and sensitively inter- preting these uncommonly demanding ar- rangements. After one or two changes the personnel heard on this album was arrived at, with Flory and Joe Lopes on alto saxes, Warne Marsh and Jay Migliori on tenors, Jack Nimitz on baritone, Conti Candoli on trumpet, Ronnell Bright on piano, Jake Hanna on drums and Clark on bass. On Just Friends, Repetition and Moose the Mooche, a seven-man brass section was added.

The common bond among these men that canceled out the diversity of their back- grounds was an intense love for and understanding of the contribution of Charlie Parker. Two of them actually worked with Bird briefly, Ronnell Bright in Chicago and Jay Migliori in Boston. The others came up in music just in time to be aware of the bop revolution, and of Parker as one of its two chief architects (along with Gillespie) while it was happening along 52nd Street and proliferating on records.

When, after 11 months of patient woodshedding, Supersax finally was presented to the public at Donte's, a question came to the minds of some listeners: does this concept constitute living in the past, or is it rather a case of relevance-through-renovation?

My own feeling immediately was that a new dimension had been added to these timedefying solo lines, as though a Picasso painting had become a sculpture, or an Old Master restored. In fact, just to hear, sectionalized and harmonized, the incredibly fast choruses based on the phenomenal Ko-Ko solo, is an experience such as Bird himself surely would have dug.

This, in effect, is how Charlie Parker would have sounded had he been able to play five saxophones at once, in harmony.

Med Flory wrote the arrangements for Be- Bop, Star Eyes, Moose the Mooche and Just Friends; the other charts were all written by Buddy Clark. As Clark points out, "Most of the way we had the baritone sax double the melody line. That was the simple, logical way to do it. Everything moves so fast in a Bird solo that if you start breaking it up, it becomes kind of logy."

"Besides," added Med, "the lines themselves are as important and timeless as Mozart, so we didn't dare do anything that would tend to understate them."'

The reed team is balanced so that Med's lead alto is the strongest voice, the baritone is next, and the three harmony parts are just about equal. Occasionally, on the more sustained passages, the voicings were changed to add a little sonority (one instance is the second chorus of Star Eyes), but the group's basic sound is that of the two parallel melody lines an octave apart.

Since Charlie Parker made many of his definitive recordings before the age of the long play record, and because he usually accorded part of the limited solo space to his sidemen, in many cases there was not enough improvisational Bird, on any one record of each tune, to constitute a full length Supersax arrangement. Buddy and Med resolved this in several tunes by using a composite of solos from two different versions of the same number. Hot House, says Buddy, is "a combination of all kinds of Bird riffs from various records he made on these changes, either as Hot House or as What Is This Thing Called Love."

Ko-Ko, possibly the greatest Bird master- piece of all, is based on the original 1945 recording, just as Parker's Mood derives from the master take cut in 1948. Similarly drawn from a single source is Just Friends, from the chart that became the most celebrated of the precedent-setting Parker-With-Strings date taped Nov. 30, 1949. Even Mitch Miller's brief oboe solo following the first chorus was retained in this faithful translation by Med of the Jimmy Carroll arrangement. Oh, Lady Be Good! was taken in its entirety from a Jazz at the Philharmonic concert record cut in Los Angeles in 1946.

Regardless of the sources of their inspiration, most important of all is that steeped as they were in the subject, the Supersax musi- cians succeeded in retaining the spirit as well as the letter of Bird's one-to-a-century genius.

"Just say," Med Flory enjoined me as we discussed my notes for the album, "that this was our affectionate tribute to a man we've respected and idolized through the years."

The comment was almost redundant, for on every track in this extraordinary set of performances you will hear the overtones of a project conceived and written with patience and dedication, executed with honesty and warmth. Supersax Plays Bird, as much as any album I have heard in recent years, is a thoroughgoing labor of love. – LEONARD FEATHER (Author of From Satchmo To Miles, Stein & Day)

Ko-Ko
Just Friends
Parker's Mood
Moose The Mooche
Star Eyes
Be-Bop
Repetition
Night In Tunisia
Oh, Lady Be Good!
Hot House

The Great Byrd - Charlie Byrd

Don't Have To Take It

The Great Byrd

Charlie Byrd

Featuring Wichita Lineman

Produced, Arranged and Conducted by Teo Macero

Cover Design: Ron Coro

Engineering: Stan Tonkel, John Guerriere, Arthur Kendy

Columbia Records CS 9747
1968

**Happy Together

  *Who Is Gonna Love Me

**Lullaby From "Rosemary's Baby

        Teo Macero - Conductor
        Charlie Byrd - Guitar
        Mario Darpino - Flute

        Chuck Rainey - Fender Bass
        Bernard Purdie - Drums
        Paul Griffin - Organ and Piano
      *Specs Powell - Percussion
    **Bobby Rosengarden - Percussion

        Vinnie Bell - Electric Guitar

  Wichita Lineman
  For Once In My Life
*Those Were The Days
   Scarborough Fair / Canticle
*Hey Jude
  Abraham Martin And John
* I'll Never Fall In Love Again

       Teo Macero - Conductor
       Charlie Byrd - Guitar
       Mario Darpino - Flute
       Bernard Purdie - Drums

       Bobby Rosengarden - percussion

       Vinnie Bell - Electric Guitar
       Herbie Hancock - Piano & Electric Piano
       Romeo Penque - Flute, Alto Flute, English Horn, Piccolo, Recorder
       Joe Mack - Fender Bass
     *Bobby Rosengarden - drums

     *Phil Kraus, percussion

I Don't Have To Take It

      Charlie Byrd - Guitar

      Bobby Rosengarden - Percussion

      Chuck Rainey - Fender Bass

      Paul Griffin - Piano & organ
      Vinnie Bell -Electric Guitar

      Mario Darpino Flute
      Bernard Purdie - Drum

From the back cover: The grooves of this record are fairly bulging with beautiful music. Charlie Byrd has selected the out- standing melodies of today (and we daresay tomorrow) and created a truly unique recording. Now, this is hardly unusual for any Byrd album, whether he be playing classical guitar or wailing with his own swinging group.

Believe it or not, this is still another bag for this multi-faceted virtuoso. There seems to be nothing in music he cannot do. Here he has added instruments like the electric guitar, the Fender bass, the electric piano, the organ, for the ultimate in contemporary sound. (Charlie's mandolins on Those Were the Days makes it!) At the same time, he utilizes the flute, English horn and recorder where he wishes a sweet and delicate chamber music sound-but it's a long way from longhair. (Yes, kids, you can trust someone over thirty to handle your favorites-if his name is Charlie Byrd.)

Of course, the songs need no introduction-but, the distinctive new sounds of Charlie Byrd might need a bit. (See above!) At any rate, it's a subtly rocking Byrd here-listen to him. It's a brand-new thing.

Wichita Lineman
For Once In My Life
Those Were The Days
Scaborough Fair / Canticle
Hey Jude
Abraham, Marting and John
I'll Never Fall In Love Again (from "Promises, Promises)
Lullaby from "Rosemary's Baby
I Don't Have To Take It
Who Is Gonna Love Me

Late Late Show - Dinah Washington

 

Feel Like I Wanna Cry

Late Late Show

Mercury Wing MGW 12140
1963

Dream
My Lean Baby 
Feel Like I Wanna Cry
Please Send Me Someone To Love
I Don't Hurt Anymore
You Stay On My Mind
I Cried For You Short John
I Love You Yes I Do
My Man's An Undertaker
Never, Never
I Just Couldn't Stand It No More