Larry Goldings – “Caminhos Cruzados” - Mais Uma Vez [Portuguese for "One More Time"]

© -Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

“With a decade [now, more two decades] of playing together under their belts, Larry Goldings, Peter Bernstein and Bill Stewart must form one of the most long-lived organ trios in Jazz history.

Each member has amassed an imposing individual resume, during this period, yet their collective work has signified something more – a reaffirmation, not of the organ trio as a unit capable of satisfying a temporary fashion for things, but as an instrumentation as perfectly balanced in its way as the threesomes of piano, bass and drums or, in another realm, the string quartet.”

- Bob Blumenthal, 1999

The music and the musicians on Hammond B-3 organist Larry Goldings’ Caminhos Cruzados [loosely translated from the Portuguese as “crossings paths”] have always been among my favorites.

Recorded in 1993, the compact disc seemed to come out of nowhere because its Brazilian bossa nova tunes hadn’t been in vogue for many years.

Here’s Larry description of how the recording came about.

“A few years ago, I made an interesting discovery about my early childhood. I had gone home to Massachusetts to visit my parents and brought with me a recording of the Brazilian singer João Gilberto. I had recently been introduced to his music by Jon Hendricks, with whom I was working, and instantly became somewhat of a fanatic.

At some point that weekend, I decided to play the CD for my mother, who isn't normally interested in the music I listen to, but I had an in­stinctual feeling that she would like it. After his opening guitar introduction, João started singing, and almost immediately my mother's face lit up and she said, ‘Oh, I remember this !’ I was sur­prised by her reaction and asked, ‘You mean you used to own this record?’ ‘Yes,’ she replied, ‘I used to play it for you when you were a baby. It would always calm you down.’

This startling piece of information was quite a revelation to me. Could this, I thought, ex­plain why I am so moved by João Gilbert's voice? Could it be, that upon listening to him now I experience the same feelings of innocence and security that I felt as an infant, 25 years ago?

Well, Sigmund Freud might have been better equipped to answer these questions, but all I know is that the music of Brazil is very close to my heart, and it was a pleasure to prepare and re­cord this CD. It was also a special challenge because the Hammond organ is not often heard in Bra­zilian music, although interestingly one of the early pioneers of the bossa nova was in fact an organ­ist named Walter Wanderley.

On this CD, the focus is not so much on the organ itself, but on the jazz organ trio - that is, organ, guitar and drums. The other members comprising the trio are Peter Bernstein and Bill Stewart, who are two of the most creative musicians playing today and have recorded with me on two other occasions. The group is augmented by the exceptional Brazilian per­cussionist Guilherme Franco, who, during the making of this CD had many insightful comments and suggestions that helped shape the music. Finally, listeners will be enchanted by the thoughtful play­ing of Joshua Redman.

While researching the material for this CD, I realized that there are many beautiful songs that have not been given the recognition they deserve. I discovered four such song among my João Gilberto records:  So Danco Samba, Ho-ha-la-la,  Avarandado, and the title track, Caminhos Cruzados. The latter, written by the prolific Antonio Carlos Jobim is perhaps my favorite on the CD. The composition is one of Jobim's most lyrical and is harmonically lush and unpredictable. Listen to Peter Bernstein's sublime statement of the melody, and the percussion accompaniment of Guilherme Franco, who, like Peter, is a master of taste. Among the other tracks are the obscure Menina-Moca. whose harmonic movement has a particularly "classical" sound, and the familiar Once I Loved, which is treated in a much slower, moodier manner than usual.

There are three selections that are not Brazilian songs at all, but naturally lend themselves to the bossa nova feeling. They are: Where or When, Una Mas, and Serenata, on which the band could not resist the urge to swing the solos. One of the two sambas on the CD, Manine, is my own composition. Featured here is the exciting interplay between Guilherme (on the cuica) and Bill Stewart. Words is also my composition, and was inspired by a Chopin mazurka. It is a perfect vehicle for Joshua Redman, who displays his ability to interpret a ballad with finesse and a hint of the blues.

I must admit that I have never visited Brazil. I feel, however, as if I have, because as I recently discovered, the first musical sounds I ever heard were those of Brazil. Although I doubt that I was actually "listening" to my mother's João Gilberto record, (as I was only 1 or 2 years old), his voice, and the harmonies and rhythms of his guitar, were seeping into my subconscious, planting the seeds that would later become my love of music.

- written by Larry Goldings”

To give you some idea of the wonderful music on offer on Caminhos Cruzados, the editorial staff at JazzProfiles in conjunction with the crackerjack graphics team at CerraJazz and the production facilities of StudioCerra have developed the following video for you to sample.

We hope that you will enjoy this presentation of classic Brazilian bossa nova by some of today’s most accomplished Jazz musicians.

Wes Montgomery / Wynton Kelly Trio Smokin' in Seattle: Live at the Penthouse (1966)

© -Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

Michael Bloom of Michael Bloom Media Relations is handling the public relations for the latest in Resonance Records continuing series of recently discovered classic recordings by Jazz Masters from halcyon days gone by and he sent along this information about:

Wes Montgomery / Wynton Kelly Trio Smokin' in Seattle: Live at the Penthouse (1966)

Previously unreleased live sets featuring jazz guitar icon Wes Montgomery with piano legend Wynton Kelly’s Trio featuring bassist Ron McClure & drummer Jimmy Cobb Recorded at Seattle’s Prestigious Jazz Club, the Penthouse, on April 14 and 21, 1966

Includes extensive book of liner notes featuring rare photos, essays by guitar icon Pat Metheny, Seattle Times writer Paul de Barros, producer Zev Feldman, original recording engineer Jim Wilke, plus interviews with Jimmy Cobb, NEA Jazz Master Kenny Barron and more.

Deluxe Limited Edition LP Released Exclusively for Record Store Day (April 22, 2017)

And Deluxe CD & Digital Editions Available on May 19, 2017

Los Angeles, CA (March 13, 2017)- Resonance Records is proud to announce the release of Wes Montgomery with the Wynton Kelly Trio - Smokin' in Seattle: Live at the Penthouse (1966) captured live at the Penthouse jazz club in Seattle, WA on April 14 and 21, 1966. Smokin' in Seattle marks the third commercially released live album of guitar icon Wes Montgomery with piano legend Wynton Kelly, recorded only seven months after their classic 1965 live album Smokin' at the Half Note, notably referred to by Pat Metheny as "the absolute greatest jazz guitar album ever made." Wynton's dynamic trio features the solid rhythm section of bassist Ron McClure -who took the place of long-time trio bassist Paul Chambers, then joined Charles Lloyd's "classic quartet" with Keith Jarrett and Jack DeJohnette following this stint with Wes and Wynton - and the legendary drummer Jimmy Cobb, an NEA Jazz Master most well-known for Miles Davis's Kind of Blue, Sketches of Spain and Someday My Prince Will Come albums.

Available on May 19, 2017 as a Deluxe CD and digital format, this archival treasure includes an extensive liner note book featuring rare photos by Lee Tanner, Chuck Stewart, Tom Copi, Joe Alpert and others; essays by guitar icon Pat Metheny, Seattle Times writer Paul de Barros, producer Zev Feldman, original recording engineer and Seattle Radio DJ Jim Wilke , and Ron McClure; plus interviews with Jimmy Cobb and NEA Jazz Master Kenny Barron.

Located in the heart of Seattle's historic district in Pioneer Square,the Penthouse jazz club was opened in 1962 by Charles Puzzo, Sr., and quickly became a destination for iconic jazz talents such as John Coltrane, Oscar Peterson, Stan Getz and The Three Sounds to name a few. Well-known radio personality,Jim Wilke, developed a working relationship with this legendary club, which in turn allowed him to air live broadcasts from the club every Thursday night using state-of-the-art equipment of that era. His weekly radio show, Jazz from the Penthouse, aired on Seattle's NPR affiliate, KING FM from 1962 through 1968, and has never been rebroadcast. When executive producer George Klabin learned of these recordings, he couldn't believe his good fortune to come across this thrilling 1960s material of Wes Montgomery with Wynton Kelly.

Producer Zev Feldman says, "The association between Wes Montgomery and Wynton Kelly is a critical part of the Montgomery legacy. Resonance has been releasing only the guitar icon's material from the 1950s thus far, so it's very exciting for us to be moving into Wes's 1960s discography with this incredible addition to the Montgomery canon from a cherished era. It's also the only known recording known of Wes and Ron McClure together, which I think is also cause for celebration. As usual, we've gathered all the rights to make it official and have created a dynamic package worthy of this timeless music."

"The experience of playing with those guys was like being baptized," says Ron McClure in his liner notes essay. "The music was joyous. It was buoyant. It was happy; positive - like they were as people."

By the time the 1966 Wes Montgomery with the Wynton Kelly Trio gig rolled around, Wes was on top of his game. His album Goin' Out of My Head (Verve) had shot up the Billboard R&B charts to No. 12, and within a year, the album would garner a 1967 GRAMMY® Award and sell nearly a million copies. At the ripe age of 43, Wes was at the pinnacle of his career. And just one year later, he would no longer be with us.

Wynton Kelly first collaborated with Wes Montgomery in 1962 with their album Full House (Riverside), also with Jimmy Cobb on drums (McClure joined Wynton Kelly's trio a few years later in 1965, replacing Paul Chambers), followed by the legendary Smokin' at the Half Note . And now we have Smokin' in Seattle, a new chapter in the storied collaboration of these two jazz giants.

Modern day jazz guitar icon Pat Metheny writes, "The news that another example of that band in action had surfaced was headline news for those of us in the hard-core Wes community. The incredible revelations contained in Resonance's previous releases of Wes's early work have been thrilling. This release adds yet another dimension to the almost impossibly brief ten years that Wes was the jazz world's most renowned guitarist, particularly to completists like me who want to hang on to and cherish every note Wes played."

This 10-track album is indeed a "smokin'" musical exchange between Wynton and Wes, swinging with fire-cracker energy. The Wynton Kelly trio opened each set of the 9-night engagement with a couple of tunes before Wes joined them on stage. The album opens with "There Is No Greater Love," an upbeat rendition of Isham Jones's well known jazz standard. Wynton glides through seven choruses filled with his trademark lyrical legato lines, with bluesy twists and turns along the way. His joyous playing is apparent from the start. In an interview with Kenny Baron included in the liner notes, he says, "Wynton was kind of in a class by himself. His touch, his feeling, his sense of time, sense of rhythm… For me it was just very, very unique." Often underappreciated as a player, despite his years with Miles Davis, Wynton remains an iconic figure, for jazz fans and next generation of jazz players.

"It's easy to hear why these two musicians relished playing together. Bluesy, soulful, linear swingers whose solos burst forward with natural, unpretentious vigor...," describes Paul de Barros in his essay. About Wes's spritely tune "Jingles," de Barros adds, "Montgomery comes out the gate loaded for bear, executing a slithering glide up the fretboard that elicits a cry of astonished approval from someone in the crowd." Wes and Wynton's playful banter continues with Wes's compositions "Blues in F" and "West Coast Blues," mixed in with Blue Mitchell's swinging bebop tune "Sir John" and Antonio Carlos Jobim's bossa nova "O Morro Não Tem Vez." The album finishes the musical journey with Sonny Rollin's "Oleo."

Jimmy Cobb remembers the band fondly, "Wes was a nice guy, man. He was a very comedic kind of guy. Like he would say funny things and do funny things…But he was a sweet guy. Wynton was also a sweet guy. So we all got along together pretty good. And the playing was exceptional for the four of us."

With the support and friendship of the Puzzo family and Jim Wilke, Resonance is proud to bring this remarkable, previously unknown recording to the public, now the second release in a series of Resonance releases recorded at the Penthouse, following the 2016 album, The Three Sounds featuring Gene Harris - Groovin' Hard: Live at the Penthouse 1964-1968 .

Previous Wes Montgomery releases on the Resonance label include rare historical discoveries from Wes captured in the 1950's, before his ascension to icon status -Echoes of Indiana Avenue (2012),In the Beginning (2015) and One Night in Indy (2016). The label is thrilled to add Wynton Kelly to their musical library and give him the royal treatment he so deserves.

The limited-edition, hand-numbered LP pressing on 180-gram black vinyl will be released exclusively for Record Store Day's event on April 22, 2017. The LP version has been mastered by the legendary Bernie Grundman at Bernie Grundman Mastering and pressed at Record Technology, Inc. (RTI), and features the same liner note material as the CD version.

Personnel:

Wes Montgomery – guitar*

Wynton Kelly – piano

Ron McClure – bass

Jimmy Cobb – drums

Track Listing: There Is No Greater Love (7:56) Not a Tear (6:29) *Jingles (4:31) *What's New (4:51) *Blues in F (2:44)* Sir John (8:10) If You Could See Me Now (5:54) *West Coast Blues (3:56) *O Morro Não Tem Vez (6:15) *Oleo (2:08)

You can located order information by visiting www.resonancerecords.org.

Wes Montgomery - the 1961 Ralph J. Gleason Interview

© -Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

“The middle and most celebrated of the Montgomery brothers was born like the others in Indianapolis. He took to guitar late and only began Ins professional career-in Lionel Hampton's band-when he was 25.  … he developed a style in which thumb-plucked single-note lines were backed with softly strummed octaves and chords. …

Wes Montgomery gave off a sense of effortlessness that is always bad karma in jazz; a little sweat and preferably some pain is almost considered de rigueur. But Montgomery used to loose off solos as if he was sitting on his back porch talking to friends.

He used a homely, thumb-picking technique, rather than a plectrum or the faster finger-picking approach. Stylistically, he copied Charlie Christian's bop and added elements of Django Reinhardt's harmonic conception. It's interesting and ironic that Montgomery's most prominent latter-day disciple, George Benson, should have made almost exactly the same career move, trading off a magnificent improvisational sense against commercial success.”

- Richard Cook and Brian Morton, The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD, 6th Ed.

“Few jazz musicians have had the rise to professional acclaim that John Leslie (Wes) Montgomery, the guitar-playing member of the Indiana Montgomery family, has had in the last two years.

Up until that time almost unknown to the jazz public outside his native Indianapolis, Montgomery was heralded by Cannonball Adderley, Gunther Schuller and other musicians who heard him and was brought by Adderley to the attention of Orrin Keepnews of Riverside Records, who promptly recorded him. Since that debut (his second, for he had toured with Lionel Hampton for two years in the early '40s), Montgomery has run away with the New Star Guitar category in DownBeat’s International Jazz Critics Poll and today seems a cinch to live up to his billing as the "best thing that has happened to the guitar since Charlie Christian."

For the last year, Wes has worked with his brothers, Buddy (vibes) and Monk (bass), as the Montgomery Brothers. The other two Montgomerys are half the original Mastersounds quartet, which a few years ago won the Critics Poll as Best New Small Group.

Pinned down recently between rehearsals and pool games (shooting pool is his only hobby), Wes discussed guitar players (including himself) with the ease and familiarity born of years of listening:

"I started in 1943, right after I got married. I bought an amplifier and a guitar

around two or three months later. I used to play a tenor guitar, but it wasn't playing you know. I didn't really get down to business until I got the six-string, which was just like starting all over to me.

"I got interested in playing the guitar because of Charlie Christian. Like all other guitar players! There's no way out. I never saw him in my life, but he said so much or the records that I don't care what instrument a cat played, if he didn't understand and didn't feel and really didn't get with the things that Charlie Christian was doing, he was a pretty poor musician—he was so far ahead.

"Before Charlie Christian I liked (Django) Reinhardt and Les Paul and those cats, but it wasn't what you 'd call new. Just guitar. For the exciting new thing, they didn't impress me like that. But Charlie Christian did; I mean, he stood out above all of it to me.

"'Solo Flight' was the first record I heard. Boy, that was too much! I still hear it! He was it for me, and I didn't look at nobody else. I didn't hear nobody else for about a year or so. Couldn't even hear them.

"I'm not really musically inclined. It takes guts, you know! I was 19 and I liked music, but it didn't really inspire me to go into things. But there was a cat living in Indianapolis named Alex Stevens. He played guitar, and he was about the toughest cat I heard around our vicinity, and I tried to get him to show me a few things.

"So, eventually what I did was I took all of Charlie Christian's records, and I listened to them real good. I knew what he was doing on that guitar could be done on the one I had because I had a six-string. So I was just determined I'd do it. I didn't quit. It didn't quite come out like that, but I got pretty good at it, and I took all the solos off the records. I got a job playing just the solos, making money in a club. That's all I did—played Charlie Christian solos and then laid out! Mel Lee—he's the piano player with B.B. King—had the band, and he helped me a lot.

"Then I went on the road with the Brownskin Models and later with Snookum Russell. Ray Brown was on the band at that time. I didn't realize he was playing so much bass until I heard him with Diz!

"Hamp was the only big band I went with, 1948-'50. I didn't use any amplifier at all. He had a lot of things for the sextet, but he never got to record that group.

"I'm so limited. I have a lot of ideas— well, a lot of thoughts—that I'd like to see done with the guitar. With the octaves, that was just a coincidence, going into octaves. It's such a challenge yet, you know, and there's a lot that can be done with it and with chord versions like block chords on piano. But each of these things has a feeling of its own, and it takes so much time to develop all your technique.

"I don't use a pick at all, and that's one of the downfalls, too. In order to get a certain amount of speed, you should use a pick, I think. You don't have to play fast, but being able to play fast can cause you to phrase better. If you had the technique you could phrase better, even if you don't play fast. I think you'd have more control of the instrument.

"I didn't like the sound of a pick. I tried it for, I guess, about two months. I didn't even use my thumb at all. But after two months time, I still couldn't use the pick. So I said, 'Well, which are you going to do?' I liked the tone better with thumb, but I liked the technique with the pick. I couldn't have them both, so I just have to cool.

"I think every instrument should have a certain amount of tone quality within the instrument, but I can't seem to get the right amplifiers and things to get this thing out. I like to hear good phrasing. I'd like to hear a guitar play parts like instead of playing melodic lines, leave that and play chord versions of lines. Now, that's an awful hard thing to do, but it would be different. But I think in those terms, or if a cat could use octaves for a line instead of one note. Give you a double sound with a good tone to it. Should sound pretty good if you got another blending instrument with it.

"Other guitar players? Well, Barney Kessel. I've got to go for that. He's got a lot of feeling and a good conception of chords in a jazz manner. He's still trying to do a lot of things, and he's not just standing still with guitar, just settling for one particular level. He's still going all he can, and that's one thing I appreciate about him. He's trying to phrase, also. He's trying to get away from the guitar phrase and get into horn phrasing.

"And Tal Farlow. Tal Farlow strikes me as different altogether. He doesn't have as much feeling as Barney Kessel to me, but he's got more drive in his playing, and

his technique along with that drive is pretty exciting. He makes it exciting. I think he's got a better conception of modern chords than the average guitar player.

"A lot of guitar players can play modern chords, they can take a solo of modern chords; but they're liable to leave it within the solo range that they're in. They're liable to get away from it and then come back to it, get away from it and come back to it. Tal Farlow usually stays right on it.

"Jimmy Raney is just the opposite from Tal Farlow. They seem like they have the same ideas in mind, the same changes, the same runs, the same kind of feeling. But Jimmy Raney is so smooth. He does it without a mistake, like some cats play piano they couldn't make a mistake if they wanted to. That's the way Jimmy Raney is. He gives it a real soft touch, but the ideas are just like Tal Farlow's to me.

"And then George Henry, a cat I heard in Chicago. He's a playing cat. He asked could he play a tune, and so he gets up there, and that's the first time I ever heard a guitar phrase like Charlie Parker. It was just the solos, the chords and things he used were just like any other cat, you know. And there's another guy from Houston who plays with his thumb.

"And naturally, Reinhardt, he's in a different thing altogether. And Charlie Byrd. You know, I like all guitar players. I like what they play. But to stand out like Charlie Christian. Well, I guess it's just one of those things.

"My aim, I think, is to be able to move from one vein to another without any trouble. If you were going to take a melody line or counterpoint or unison lines with another instrument, do that and then, maybe after a certain point, you drop out completely, and maybe the next time you'll play phrases and chords or something or maybe you'll take octaves. That way you have a lot of variations, if you can control each one of them and still keep feeling it. To me the biggest thing is to keep the feeling within your playing regardless of what you play. Keep a feeling there, and that's hard to do.

"You know, John Coltrane has been sort of a god to me. Seems like, in a way, he didn't get the inspiration out of other musicians. He had it. When you hear a cat do a thing like that, you got to go along with him. I think I heard Coltrane before I really got close to Miles. Miles had a tricky way of playing his horn that I didn't understand as much as I did Coltrane. I really didn't understand what Coltrane was doing, but it was so exciting, the thing that he was doing. Then after I really began to understand Miles, then Miles came up on top.

"Now, this may sound pretty weird— the way I feel when I'm up there playing the way I play doesn't match—but it's like some cats are holding your hands. C'mon, you know, and they'll keep you in there. If you try to keep up to them, they'll lose you, you know. And I like that. I really like that.

"Sometimes I'll do nothing but listen to records. All kinds, over and over. Then, after a while, it breaks and I don't even want to hear them. Nothing. I think it's because at the times I don't want to hear, I've heard so much it's got me confused and I'm so far away from it on my instrument—from the things I've been hearing— that I've got to put it aside and go back to where I am. And try to get out of that hole!

"I was surprised to win the DownBeat thing. I think I was playing more in 1952 than I ever have."”

Billy Mitchell: 1926-2000 - A Tribute

© -Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

Billy Mitchell’s musical story is a tale of two cities: Kansas City, Missouri where he was born and Detroit, Michigan where he grew up.

What the tenor saxophonist inherited from K.C. and the Motor City can be heard every time he takes a chorus. This inheritance is the roots of the Jazz tradition.

Mention Kansas City and Bennie Moten, Walter Page’s Blue Devils and Count Basie come to mind.

Bill Mitchell was a driving force and major influence during this post WWII Detroit modern jazz explosion.

Incubating in the Detroit of Billy Mitchell’s youth were a number of future great Jazz musicians including the Jones Brothers - Thad, Hank and Elvin - Yusef Lateef, Frank Foster, Tommy Flanagan, Barry Harris, and Paul Chambers

"I had a band at the Blue Bird," Mitchell recalled in a conversation with Jazz author Bob Blumenthal. "It was a quartet until Thad sat in one night. The next night, he was working with us permanently. We recorded for Dee Gee Records, which was jointly owned by Dizzy Gillespie and Dave Usher. At that time, Terry Pollard was in the band — she was later replaced by Tommy Flanagan — and she played vibes and piano. When she took a vibes solo on the recording session, Thad comped for her on piano. Elvin was in the band at that time, too. In fact, Elvin had never played in a professional band before that."

The Mitchell session is a rare one, having last appeared in the '50s on a Savoy anthology called SWING, NOT SPRING, and the details are obscure. Discographies have given 1948 as its date, though Mitchell confirms that it was more likely done in 1951 or '52.”

Billy was to become best known for his work in the 1950’s and 60’s with Dizzy Gillespie’s Big Band and The Count Basie Orchestra. He also performed with the Clarke-Boland Big Band in Europe on several occasions.

Mitchell and trombonist Al Grey left Basie in late 1961 and formed the Al Grey/Billy Mitchell Sextet, which won the Downbeat Award for best new jazz band of 1962! This band also officially introduced vibraphone future star Bobby Hutcherson. Barry Kernfeld noted in The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz that this “... ensemble, in its use of swinging riffs and bop improvisation, captured in a small group context the essence of Basie’s orchestral approach.

Besides leaving and rejoining Basie's band several times in the 60's, Billy was an important figure on Long Island (his home) and Manhattan in the educational area of jazz; he was mentor and friend to alto saxophonist Charles McPherson and also worked for a time in Los Angeles where he and influenced LA trombonist/composer-arranger Richard Pulin.

With his bright, bouncy, on-the-beat improvisations, Billy has always personified Joyous Jazz to me. Jazz that’s not complicated and swings in a straight-ahead manner. It’s fun to play the music this way and equally as much fun to listen to it without having to reach for it.

Sonny Stitt, Lucky Thompson, Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis, Johnny Griffin, Gene Ammons, Arnett Cobb, David “Fathead” Newman, Harold Land, Paul Gonsalves - the list of big-toned bluesy tenor saxophonists is as endless as it is endlessly satisfying.

Mike Longo - "Only Time Will Tell"

© -Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

“Mike Longo didn't get much sleep as a teenager in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. He spent most nights listening to disc jockey Leonce Picot's jazz program, which broadcast from midnight to 6am on radio station WFTL. One night Longo heard Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie for the first time. It was an epiphany.

"I wanted to wake up my parents and tell 'em," he recalls. "It changed my whole life around."

Little more than a dozen years later, in 1966, Gillespie himself hired Longo as his pianist and appointed him the group's musical director the following year. Their association lasted 26 years.

Longo, who was born in Cincinnati on March 19, 1939, has featured songs written by Gillespie on his own recordings over the years. Only Time Will Tell, his 26th album since 1962, … The new trio disc, his 20th album for the CAP (Consolidated Artists Productions) label, includes two Gillespie compositions. The up-tempo "Wheatleigh Hall" was first recorded by the trumpeter in 1957 on an album with Sonny Rollins and Sonny Stitt. The gently swinging "Just a Thought," written by Gillespie in the '60s as a piano feature, had never been previously recorded. "My first night on the band, he put that chart up in front of me and I had to sight-read it," Longo remembers. "I played it well. Dizzy said, 'Hell, yes!'

"The next night I fell on my butt as a player. The first night I was inspired so much just playing with him, but the next night I said, 'Oh, damn. You gotta come up with this level every night?' He said, 'What the hell you think I'm paying you for?' I had this reality shock of ‘'Oh my God! I've got a lot of work to do.' The rest of my life up to this point has been working on achieving and maintaining that level.

"Nobody really knows about the tune 'Just a Thought.' I had been carrying it around in my head all these years. After Dizzy passed, I wrote a lead sheet and sent it over to Lorraine [Gillespie's widow]. I told her to send it in and get a copyright."

Longo is joined on Only Time Will Tell by bassist Paul West and drummer Lewis Nash. West had done two stints with Gillespie—in the '50s with the trumpeter's big band and again in the '60s with the quintet that included Longo. Nash had worked with Gillespie on several occasions in subsequent years.”

Our thanks to Terri Hinte for sending along the above biographical information on pianist Mike Longo and the following media release for Only Time Will Tell [CA} 1054] which was issued on March 31, 2017.

Mike’s approach to piano trio Jazz is heavily influenced by his background as a composer-arranger for his own big band. He applies the same structured themes to his trio work so that everything comes from something: there are introductions, interludes and intervals; piano features, bass features and drum features; up tempo, medium swing and ballad song selections - a full array and panoply of arranger’s conceptions which constantly alter the music and keep it interesting.

His choice of tunes also helps provide the listener with a wide variety of melodies. These include Jazz Standards such Monk’s Nutty and Brilliant Corners and Oscar Pettiford’s Bohemia After Dark, Memories of You, Exactly Like You and Ruby from the Great American Songbook and four originals by Mike including the title tune.

And then there is the unsurpassed musicianship of Mike, Paul West and Lewis Nash; all three extremely accomplished on their instruments but experienced and unselfish enough to listen to one another and make exciting and stimulating music together.

Here are some excerpts from Terri Hinte’s press release.

PIANIST MIKE LONGO'S

CONSOLIDATED ARTISTS PRODUCTIONS

TO RELEASE HIS NEW CD,

"ONLY TIME WILL TELL."

WITH BASSIST PAUL WEST & DRUMMER LEWIS NASH,

MARCH 31, 2017

“Connoisseurs of jazz piano trios will welcome the release, on March 31, of Only Time Will Tell, the new trio recording by piano master Mike Longo with Paul West on bass and Lewis Nash on drums. The disc is Longo's 20th for the CAP (Consolidated Artists Productions) label, and his 26th since debuting as a leader in 1962.

Included on the CD are two compositions by Dizzy Gillespie, with whom Longo worked as pianist and musical director for 26 years, until Gillespie's death in 1993. The up-tempo "Wheatleigh Hall" was first recorded by the trumpeter in 1957 on an album with Sonny Rollins and Sonny Stitt. The gently swinging "Just a Thought," written by Gillespie in the '60s as a piano feature, had never been previously recorded.

Longo's trio-mates had their own associations with Gillespie. West had done two stints with the trumpeter—in the '50s with Dizzy's big band and again in the '60s with the quintet that included Longo. Nash had worked with Gillespie on several occasions in subsequent years.

Longo, West, and Nash play two Thelonious Monk tunes—"Nutty" and "Brilliant Corners"—on Only Time Will Tell and also offer their takes on Oscar Pettiford's "Bohemia After Dark"; "Exactly Like You," delivered at an ultra-slow tempo; and Eubie Blake's "Memories of You," which closes the album. Among the Longo originals are the bossa nova-propelled "Stepping Up"; "Conflict of Interest," first recorded for a 1994 quintet album dedicated to Gillespie; and the gently waltzing title track, inspired by a documentary about Lyndon Johnson. "I started feeling sorry for him and went to the piano and wrote it," says Longo. "The point of the title is that after the passage of time, things may appear different than when you originally perceived them."

The son of a band-leading bassist father and a church organist mother, Michael Longo Jr. was inspired as a child by boogie-woogie pianists Sugar Chile Robinson in his native Cincinnati, and Jack Fina later in Fort Lauderdale, where the Longos had moved when he was in the third grade. While in Florida, Longo was later inspired by jazz piano master Oscar Peterson, with whom he would eventually spend six months studying privately.

After earning a bachelor's degree in classical piano at Western Kentucky University, in 1959, Longo spent two years touring with the Salt City Six, the Dixieland group, and was hired at the Metropole Cafe in New York as one of the club's house pianists. In his two shifts a day, he backed Coleman Hawkins, Gene Krupa, and Henry "Red" Allen, among many others.

Gillespie, who first heard the young pianist at the Metropole, hired him in 1966. Longo went on to make nine albums with the trumpet legend, beginning with Swing Low, Sweet Cadillac in 1967, and has also recorded with Astrud Gilberto, Lee Konitz, Buddy Rich, and Moody, to name just a few. He cut the first album under his own name, A Jazz Portrait of Funny Girl, in 1962; his last 20 have appeared on Consolidated Artists Productions (CAP), a musicians' cooperative label managed by Longo and his wife. He also has enjoyed a successful second career as an educator and creator of instructional books and videos.

Since January 6, 2004, the anniversary of his friend Dizzy Gillespie's death, Longo has presented concerts every Tuesday evening in the Gillespie Auditorium of the New York City Baha'i Center. Longo will appear there 4/25 with his 17-piece New York State of the Art Jazz Ensemble featuring Ira Hawkins. He'll be performing at Mezzrow 5/25 with Paul West.”

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Media Contact:

Terri Hinte

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