Louis Stewart - Out on His Own [Livia Records LRCD 2201]

 © Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

“Born in the Irish town of Waterford, Stewart worked in showbands (an Irish manifestation of a dance orchestra with a slightly more Gaelic bent to it) before a visit to New York fired his interest in playing jazz. He then began backing visiting players, including Lee Konitz, and at the end of the 6os he joined Tubby Hayes's group before undertaking touring work with Benny Goodman. He was a sideman with Ronnie Scott and George Shearing l and since then has worked as a freelance in a variety of settings, recording as a leader mostly for the independent Jardis label. A perennially unruffled bebop stylist somewhat in the Tal Farlow mold, Stewart has rather more of a reputation among musicians than listeners, partly because he comes from a territory with very little jazz clout, and further because he has never had much interest from record labels: a sympathetic company could yet get a classic out of him.”

- Richard Cook’s Jazz Encyclopedia [2005]

“Mr. Stewart, who has the staid and sober appearance of a prosperous greengrocer, seems to have his musical roots in be-bop. He leans toward material associated with Charlie Parker and he spins out single-note lines that flow with an unhurried grace, colored by sudden bright, lively chorded phrases. His up-tempo virtuosity is balanced by a laid-back approach to ballads, which catches the mood of the piece without sacrificing the rhythmic emphasis that keeps it moving.”

- John S. Wilson, The New York Times

“There is no doubt that Irish jazz guitarist Louis Stewart is one of the all-time greats, and it is obvious from the first notes he plays on any occasion. Quick witted, clean and clear, original, inventive, steeped in tradition, astonishing at most turns and only remarkable on the others, the only reason most of you don't know him is that he works in Europe, barely visiting the continental America's during his five decades of performing.” 

Allmusic.com

“In the late 1960s, he rose to international prominence, winning successive awards at the prestigious Montreux Jazz Festival, including the offer of a full scholarship to Berklee College of Music in Boston - an offer which he never took up.

Instead, he returned to Dublin in the 1970s to raise his family, and became the lynchpin of a burgeoning domestic scene. His peers, by whom he was hugely respected, included pianists Jim Doherty and Noel Kelehan, saxophonist Dick Buckley and drummer John Wadham.

It was in this company that Louis was most comfortable, and his residencies in basements and upstairs rooms around Dublin - at Conways on Parnell Street, Slatterys of Capel street, and latterly in JJ Smyths on Aungier street - provided the proving ground for a new generation of jazz musicians….

His oldest friend and musical partner, pianist Jim Doherty, who has the distinction of playing on Stewart's first and last public performances - separated by some 56 years - told The Irish Times how a fan once asked him if it was true that Louis Stewart was one of the three best guitarists in the world. "Well", replied Doherty, "the other two certainly think so".

Bassist and composer Ronan Guilfoyle, who began his career with Stewart in the late 1970s, said: “For young aspirant jazz musicians of my generation, Louis was a god. He showed by example the heights to which an Irish jazz musician could aspire and for that alone we should be grateful.

“To listen to him at the height of his powers was to witness the playing of one of the world’s greatest jazz guitarists.”

Prominent New York-based guitarist Dave O’Rourke, who was mentored by Stewart, said: “Louis Stewart set the bar so high in Dublin that those of us who moved abroad to play, especially me in New York, had already been exposed to jazz played at its highest level.”

Acknowledging his own personal debt to Stewart and his playing, O’Rourke added: “His legacy can be heard, and will live on in those of us who came after him.”

- Cormac Larkin, The Irish Times Obituary August 21, 2016

Thanks to Amanda Bloom, Publicity and Communication Manager with Crossover Media [and a New York City-based Jazz vocalist], and Dermot Rogers who has recently reactivated Livia Records in Dublin, Ireland, I’m the recent recipient of this wonderfully engaging Jazz guitar recording by the late Louis Stewart [1944-2016]. 

Although Louis was based in Ireland for much of his career, I had the pleasure of hearing him in person in 1996 when he appeared as a member of pianist George Shearing’s newly reformed quintet at the San Francisco Jazz Festival along with vibraphonist Steve Nelson, bassist Neil Swainson and drummer Dennis Mackrel.

I had heard Louis a couple of years earlier when, after a 20 year hiatus, George recorded this new version of his quintet with this personnel and issued The New George Shearing Quintet: That Shearing Sound on Telarc CD [83347].

And, if you are so inclined to a bit of irony, Louis was also a recent “visitor” in the form of a series of recordings he made in the late 1970s with George and bassist Niels Henning Orsted Pedersen for the MPS label which I found as a CD compilation at a fairly reasonable price from a reseller. If truth be told, I didn’t even know these existed as I missed the initial LP release.

So it would appear that Louis Stewart was to be a factor in my musical life yet again with the arrival of his splendid Out on His Own [Livia Records LRCD 2201].

Guitar is a very unforgiving instrument, especially in a Jazz environment where so much seems to happen so quickly. Mistakes are glaring when they happen on any instrument, but they seem to sound particularly harsh on those that are amplified.

To put it another way, in Jazz, there are only good guitarists, those who have a command of the instrument such that they are able to improvise on it flawlessly and, even more importantly, to be able to create beautiful music on what is essentially a wooden box with a whole cut into it and six strings stretched over it.

Occasionally - think Django Reinhart, Charlie Christian, Tal Farlow, Johnny Smith, Barney Kessel, Wes Montgomery, Jim Hall, Joe Pass, Pat Martino, Lenny Breau, George Benson and Pat Metheny - there are guitarists who are able to elevate their playing to a level of greatness recognized and respected by the Jazz community as a whole.

Louis Stewart belongs to this group of guitar artists. To quote Ronnie Scott: “Louis is a superbly talented natural musician. In my book he's one of the world's great jazz guitarists”

For an instrument so demanding, Louis’ guitar playing sounds almost effortless: he hears it, he plays it and it all comes out with a beautifully warm sound.

Perhaps, one some of the reasons for Louis’ special qualities as a player came about as a result of some of the developments noted in this excerpt from Cormac Larkin’s booklet notes to Louis Stewart - Out on His Own [Livia Records LRCD 2201]:

[Visiting New York with an Irish show band]Louis also heard Miles Davis' legendary 50s quintet during that visit to New York and he returned to Dublin with his mind made up. 'Being in the showband, I really thought I was getting into being a professional musician', he told the Irish Times, 'but in fact I was getting further and further away from music. So I quit and I spent about six months doing hardly any gigs at all - just started trying to figure out the guitar.’

It was perhaps the first time in Irish jazz that a musician had decided to devote his entire career to this music, There followed an intense period of self-education for Louis, when he sat at home in his room, poring over the records by Barney Kessel, Tal Farlow, Charlie Christian and others, teaching himself to play his instrument, 'in those days there wasn't all the material that's available to players now showing how to do it. You bought the records by the players and tried to figure out how these lines they played evolved over the chords. It was a very slow process, but in another way, you absorbed it in a special way, rather than having it all laid out for you on paper'

Of course, today’s online courses and instructional videos are wonderful educational tools for those interested in learning Jazz technique, but my own personal experience in learning how to play the music echoes that of Louis’ in that something deeper evolves from listening and applying what you are hearing to practicing on the instrument.

Whatever the ultimate source for how it came about, what is on hand for the listener in Louis Stewart - Out on His Own is best summed up this way:

"In his liner note for the original vinyl release, Sunday Times critic Derek Jewell remarks that Louis ‘is revealed here as a guitar virtuoso already of

_ considerable maturity. A virtuoso in anyone's language, and ... a musician to be spoken of in the same league as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery or, among contemporary virtuosos, Joe Pass.’ My own esteemed predecessor as Irish Times jazz critic, Ray Comiskey, called it 'a performance of such virtuosity, that very few guitarists of any era could ever hope to match it ...a brilliant combination of melodic inventiveness, harmonic ingenuity, technical virtuosity and sheer joy in playing that seems certain to win for it an outstanding place in the record of Jazz guitar'” 

Louis’ discography is composed of recordings that, by and large, are difficult to find.

Given that fact, you won’t want to miss this one. Hats off to Dermot Rogers for making this beautiful recording by Jazz Master Louis Stewart readily available via Livia Records.

The particulars about the recording are listed below on Crossover’s “Radio Release” sheet.

• Livia Records announces the release of a newly remastered edition of Louis Stewart’s milestone and solo album, “Out On His Own”. Released in 1977 on LP and cassette and on CD in 1995, this new edition includes 3 previously unreleased tracks along with a 16-page booklet with several previously unseen photographs. “Out On His Own” is a fitting title for Louis Stewart as he is perhaps the only Irish jazz musician to attain international front-rank status. This solo record features a mix of lead only and rhythm with lead tracks with a repertoire of Jazz and American Songbook standards, contemporary composers (Chick Corea, Steve Swallow etc.) plus an interpretation of an Irish traditional tune and a self-composed blues.

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• The album was recorded in Bray, just south of Dublin, while Louis was at his peak and alternating between playing with Ronnie Scott’s band in London with the best of visiting musicians, and his frequent trips back to Dublin to play to packed clubs and bars. “Out On His Own” was Livia Records first release meeting with excellent press reviews as follows: Sunday Times critic Derek Jewell: “Louis is revealed here as a guitar virtuoso already of considerable maturity. A virtuoso in anyone's language, and ... a musician to be spoken of in the same league as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, or, among contemporary virtuosos, Joe Pass.” Irish Times critic, Ray Comiskey: “a performance of such virtuosity, that very few guitarists of any era could ever hope to match it ...a brilliant combination of melodic inventiveness, harmonic ingenuity, technical virtuosity and sheer joy in playing that seems certain to win for it an outstanding place in the record of Jazz guitar” Ronnie Scott: “Louis is a superbly talented natural musician. In my book he's one of the world's great jazz guitarists”

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• Tracks Brief Notes:

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• 1.BLUE BOSSA* (Kenny Dorham)Virtuoso up-tempo flight of melodic daring

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• 2.WINDOWS* (Chick Corea)Influenced by the Stan Getz version

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• 3.DARN THAT DREAM (Van Heusen)Mining the chord sequence inside out

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• 4.WAVE* (A.C. Jobim)Filled with wit and harmonic wisdom

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• 5.SHE MOVED THROUGH THE FAIR (Trad. arr. Stewart) A unique arrangement of traditional tune

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• 6.MAKE SOMEONE HAPPY* (Styne/Green)Reflecting the greats of jazz guitar history

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• 7.I’M ALL SMILES* (Leonard/Martin)Waltz probably inspired by Bill Evans version

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• 8.STELLA BY STARLIGHT* (Young/Washington)Tour de force version of a difficult standard

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• 9.LAZY AFTERNOON (Morros)A tone poem with striking ringing harmonics

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• 10.INVITATION*(Kaper)With harmonically adventurous soloing

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• 11.I’M OLD FASHIONED (Kern)Displays mastery of the chordal melody

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• 12.GENERAL MOJO’S WELL LAID PLAN* (Swallow)With plangent chords and folksy melody.

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• 13.WHAT’S NEW (Haggard/Burke)Pensive mood, tender and poignant

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• 14.I’LL REMEMBER APRIL (Raye/de Paul/Stone)A fixture in Louis’ live repertoire

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• 15.SPRING IS HERE (Rodgers/Hart)Effortless and playful

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• 16.BLUES (Louis Stewart)Masterful exploration of deep-rooted form

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• 17.FOREST FLOWER (Charles Lloyd)** From his 70s repertoire

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• 18.WHAT’S NEW (Haggard/Burke)**–alt take

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• 19.SPRING IS HERE (Rodgers/Hart)**–alt take

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• *Louis on rhythm and lead.

• ** New to this release

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• On Louis Stewart:

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• While revered in Ireland, Louis’ fame was always greater abroad. Towards the end of his life, he gained honours at home as Ireland began to realise that he was one of the great geniuses of modern music, and an Irish artist to stand alongside Heaney, Beckett, and Le Brocquy as one who transcended his artform and earned the respect and admiration of his peers around the world. Over the course of a long career, Louis Stewart would appear on over seventy albums, and tour the world in the company of some of the foundational stars of the music he loved, including Benny Goodman, JJ Johnson and George Shearing. He was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by Trinity College Dublin (1998) and Aosdána membership (2009) (Arts Council body to acknowledge outstanding contribution to the creative arts in Ireland). Louis died in2016.

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• Gerald Davis and Livia Records: Gerald Davis, a Dublin painter and friend of Louis produced his first 1975 recording ”Louis the First'' and then founded Livia Records to release, “Out On His Own”, establishing Ireland’s first jazz record label with a name inspired by the works of James Joyce. Several other Livia releases followed, each featuring Louis in different line ups: duos, and small to medium size groups, e.g., “Alone Together” “Spondance” and “Super Session”. Livia ceased operations following Gerald’s death in 2005. With his family’s support, Dermot Rogers started a rediscovery and reactivation project in 2021 that led to this release and has unearthed a wealth of other live and studio recordings that are intended for future releases.

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• Epilogue: “Out On His Own” still stands as the most personal and completely assured recording that Louis Stewart made under his own name. Thanks to the foresight of original producer, Gerald Davis, and the dedication and hard work of executive producer Dermot Rogers who led the retrieval and reactivation of the Livia archive from obscurity, it can be heard again, and a new generation of listeners can bear witness that such a guitarist as this once lived and played in Dublin’s fair city. Enjoy this one and look forward to more releases from Livia Records.

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• Credits: Original Production: Gerald Davis, Reissue Production: Dermot Rogers, Mastering: Michael Buckley at House of Horns Studio, Sleeve Notes: Cormac Larkin, Design and Artwork: Jon Berkeley at Holy Trousers, Cover Photograph: Roy Esmonde, Masters Retrieval and Reissue Support: The Davis Family, Project Support: The Stewart Family.