"Art Pepper-Marty Paich Inc." - Alun Morgan [From the Archives]

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

Alun Morgan’s essay Art Pepper-Marty Paich Inc., originally appeared in the November 1960 issue of the Jazz Monthly magazine and was reprinted by permission in Todd Selbert, editor, The Art Pepper Companion, Writings on a Jazz Original [New York: Cooper Square Press, 2000].

Held in the highest esteem by the British Jazz community, Alun was a gentle and genteel person with many significant accomplishments as a Jazz writer and critic during his long career. The following article reveals delightful insights about Art, Marty and the nature of their working relationship and some startlingly revelations about Art’s preferences, not the least of which was his adulation of John Coltrane’s style of playing.

In 1960, Coltrane was not the legendary figure he would become later in the decade after the formation of his classic quartet with pianist McCoy Tyner, bassist Jimmy Garrison and drummer Elvin Jones. He was criticized rather than revered by the majority of Jazz fans and Jazz critics and a relatively small number in the Jazz world held the view of his playing which Art expresses in very appreciative terms.

Sadly, Jazz fans would have to wait 15 years for Coltrane’s influence to manifest itself in Art’s playing as he would spend those years in prison.

Alun certainly doesn’t pull any punches in his appraisal of Art’s playing:

“For some years I have looked on Art Pepper as the greatest solo player in jazz since Charlie Parker and … Art Pepper + Eleven, which I cannot recommend too highly, merely reinforces that opinion.”

[Based in the UK, Alun used English spelling.]

“In the spring of 1956 Marty Paich came to London as accompanist to Dorothy Dandridge. Raymond Horricks and I were fortunate enough to spend some time with Marty and this was my first "live" contact with the currently popular West Coast jazz movement. Identifying terms are convenient but invariably misleading and a great deal of misconception has arisen through this glib method of pigeon-holing. "West Coast jazz" eventually rebounded on its creators and developed into a term of derision in certain circles although, strictly speaking, the description covered the music of such California-based jazzmen as Kid Ory, Dexter Gordon, Earl Hines, Teddy Buckner and Maxwell Davis as well as Lennie Niehaus, Shorty Rogers and Shelly Manne. 

A recession in jazz interest in the area during the late fifties has led to a reduction in the amount of work for men such as Bill Perkins, Niehaus, Russ Freeman, etc., but the stigma has remained. This bias is depressingly unfair, for it means that many collectors and critics have pre-judged new records bearing the "made in Los Angeles" tag. When this method of assessing value and importance is applied to the work of musicians such as Marty Paich, Art Pepper, Bill Perkins, Alvin Stoller, Charlie Mariano and Jack Sheldon it is time to call a halt so that a few critical blinkers might be removed.

Marty Paich, as I soon discovered, is a man with an acute awareness of tradition and a love of all that is good in jazz. He spoke to me with relish of his then recent engagement with Harry Edison and Buddy Rich and revealed an extensive knowledge of the first Basie band culled direct from Edison. 

"When the band left Kansas City for New York in 1936," he remarked, "the book, the entire set of parts, travelled in Harry's trumpet case." His eyes glowed with pleasure at the thought of an orchestra which achieved so much largely on the strength of its head arrangements. Our conversation turned to a big band of more recent vintage, the fine orchestra put together by Shorty Rogers for the "Cool and Crazy" album (HMV DLP1030, Victor LPM1350). 

Marty played piano on the two dates for the LP and had based the broad outline of his style on the orchestral keyboard work of the Count. "We used five trumpets," he said. "Four played the opening ensemble chorus first time round with Conrad Gozzo on lead. (You know, Gozzo's one of the greatest lead men of all time.) Then when we'd given the impression that that was our full power we repeated the passage but this time we brought in Maynard Ferguson doubling the lead an octave above. It was quite a sound." Art Pepper had been one of the featured soloists on the "Cool and Crazy" LP and gradually we found ourselves talking of Pepper who, at the time of our conversation, was serving a sentence for narcotic addiction. 

Pepper had long been a particular favourite of mine (the only Kenton records I ever bought have been the ones with solos by Art) and I was anxious to learn of his whereabouts. Marty spoke at length and with obvious warmth about the alto player, regretting his absence from the Los Angeles circle at a time when there was so much work for jazz musicians and bemoaning the circumstances which had ensnared this superb soloist. It became obvious that Paich's love for Pepper's music was enormous.

Some months after Marty returned home I was surprised and delighted to learn of Art Pepper's release and I guessed that Paich's reactions would be the same. Within weeks of his reappearance Art had recorded an LP with Marty (Tampa TP28, London LZ-U14040) and it seemed that the Old Firm was back in business. Since that date Paich has worked and recorded with Pepper on a number of occasions but the surprising truth of the matter is that Art has found difficulty in breaking into the circle of musicians commanding the studio jobs and jazz club engagements. 

Down Beat dated April 14, 1960, carried a revealing feature on Pepper (the author was uncredited) which contained the information that at the beginning of 1959 Art was selling piano-accordions, complete with lessons on the instrument, to make a living. Less than three years before it seemed that Pepper was destined for a triumphant re-entry into the jazz world which had, in 1949, 1951, 1952, 1953 and 1954, placed him amongst the leading three or four alto saxists in referendums [polls] organised by Metronome magazine. 

A relatively brief spell of recording activity during 1957 and the latter half of 1956 left him high and dry. Warding off the narcotic peddlers who thought he might be easy meat having once experienced this deadly and easy way of nullifying frustrations, hardly helped matters, and the accordion-selling job seemed the only way he could earn a living for Diane (his wife) and himself. "It's true I was pretty disinterested in music at that time," he told Down Beat, "But I began to put down the music rather than the circumstances. The guy who really made me want to play again was John Coltrane. The fact that he'd come up with an original style struck me strongly. In the past there was Pres, then Charlie Parker. Now there's Coltrane. He starts playing and just flows through the rhythm. And I like his sound. Many people object to his sound, they say it's too rough and hard. Not me. He plays an awful lot of notes but as beautifully as anyone ever played. The way he plays with a chord and with scales is really remarkable."

When his interest in music was rekindled by Coltrane, Pepper cast about for a job in which he could get back to the music he loved. Strangely enough the only offer seemed to come from a rock and roll unit playing at a club in San Fernando Valley. "This was an authentic rock and roll band," he insists. "Most of the guys were from Shreveport, Louisiana, and they didn't fool around with the music. I began to dig music again from working with them. Because they really felt it. The music swung." Pepper was not the first to discover the importance of the rhythm and blues group to the jazz musician. 

Most of the leading soloists of today have come up through the ranks of r. and b. bands, bands in which the beat is important and the projection of the solo voice above a strongly riffing background leads to a tone and volume control which can never be achieved through working only with small jazz groups. By the middle of 1959 Art was anxious to get back into jazz proper and he jumped at the chance to join Bud Shank's new quartet at the Drift Inn at Malibu for week-end engagements. Soon afterwards he was signed up as a full-time member of the Lighthouse club band along with Conte Candoli, Vince Guaraldi, Bob Cooper and drummer Nick Martinis. 

Yet a man of his stature should be in a position to command a higher salary and to reckon on a fairly steady supply of day jobs in radio and television studios. "The truth is," Art confessed to the Down Beat reporter, "Marty Paich is the only leader in town who has called me for record dates, and who still does whenever he records. Even if he has an arrangement, say, on a vocal album with all strings, he'll even write in an alto part for me to blow on." About Pepper, Marty replies, "There's no-one else I would rather write for because the minute he hears the background, he makes an immediate adjustment to the arrangement. Art never stops listening to what's happening in the background; in reverse, it's like a pianist working with a singer."

The finest collaborative work featuring Pepper and Paich is the album entitled "Art Pepper plus Eleven: Modern Jazz Classics" (Vogue LAC 12229, American Contemporary M3568) recorded at three sessions in March and May, 1959. Art and Marty chose twelve outstanding jazz compositions dating from the 1944-vintage 'Round about midnight to Sonny Rollins's 1954 Airegin by way of Move, Groovin' high, Opus de funk, Four brothers, Shaw 'nuff, Bernie's tune, Walkin' shoes, Anthropology, Walkin' and Donna Lee. 

Paich used a modified version of 'Dek-tette'-type instrumentation to support Pepper, the 'Dek-tette' being itself a development of the famous Miles Davis band. Marty was fortunate to have the services of Bob Enevoldsen, for this versatile musician was at home either on valve-trombone or tenor sax, thus giving the arranger the choice of five brass and three saxes or four brass and four reeds. Pepper played clarinet on one number (Anthropology), alto on seven, tenor on three, and both alto and tenor on one. An excellent transcription of the original Woody Herman sound was achieved on Four Brothers when Pepper played lead tenor in a sax section completed by Enevoldsen and Richie Kamuca, also on tenors, and Med Flory on baritone. 

Rarely in jazz can there have been more sympathy between arranger and soloist or a greater affinity of purpose. I must disagree wholeheartedly with the review of the record which appeared in this magazine for it contained the misleading statement, "in view of the lack of stimulating rapport between soloist and accompaniment here one feels that Art Pepper meets the rhythm section (Vogue-Contemporary LAC12066) remains this artist's best record." 

This is one of those cases (by no means rare in jazz criticism) when the reverse is actually the truth. Vogue LAC12066 features Pepper with Miles Davis's rhythm section (Red Garland, Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones); Art had never played with the rhythm section before and there are a number of occasions on the LP when the quartet seems to be heading in two directions at once. Philly Joe, for example, is such a strong individualist that there are few groups in which he can play his part to maximum effect; his trick of doubling the tempo for no apparent reason (it seems to take control of him like a nervous twitch) appears to surprise and annoy Pepper. Chambers's habit of playing a kind of running solo also runs counter to the ideas of the alto saxist who had previously enjoyed the superior class playing of Ben Tucker or Leroy Vinnegar in his rhythm sections. 

Most jazz enthusiasts (and surely all musicians) hearing Art Pepper plus eleven will sense at once the stimulating rapport between arranger and soloist, a truth which is borne out by the statements appearing in the Down Beat article. "I feel the situation between Art and myself is similar to that between Miles Davis and Gil Evans" stated Paich. "We understand each other. I've played with him long enough to understand his feelings. Because Art's usually recorded with a quartet or similar group, I tried to write for the Eleven album in a manner that would make him feel that he was playing with a small band." 

Marty expands the argument on the sleeve to the LP: "I wanted to give him a different kind of inspiration than he's been used to with just a quartet behind him. I wanted Art to feel the impact of the band, and I thought this setting would spur him to play differently than usual — though still freely within his natural style. And it did. Art and I have always thought very much alike. I couldn't have asked for a more compatible soloist." Pepper's agreement is implicit in his statement: "Seems like everything I've ever done with Marty came out good — from the first quartet we did on the Tampa label. He writes very interestingly — just listen to the latest album — and it always swings. That Eleven album is written with a lot of taste, and the voicing is excellent. Between him and me, it's a feeling . . . Like, some people make it together and some don't. We do." 

Paich's writing for the Eleven album is something of a high-spot in a consistently excellent arranging career. A knowledge of, and love for, the subject matter has meant that each number is not only treated with respect but with circumspection. On Groovin' high, for example, Marty has transcribed Parker's solo from the original Musicraft record and handed it to the saxes to play as a section; Jeru makes its appearance, in part, as an ensemble figure towards the end of Walkin’ shoes while the opening half chorus of Donna Lee captures the spirit and hope inherent in the music of Parker's quintet. 

The attention to detail not only in the writing but also in the playing means that Pepper has been given a series of springboards from which to launch himself into inspired solo passages, and the scoring of Groovin' high, Airegin and Anthropology in particular boosts Art up into the clouds. Always a lyrical, passionate player, Pepper is heard at his best on Groovin' high where his sense of occasion stands him in good stead. Stylistically he descends from an admixture of Parker, Lee Konitz and Benny Carter and the singing quality of his improvised lines would do credit to Carter or Lester Young. 

Alto remains his most effective instrument, the one on which he seems best able to communicate his thoughts, but his tenor playing in this album indicates that he could also become a major voice on the larger saxophone. His clarinet feature, Anthropology, is a revelation, for it is the first clarinet playing in the modern idiom I have heard which is warm-toned and free-swinging. "Art Pepper is probably one of the most dedicated musicians I know," maintains Paich. "He just lives for his horn." It is certainly true that he immerses himself in his music whenever he is called upon to solo. There is never a feeling of superficiality nor insincerity but always an impression of deep-seated emotion and a desire to get at the truth.

In recent months I have read full-page advertisements in American magazines calling attention to "soul" music which, if I have read the announcements correctly, is the prerogative of the Riverside and Prestige record companies. I am not sure of the exact meaning of "soul music" in this context but it seems to comprise a crude, insincere imitation of Negro gospel diluted with a generous helping of the vastly overrated Ray Charles. 

The result is more contrived than the most extreme examples of Illinois Jacquet's crowd-rousing screams. My conception of music which has heartfelt emotion or soul is the kind of jazz produced by trumpeter Joe Thomas or Art Pepper, for both these men play with a simple directness and poetic lyricism. Pepper can, and does, play the blues with more conviction than many of his so-called "soul" brothers and I would recommend in particular his Blues out from Score SLP4030, an extended performance on alto backed only by Ben Tucker's bass. 

Unfortunately the hippies of this world are not likely to accept Pepper at his true value for, not to put too fine a point on it, Art, in their eyes, is not only resident on the wrong coast but is of the wrong colour. This is one of the fundamental injustices which no amount of preaching will put to rights, nevertheless my aim in writing this brief appraisal of an outstanding record is an attempt to set things in their correct perspective.

Art Pepper plus eleven is a superb album in every way. Not only does it showcase one of the really important soloists of our times but it focuses attention on one of jazz's brightest arrangers. It also indicates that Jack Sheldon, who shares the solo space with Pepper, is potentially the best of the newer jazz trumpeters resident in California and that Mel Lewis is a drummer with an enviable sense of timing and a Don Lamond-like approach to big band work. Further, it revives at least four masterpieces of a decade or so ago, tunes which are likely to retain their validity long after many of today's "originals" are forgotten. For some years I have looked on Art Pepper as the greatest solo player in jazz since Charlie Parker and this present LP, which I cannot recommend too highly, merely reinforces that opinion.”

Remembering The Curtis Counce Group

© Copyright ® Steven Cerra 2024

 All rights reserved.

"The Curtis Counce quintet is one of the great neglected jazz bands of the 1950s. The reasons for this neglect are difficult to pinpoint.” 

- Ted Gioia, West Coast Jazz: Modern Jazz In California [New York: Oxford University Press, 1992, p.318].

Bob Gordon is the author of the brilliant Jazz West Coast: The Los Angeles Jazz Scene of the 1950’s [London: Quartet Books Ltd., 1986]. Among it’s many attributes, the book contains an excellent section devoted to the Curtis Counce Group [pp.147-50  and 156-61] whose members are also depicted in the graphics that adorn the book’s cover.

Jack Sheldon on trumpet, Harold Land on tenor saxophone, Carl Perkins on piano, Curtis Counce on bass and Frank Butler on drums made up the original powerhouse group whose aggressive and hard-hitting style of Jazz certainly belied Grover Sales wrap that "many West Coast Jazz … recordings … today strike us as bloodless museum pieces ….”

It is this point in contention that Bob takes on directly in the “California Hard (II)” chapter of his work which he has kindly allowed the editors of JazzProfiles permission to reproduce in an effort to draw attention to the marvelous music of the Curtis Counce Group. 

“It is hard to understand why the Curtis Counce Group failed to achieve the recognition ‑ either popular or critical ‑ it deserved. Perhaps it's because the group was so difficult to pigeonhole. As a Los Angeles‑based group it couldn't remotely be identified with the West Coast school. Stylistically, the Curtis Counce Group fit quite naturally with such groups as the Jazz Messen­gers or the Horace Silver Quintet, but such a comparison tended to upset the East Coast‑West Coast dichotomy that then figured so prominently in jazz criticism. So, stuck as they were thousands of miles from the centre of editorial power, the musicians in the group turned out their own brand of hard­-swinging jazz in relative obscurity. It wouldn't be fair to say they were totally ignored by the influential critics, but they were seldom evaluated at their true worth.

We've already discussed most of the band's principals. Bassist Curtis Counce had played with Shorty Rogers and numerous West Coast groups, and was one of the few black musicians to have gained acceptance in the Hollywood studios; he had just returned from a European tour with the Stan Kenton orchestra when he set about forming a band in August of 1956. Tenor saxophonist Harold Land had of course been a mainstay of the Max Roach‑Clifford Brown quintet. 

Trumpeter Jack Sheldon, shared the front line with Land, was born 30 November 1931 in Jacksonville, Florida and moved to LA in 1947, where he studied music for two years at LA City College. Following a two-year stint in the air force, he gigged around town with Jack Montrose, Art Pepper, Wardell Gray, Dexter Gordon and Herb Geller; he was also a charter member of the group centered around Joe Maini and Lenny Bruce.

The rhythm section of the Curtis Counce Group was anchored by two exceptional musicians, pianist Carl Perkins and drummer Frank Butler. Carl Perkins (no relation to the rock‑and‑roll singer) had been born in Indianapolis, Indiana, 16 August 1928. A self‑taught pianist, Perkins had come up through the rhythm‑and‑blues bands of Tiny Bradshaw and Big Jay McNeely, and had forged a blues‑drenched modern style for himself. He had developed an unorthodox style and often played with his left arm parallel to the keyboard. Frank Butler was born on 18 February 1928 in Wichita, Kansas and had made jazz time with Dave Brubeck, Edgar Hayes and Duke Ellington, among others.

None of the musicians in the band was a household name, although Harold Land had gained some fame during his stay with the Clifford Brown‑Max Roach band. But this was, above all, a group, and it was as a co‑operative unit that the band excelled. Everyone is familiar with all‑star bands that somehow or other don't quite make it ‑ the chemistry between the players is somehow wrong; perhaps an ego or two gets in the way. The Curtis Counce Group was that sort of band's antithesis; a living, working example of a unit wherein the whole is much greater than the sum of its components. Although the original idea to form the group was Curtis Counce's, the band functioned as a collaborative affair. 'We were all close friends within the group,' Harold Land remembers, 'so it was a good idea for all of us, because we all liked each other personally as well as musically.'

The Curtis Counce Group was formed in August 1956, played its first gig at The Haig in September, and entered the recording studios a month later. Lester Koenig always had an ear for promising musicians, and in the latter part of the 1950s he recorded a fascinating assortment of exciting and forward­-looking groups and musicians, including Ornette Coleman and Cecil Taylor, for his Contemporary label. The Curtis Counce Group was one of his happiest finds. The musicians entered the studio on 8 October for their first session, and the band's chemistry was evident from the start. The first tune recorded was Harold Land's 'Landslide', a dark yet forceful hard‑bop theme. Harold leads off with some big‑toned tenor work and is followed by some thoughtful Sheldon and grooving Carl Perkins. Two other originals were contributed by members of the band: 'Mia' by Carl Perkins, and Jack Sheldon's blues line 'Sarah'.

'Mia' sports a bright, bouncy tune with unexpected chord progressions and sparks swinging solos by all hands. Everybody digs deeply into the blues on 'Sarah', but Carl Perkins is especially impressive in his solo; throughout his all too short career Perkins displayed a close affinity for the blues. 'Time after Time' serves as a vehicle for Harold Land's tender yet muscular ballad style. 'A Fifth for Frank', as the title suggests, is a showcase for Frank Butler. Frank's driving support for the band throughout the session belies his relative inexperience ‑ this was in fact his first recording. A sixth tune, Charlie Parker's 'Big Foot' (recorded by Parker as both 'Air Conditioning' and 'Drifting on a Reed' for Dial), was also recorded at this original session, but was not issued until later. To round out the initial album, a tune recorded at the group's second session ‑ held a week later on 18 October ‑ was used. 'Sonar' (written by Gerald Wiggins and Kenny Clarke), is taken at a bright tempo and has plenty of room for stretching out by all of the musicians.

The first album, titled simply The Curtis Counce Group [Contemporary S-7526; OJCCD-606-2], was released early in 1957 and immediately gained favourable attention. Nat Hentoff awarded the album four stars in an admiring review in Down Beat magazine. Yet somehow national stature seemed to elude the band. Undoubtedly the main reason for this was that the Curtis Counce Group was not a traveling band. Harold Land does remember that the group 'went to Denver one time, but as far as getting back east, it never did happen'. In Los Angeles the band enjoyed an in‑group reputa­tion ‑ they were especially well‑liked by fellow musicians ‑ but they never achieved the popularity of, say, the Chico Hamilton Quintet. They did play regularly around Los Angeles. 'There was another spot down on Sunset: the Sanborn House,' Harold remembers. 'We played there quite a while, longer than we did at The Haig, and the group built up quite a following. The Haig was very small, but this was a larger club.'
In the meantime, the band continued to record prolifically for Contemporary. The group's second album contained tunes cut at various sessions held in 1956 and throughout 1957. In addition to 'Sonar', the band recorded a swinging version of 'Stranger in Paradise' at the second session of 15 October 1956; this tune and the aforementioned 'Big Foot' were on the second album, which was originally entitled You Get More Bounce with Curtis Counce [Contemporary C-7539; OJJCD-159-2].

Two more tunes were recorded 22 April 1957 ‑ 'Too Close for Comfort' and 'Counceltation'. The latter is an original by the leader. Curtis was studying composition with Lyle 'Spud' Murphy at the time, and 'Counceltation' is an experimental piece based on Murphy's twelve‑tone system. The tune is interesting, but smacks a little too much of the classroom. As if to balance this, another tune of Counce's, a bright blues named 'Complete', was recorded at a session in May. Everybody gets to let down his hair on 'Complete', and Jack Sheldon contributes a funky Miles Davis‑influenced solo in Harmon mute. A ballad version of 'How Deep is the Ocean', also recorded at the May session, and an up‑tempo 'Mean to Me', recorded in September, complete the album. When the album was released late in 1957, the Curtis Counce Group was riding high, but unfortunately several unforeseen events would soon contribute to the band's early demise. Chief among these was the tragic death of pianist Carl Perkins in March of 1958; an additional strong factor was the rapid decline of jazz, clubs in LA in the closing years of the decade.

Perhaps the most poignant example of the break‑up of a working band was that of the Curtis Counce Group, if only because the group had shown so much promise from inception. They did manage to hold together through 1957 when so many bands fell by the wayside, but finally broke a early in 1958. But before the group disbanded they manage produce two more albums, both enduring legacies of jazz in fifties.

The group's final recording for the Contemporary label titled ‑ when it was finally released in 1960 ‑ Carl's Blues [Contemporary S-7574; OJCCD-423-2]. The title was, unfortunately, especially apt, both because 'C Blues' by pianist Carl Perkins is one of the album's highlights and because Perkins died shortly after the tune was recorded. The album contains tunes cut at three sessions in all. J Sheldon's 'Pink Lady', a smoking work‑out on the standard ‘I Got Rhythm' changes, and a spirited version of 'Love Walked In’ are from the earliest date, held on 22 April 1957. There is also a grooving version of Horace Silver's Latin‑flavoured tune 'Nica’s Dream', recorded 29 August. The tempo here is slower and more deliberate than Horace Silver’s justly famous Blue Note recording, but the Curtis Counce performance is no less expressive.

The album’s remaining tunes were recorded at Carl Perkins's final session on 6 January 1958. For this date, Gerald Wilson replaced Jack Sheldon in the group's trumpet chair, although Wilson plays on only two tunes. One track, 'The Butler Did It', is an unaccompanied drum solo by Frank Butler. 'I Can't Get ' features Harold Land and the rhythm section, and the performance gives a strong indication of Land's growing powers improviser. The two tunes featuring the entire quintet are ‘Larue’ and the aforementioned 'Carl's Blues'. The ballad ‘Larue’ was written by Clifford Brown for his wife; Harold Land plays an especially tender solo on the tune. 'Carl's Blues', written by Perkins expressly for the session, is a leisurely examination of the blues and a fitting epitaph for the pianist.

Carl Perkins died on 17 March 1958, just five months short of his thirtieth birthday, another victim of drug abuse. He was the at of the Curtis Counce Group, and it is not surprising e quintet did not long outlive him. When Les Koenig issued his third album, several years after the selections en recorded, he had this to say about the band.

"While it lasted, the Curtis Counce Group was one of the most exciting ever organized in Los Angeles. Counce picked four men who almost immediately achieved a togetherness only long‑established bands seem to have. Today, Carl Perkins is dead, and the members of the group have gone off in different directions ... It would be difficult under the best of conditions to recapture the feeling of the 1957 quintet. Without Perkins whose unique piano style was basic to the group's special sound, it is impossible. It is tempting to wonder how the band would have been received had it been based in New York; certainly it would have give some of the more famous groups of the fifties a run for the money.


Carl's Blues was not, however, the final recording of the band. A month after Perkins's death the restructured quintet recorded for Dootsie Williams's Dooto (Dootone) records. Counce, Land and Butler remained from the original group. The trumpeter the date was Rolf Ericsson. Ericsson, born in Stockholm, Sweden on 29 August 1927, had moved to the States in 1947 and had worked with various bands including those of Charlie Barnet, Elliot Lawrence and Woody Herman. He was a member of Lighthouse All‑Stars in 1953. The new pianist was Elmo Hope native New Yorker, whose brief tenure on the Coast in the late fifties sparked several outstanding recordings. Hope, born on June 1923, was a childhood friend of Bud Powell and an active participant of the New York jazz scene of the forties and early fifties, although he remained little known to the public at large. Hope's piano was not as blues‑oriented as that of Carl Perkins but was instead sinewy and spare, the hard‑bop piano style pared to its very essence. In view of the band's restructuring, it is significant that the group was billed as the Curtis Counce Quintet rather than the Curtis Counce Group.

This set is unfortunately something of a let‑down after the three previous albums. Contemporary and Pacific jazz were the class of the West Coast independents, and however one may quibble over Les Koenig's or Dick Bock's choice of artists or material on any given record, their records were always superbly engineered and professionally produced. 

The Dootone album Exploring the Future [Dooto LP DTL 247; CDBOP 007], is noticeably inferior to the Contemporaries in recording quality, and there seems to have been a lack rehearsal time as well. Of course this was not the tight working band of a year earlier ‑ Carl Perkins's death and Jack Sheldon's departure obviously disrupted the group's cohesiveness ‑ but a couple of the numbers could have benefited from an additional take or two.


There is also the matter of the album's 'theme'. The group was definitely not ‘Exploring the Future’, but was diligently laboring the well‑established vineyards of hard bop. The futuristic album cover, showing Curtis Counce floating through the void in a space suit, and the choice of titles, which include 'Into the Orbit', 'Race for Space', 'Exploring the Future', and 'The Countdown', promise things the album simply can't deliver. (It is possible that some of the names were tagged on to untitled numbers after they had been recorded, a common enough practice.) All of this is not to say, however, that the album is a lure: the record does deliver a satisfying amount of modern, hard‑driving jazz.

Four of the album's eight numbers were written by Elmo Hope; all are decidedly in the hard‑bop vein. 'So Nice', the record's opener, has a catchy tune and driving solos by Ericsson, Land and Hope. Rolf Ericsson's tone is brash, and fits well in the hard‑bop context, but his trumpet playing suffers in comparison with Jack Sheldon's fluid yet funky work. 'Into the Orbit' seems well-named, since each soloist is launched into his solo at a doubled‑up tempo. 'Race for Space' is a rapid minor‑key theme which has a burning solo by Harold Land. And 'The Count­down', the album's closing number, sounds very much as if it were used by Hope as a set‑closer; it features the rhythm section working as a trio. 'Exploring the Future' has a nice theme that is attributed to Dootsie Williams, but since he is also credited on the album for Denzil Best's classic 'Move', one wonders. 'Move' serves largely as a drum solo for Frank Butler. The album also has two ballads. 'Someone to Watch Over Me' is a solo vehicle for Curtis Counce's bass, while Ericsson, Land and Hope all contribute tender solos on 'Angel Eyes'.

Although this was the last recording of the band under Curtis Counce's leadership, two additional sessions featured largely the or same personnel. The first of these was under the leadership of Hope. On 31 October 1957 the Elmo Hope Quintet ‑ Stu Williamson, Harold Land, Hope, Leroy Vinnegar, Frank Butler -, recorded three tunes for Pacific Jazz: 'Vaun Ex', 'St Elmo's Fire’ and 'So Nice'. All three of course were the pianist's compositions. Whether Dick Bock had originally planned on an entire album for the group or not, these were the only tunes recorded (or at least ever released) by Pacific Jazz. Two of the numbers were released on anthologies the following year; all three eventually found their way on to an Art Blakey reissue in the early 1960s. The recording quality on these Pacific jazz sides is noticeably superior to that of the Curtis Counce Dooto album, but it's also true that the Dooto sides exhibit a bit more uninhibited fire.


At this point, Bob’s essay on the Curtis Counce Group/Quintet segues into the work of Harold Land, particularly his Harold in the Land of Jazz  [Contemporary S-7550; OJJCD 162-2] which carried on the musical “feel” of the Counce groups. This may of course be due to the fact that with the exception of Leroy Vinnegar substituting for Curtis on bass, the group consisted of musicians who had all been with Counce’s combos, including pianist Carl Perkins, for whom this would be his last recording. Given these close connections, Bob goes on to write:



Perhaps the definitive recordings from this period came under the leadership of Harold Land for Contemporary records. Harold in the Land of Jazz (reissued later as Grooveyard) is significant both as the first album released under Harold Land's name and as Carl Perkins's last recording. The sessions were held on 13 and 14 January 1958, and the musicians were Rolf Ericsson, Land, Carl Perkins, Leroy Vinnegar and Frank Butler. These Contemporary recordings combine the fire of the Dooto recordings and the recording quality of the Pacific Jazz session.

The album opens with a driving arrangement of Kurt Weill's 'Speak Low'. The interplay between Land and Frank Butler here ‑ as always ‑ seems nothing short of miraculous. The two had been playing together almost daily since the formation of the Curtis Counce Group, of course, but beyond that Land and Butler could communicate on a telepathic level that was sometimes almost frightening. 'We've always been close friends, Land would later remember, 'and we were born on the same day of the month in the same year [Butler on 18 February, Land or 18 December 1928] ... and even our wives get sick and tired of our talking about how "in tune" we are with each other [laughs]. At times during one of Land's solos, the saxophonist will begin a phrase and Butler will immediately jump in, the two finishing together. 'Delirium', Harold Land's tune, is composed of descending sixteen‑bar phrases following each other like an endless succession of waves. 'You Don't Know What Love is serves as a solo vehicle for Land, who names it as one of his favorite ballads. Elmo Hope's 'Nieta' features Latin rhythm and some unconventional chord progressions. Two of the remaining tunes were written by Land. 'Smack Up' is a boppish tune which is propelled by some strong rhythmic accents, while the ballad 'Lydia's Lament' is a tender tribute to Harold's wife.

The remaining tune, and the album's high point, is the Carl Perkins composition 'Grooveyard'. It has a relaxed and timeless theme with roots in both gospel and the blues, and yet it has none of the self-conscious posturing of so many of the soul tunes of the day. Land, Ericsson and especially Perkins reach deep into the jazz tradition with their solos. The performance remains a fitting tribute to the composer.”

In 1989, subsequent to the publication of Bob’s book, and thanks to the diligence of Ed Michel’s perusal of the Contemporary Records vault, a fifth album of the group’s music was released as Sonority [Contemporary CCD 7655].


Ed revels how his “creation” came about in the following insert notes to these recordings:

“I always feel like I m being given a treat when I get to work on materials from the Contemporary vault (not only because one of the things I’d hoped for in my salad days was to grow up to turn out something like Les Koenig): but this batch of Curtis Counce previously‑unreleased takes strikes some sort at special nerve. They were all recorded around the time I was starting out in the record business (for Contemporary’s down‑the‑street rival Pacific Jazz, run by the estimable Richard Bock), and featured players I was hearing with great regularity at the time on the active and exciting L.A. scene. And "active" and "exciting" are appropriate words to describe things.

In a recent set of Art Pepper notes, Gary Giddins refers to 'the cool posturing of those improvising beach boys who tried to recreate California jazz as fun in the midnight sun…,’ which pretty well reflects what was, at the time West Coast Jazz was getting lots of press, the Official New York Party Line on matters west of either Philly or, in the musings of particularly open­-minded writers, Chicago. It’s a little frightening to see this view coming around again as ‘the way it really was.’ Looking backward at art can certainly be an iffy business. There was certainly a great deal more going on along the Hollywood‑South Central‑East LA‑Beach Cities axes (for the life of me, I can't recall anything at all happening in the San Fernando Valley, which might be just another regional blindness) than one would have expected after reading the (non-­local) critics.

One of LA’s many joys was the music made by Curtis Counce and his associates. In what was, certainly, an often largely caucasian‑complected bandstand scene, Curtis's was a black face you could see with regularity in many contexts, It's my recollection that I first became aware of him during a Shorty Rogers‑ Shelly Manne stint at Zardi's, when he was featured on an ear‑opening "Sophisticated Lady." Harold Land was everywhere, and playing in a way that hardly fit any descriptions of an effete West Coast style. Jack Sheldon always seemed to be in the company of the lamentably‑undervalued alto saxophonist Joe Maini (you could catch them in the band at, if memory serves, Strip City, just off Pico Boulevard's Record Distributor's Row, around the corner on Western, where, more likely than not, Lenny Bruce was working as M.C.). And Carl Perkins. who really did play with his left hand cocked around so his thumb was aimed toward the bottom of the keyboard, ‘fingering’ bass notes with his elbow, was always working at some joint on Pico or somewhere south, more often than not with Frank Butler (who Miles Davis managed to find interesting enough to use on a few early Columbia sides).

Pianist‑composer Elmo Hope was in town from New York, and for some reason part of my job involved my spending a good deal of time driving him around to various record companies where he was selling his compositions (actually, I know for certain that he sold "So Nice" and "Origin" to both Pacific Jazz and Contemporary because I took him to both offices and watched negotia­tions go down, record business practices are learned under apprenticeship/ observation condi­tions. and I assumed everybody did business that way; I may have been right). And in addition to his splendid trumpet work and arranging in all sorts of contexts, Gerald Wilson was establishing his reputation as the leader of a remarkable, talent‑fostering band….

So it was a sweet surprise to find these cuts waiting in the can a bit more than 30 years after they'd been recorded, a reminder that there was a good deal more going an along the Pacific Rim than made the popular magazine covers. Or‑ more accurately than "surprise"‑ a reminder, and for some of us, lucky enough to have been mousing adolescently around the edge of the scene, no surprise at all.”


‑Ed Michel

In retrospect, we are fortunate that this music was recorded when it was as in 1963, just a few years after these splendid recordings were made, Curtis died of a heart attack while in an ambulance on its way to a hospital. He was thirty seven years old.

By then, as Ted Gioia points out in his seminal book, West Coast Jazz: Modern Jazz in California, 1945-1960 [paragraphing modified]:

“The great flowering of modern jazz on the West Coast, which had begun in the mid-1940s on the street of Central Avenue, had reached a dead-end, financially if not creatively. It’s place in Southern California music culture was now taken over by innocuous studio pop records, the nascent sound of surf music, and the steadily growing world of rock and roll.

In retrospect, the music being played by Harold Land, Sonny Criss and Teddy Edwards … [and that had been played by the Counce groups], and the few other straggling survivors of the modern jazz revolution stands out as the last futile effort to hold onto the ground painfully won over a decade and a half of jazz proselytizing in the Southland, of attempts to spread the gospel of a rich, complex and deep music, a music now on the brink of being drowned out by the amplified sounds of garage bands, three-chord wonders somehow made into media stars.” [p.325]"

‘In Perfect Harmony: The Lost Album’ by Chet Baker and Jack Sheldon Review: Trumpeters in Tandem by Will Friedwald

 Though the two musicians were very different in both life and music, they came together in 1972 to record this excellent, newly released album.

By Will Friedwald

April 20, 2024 Wall Street Journal

Copyright ©2024 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

“Chet Baker and Jack Sheldon didn’t have much in common. The two trumpeters and occasional singers, who are heard together on the recently discovered, newly released “In Perfect Harmony: The Lost Album” (Jazz Detective, out now), both emerged from the West Coast jazz scene of the early 1950s, but that’s where the similarity ends. Baker has come to be seen as the ultimate moody loner, the original jazzman without a country, wandering across the globe in an endless tour of one-nighters, generally staying one step ahead of drug-enforcement police. Sheldon became a mainstay in studio orchestras, playing on “The Merv Griffin Show,” singing on “Schoolhouse Rock!” and rarely leaving the West Coast. Baker’s singing was quiet, reserved and understated in a way that many found irresistibly erotic, whereas Sheldon was a figure of fun, full of irrepressible humor and wisecracks galore—he even made an album of standup comedy. Baker was unrepentantly self-destructive, leading to his death in 1988 under mysterious circumstances at age 58, while Sheldon had a long, productive life and died at age 88.

And yet the two men were, in fact, close friends. Sheldon, who was two years younger, idolized Baker, though he was careful not to emulate the slightly older trumpeter’s lifestyle.

In the late 1960s and early ’70s, Baker was back in California, but not by choice: In 1966, he had been beaten and robbed, and his teeth were decimated to the point that he needed dentures and to relearn how to play the trumpet. Other than on a series of forgettable, pop-oriented albums, by the summer of 1972 he had barely played or recorded in years.

It was Sheldon’s idea that the two should do an album playing and singing together, as a means of easing Baker back into full-time performing. Sheldon approached the guitarist and producer Jack Marshall, who had opened a recording studio in Tustin, Calif. As Frank Marshall, the producer’s son, writes in the album notes, the two Jacks then assembled an excellent rhythm section with bassist Joe Mondragon (who is playing electric on at least a few tracks here), drummer Nick Ceroli, and Dave Frishberg, the Minnesota-born jazz piano giant who had only recently relocated from New York. To make Baker feel even more secure, Marshall himself also played on the date, giving the trumpeter something he virtually never had the luxury of working with, a full four-piece rhythm section. Sheldon and Marshall prepared 11 songs, totaling 35 minutes of music: seven songbook standards, one Sheldon original, two bossa novas, and a blues.

The finished album is excellent—though at times there isn’t enough of it. The most extreme example is the opener, “This Can’t Be Love,” which starts with Sheldon singing the first chorus rubato; then Frishberg subtly shifts it into tempo and Baker sings an uptempo chorus with Sheldon playing behind him. And that’s it. One yearns to hear the two trumpeters then start trading fours, but it ends there.

Elsewhere the album seems just right, even on the shorter tracks. “Just Friends” is Baker singing all the way through, here getting to do a jazzier second chorus, with Sheldon again playing obbligatos; although both tracks are only two minutes and change, “Friends” at least feels complete. “But Not For Me” is even better, opening with a charming intro in which Frishberg pays allegiance to Earl Hines and Teddy Wilson, again with Sheldon playing in support of Baker’s singing.

They never do actually sing together, but they play in tandem on several numbers, such as “I Cried for You” and Sheldon’s “Too Blue”—a quasi-comedic novelty with allusions to the blues.

The two Brazilian songs, “Historia de un Amor,” sung by Sheldon, and “Once I Loved,” where Baker takes the lead, are satisfying vehicles for the two. Throughout, the presence of a second horn challenges and inspires Baker to play more aggressively than he later would on most of his ’70s and ’80s recordings. The longest track, “When I Fall in Love,” finds Baker singing and then playing especially rapturously and Sheldon offering equally beautiful support.

“I’m Old Fashioned” and “You Fascinate Me So” are brief but highly copasetic features for Baker and Sheldon, respectively, each playing agreeably behind the other’s vocals.  The set ends with “Evil Blues,” from the songbook of Jimmy Rushing, with Baker playing, Sheldon singing, and Frishberg paying homage to Count Basie. 

We can’t be sure what Sheldon and Marshall’s plans were for the album—to sell the master itself to a label or merely to use it as a demo. Ultimately, neither happened; about a year later, Marshall died at age 51, by which time Baker, his chops and his confidence restored, had resumed his endless nomadic trek around the world. It remained for the guitarist’s son to discover the tape in a garage 50 years later. We can be very glad he did; it’s a remarkable collaboration by two uniquely gifted musicians, Chet Baker and Jack Sheldon, so different and yet in harmony..”

Jack Sheldon - The Early Years

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

Jack Sheldon’s puckish, vibrato-less, mid-range sound on trumpet has always been a favorite of mine dating back to the first time I heard him on the Contemporary Records he made with bassist Curtis Counce’s quintet in the 1950’s.

Jack was also a favorite of composer-arranger Marty Paich who used him on his [too few] big band recordings and paired him with alto saxophonist Art Pepper on the classic Art Pepper Plus Eleven Contemporary LP.

For a while, it seemed that Jack was everywhere on the West Coast Jazz scene including stints with bassist Howard Rumsey’s Lighthouse Cafe All-Stars, Stan Kenton’s orchestra and Dave Pell’s octet.

In addition to the recordings he made with Curtis Counce and Art Pepper, Jack also made small group recordings with the Jimmy Giuffre Quartet, the Mel Lewis Sextet and the John Grass Nonet.

Ironically, for as much as I enjoyed Jack’s trumpet playing and held it in the highest esteem over the years, I never owned any of the recordings that he made under his own name for the Pacific Jazz and Jazz West labels.

That is, until these were collected and reissued on part of the limited West Coast Classics series release on a CD entitled - Jack Sheldon: The Quartet and Quintet [Pacific Jazz/Capitol CDP-93160].

Recorded on three separate occasions in 1954 and 1955, the 19 tracks on the CD feature Jack in a quintet with Joe Maini on alto sax, Kenny Drew on piano, Leroy Vinnegar on bass and Lawrence Marable on drums, in a quartet with Walter Norris on piano, Ralph Pena on bass and Gene Gamage on drums and in a quintet with Zoot Sims on tenor sax, Norris on piano, Bob Whitlock on bass and Marable on drums.

While relistening to the CD recently, I thought that Bob Gordon’s insert notes and some comments about Jack from Ted Gioia’s seminal West Coast Jazz: Modern Jazz in California, 1945 - 1960 might form a interesting blog feature about Sheldon’s earliest years in the music.

Ted’s book is available in a hard bound version from Oxford University Press and in paperback from the University of California Press. Unfortunately, Bob Gordon’s excellent book Jazz West Coast is no longer available but you can locate a complete posting of it to the JazzProfiles blog using the link at the end of this piece.

Ted and Bob’s books along with Alain Tercinet’s West Coast Jazz, which, unfortunately, has not been translated into English, constitute a published troika of seminal and definitive information about the style of Jazz that flourished in post World War II California from approximately 1945-1965.

Ted Gioia, West Coast Jazz: Modern Jazz in California, 1945 - 1960, [pp. 322-323]

“... For most of his musical career, [Jack] Sheldon has been best known as an exceptional exponent of the cooler West Coast trumpet sound. … The influence of Chet Baker and Shorty Rogers is apparent at such moments. The [three recordings he made with bassist Curtis] Counce’s band, in contrast, gradually brought out a different side of Sheldon's playing. A more forceful, Clifford Brown-inflected style, perhaps reinforced by the presence of former Brown bandmate Harold Land, emerged during his tenure with the group. … flashes of this new approach are apparent on the band"s earliest work, it is with Sheldon's composition "Pink Lady," released on the Carl's Blues album, that the trumpeter makes his strongest statement in the new idiom. His sinewy melody line and assertive solo are the work of a dedicated hard-bopper.

Sheldon was born in Jacksonville, Florida, on November 30, 1931. Much of his childhood was spent in Detroit, where he began playing trumpet at age twelve, as part of a local school program. He came to California in 1947, and at age sixteen he enrolled at USC. Disenchanted with the music program, he transferred to Los Angeles City College, where Jack Montrose and Lennie Niehaus were also students.

After a stint in the air force, Sheldon began working and jamming in Southern California clubs. "I got started playing on Main Street in Los Angeles in real dives and playing in little trios—piano, bass, and trumpet. We played for two, three, five bucks a night." Soon Sheldon was working with Wardell Gray and Earl Bostic and sitting in with older musicians like Shorty Rogers and Art Pepper. Sheldon talks with some reluctance about his early experiences in the Counce band: "That was a good band. I was a little intimidated, though. I was the only white guy and I was very young. I didn't think I played as good as them. I didn't have the self-esteem, but I sort of held my own. But now I think I could do much better with that band."

Sheldon's stay in the Counce band ended when he joined the Kenton orchestra. In this setting — as in his later leader dates — Sheldon's playing often returned to the cooler West Coast orientation of his earliest work. For example, an excellent March 6, 1959, date as a leader finds him contributing several thoughtful and tasty solos in the company of an impressive line-up of West Coasters—among others, Art Pepper, Chet Baker, Harold Land, Mel Lewis, and Paul Moer. …”

Bob Gordon, Jack Sheldon: The Quartet and Quintet [Pacific Jazz/Capitol CDP-93160]. [Original paragraphing modified.]

“These performances represent a crucial juncture in Jack Sheldon's career. They were the first recordings to be made under his own leadership and, not coincidentally, offer a fascinating glimpse of a jazz musician finding his own voice.

Born November 30, 1931 in Jacksonville, Florida, Sheldon displayed a bent for music early on. Taking up the trumpet at age twelve, he proved to be a quick study and was playing his first professional gigs a year later with the bands of Gene Brandt and Tiny Moore. Sheldon moved to Los Angeles in 1947 and studied at L.A. City College for two years, then joined the Air Force at age nineteen, playing with Air Force bands in Texas and California. Upon his discharge in 1952, he played a couple of months with Howard Rumsey's Lighthouse All Stars and then moved on to freelance work around the Los Angeles area.

During this period he recorded for the first time under the leadership of Jimmy Giuffre, a fellow alumnus of the Lighthouse crew. Following two Giuffre recording sessions for Capitol Records early in 1954, Jack was invited to record on his own for the Jazz West label, a subsidiary of Aladdin Records, in the summer of 1954. The eight resulting tracks were released later in the year on a ten-inch LP, the first offering of the Jazz West catalog. These performances appear here for the first time on CD.

The results of Jack's first record date are, admittedly, a bit schizophrenic. Jack is caught in the process of finding his own voice, and although the instantly recognizable style that he perfected in later years is sometimes evident, especially on the faster tunes, at times he sounds much like his potential crosstown rival, Chet Baker. This would hardly be surprising; Chet was at the time the focus of international acclaim.

Moreover, there is the obvious correspondence of instrumentation-trumpet plus rhythm-with pianist Walter Norris providing a function in Sheldon's quartet analogous to Russ Freeman's in the Chet Baker group. That is, Norris complemented Sheldon's lyrical trumpet lines with a hard, percussive attack and contributed compositions to the group's book that featured both highly original lines and unexpected chord progressions. The two remaining musicians of the quartet, bassist Ralph Pena and drummer Gene Gammage, provide solid support throughout these selections.

The second session for Jazz West was recorded about a year later, sometime in the Spring of 1955. (As was the case with many of the small independent labels of the day, there was a dearth of adequate record-keeping at the Jazz West offices.) Zoot Sims, always a welcome addition to a recording session, was happily added to the roster, which included Norris, bassist Bob Whitlock, and the fine drummer Larance Marable. (That is Marable's preferred spelling, by the way.)

By now Jack had pretty much found his own voice; the Chet Baker mannerisms are few and far between, and there is increasing evidence of Sheldon's own developing style.

The three sides cut for Pacific Jazz were the last on this CD to be recorded. These three selections have been reissued before, by the way, on Kenny Drew's Blue Note album, Talkin' & Walkin'. At this late date, it's impossible to determine why Dick Bock of Pacific Jazz initially recorded the group, then failed to follow up with enough additional sides to fill an album, although an obvious guess would be that quintet's hard-bop orientation didn't quite fit with the main focus of the Pacific Jazz catalog.

In any event, the three tunes were released singly on various Pacific Jazz anthologies. Sheldon is definitely his own man by this time, and Joe Maini's pungent alto provides a marvelous foil for the trumpeter. The rhythm section of Kenny Drew, Leroy Vinnegar, and Larance Marable is as strong as could be desired. These are very satisfying performances and it is gratifying to find them together once again.

Shortly after these selections were recorded, Sheldon joined Harold Land in the front line of the talent-laden Curtis Counce Group, one of the great working bands of the 1950s (of whatever coast). He went on to become a mainstay of the Los Angeles jazz scene, heard on many of the recordings-from small group to big band-that practically define the West Coast sound of the day.”

— ROBERT GORDON

Bob Gordon’s Jazz West Coast link.

Ted Gioia's paperback edition of West Coast Jazz: Modern Jazz in California, 1945 - 1960 link.

The following video features Jack on bassist Bob Whitlock’s Beach-wise with Zoot Sims on tenor saxophone, Walter Norris on piano and Larance Marable on drums.