One of the most frequently accessed posts in the JazzProfiles archives is our featured entitled “Tal Farlow: Jazz Guitar and Bebop.”
I’ve said it before but it bears repeating - Can you imagine picking out Art Tatum solos note-for-note on the guitar while listening to them on records? - that’s exactly what Tal Farlow did and the incredulity of this achievement only increases each time I repeat it.
And the amazing thing about Tal’s accomplishment is that it is only magnified when one considers the fact that he was a completely self-taught musician!!
Jean-Luc Katchoura has written a new book about Tal and I thought his many fans might enjoy reading the following review by John Epland.
“For fans of guitar great Tal Farlow, for anyone who loves jazz guitar, or for those who just love getting another slice of 20th-century jazz history, Jean-Luc Katchoura's Tal Farlow: A Life In Jazz Guitar (Paris Jazz Corner) is a worthwhile contribution. "Tal Farlow was the man, as far as that was concerned," says George Benson toward the book's end. "I played concerts with him, and he wiped us out. But I never felt so good getting beat up." Benson's quote is one of many pulled from Down Beat's archives that augment the telling of Farlow's story.
There are entries to A Life In Jazz Guitar from other sources, including Katchoura's conversations with Farlow, album liner notes, quotes from Guitar Player magazine, the New York Times and various foreign press. It's a soft-focus remembrance laced with dates, places, names and songs, starting with Talmage Holt Farlow's birth in Revolution, North Carolina, on June 7, 1921, and ending with Farlow's death at age 77 on July 25,1998, in New York City.
Drawn to music, early influences Charlie Christian and Art Tatum are complemented by the stronger pull of beboppers Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie and Bud Powell. Self-taught, Farlow couldn't read music, but that didn't keep him from blooming during his greatest decade of achievement, the 1950s, most famously with vibraphonist Red Norvo and bassist Charles Mingus.
Published in both English and French, Katchoura's well-researched 344-page tribute, with help from Farlow's widow Michele, puts the focus on Farlow's music. Katchoura and Farlow, incidentally, met in 1983, Katchoura working as the guitarist's agent for a European tour the following year. The two remained friends until the end.
Perhaps more striking than the story in words to this hardcover, coffee-table book is the remarkable series of photos and reproductions of album covers, advertisements and press coverage (including more than a few DownBeat covers spanning the decades). Whole pages are set aside to showcase major episodes, including Farlow's first album under his own name (his 195410-inch Blue Note eponymous release) and recording-session contact sheets. All told, there are over 400 illustrations, including 150 never-before-published photographs, that compete with the quotes and commentary. An attached CD includes Farlow playing both at home and in concert with, among others, guitarists Jimmy Raney, Gene Bertoncini and Jack Wilkins. An impressive illustrated discography, filmography and bibliography of cited media references, and extensive portraits of important collaborators Norvo, Mingus, Jimmy Lyon and Marcia Dardanelle, fill out the rest.
Historically, Katchoura appears to have covered all the bases. His discussion of the racial tensions surrounding the presence and departure of Mingus in the Norvo trio indicate an openness to what little controversy seemed to exist in Farlow's professional and personal life. According to Katchoura, in 1951, as the Norvo trio was set to perform for a CBS TV special, Mingus was flagged by the primarily white members of the New York musician's union for not having a cabaret card. Facing pressure from CBS producers and the union, Norvo decided to replace Mingus with white bassist Clyde Lombardi, which enraged Mingus. Controversy aside, that same television show's producers, excited about launching their inaugural program of color TV nationwide, insisted that Farlow's guitar be seen in bright red. Farlow deferred to Gibson instead of submitting to what was perceived as a ridiculous first-request.
Years later, as Farlow remained in "semi-retirement," as a sign painter in Sea Bright, New Jersey, the first half of the 1960s would see the guitarist's growing interest in electronics and design take hold as he worked with Gibson to develop his own "Signature" guitar, and, as the decade proceeded, other guitar innovations followed, among them a preamp and octave-divider pedal.
Farlow's late-'60s reemergence on the club and festival circuits brings the story full-circle. As before, Katchoura continues in great detail to describe Farlow's ongoing recording projects that ended up as documents to a familiar sound now newly discovered. His accounting of Farlow's last years and days is a touching send off, as friends, family and musical colleagues emerge to pay tribute to a beloved jazz icon who, no surprise, also happened to be a pretty nice guy.”
“In a sense, each solo is like a tale within a tale, a personal account with ties of varying strength to the formal composition.”
- Paul F. Berliner, Thinking in Jazz: The Infinite Art of Improvisation
The word Storytelling seems to be in common usage these days in reviews, writings and blog postings about Jazz, yet what does it really mean?
Reasoning by analogy is dotted with pitfalls, but in a narrative, written form, storytelling denotes an account of imaginary or real people and events told for entertainment with a beginning-middle-end progression.
So by analogy, storytelling in Jazz refers to an improvisation which provides the listener with a coherent expression of melodic phrases which similarly evolve through a starting point, expansion and conclusion, although in this case, the ear is the primary sense rather than the eye.
One of the accounts in the Jazz literature of how of Jazz soloists actually develop their storytelling abilities is contained in the following excerpts from Paul F. Berliner, Thinking in Jazz: The Infinite Art of Improvisation:
Taken as a whole, I’ve always considered the half dozen tracks that make up Julian “Cannonball” Adderley’s Blue Note recording Somethin’ Else [CDP 7 46338 2]to be one of the best expressions of storytelling in Jazz ever recorded. Thanks to the audio-visual efforts of Federico Zecca, you can listen to it in its entirety at the conclusion of this piece.
The recording gets its name from Miles’ reference to Cannonball as being …. Somethin’ Else … words of high praise in Jazz parlances. This 1958 LP also has the distinction of representing the last time that Miles recorded as a sideman.
To refresh you memory, the musicians on Somethin’ Else were “Cannonball Adderley”, alto sax, Miles Davis, trumpet, Hank Jones, piano, Sam Jones, bass and Art Blakey, drums.
“In part, the metaphor of storytelling suggests the dramatic molding of creations to include movement through successive events "transcending" particular repetitive, formal aspects of the composition and featuring distinct types of musical material.
For early jazz players like Louis Armstrong and Sidney Bechet, and for swing players like Lester Young, storytelling commonly involved such designs for multiple choruses as devoting an initial chorus to interpreting a piece's melody, devoting the next to expressive liberties varying it, and then returning to the melody or proceeding on to other events such as single-note riffing patterns.
For contemporary players, who may place less emphasis on the melody, the considerations of shaping remain just as essential. Typically, when it comes time for Buster Williams to solo, he "wants to tell a story, and the best way to tell a story is to set it up." If someone who is "very excited about something that just happened" comes running to Williams "saying, 'Buster, blah-blah-Mah-blah,' the first thing I'm going to say is, 'Look, wait a minute. Calm down and start from the beginning.'" Williams's plan is the same for solo work. "Start from the beginning," he advises. "It's also like playing a game of chess. There's the beginning game, the middle game, and then there's the end game. Miles is a champion at doing that. So is Trane. To accomplish this, the use of space is very important—sparseness and simplicity—maybe playing just short, meaningful phrases at first and building up the solo from there."
Similarly, [pianist] Kenny Barron tries "to start the solo in a way that's sparse or low key" so that he has "somewhere to go, so that the solo can build." From listening to Dizzy Gillespie when he performed in Gillespie's band, Barron earned how to "save" himself in his playing. "You don't have to play everything you know every minute," Barron says.
You can leave some spaces in the music. You're not going to start off a solo double-timing. You start off just playing very simply and, as much as possible, with lyrical ideas. And as the intensity builds, if it does, your ideas can become a little more complicated. They can become longer. The way I look at it is that you're going to start down so that you have somewhere to go. It can build to different points in different parts of the solo. It's hills and valleys. That's what it is anywhere. There are certain sections of the tune which build harmonically and suggest that the intensity should also build at that particular point. That's a very natural thing to happen, and what you play will always build there. Other times, it's a matter of wherever it occurs, wherever you feel it coming. It could happen in different spots within the tune at different times.
A related feature of storytelling involves matters of continuity and cohesion. Paul Wertico advises his students that in initiating a solo they should think in terms of developing specific "characters and a plot. . . . You introduce these little different [musical] things that can be brought back out later on; and the way you put them together makes a little story. That can be [on the scale of] a sentence or a paragraph.. . . The real great cats can write novels." Wertico expresses admiration for the intellectual prowess of these players. Throughout a performance, they creatively juxtapose ideas that they introduced in their initial "character line," and at just "the right time" in their story, they can "pull out" and develop ideas that they "only hinted at" earlier in the performance but have borne in mind all along. "That's what's really fantastic about a solo," Wertico maintains.
To develop the skills of expert storytellers, artists find it essential to devote some practice time to improvising under conditions that simulate formal music events, thereby imposing maximum constraints upon performances. Negotiating a composition's structure as "one cohesive string," with each chord leading to the next in strict rhythm, they formulate complete solos, pausing but momentarily to reflect on their inventions. "To learn to play a song better," Art Farmer would "work on its chords, chorus after chorus, trying to play whatever came to mind. Even if it didn't come out right, I'd keep playing," he says. "At certain times, it's not good to stop."
Musicians commit themselves to the rigors of developing the ideas that occur to them at the moment, cultivating powers of concentration upon which larger-scale invention depends. "After a lot of practice, you find that the phrases just begin to fall in the right place," Harold Ousley recalls. "You are able to play a whole chorus of phrases together, and you are ready for the next chorus. The more you do it, the smoother and the easier it gets. When you begin to feel proficient at this, you feel a certain sense of freedom, and you get the inspiration to really get into your horn and to try out different things. There's a great excitement about that."
As Ousley's remarks imply, the improviser's world of imagination considers more than musical abstractions. Emotion serves as a partner to intellect in the conception and expansion of ideas. Beyond emotional responses to their evolving creations, artists speak generally of "tapping an emotional reservoir," whose "energy" represents a distillation of their experiences with life (Emily Remler). Roberta Baum considers emotion to be "the biggest part of singing. It has become an extension of how it is to be alive," she says. In this sense, performances can reflect the individual's characteristic scope of expression, including extreme fluctuations of feeling.
As alluded to earlier, artists can also draw upon the extramusical associations of the compositions that serve as vehicles. They sometimes set up for performances by dwelling momentarily on a piece's moods and meanings, recalling, perhaps, the sense of personal identification with the theme of a standard piece that prompted its incorporation into their repertory, or envisioning the characters and incidents depicted in their own original compositions. At times, Dexter Gordon actually sang a few lines of a ballad's lyrics to invoke its meaning, before switching to saxophone improvisations.26 With song texts, or in their absence, the emotional sentiment and the imagery suggested by titles and musical features also offer direction.
Overall, a piece's precise mood has a powerful tempering effect on improvisers, guiding their personal feelings to blend with those appropriate for the performance. For Arthur Rhames, " 'God Bless the Child' [evokes] one set of moods about the remorse of not being on your own or having to depend on others, while a tune like 'Giant Steps' may be about advancing yourself"; each provides "different perspectives, different feelings, different moods. And those moods govern a lot of what's going to come out in your interpretation of the chord changes in your improvising." Chuck Israels also routinely takes the mood of the piece into account when he prepares to solo. Over the course of an evening, "I'll play a tune like 'The Preacher' that has a certain gospel flavor; then a tune like Bill Evans's 'Peri's Scope,' which is an outgoing, dancing, lighthearted tune. [Next, I will] play something melancholy, like 'Nardis.'"
There is a constant spending and replenishment of a player's emotional reserves. Israels performs "tunes that have different emotional states" in order to give himself "different things to think about, different things to feel and to play" when he improvises. Each tune has "its own feelings, its own shapes and patterns that occupy me when I play it," he explains. "You just jump from one emotional mood to another because the moods change with each piece." Sometimes, Emily Remler says, "when I play a ballad like 'I'm in a Sentimental Mood,' I feel almost sick to my stomach because it is so heartrending and takes so much from me." A piece's emotional associations commonly influence an artist's rhythmic approach or selection of tonal materials, in the latter instance suggesting, perhaps, an emphasis upon blues-inflected melodies rather than brighter, un-inflected melodies or upon tense rather than relaxed harmonies.
Throughout the piece, artists may prepare themselves to respond to each of its varied nuances, beyond its most general tenor. Emily Remler, looking forward to "a gig tonight," knows "that there are sections where I'll feel a lot of different emotions. The [composition] breaks into a real happy part, and it makes me feel really happy. Then there are other parts where I'll just feel determined." In some instances, the elements of a piece combine to reinforce a particular emotional shape overall, suggesting that improvisers structure their own creations accordingly. In a blues, an artist may build toward peaks of intensity at the same point as the harmony and poetic text reach a dramatic climax.
Various aspects of the meanings of compositions are also tied to their performance histories, especially the ways in which earlier improvisers have handled their original compositions (Barry Harris). When Jimmy Robinson prepares to solo, he "thinks about the things that have been done on the tune in the past" and what he would "like to do on it." Of course, he says, if he has "never heard the tune before" or is performing his own pieces, he "just strikes out" on his own. If it is a recent piece by someone like Dizzy Gillespie, however, he wants "to know what Dizzy did on it just to give me an idea to start with, so I won't be too far off with it." Robinson's intention is to be respectful to "the idea" of the composer. "That also shows that I've been influenced by Dizzy," he says, "since he did some very intricate things on it that I wish I had come up with [he laughs]. You try to play in relationship to that to learn what he's doing, and then you try to build and improve on it."
Renowned artists have sometimes improvised so effectively within the framework of other composers' works, bringing fresh interpretations to them, that they leave an indelible mark upon the works' performance traditions and on those of pieces with comparable styles. Walter Bishop Jr. learned the general principles for formulating solos within modal compositions by analyzing Miles Davis's solos.
Another trumpeter admitted that after "Miles's playing on 'Sketches of Spain,' it is impossible to improvise on any Spanish-type piece without using some of Miles's inflections." A composition "like 'Nardis' also has a lot of connotation because Bill Evans played it so much," Fred Hersch observes. Along similar lines, even if Roberta Baum "were to give my own interpretation of a song by Cole Porter, there is no way that I could forget how Ella Fitzgerald had phrased something." A commemorative piece lends itself particularly to an interpretation imbued with the stylistic traits of the honored namesake. In rendering the ballad "I Remember Clifford," Lee Morgan integrates his own personal blues-oriented commentaries into the ballad's theme, at times adopting Clifford Brown's wide, singing vibrato, unique articulation devices, and characteristic embellishments. Sometimes, it is in the very act of improvising that players discover and pursue the deep connections that compositions and the individual styles of soloists reveal to them.
For improvisers, the meaning of a piece incorporates layers of nuance derived from intimacy with its imagery, its rhythmic and tonal associations, its performance history, and its relatives within the wider repertory of pieces. Among the myriad resources that soloists filter through their imaginations, one of the most striking is the vibrancy of the human connections that inhabit the piece—myriad inflections, personalities, voices, fingerings, and stances, coursing through the mind and into the musical performance. Such varied imagery informs and deepens every story in the telling. In a sense, each solo is like a tale within a tale, a personal account with ties of varying strength to the formal composition.
While absorbing the conventions associated with idea formulation and storytelling in the jazz tradition, artists place different emphases upon the conventions. They apply them uniquely according to each individual's temperament, personal style of jazz oratory, emotional response to compositions, and specific goals for the solo under formulation. As expected, the differing emphases result in correspondingly varied transformations of jazz vocabulary and in different formal characteristics among the solos produced by improvisation .
Underlying their efforts to achieve such diversity of expression is rigorous practice on the part of jazz learners, as they develop flexibility in the use of initially limited stores of vocabulary, devise a systematic way of relating vocabulary patterns one to another, and absorb the aesthetic principles that guide vocabulary usage.
Students with such comprehensive training are in a far better position as improvisers than are those among their counterparts who may have acquired a large store of vocabulary patterns, chords, scales, and the like, but yet fail to appreciate these other critical aspects of jazz knowledge. Ultimately, learning the tools and techniques of the art provides only the ground for the student's development.
To build the foundation, aspiring musicians must commit endless hours to practicing improvisation—mentally simulating the conditions of live performance events—if they are to acquire the cumulative experience upon which effective storytelling rests. Among the challenges practicers confront in their earliest efforts are improvisation's capricious aspects, which can operate as powerful forces to influence a work's musical outcome.”
“Speaking as a composer, it’s a great thrill to listen to another artist or group of artists interpret your compositions. Every artist will give them a new and different concept.
I am especially thrilled that The Mastersounds have chosen to do an album of my compositions because I have long admired the group.
I’ve listened to them at Birdland and at The Newport Jazz Festival, and they are a well-rehearsed, well arranged (but not overly arranged), swingin’, blowin’ group.
I’m sure that everyone who hears this album will be pleased with the interpretations given my compositions as I am, and equally pleased by the solos.”
- Horace Silver
I’ve always consider the sound of vibes or, more properly, the vibraphone, to be the ultimate sonic expression of “Cool.”
Mallets on metal with the struck sound oscillating through inverted organ-like tubes has always been my ideal of the Jazz textural equivalent of Cool.
Interestingly, Cal Tjader, Victor Feldman and Larry Bunker, three drummers that had a tremendous influence on my perceptions of modern Jazz, all made the switch to vibes early in their careers.
And although I studied drums with Victor and Larry, I never took up vibes, per se, but I did pick up the ability to play some mallets in concert orchestra settings when such gigs came my way.
In my opinion, Cal, Victor and Larry were extremely underrated as vibraphonists and each played the instrument using a very “Cool” style [see Ted Gioia’s description below for a definition]. I mean, Victor even wrote a tune that he entitled Too Cool [a 12 bar blues that appears on his Contemporary CD, The Arrival of Victor Feldman]. How cool is that!
For a drummer, the vibraphone can be an easy instrument to mess with, but a “dangerous” one, too.
As Ted Gioia explains:
“The vibraphone invites overplaying almost by its very nature. … Unlike a horn player, the vibraphonist is unable to sustain notes for very long, even with the help of vibrato and pedal. The vibes invite overplaying to compensate for such limitations. Added to these difficulties is the fact that … [they are played with] a hitting motion powered by the wrists. With the mastery of a steady drum roll, the aspiring vibraphonist is already capable of flinging out a flurry of notes and, given the repetitive motions used to build up drum technique, the vibes player is tempted to lock into a ‘steady stream’… [of notes]. [West Coast Jazz: Modern Jazz in California, 1945-1960, p.103].
Ted goes on to offer this description of Cal’s playing which I think could also be applied to Victor and Larry and may also explain what I heard in the instrument that made it sound so “Cool” to my ears.
“Tjader’s playing, however, was nothing like this. Although he was a drummer and percussionist by background, he seemed to draw on the instincts of a horn player in shaping his improvised lines. They did breathe. ..."
Cal always maintained that his two main influences on vibes were Lionel Hampton and Milt [“Bags’] Jackson. “Hamp” was a banger and “Bags” was a bopper and a blues player without equal. How in the world did Cal fuse such dissimilar styles?
“These disparate strains in his playing came out most clearly in his Jazz work. Where Tjader melded them into a melodic, often introspective style that was very much his own. Even when playing more high-energy Latin numbers Tjader kept a low-key demeanor, building off the intensity of the rhythm section rather than trying to supplant it. For the most part, he came across as an introvert on an instrument meant for extroverts.” [Ibid, pp.103-104].
Although he came to the vibes from the piano and not the drum chair, one of my all-time favorite vibraphonist was Buddy Montgomery who also impressed me as a Cool player because he, too, relied on a “ … melodic, often introspective style [with a] ... low-key demeanor, building off the intensity of the rhythm section.”
Victor Feldman and Cal Tjader basically never returned to the drum chair in the later years of their career and Buddy Montgomery rarely ever played vibes again after doing so for about three years with The Mastersounds.
The Mastersounds were only in existence for about three years - 1957-1960 - but I thought they had a Cool sound built around Buddy’s vibes so I collected all of their records on Pacific Jazz and Fantasy and heard them as often as I could in clubs and concerts.
During their brief existence, The Mastersounds were particularly welcomed at The Jazz Workshop in San Francisco which was located on Broadway between Columbus and Montgomery and was within walking distance of Sugar Hill, Basin Street West, El Matador and the El Cid, a club that I worked.
In celebration of their warm reception as artists-in-residence at their beloved North Beach San Francisco bistro, The Jazz Workshop, at the end of 1958, World Pacific released The Mastersounds Play Compositions of Horace Silver at the Jazz Workshop [WP-1282].
I don’t know about you, but I think there is a certain irony in a group that features the Cool sound of vibes playing the hot, hard bop compositions of Horace Silver, but we'll save that anomaly for another time.
With their unique interpretations of Horace’s Ecaroh, Enchantment, Nica’s Dream, Doodlin’, [the-all-too-rarely-heard] Moonrays and Buhania, as Richard Bock points out in his liner notes:
“The music of Horace Silver provides a perfect vehicle for the Mastersounds to project their very earthy concept yet sophisticated jazz conception. The group has never been recorded in better form. …
The Mastersounds have reached a jazz maturity that has developed from over three years of playing together. This collection of the music of Horace Silver, one of Jazz’s greatest new composer-arrangers, represents a high point in the Mastersounds’ career.”
With the cool sound of Buddy Montgomery’s vibes complemented by Richie Crabtree on piano [Richie’s playing reminds me of that of Russ Freeman’s], Monk Montgomery on Fender electric bass and Benny Barth on drums [a dynamic drummer who has obviously listened closely to Art Blakey], The Mastersounds Play Compositions of Horace Silver at the Jazz Workshop [WP-1282] has always been among my favorite albums.
Over the years using various themes for video montages and uploading these to YouTube with each of the six tracks on the original album, I have managed to replicate the entire LP in an audio-video format.
I thought it might be fun to feature the cool sound of Buddy’s vibes with the wonderful musicianship of Richie, Monk and Benny on these pages as a tribute to The Mastersounds:
The videos are posted in the original track order of the LP:
"I'm basically an evangelist," Vic Hall told The Tampa Tribune in 1993.
"I'm trying to spread the word about jazz, but it's in a gentle way."
Hall was host of the National Public Radio station's "Sound of Jazz,"
an eclectic show that first aired in 1968. Each week, Hall queued up
the big bands, giants of bebop and West Coast school, always tapping
into his enormous collection of 78s, LPs, open reel tapes and CDs. His
final show aired in 2005.
"And he was a volunteer the entire time," said Bob Seymour, jazz
director at the station, who lived next door to Hall in Seminole
Heights. "Vic always used to say that jazz was the one abiding passion
through his life, and he shared that love with such a commitment and
for so long."
The title of this piece comes from a compilation of Tubby’s recordings by the International Association of Jazz Record Collectors [IAJRC] which was issued as a CD in 2005 [IAJRC CD-1019] along with insert notes written by Vic Hall.
Sadly, both the IAJRC and Vic Hall are no longer with us.
Like Tubby, Vic was an Englishman. Both Tubby and Vic visited the USA from time-to-time, but unlike Tubby who died in London in 1973, Vic took up permanent residence in south Florida in 1968 and was for many years the co-host with Susan Giles Wantuck of “The Sound of Jazz,” an NPR radio program which aired on WUSF, 89.7 FM. Born in England in 1925, Hall bought his first jazz record when he was 13 [1938; the year that Tubby Hayes was born.]
Vic passed away on November 20, 2006 and one of his last achievements was in helping the IAJRC produce - Tubby Hayes: "England's Late Jazz Great" [IAJRC CD-1019] - which was to serve as his loving tribute to Tubby whom Vic considered to be “England’s greatest Jazz musician.”
There are 42 recordings by Tubby Hayes in my collection and I would venture to say that more than half of these arrived over the years as gifts from Vic with little Post-It-Notes attached to their jewel cases on which Vic had scribbled - “You gotta check this out,” or “Boy, are you in for a treat,” or “I think this one will blow you away.”
In an ongoing conversation with Vic, I always maintained that vibraphonist/pianist Victor Feldman was the best Jazz musician England ever produced and away the argument would go.
I think that Vic Hall and I were old enough to know better about labeling or ranking musicians, but it was fun to argue the point mainly because Vic was so passionate about it.
Before Victor Feldman emigrated to the USA in the fall of 1956, he worked and recorded often with Tubby and they continued playing together when Victor returned to London or Tubby came to The States to play at Shelly’s Manne Hole in Hollywood in the 1960s.
Victor Feldman and Tubby Hayes had the highest regard for one another’s abilities and I always thought the world of Vic Hall as a patient mentor and a generous friend.
I wanted to remember Vic on these pages with the following excerpts from his insert notes to Tubby Hayes: "England's Late Jazz Great" [IAJRC CD-1019] after which you’ll find a video tribute to Tubby featuring none other than Victor Feldman on piano.
“The man whose music is contained on this compact disc may, arguably, be the best, all around jazz talent that Britain ever produced, Had his lifestyle been as pure as his musical convictions, he might still be with us today, instead dead at age 38, in 1973, another victim of the tragically misguided belief that drugs enhance the creative process, During his all too brief lifetime, however, Edward Brian "Tubby" Hayes produced some of the most brilliant and exciting jazz music ever spawned by the British modern jazz scene,
Tubbs, as he was also called, was, undeniably, a virtuoso on the tenor, saxophone, and more than merely competent on flute and vibes, These instrumental talents, together with his composing and arranging skills portray the complete modern jazz artist, a man who was able to create and perform memorable music within the framework of both the small group and big, with equal facility.
Born in London, England on January 30, 1935, Tubby started out on violin at the age of 8, switching to tenor sax four years later. At the age of 15 he became a professional musician, ultimately playing with the bands of Kenny Baker, Vic Lewis, Ambrose and Jack Parnell,
The first recording sessions under his own name were produced in 1955 and 1956 for Tony Hall's Tempo label, in octet, quintet and quartet formats, Most of these rarities have now been compiled by noted British jazz writer Brian Davis, then released on compact disc on the British Jasmine label. Also some of the Fontana sessions were re-released on LP on the Mole jazz label. The year 1957 saw the formation of the Jazz Couriers which was co-led by Tubby and Ronnie Scott, two men who shared the same musical concept, and who developed a remarkable musical affinity during the period the group was in existence. The group, a quintet consisting of two tenors plus rhythm, toured and recorded for a little over two years, finally disbanding in August 1959,
For the next couple of years, Tubbs led his own quartet with Terry Shannon on piano, Jeff Clyne bass and Phil Seamen drums, later to be replaced with Bill Eydon. In 1961, Tubby was selected to be temporarily traded for Zoot Sims In an unusual transAtlantic exchange, an arrangement that created a breakthrough against the British musicians union's staunch resistance to the booking of American jazz musicians to work in England. American jazz fans and musicians alike were simply knocked out by" the playing of this chubby 26-year-old, who tore around on the tenor like Charlie Parker did on alto, Understandable when you consider that. Tubbs cited Bird as his primary influence, Hayes made three return visits to the U,S, during the early sixties, recording with the likes of James Moody, Roland Kirk, Clark Terry and Eddie Costa, among others. These sessions were released on the Epic and Smash labels in the U.S. and one of them on Montana m England, Some of the
material was re-released on CBS and Columbia,
During this period several other important musician influences came into Tubby’s life. Victor Feldman, who ultimately emigrated to the States, encouraged him to take up the vibes and to study theory, harmony and composition. Jimmy Deuchar, a highly underrated Scottish trumpet player, who rivaled Hayes in technique and intensity of expression, was, according to Tubby, a profound stimulus on Hayes' playing during the period in which he was the other horn in a quintet that was together for about two and a half years and which disbanded in 1964. Hayes credited Deuchar and Harry South, who played piano in Tubby's early quartet, and was an accomplished composer and arranger, for the guidance and help they gave him in his studies of jazz composition and orchestration,
In 1961, Tubby decided that the time had come to test his burgeoning skills as a jazz writer/composer so he formed his big band, his stature in English jas circles enabling him to bring together the very best musicians available, During the period 1961 through 1966 big bands under Hayes' leadership recorded several sessions for the Fontana label, featuring a number of Hubby's original compositions and arrangements.
In addition to recording sessions and live appearances, Hayes was also featured in a number of radio broadcasts and television programs, as leader of both small groups and big bands, and as a sideman with other leaders.
No attempt has been made to comment on the music contained herein, as it speaks far more eloquently for itse!f. Tubby is heard on tenor saxophone flute and vibes on the various tracks, anti thanks to Jack Towers' wizardry, some recordings of highly questionable quality have been made listenable. Further re-mastering by Gary Baldassari has created the optimum sound on this compact disc.
Recording dates, personnel and composer/arranger credits for the original recordings have been annotated where known, Educated guesses have been ventured for the undocumented material,
If these recordings represent your first encounter with the playing of this British musician, you may be struck with the similarity in style and phrasing between that of Tubby Hayes and American tenor man johnny Griffin. They shared other similarities, as both were short in physical stature, and both were referred to as "The Little Giant", Griffin was known as the fastest horn in the East and this appellation could well have been applied to Hayes also, it would have been a High Noon shoot-out had these two diminutive giants faced off across a stage, horns a-blazin’. Unfortunately we will never know what the outcome of such a confrontation would have been, even though johnny Griffin is still alive, and playing as well as ever, we only have recordings such as are preserved on this disc, to remind us of the remarkable creative force in British jazz, that was Edward Brian “Tubby” Hayes.”
