"It was difficult for the public, and impossible for the musical establishment, to take "seriously" a music played by a black subculture and white dropout rebels in dives and dance halls; whose leaders were hailed as "Satchmo'," "Prez," and "Bird"; whose recorded masterpieces bore such frivolous names as Potato Head Blues, Taxi War Dance, and Shaw 'Nuff. How could anyone be serious about a music bursting with such wild humor, parody, and lewd shrieks? A music wedded to sexy dancing and profane lyrics? A music that sent players and listeners alike into states of holy-roller ecstasy? How could you be "serious" and have such a screaming good time?"
- Grover Sales, Jazz author, educator and publicist
By way of background, the following appeared in www.jazzhouse.org as an obituary following Grover Sales’ death in 2004. You can locate the complete text for Jazz Is "Serious" Music in Jazz: America’s Classical Music [New York: Prentice Hall, 1984; New York: Da Capo Paperback Edition, 1992]. Grover is filling-in while the editorial staff at JazzProfiles develops its reviews of three, new books on the subject of Jazz.
“Strongly opinionated and superbly literate, longtime Bay Area resident Grover Sales was the kind of jazz critic who left no doubt about where he stood on issues ranging from the genius of Lenny Bruce to the paucity of gay jazz musicians.
During a career that spanned 50 years Sales [1919-2004] wrote about jazz, film and cultural politics and published widely in the San Francisco Chronicle, San Francisco Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, the Tiburon Ark and Gene Lees' Jazzletter. He wrote three books: Jazz: America's Classical Music, a biography of John Maher and, with his wife Georgia, The Clay-Pot Cookbook, which sold more than 800,000 copies.
Sales was also publicist for the Monterey Jazz Festival from its birth in 1958 until 1965, and for the hungry i nightclub. He also did freelance publicity work for artists such as Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Judy Garland and Dick Gregory, and wrote liner notes for several Fantasy recordings.
Over the years, he taught jazz history courses at Stanford University, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, San Francisco State University and the JazzSchool.
Sales became a jazz fan at 16, after hearing a broadcast of Benny Goodman's band with drummer Gene Krupa, and later became what he called "an inveterate Ellington groupie" after hearing a recording of "Black And Tan Fantasy".
After serving in the Army Air Corps in Southeast Asia during World War II, Sales studied at Reed College in Portland, Oregon, and then settled in the Bay Area, where he received a BA in history from the University of California at Berkeley.
In addition to his wife, Sales is survived by a daughter and two stepsons.”
Jazz Is "Serious" Music
From its earliest times, "respectable" people, regardless of color, scorned jazz as low-class trash not to be mentioned in the same breath with "serious" music. This condescending posture still crops up in record catalogues, critical essays, and news columns that erect a mythical fence separating jazz from "serious" composition.
Even jazz enthusiast Leonard Bernstein fell into this trap in 1947 when he wrote, "Serious music in America would today have a different complexion and direction were it not for the profound influence upon it of jazz." (Esquire.) This inference that jazz is not "serious" might have amused John Coltrane, who spent his days practicing and his nights on the bandstand. "No one,"said Ellington, "is as serious about his music as a serious jazz musician." When a student asked Dizzy Gillespie during a band break if he ever played any "serious" music, the puckish trumpeter grew serious indeed: "Just what do you think we're doin' up here—foolin' around?" Bassist Ray Brown told the Chevron School Broadcast: "One of the great fallacies of all time is that the classical players felt the jazzman, if he were good, just rolled out of bed one morning and was able to do everything on his instrument. But if you want to play a two-octave D scale [he demonstrates] you have to study, practice, you don't luck up on it, and you spend the same amount of time a guy would who plays in a symphony orchestra."
It was difficult for the public, and impossible for the musical establishment, to take "seriously" a music played by a black subculture and white dropout rebels in dives and dance halls; whose leaders were hailed as "Satchmo'," "Prez," and "Bird"; whose recorded masterpieces bore such frivolous names as Potato Head Blues, Taxi War Dance, and Shaw 'Nuff. How could anyone be serious about a music bursting with such wild humor, parody, and lewd shrieks? A music wedded to sexy dancing and profane lyrics? A music that sent players and listeners alike into states of holy-roller ecstasy? How could you be "serious" and have such a screaming good time?
Another little-known aspect of jazz that renders its lack of seriousness all the more absurd is that jazz players have pushed the technical frontiers of many instruments far beyond classical boundaries, doing things on the string bass, drums, brass, and reeds that symphony players said couldn't—or shouldn't—be done. Left to their own devices with no music school to interfere, they experimented and, like most American inventors, became pragmatists: "If you plug it into the wall and it lights up, then it works." When Charlie Mingus found that classical string bassists rarely used the third finger of the left hand, "I started using the third finger all the time."
This break-the-rules attitude does much to explain why jazz players often develop techniques that astonish symphony musicians. When I introduced a concert pianist to Art Tatum on records, his first reaction was, "All right — who are those guys?" On hearing a fast Charlie Parker solo, a symphony clarinetist insisted I was spinning a 33 rpm disc at 45 rpm. Classical musicians marvel at Niels-Henning Orsted Pedersen who strums the double bass like some giant guitar. The Trombone Concerto Rimsky-Korsakov wrote as an endurance contest is something J.J.Johnson and the late Kai Winding could play in their sleep. This determination to play what the Academy considered unplayable is one reason why jazz blossomed with such richness and variety within an amazingly short time. But there were other catalysts of jazz's sudden growth that made it, in the words or composer Virgil Thomson, "the most astounding spontaneous musical event to take place anywhere since the Reformation." … to be continued
Recently, we reviewed on these pages new CD’s from New York based big bands led by John Fedchock, Hector Martignon and Dick Oatts/Mats Holmquist.
Now comes word that the Left Coast Big Band scene is also rising as L.A.’s top players joining saxophonist Bob Mintzer and drummer Peter Erskine on their new CD All L.A. Big Band which is set for release in August, 2016 on Fuzzy Music [PEPCD 022].
The CD will be accompanied by a new app which can be downloaded from Fuzzy Music mobile which allows musicians and students to play along, record and mix their own versions of the music on All L.A. Big Band [read more about the app’s features below].
If you are a fan of big band Jazz, you won’t want to miss this one.
Here’s the press release that Jim Eigo of JazzPromo Services sent along in advance of the CD’s release.
“The extraordinary saxophonist/composer Bob Mintzer and master drummer Peter Erskine go back nearly 50 years since their high school days in a big band at the renowned Interlochen Arts Academy. Afterwards, when Bob was in Buddy Rich's big band and Peter worked with Stan Kenton and Maynard Ferguson, their paths crossed often.
But in the 1980s in New York City, their big band collaborating took full root, resulting in numerous projects over the years. Now both of them are in Los Angeles and the outstanding new album Bob Mintzer - All L.A. Band on Fuzzy Music is the latest gem to blossom from this fruitful relationship.
Joined by some of the finest musicians on the L.A. scene for ten marvelous tracks, they have added another component that is both ambitious and ingenious to the mix. Through Fuzzy Music Mobile, they have developed a new app that brings the stimulating big band experience directly to students and musicians, allowing them to play along, record and mix their own versions of this inspired music. Where most play-along products allow the user to music-minus two or three tracks, this new app allows the user to minus (or solo) virtually any of the instruments involved in the recording. Each part can be printed directly from the app, and resultant play-along recordings can be mailed to teachers, colleagues and friends.
But the primary treasure is in the music itself, whether participating through the app or simply enjoying the remarkable music contained in this album. Bob and Peter are joined by 15 splendid musicians - a trumpet section of Wayne Bergeron, James Blackwell, John Thomas, Chad Willis and Michael Stever; Bob McChesney, Erik Hughes, Julianne Gralle and Craig Gosnell on trombones; Bob Sheppard on alto and Adam Schroeder on baritone join Bob in the reed section; pianist (and Bob's fellow Yellowjackets colleague) Russ Ferrante; guitarist Larry Koonse; Edwin Livingston on bass and Aaron Serfaty on percussion. In addition to playing drums, Peter also supervised the project and produced the recording.
The collaborative relationship between Mintzer and Erskine is the central nervous system upon which this entire journey is constructed. Bob's exceptional tenor is the primary storyteller in the plot and theme provided by his brilliant compositions and arrangements. His writing is highly imaginative and wonderfully textured with layer upon layer of sonic brushstrokes painted on the canvas. Call and response, thrust and parry, multi-leveled conversation and bold counterpoint create harmonic and rhythmic structure and tension that challenge in contemporary fashion while remaining thoroughly musical in the finest traditions of the big band legacy from Basie and Ellington to Charles Mingus and George Russell.
Bob's experience with Buddy Rich clearly instilled a sense of the drums providing the big band's engine. Peter's impeccable rhythmic sense and consummate artistry provide the mortar that fortifies the structure, while also stirring the kettle to properly cook all the ingredients in the brew - whether driving powerfully, enhancing subtly, rocking or stomping as demanded by the music.
While there is solo space for a number of the musicians, Bob's virtuosic tenor is the key ingredient - muscular, passionate, adventurous, lyrical and urgent - dancing and interweaving in perfect synch within the rich textures of the horn parts that are constantly in motion creating a vibrant and exhilarating atmosphere for every tale told on this album.
Afro-Cuban influences have been a major part of orchestral jazz since the 1940s when Machito and Mario Bauza poured the foundation and Dizzy Gillespie and George Russell built upon it. There are three pieces rooted in that style here, crossing it with sheer swing in a manner that evokes the spirit of another West Coast legend, Gerald Wilson.
The album's opener El Caborojeno features percussive, layered horn lines in rich syncopation. Spirited horn riffs cushion a lyrical Cuban/hard-bop trumpet solo by Stever and punchy, deeply grooved simmer-to-boil blowing from Mintzer.
Ellis Island is a 6/8 excursion built on vividly intricate interplay between brass and reeds, with a fluid baritone solo by Schroeder caressed by swirling horns and buoyed by darkly luminous low brass.
A blending with R&B and a touch of calypso is at play on Latin Dance and features Bob's tenor in a hollerin' conversation with trombones, McChesney's trombone solo driven by counterpointing horns and flared with a trumpet fanfare, and a vigorous drum solo rooted by deliciously suspended horn lines.
A different Caribbean island adds a spice in the reggae-tinged Original People with a gentle groove that blends easy swing with the inside-out reggae rhythmic approach, providing a relaxed setting for smoothly lyrical tenor and trumpet solos.
At the other end of the thermometer, Runferyerlife is a rip-roaring be-boppish romp with Bob's tenor roaring through, around in, out and under the horn lines into a scorching solo. McChesney's blistering trombone solo follows and a robust drum solo pitted against the horns closes it out.
Mintzer has been a member of The Yellowjackets for over 20 years, so it makes sense that soulful R&B would be the flavor for three items neatly blended with the swing feel. New Rochelle (originally written for that group) opens with baroque-ish brass before easing into its R&B groove, providing the setting for Bob's soulful sojourn in the territory so often staked by Hank Mobley and Stanley Turrentine.
Slo Funk written by Bob for the Buddy Rich band swings mightily over a half-time funk bottom with Bob Sheppard taking a barking alto solo so funkily rooted in Maceo Parker territory that one might expect to hear Fred Wesley chime in beside him. That marriage of pure swing and R&B is most appropriate on Home Basie, which could be a portrayal of the Count meeting the pre-funk big band James Brown and the Famous Flames. Punctuated by syncopated horns, Mintzer's solo pays homage to King Curtis and Junior Walker.
A more traditional Basie influence is at hand for two pieces. Havin' Some Fun was composed in the classic Count Basie style - from that smoothly dulcet Neal Hefti Li'l Darlin' angle of perspective. Bob's tenor does a captivating dance with the horns, and Schroeder offers a lyrically virile baritone solo.
The album's extended closing track Tribute was conceived to honor the many immortals who came out of the Basie band - most specifically, the legendary Thad Jones, who made his own mark on the big band legacy holding his own court along with Mel Lewis in their co-led orchestra at NYC's landmark Village Vanguard from the mid-sixties through the seventies. An excursion in blue swing, launched by Ferrante with that profound Basie blues simplicity, it features a deeply soulful Mintzer and Steven's very Thad-ish homage - providing a perfect ending to this truly wonderful album. Special note must be made regarding the peerless lead trumpet playing throughout by the legendary Wayne Bergeron.
To sum it all up in Bob's words: "It was a total joy to record this music with my long time colleague Peter Erskine, and my new family of musicians in Los Angeles. Special thanks to Talley Sherwood for his expert engineering."
Not too long after its inception in New Orleans during the WWI years and its incubation in Chicago in the mid-1920s, Jazz moved to New York City which, as implied in the above lyrics by Jon Hendricks, has become the music’s proving ground ever since.
If musicians want to make it big in the Jazz World, sooner or later they have to test their luck in New York City.
The ease of moving around the city via its public transportation system, the close proximity of people and venues made possible by the restricted island geography, the cultural proclivity of many of its denizens toward The Arts which is underscored by its status as the financial capital of the United States made New York City the premier “place-to-be” for the aspiring Jazz artist.
With lots of people, plenty of places to play and a ton of money to be spent on entertainment, what’s not to like about being in New York if you are a Jazz musician looking to make a name for yourself?
And yet, following World War II, plenty of first-rate Jazz musicians eschewed New York City and came to the Los Angeles area where the backyard living made possible by the sunny and healthy southern California weather, a geographic dispersement into affordable family homes facilitated by the automobile and the stunning growth of freeways and the development of the entertainment, aircraft and assorted service industries provided a financial base for the explosive growth of the area from 1945-1965.
During this period, southern California wasn’t the mess that it is today. In 1960, the entire state of California had a population of 15 million as compared with today’s 38 million. The 3.7 million folks living in LA was about half the size of the population of NYC, but they were spread over an area of 4,084 square miles compared to NYC’s 304.8 square miles.
In the post WWII years, Southern California’s movie and television studios and its radio stations provided lots of commercial work for musicians who could read music as well as improvise Jazz. There were excellent symphony orchestras, concert venues and numerous hotel lounges that featured excellent show bands. And LA had twice as many Jazz clubs as Manhattan, although it’s true that many of them were not as well known as those in NYC.
Is it not surprising then that a number of excellent Jazz musicians shunned New York City and preferred to remain in southern California?
Many of the musicians who settled in Los Angeles during the post WWII period were transplants from the East Coast and the Midwest who came to California as members of touring big bands and vocal groups and discovered in southern California’s sun-drenched climate that, among other things, winter was optional.
One such Midwestern transplant from Durand, MI was keyboardist, composer and arranger, Clare Fischer who arrived in Los Angeles as the Musical Director for the vocal group The Hi-Lo’s in 1957.
Soon after his arrival, Clare established his own trio and began a recording career with Dick Bock’s Pacific Jazz label.
The distinguished Jazz author Leonard feather picks up the story from there with this article about Clare’s earliest recordings for that label.
In the summer of 1962, reviewing Clare Fischer's First Time Out (Pacific Jazz PJ 52) for Down Beat and assessing it as a five-star surprise of the year, I commented that "Fischer has had enough trouble establishing himself as a major jazz composer-arranger, through a series of bad breaks (the non-release of his Donald Byrd LP, the failure to credit him on Dizzy Gillespie's Duke Ellington portrait album); but hardly anyone knew that he is also an extraordinary jazz pianist." [Leonard’s review follows this piece]
Some of the reasons for the delay in recognizing Fischer were made clear by biographical details as sketched by John William Hardy in the liner notes for the album in question. Because of his extensive schooling, interrupted for two years by his Army service and then resumed until he obtained his master's degree, it was not until 1957 that Fischer came to Los Angeles and began to be noticed by big-league professional contemporaries.
But the next few years were spent largely on tour with the Hi Los. For all their superiority over other vocal groups of the late 1950s, and despite the occasional credit accorded Clare for his remarkable work with them as pianist and arranger, the job was hardly conducive to the kind of prestige and artistic freedom of expression he has been enjoying more recently.
Having decided once and for all to find his own direction, Clare in 1962 became a part of the local jazz scene. For a while he had a regular gig playing one night a week at Shelly's Manne Hole. The group that worked with him there (Larry Bunker and Ralph Pena) is heard in three tracks on the present set; Strayhorn, Things Ain't What They Used To Be and Davenport Blues. Later he gave up this weekly showcase in order to gain some experience as a working member of a jazz combo: he joined Cal Tjader, and at the time these words went to press was within earshot of Pee Wee Marquette as the Tjader group played one of its intermittent stands at Birdland.
The Tjader job obviously is a stepping stone toward his ultimate objective. Eventually Clare will be able to keep a trio of his own together on a steady basis, and will be able to select, from the many offers reaching him, whatever album writing assignments may provide the most stimulating challenge to his pen.
The sides between these covers mark Clare Fischer's third major pianistic exposure on records. In addition to First Time Out there was the remarkable bossa nova album, Brasamba!, on Pacific Jazz PJ 64, presenting him in a different instrumental context (Bud Shank, Joe Pass et al) in one of his several flings in the realm of Brazilian music. (He has also written bossa nova compositions and arrangements for such leaders as Tjader and George Shearing.) But this new LP is like neither of the previous ventures. Instrumentally, it returns to the piano-bass-drums format of the original; but from the standpoint of material it places an entirely different accent, for instead of an album dedicated largely to original material, we have here a collection that includes jazz and pop standards, one recent movie song and only a single Fischer composition. With the exception of the final track the personnel, too, is different from that heard on Clare's debut sides.
These differences are not necessarily qualitative; they simply represent an attempt to find new approaches, sympathetic new talent and appropriate familiar material. Inevitably, though, comparisons are going to be drawn. There will be those who find the Fischer style easier to grasp and more fascinating to follow when the framework is an established, recognizable piece; there will be others, of course, for whom the manner rather than the matter of his playing is the only relevant factor (or, as I heard a critic observe one night at the Half Note, "the material is immaterial.")
The musicians who work closely with Clare on the first side (one dare not say that they "accompany him!' for the trio as a piano-with-rhythm-accompaniment composite is a thing of the past) are both comparative newcomers to the scene. Colin Bailey, a 28-year-old drummer from Swindon, England, came to this country in 1961 as a member of Bryce Rohde's Australian Jazz Quartet, but stayed on after the group broke up and worked for 16 months in San Francisco with Vince Guaraldi. He came to Los Angeles in January of 1963 and has been playing with Victor Feldman's Trio at the Scene.
Albert Stinson is a discovery of Charles Lloyd, saxophonist with the Chico Hamilton Quintet. A native of Pasadena, he has been working with Chico in recent months. Colin Bailey says: "The first time I heard Al take a solo, I stopped playing and just sat there listening in amazement. We hit it off well together right away. Needless to say I have the greatest respect for him — he's like another Scott La Faro!'
The original intention on this session was simply to cut Way Down East for a single disc release, but the trio achieved such an immediately happy groove that Dick Bock immediately declared himself in favor of extending the date to complete a whole album side.
Concerning Clare's own work, it might be fitting to recall some of my comments in the review of the first LP: "It is hard to describe his style. There are in him elements that suggest a harmonic sympathy for Bill Evans, and at moments his articulation and right-hand voicing reminded me of the early Dodo Marmarosa. He is always in complete command of the keyboard; unlike Gil Evans, Tadd Dameron and other arrangers who are secondarily pianists, he can be judged entirely by a pianistic yardstick!'
These comments came to mind when I listened for the first time to Billie's Bounce. Using the 1945 Charlie Parker blues line as a point of departure, Clare manages from the outset to retain the essence of Bird's theme while adding harmonic changes that were never envisioned in the simple original. After the thematic statement has been completed, he is off on his own, playing the blues, constantly emphasizing his concern for the rhythmic and emotional essentials of the form while extending it to reach new and intriguing harmonic horizons.
As Clare remarked concerning this album in general: "I suppose my underlying intention was to present the blues oriented side of me, so that later I can present the lyrical side in another. You can well understand that the side presented here I've found in clubs to be the more readily graspable!' To these comments it should be added that no hard and fast line can or should be! drawn between the two aspects. There are lyrical moments in his blues-directed moods just as there is a touch of the blues here and there in his more lyrical performances.
Way Down East was, as noted, recorded as an idea for a motion picture called The Chase, it was composed by Larry Adler, whose reputation as a strictly pop harmonica soloist has long concealed his deep concern for modern jazz (recently he insisted on using Bill Evans in a TV show; for years his pianist was Ellis Larkins). Adler's waltz is a charming theme and Clare's interpretation commercial in the better sense of the term, i.e. appealing and melodic on a high level.
Satin Doll, a 1952 Duke Ellington tune, is used as the groundwork for a seven-minute harmonic masterpiece. The intensity builds magnificently, the creative process is at work constantly as Fischer flexes all his mental and physical muscles in an infuriatingly perfect performance. Infuriating to me, that is, because I become angrily jealous of all pianists with gifts such as Clare's. Here is a rare example of mind, hands, heart and soul in impeccable collaboration.
This Can't Be Love is a tour de force in the course of which, notably during the third and fourth choruses, Clare indulges in octave unison lines for two hands, a technique that recalls Phineas Newborn, though his application of it is entirely his own. Bailey has a tasteful solo chorus and Stinson maintains the remarkable sense of note-selection that is a strong feature throughout this side.
Strayhorn, one of the three tracks cut with the trio Clare led at the Manne Hole, is to the best of my knowledge the first song ever dedicated to Swee'pea since Duke himself recorded Weely in 1939. "The tune" says Clare had been used on Johnny Come Lately for Diz's album. He has always been part of my admiration for Duke's group" The only original in the album, this occasionally gospel-tinged work moves with grace from 4/4 to 3/4 time and reflects some of the airy charm of Strayhorn the person, of whom Clare must have an instinctive knowledge. Larry Bunker and Ralph Pena, long among the most respected musicians both in jazz and studio circles around Hollywood, lend strong support.
Things Ain't What They Used To Be is a 1941 blues concocted by Mercer Ellington (now a disc jockey on New York's WLIB) and his father. As with Billie's Bounce, it is subjected to extensive renovation without losing any of its blues-drawn essence.
Davenport Blues was recorded by its composer, Bix Beiderbecke, in 1925. Except for the opening phrase (starting with the two triads stated by Pena), little is retained of the original theme and the performance to all intents becomes an original, and a mood-sustaining one, to which the 12/8 meter lends much of its character.
Without A Song is the only track that uses the personnel heard on the previous trio album (Gene Stone and Gary Peacock). Played in long meter (the tune is rarely heard nowadays in its original 32-bar form), it provides a point of departure for some of the most buoyant improvisation of the album.
It is difficult, until one has lived with an LP for a while, to select the items most likely to prove lastingly valuable and most certain of repeated playing. All that need be added at this point with reference to these two sides, and to the outlook in general for Clare Fischer at this stage of his career, is that the evidence of his stature continues to mount. Musicians of his caliber, and with his outlook, are not merely an invigorating element in the present day scene; more meaningfully, they symbolize the wave of the future in the progress of jazz.”
Clare Fischer FIRST TIME OUT—Pacific Jazz 52:
Nigerian Walk; Toddler; Stranger; Afterfact; I've Been Free Too Long; Piece for Scotty; Blues for Home; I Love You.
Personnel: Fischer, piano; Gary Peacock, bass;
Gene Stone, drums.
Rating: *****
“This is the surprise of the year.
Fischer has had trouble enough establishing himself as a major jazz composer-arranger, through a series of bad breaks (the non-release of his Donald Byrd LP, the failure to credit him on Dizzy Gillespie's Duke Ellington portrait album); but hardly anyone knew that he is also an extraordinary jazz pianist.
It is hard to describe Fischer's style; there are in him elements that suggest a harmonic sympathy for Bill Evans, and at moments his articulation and right-hand voicings reminded me of the early (not the recent) Dodo Marmarosa. He is always in complete command of the keyboard; unlike Gil Evans, Tadd Dameron, and other arrangers who are secondarily pianists, he can be judged entirely by a pianistic yardstick.
Five of the eight pieces are Fischer originals. The others are Peacock's Stranger, the Cole Porter’s I Love You, and the most attractive Nigerian Walk by drummer Ed Shaughnessy. All the Fischer works are of vertical as well as horizontal interest. Scotty, dedicated to the late Scott LaFaro, is a poignantly pretty tribute. Afterfact is a compiling swinger.
Free Too Long is a study in group improvisation, with no set plan structurally, melodically, or harmonically. It is not exactly atonal and seems at most times to be geared to a C feel or pedal point; whatever the technicalities, it comes off better than any experiment of this kind since Lennie Tristano's Intuition. This freedom is constructive rather than anarchistic.
Home is an unpretentious piece, always true to the blues changes and never betrayed into condescending pseudo-funk. The mood is ruined by the drum solo; in fact, the often-obtrusive drums almost reduced the rating by half a star. Yet Stone on the whole is a capable, swinging musician.
Peacock, though, is worth an extra full star in himself. He is one of the most amazing bassists I have heard, with the dexterity of a guitarist and consequently tremendous melodic strength. His solos are consistently original and inventive. His only faults are a tendency at times to get too busy during Fischer's solos instead of just playing straight time, and an occasional intonation lapse in the higher register.
This is not the best-organized trio on the scene, but it includes two talents of such magnitude that the album is essential listening for anyone interested in unexploited talents. It is ironic that Fischer had to wait almost until his 34th birthday for the first exposure of a talent that probably has been his for 10 or 15 years.” (L.G.F.)
Source:
Downbeat Magazine
September 13, 1962
The following video features Clare, Ralph Pena and Larry Bunker on Things Ain't What They Used To Be.
