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Benny Carter: Aspects
In 1943, when alto saxophonist Benny Carter settled in California, he focused on composing, arranging and playing and gave up leading and touring with a big band. The move was a pragmatic one: with World War II on, the draft was snapping up many musicians, and gasoline and parts rationing made bus travel difficult and costly. ...
Shellac Flacks' Double Dip
Upon leafing through old Down Beats from the 1940s the other day, I came across an editorial in the April 9, 1947 issue chastising disc jockeys for engaging in shady practices. Long before the infamous payola scandals of the late 1950s, when on-air announcers accepted cash from record pluggers to repeatedly play specific singles and turn ...
Interview: Sammy Nestico (Part 2)
The first thing you notice about Sammy Nestico when you speak with him is his jolly nature. There's a distinct twinkle in his personality, like that of a storybook toymaker. It's a trait that goes beyond charisma. Sammy's generosity and positive spirit are embracing and motivating Yet neither quality has distracted him from his work or ...
Interview: Sammy Nestico (Part 1)
Count Basie's finest album of the 1960s is easily Straight Ahead. Recorded in 1968 for the Dot label, the album's tracks were composed and arranged from top to bottom by Sammy Nestico. He even conducted the band. What's remarkable about this album is how naturally Sammy's charts swing within the Basie idiom. Sammy's up-tempo numbers build ...
Photostory13: Harry Edison
This 1997 image of Harry “Sweets" Edison by photographer Paul Slaughter is a study in contrasts. The creases in Edison's eyes are piercing yet seductive. His smile is broad but also slightly pained. What we see here is a swinging legend late in life, relentlessly devoted to his music and the joy it brought fans. Edison ...
Herb Pomeroy: A Splendored Gig
Before he became an educator at Boston's Berklee School of Music, trumpeter Herb Pomeroy briefly led a big band in the late 1950s. The band had a solid, swinging sound, like a steam locomotive going at full tilt. While Maynard Ferguson's band during this period was about the sonic impact of the brass section and frenzied ...
Interview: Dick Hyman (Part 3)
Pianist Dick Hyman is as precise with his words as he is with his notes. During our conversation, Dick often stopped mid-sentence momentarily when answering a question, as if rolling his choice of words around in his palm before selecting them. His pauses weren't abrupt or disconcerting. They were lyrical, like his playing, coming almost like ...
Interview: Dick Hyman (Part 2)
Dick Hyman can play anything and sound like anyone. Too often this has been unfairly characterized as impersonation. As anyone who has listened carefully to Dick knows, his ability to play fluently in the style of, say, James P. Johnson or Erroll Garner isn't an attempt to pass himself off as someone he's not. Rather, Dick ...
Interview: Dick Hyman (Part 1)
Few pianists have been there and done that as often as Dick Hyman. In addition to playing with Charlie Parker, Lester Young, Tony Scott and Red Norvo, Dick studied with Teddy Wilson and recorded with Benny Goodman, Zoot Sims and virtually every other jazz great you can think of in the 1950s. In the late 1960s, ...
Diana Ross-Touch Me in the Morning
It's a mistake for jazz fans to compare Diana Ross to jazz vocalists. Ross' intonation, timbre and roots all come from a completely different place. Her Lady Sings the Blues (1972) drew praise from jazz circles, and it was a big seller. But to me, Ross as Billie Holiday always felt inconceivable and forced. Too much ...
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