Norman Granz: The Sound Of America

If there were a more important "back office" figure in the history of American jazz than Norman Granz, who would it be? When Granz first heard Coleman Hawkins, he knew that the music was going to have a major role in his life—but he did not yet know how many others would be in his debt as well. Hundreds, if not thousands of musicians would owe him a living. Some, like Oscar Peterson and Ella Fitzgerald, would nearly become his creations, although Fitzgerald less so. The sonic record of Art Tatum would be immeasurably enriched by Granz's masterful recorded output. And, yes, even the words of some of America's finest humorists and writers were in part preserved by Granz.

To say that he moved the music from the dance hall to the concert hall is something of an understatement. How many were fortunate enough to attend a Jazz at the Philharmonic concert, some as late as 1967, after Granz had been at it for more than twenty years? Critical assessments would inevitably vary from Lester Young's "flying plantation" to "a miracle." And Granz's record as a promoter and defender of racial equality was realized with a philosophy of "only performance matters." Granz heard and saw talent, not color, a reminder that the music may have Afro-American roots but really belongs to everybody.

Granz made a handsome fortune as well, showing that you could make a living playing jazz or promoting it under the right circumstances. It took sophisticated audiences, but Granz knew where to find, attract and entertain them. He may have been abrasive, as pushy people often are, but Granz was not simply in it for himself. This welcome collection The Sound of America affords yet another generation a chance to hear some of the true magic that Norman Granz could conjure.

The collection is available on vinyl and CD, and this review must be limited to what the CDs bring. Here there are two discs, and for certain, there will be few who do not hear something new—or, at least new to them.

One of the most remarkable tracks is, fittingly, by Coleman Hawkins. The recording is drawn from The Jazz Scene (Mercury Records, 1950), a multi-record compendium that Granz intended less for commercial purposes than as a display of the range of artists and styles that Granz saw as constituting the essence of the music then. The musicians were given complete freedom to record what they wanted and in the way that they wanted, something immediately evident in Hawkins' recording, "Picasso." It is unaccompanied tenor that runs for 3:17, and while hardly atonal, seems to have no formal shape per se, although that may be deceptive. On first hearing, a reaction may be "Hey, that is Sonny Rollins." The more banal "I did not know that Hawkins could play that way" is not unjustified either.

Its shrewd placement at the opening of the collections should entice any curious listener, although "JATP Blues" appropriately enough takes that honor. Why more staid critics, musicians and early venues turned away from the entire concept of JATP is pretty obvious from "Blues," with honkers and squeakers on full display; a "chase" between Nat King Cole and Les Paul redeems the session. And as Buddy DeFranco was to remark, a nice paycheck typically resolved a skeptic's doubts.

Oscar Peterson then trails octaves through "Tenderly" to lovely effect. This was Peterson's debut to audiences in the United States, much more than a display of the astounding technique for which he was often criticized. Other favorites: "Ballad Medley"; featuring Charlie Parker, Ben Webster, Johnny Hodges, Flip Phillips and Benny Carter(!); Roy Eldridge doing "Dale's Wail" and Anita O'Day's "Lullaby of the Leaves." Listening to Ella Fitzgerald rehearse "Chelsea Bridge" is another rare pleasure. Even if someone does not care much for Fred Astaire's singing, it has a certain novelty value and can be found here.

As far as novelty goes, there is also spoken word: Jack Kerouac reading from his work; Shelly Berman doing his telephone shtick; Jonathan Winters, a kind of direct ancestor of Robin Williams; and a genuinely funny Mort Sahl. All of these offer insight into the psyche of the United States in the 1950s, and they fit into Granz's panoramic view of American life.

Ultimately, Granz decamped to Europe, where, despite the obstacles, he was equally successful as a jazz producer. It may well have been that the distinctly swing bias of Granz's presentations simply ran out of a domestic audience, although considering the spectacular level of talent he could assemble, that seems a bit difficult to believe. He also had competition in the United States from George Wein and the Newport Jazz Festival. There was no love lost between the two figures, but in a way, Wein was more representative of the future of the music, or, at least, its primary exponents.

The liner notes by Tad Hershorn are as full as anyone could reasonably expect, although they are a bit difficult to read—at least to ageing eyes. Really, the best thing one could do is to go to Hershorn's definitive biography of Granz, Norman Granz. The Man Who Used Jazz for Justice (University of California Press, 2011), where Granz's thinking is explored in detail, and in which the context for selecting the music from his enormous oeuvre is much clearer.

While there may be, to an older generation of listeners, at least some overlap with what it listened to over the years (e.g., The Verve Story, 1944-1994 (Verve, 1994), this collection is a splendid way of introducing younger listeners, perhaps an entirely new audience, to the work of a pioneering figure in American jazz who did not play a horn.