MulesRasch

Sad news from France. American jazz giant Johnny Griffin has passed away at his home in Mauprévoir in France, hours before he was scheduled to perform with organist Rhoda Scott, French sax player Olivier Termine and drummer Julie Saury. He gave his last concert on Monday in the town of Hyère, France.

Born April 24, 1928 in Chicago, he attended the famed music program at DuSable High School under the supervision of Capt. Walter Dyett (which was also notably attended by singers Nat King Cole and Dinah Washington, and saxophonists Gene Ammons and Von Freeman). 

After his studies, Griffin joined Lionel Hampton's band in 1945, leaving him in 1947 to join trumpeter Joe Morris. In the '50s, he played with several bands, most notably Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers with whom he played with in 1957. He also performed with Nat Adderley, Thelonius Monk, and John Coltrane with whom he recorded "A Blowin' Session" in 1957 for Blue Note.

He teamed up with another sax player, Eddie 'Lockjaw' Davis in the 1960s to form a group which recorded eight records.

French saxophonist Jean-Noël Auer has posted on his blog an audio interview conducted by one of his students, Marie Mongel, with composer Gérard Condé and himself about a new work for saxophone and concert band. 

Brief excerpts of the piece, titled Sur les Hauts can be heard as we listen in on  a working exchange between Auer and Condé while they are working on the piece. 

The interview, which is in French, can be heard in multiple sections: parts 1-2-3 here,  and parts 4-5-6 here.  The clips are only a few minutes each.

The Lincoln Center Festival in New York is presenting Bernd Alois Zimmermann's opera Die Soldaten in what looks to be an amazing production. The New York Times is showing a video clip presenting the massive preparations which are involved.

As Daniel J. Wakin states in a related article: 

“It is one of the monuments of 20th-century music,” said David Pountney, the stage director. “You can say, ‘I don’t like it,’ but you can’t ignore it. It’s the end point of 12-tone music, really.”

Zimmermann, who died in 1970, served in the German Army during World War II. He began writing the opera in 1957, and it had its first performance in Cologne eight years later. Sarah Caldwell’s Opera Company of Boston presented its American premiere in 1982, and it was next performed in this country in 1991, at New York City Opera.

The Lincoln Center Festival imported this production from the Ruhr Triennale in Germany, which produces works in industrial spaces. Nigel Redden, the festival director, declined to disclose the cost, but it has clearly siphoned off resources. The festival has said that it reduced the scope of offerings this summer because of the size of “Die Soldaten.”

Jazz great Jimmy Giuffre passed away on Thursday (read New York Times article). He would have been 87 today. 

Prolific on many instruments, he will mostly be remembered for his clarinet playing and his role as one of Woody Herman's "Four Brothers" on tenor. Based on Giuffre composition of the same name which featured a new configuration within the big band. The piece was set with the an alto (played by Sam Marowitz), three tenors (Stan Getz, Zoot Sims and Herb Steward) and a baritone sax (Serge Chaloff). The emphasis of this particular piece, especially with these particular players, featured the three tenors, influenced by the Lester Young school of playing. The alternation between the individual soloists and the relaxed, free flowing, non vibrato playing gave this piece a special coloration which enthused Herman and became a trademark of his ensemble.

Here's a great clip which shows Giuffre's proficiency on multiple instruments as he moves from baritone sax to clarinet to tenor sax in a trio setting of "The Train and the River". This also highlights another of Giuffre's contribution to jazz history, the drumless trio. As Ben Ratliff explains: 

Here is an interesting interview with Irish composer Greg Caffrey. 

You can hear some more of this interview, including excerpts of some of Caffrey's music which includes a couple of saxophone piece: Honk! and Pluck, Blow, at this site: 

An Interview with Greg Caffrey at the Contemporary Music Center Ireland. 

You'll find two audio files for over 25 minutes of the interview as well as a transcript of it.

After yesterday's Tenor Nostalgia, here is some Tenor Sadness as I hear about two excellent tenor players who have just passed away. 

Monday, April 7th saw Phil Urso, 82, passed away in Denver where he settled in the 1960s after having been part of the West Coast scene for a number of years, most notably with Chet Baker and his groups. 

Here are some interesting tributes about Urso and his legacy. 

Saxophonist Phil Urso RIP by David at the WFIU blog from NPR at Indiana Universuty and Remembering Phil Urso (1925-2008).by Ted Gioia at jazz.com. The last site includes a youtube file of a Chet Baker big band recording.

Earlier this week, on Sunday, Donald Walden, an influential tenor player in Detroit died after his battle with cancer. He was 69. He taught at the Michigan State University, Oberlin Conservatory in Ohio, and eventually found his way to the University of Michigan.

You can read the obit from the Detroit Free Press here. 

Mark Stryker notes that "Walden followed his friends to New York in 1960, where he played with Grant Green, Joe Chambers, Booker Ervin and Sun Ra, but he returned home in 1966 for more opportunities to work. He played in Aretha Franklin's band for five years and toured widely with Stevie Wonder, the Temptations and Four Tops. He played jazz, too, of course, and eventually found security as a teacher."

I was recently pointed to a web site about an early pioneer of the saxophone: Ali Ben Sou Alle. 

Interesting figure who was active in the 1850-1860's. Born Charles-Valentin Soualle, he received a first prize in Clarinet at the Paris Conservatory in 1844. After the 1848 Revolution, he found himself exiled to England where he took up the saxophone. He added the single octave key mechanism (the modern system which still exists today). He became known as a virtuoso of the instrument and travelled world wide introducing the sax to Australia, New Zealand, Java, China and India. He finally settled in Mysore, becoming the director of the Royal Music for the Maharadjah. That is where he converted to Islam and changed his name to Ali Ben Sou Alle. 

Around 1860, Soualle returned to France.

Thanks to Paul Wehage for his research and his work uncovering and publishing the works of this intriguing personality. 

You can find some of Ali Ben Sou Alle's music published by Musik Fabrik as well as a longer biographical sketch at this link: http://www.classicalmusicnow.com/absa.htm#French.

Dexter Gordon

If you love Dexter Gordon, then you need to go get an earful of the great Dex at the Freedom Jazz Dance site. Host Ken Hohman presents 2 hours of Dexter Gordon which you can stream off his site. 

One of my favorite players, there's always a hint of sensuousness in his big tone. A true master.

Nice way to celebrate Gordon's birthday, which happens tomorrow. He would have been 85.

You can also see Gordon on this youtube clip, playing soprano sax.

Just learned that Teo Macero (1925-2008) has died in Riverhead, NY. He was 82. 

After graduating from the Juilliard school in 1953, Macero became a member of the Charles Mingus's Jazz Composers Workshop, recording with Mingus between 1953-55 playing tenor and baritone saxophones. With Mingus, Teddy Charles, and Gunther Schuller, he became interested in what would become known as the third stream, ie. combining elements of classical music and jazz. He wrote several atonal classical works that showed his jazz influence.

He is an Emmy Award winning film and television composer and was instrumental in developing Miles Davis fusion movement.

Ben Ratliff of the New York Times writes: 

"Helping to build Miles Davis albums like “Bitches Brew,” “In a Silent Way” and “Get Up With It,” Mr. Macero (pronounced TEE-oh mah-SEH-roh) used techniques partly inspired by composers like Edgard Varèse, who had been using tape-editing and electronic effects to help shape the music. Such techniques were then new to jazz and have largely remained separate from it since. But the electric-jazz albums he helped Davis create — especially “Bitches Brew,” which remains one of the best-selling albums by a jazz artist — have deeper echoes in almost 40 years of experimental pop, like work by Can, Brian Eno and Radiohead.

Leon Stein's Quintet for Saxophone and String Quartet was premiered on this date in 1958, 50 years ago. Stein (1910-2002) was a Chicago native who composed in a strongly influenced by Hindemith style. He was commissioned for several saxophone pieces by Cecil Leeson and Brian Minor. 

A few recordings of the Quintet exists. Among the older discs, there was "Brian Minor Plays Saxophone with the Chicago Symphony String Quartet" on Crystal Records (S 151) and "Cecil Leeson and the Lyric Arts String Quartet" on Enchanté Records (ENS-2001).

A more recent recording is by Martin Piecuch:  "Sax With Strings Attached" on Boston Records, performed with the Stravinsky Quartet and includes Alphonse Stalleart's Quintet for Saxophone and Strings, and Gerhard Maasz's Divertimento for Sopranino Saxophone and String Quartet. 

You can hear a few excerpts of this recording by visiting Martin Piecuch's web site. To hear the first movement of the Stein Quintet, go here.