I still remember seeing Elvin Jones at the Tralfamdore Cafe in Buffalo. It was an amazing weekend of music. The only member of the band I remember was guitarist Ryo Kawasaki. It was great to watch Elvin behind the drums with the energy and joy he displayed while playing.
Today we sample a few of the recordings he played on starting with one with the classic John Coltrane Quartet. Here is "Chasin' The Trane" that for parts is a duet.
Here is Elvin with saxophonist Joe Farrell and bassist Jimmy garrison from 1968 performing "Ginger Bread Boy."
One of Elvin's first recordings was with Sonny Rollins at the Village Vanguard. When Sonny signed with Impulse Records, Elvin and Jimmy Garrison were on some of the sessions including "East Broadway Run Down."
Elvin made a few recordings with his brothers Thad and Hank. here they perform "Three and One."
Our final selection is with Pat LaBarbera on sax, David Williams on bass and Ryo Kawasaki on guitar, playing "Three Card Molly" a few years after I saw Elvin in Buffalo.
Today is the third, and for now final, Take 5 devoted to performances of Body and Soul. Our first installment had renditions that preceded Coleman Hawkins' classic recording. last week we started with on Hawkins and then included four other tenor saxophone recordings. This week, I present five other recordings of this standard.
First up we have Billie Holiday from 1940.
Next up is Bud Powell
Hank Jones is another piano master who has recorded it.
Ella Fitzgerald performed it on a legendary Frank Sinatra TV show.
Hank Jones Live at Jazzhus Slukefter 1983 Storyville Records
Recorded at a Copenhagen jazz club, this location recording has the great pianist Hank Jones leadings trip with bassist Mads Vinding and drummer Shelley Manne on a selection of standards and bebop classics. Ably supported by Vinding and Manne, Jones was in full mastery of his skills and interpretative powers this night. He dazzles on Charlie Parker's "Scrapple From the Apple" and "Au Private," as well ason Bud Powell's "Budo." At the same time, his lyricism is to the fore on standards such as "Just Friends," "It Could Happen To You," and "What's New."
"Live at Jazzhus Slukefter 1983" is a wonderful addition to Hank Jones' recorded legacy.
I purchased this recording as a download from Bandcamp.com. It is also available as a CD from there and other sources. Here is a video, with a different trio from the CD, of Hank Jones performing Charlie Parker's "Au Private."
Roberta Gambarini certainly has come a long way in a few years since coming to the United States in 1998 from her native Italy. Within two weeks of her arrival, she was a finalist at the Thelonious Monk Competition, devoted to jazz vocalists that year along with Jane Monheit and Terry Thornton. Since then her career has slowly taken off, accelerating in more recent years after the release of her first American recording, Easy to Love, and now her major label debut with the great Hank Jones on Emarcy, You Are There. In the interim she has been nominated for a Grammy, selected by the Jazz Journalists Association as best female jazz vocalist and selected as Talent Deserving Wider Recognition in the Downbeat Critics Poll, while making acclaimed concert and festival appearances with some of the greatest jazz musicians in the world including Roy Hargrove’s Big Band and the Dizzy Gillespie Alumni Orchestra.
Hank Jones and Roberta Gambarini at the 2007 Duke Ellington Jazz Festival
Roberta Gambarini possesses such a beautiful voice and if one can here some echoes of Sarah Vaughan and Ella Fitzgerald, she has become such a marvelous singer in her own right. Her pitch perfect, her phrasing exquisite, her enunciation of the lyrics so magical. Between her delivery of the lyrics and her scatting her voice is another instrument. Backed by only Hank Jones’ piano, she takes us on at our of some of the great songs, such as Deep Purple, Just Squeeze Me, Lush Life and Stardust. She introduces us to lesser known gems like a Benny Carter song, When Lights Are Low, and a Gigi Gyrce and Jon Hendricks ballad, Reminiscing. Most interesting is Irving Berlin’s Suppertime, that is done in tribute to Ethel Waters who first sang this moving song in the musical revue, As Thousands Cheered. As Ms. Gambarini notes, this was “the first song to address the unspeakable evil of racial lynching.” The lyrics do not describe the strange fruit of southern tress, but rather the heartache of the wife and mother who knows her husband and the children’s father is not coming home. “I know I should set the table cause it’s Suppertime,” but is unable ‘because that man of mine ain’t coming home no more.” With Jones understated accompaniment here, this is simply a powerful performance.
Elsewhere Jones gets a number of opportunities to stretch out as on the Ellington classic, Just Squeeze Me. After his solo, she scats and then trades fours with him. The delight the two have making music together comes across throughout this recording that certainly will be among the most highly recorded vocal jazz recordings issued in the United States this year. Having the pleasure of having seen the two performing this past fall, this writer has been awaiting the US release of this 2005 recording session, and it has certainly been waiting for.
This was a purchase. Here is Roberta Gambarini and Hank Jones with a rhythm section performing.
It really does not get better than this. He turned 90 not too long ago and the jazz community expressed their love and admiration for him as among the greatest of all jazz pianists. Joe Lovano, one of today's outstanding tenor players is also a fan of the amazing Mr. Jones who has come a long way from playing at the Anchor Bar (in Buffalo and long before chicken wings were invented) across the street from where Art Tatum was playing.
Last Thursday, September 13, I saw a wonderful intimate performance by vocalist Roberta Gambarini and pianist Hank Jones as part of the 3rd Duke Ellington Jazz Festival in Washington DC. This performance which included wonderful interpretations from the American songbook (including Duke Ellington's Come Sunday, Billy Strayhorn's Lush Life and others). One highpoint was her performance of Sunny Side of the Street based on Dizzy Gillespie's recording with Sonny Stitt and Sonny Rollins. She scats like Ella, does some vocalese and has such a pure voice that is an instrument like the voice was for Ella. The most sterling moment was Irving Berlin's Supper Time written for a thirties review. Written for Ethel Waters, it is a song about a woman waiting for her husband who won't be home for supper because he's been lynched. A very simple, straight-forward delivery that was quite moving. As one might expect, Hank Jones was marvelous as an accompanist. They have a duet album coming out, so keep an eye for it.
BTW, they answered some Q's and A's from the audience and one member of the audience came with her mother who had suang with Hank at the Anchor Bar in Buffalo in the fifties. hank spent a lot of time in Cleveland and Buffalo in those years. And after his night was done he would catch Art Tatum at some other Buffalo venue. Chicken wings were invented later at the Anchor Bar.
Hank also accompanied Marilyn Monroe when she sang Happy Birthday to President Kennedy. He is the older brother of the late drummer Elvin and late trumpeter-composer Thad. Quite a family and he was quite funny in addition to being a marvelous pianist.
Recommended listening- Roberta Gambarini - Easy to Love Hank Jones as part of The Great Jazz Trio (with his late brother Elvin)
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