Archives for December 2014

Nat Cole (1919-1965) was one of the most admired young jazz pianists of the late 1930s and early ‘40s. In nightclubs, he occasionally included vocals in numbers with his trio, and patrons began requesting more of them. The King Cole Trio’s 1943 recording of his composition “Straight Up and Fly Right” became a significant hit because of his vocal. It wasn’t long before Cole’s singing dominated his career. His 1946 records of “The Christmas Song” and “(Get Your Kicks on) Route 66” made him one of the biggest popular music stars of his era. Nearly 50 years after his death, his albums are lively sellers.

Cole was a powerful stylistic influence on major pianists including Bud Powell, Bill Evans and Tommy Flanagan, but he was so famous as a singer that listeners today are often surprised to learn that he played the piano. A new Cole album presents many of his biggest hits using a revolutionary 21st century sound process. The collection’s quality captures the admiration of Rifftides contributor Jeff Sultanof.

Mr. Sultanof is admired by professional musicians for his analysis and editing of scores and for his writing and teaching about composers and composing, fields in which he is also a respected practitioner. He has written previously for Rifftides about Benny Carter, Pete Rugolo, Gerry Mulligan, Russell Garcia and Robert Farnon. He lives and teaches in New York City.

King Cole Gets The Royal Treatment

By Jeff Sultanof

It seems that even the most minor event gets publicized today. Yet, something has happened that too few people seem to know about. It started with a CD called The Extraordinary Nat King Cole, a compilation of well-known and newly released Cole recordings, issued in June of 2014. A 2-CD deluxe version came out at the same time. The collection was prepared in cooperation with the Cole estate. In some cases, the estate owns the tracks; Capitol had to get a special license to use them. The same album was released in November of 2014, in the High Fidelity-Pure Audio format playable on Blu-ray players. It is not as easy to find on Amazon’s website, but if you poke around, it is there. CD Universe also carries it.

Blu-ray is an audio/video format that delivers high definition picture and sound. What may seem hype is actually correct in this case— Blu-ray is amazing! With an HD television set, the picture and sound quality of this medium must be experienced to be believed. High Definition in the home has actually encouraged expensive restoration and availability of movies both classic and minor. It is possible to see films like Lawrence of Arabia from 70MM sources, even to see vintage Cinerama and 3D films in amazing quality. But how does this new technology interact with older recordings?

For those too young to remember, Sony unveiled the first CD player in 1982. It cost about $1000. It was originally marketed to listeners of classical music and jazz. By 1984, excellent players could be bought for about $225.00. They were still high in price, but much better than that first Sony player. The sound was a revelation, and the discs had no ticks and pops. The medium caught on quickly in the pop, rock and country genres. The LP seemed doomed.

And yet there were naysayers: they claimed that the sound was too clinical, not ‘warm’ like vinyl LPs. Part of the problem was the sampling rate of CDs. Without getting too technical about it, the bit rate, or amount of information, was just good enough so that the players and discs could be marketed, and both Sony and Philips could recoup their research and development costs. In our modern world of downloading, most people can’t tell the difference between MP3 downloads and CD tracks, and many don’t care. CD sales are way down. Ironically, vinyl has made something of a comeback, but that’s another story.

With its higher bit rate, Blu-ray has the capacity to deliver high quality audio. True, you really don’t hear the difference unless you have a good quality home system, but since home theatre sales are continuing to climb, it’s safe to say that quite a few people do care about quality, and you can get a Blu-ray player for about $50.00. They are also available on the PlayStation 3, providing further availability of the medium. In the concert music field, Naxos has issued several Blu-ray Audio discs, but in 2013, Universal released about 30 titles which ran the gamut from concert music, pop, rock and Jazz. Among the titles were A Love Supreme, Big Band Bossa Nova (Quincy Jones), and the complete Ella and Louis.

The Extraordinary Nat King Cole has upped the stakes. Featuring 36 tracks from the period 1951 through 1964, it is both a greatest hits album and a treasure trove of other tracks, including duet recordings with Dean Martin, two pieces with Cole and his daughters, a group of unissued tracks and alternate performances of hits he re-recorded in 1961 for The Nat King Cole Story.

Cole holds a unique place in American music. He is considered one of the great jazz pianists in the music’s history, cited as an influence by instrumentalists worldwide. He is also one of the great singers of the twentieth century. Primarily known for his ballads, he could sing other styles with great success. This album shows off many aspects of his craft: “Straighten Up and Fly Right” was an early hit for Cole’s trio, “Send For Me” qualifies as R&B, “Orange Colored Sky” is a collaboration with the Stan Kenton Orchestra in an arrangement by Pete Rugolo (pictured with Cole). In this album the accompanists include the swinging Billy May studio orchestra and the string-laden orchestra of Nelson Riddle. Ralph Carmichael conducts the 1961 re-do’s. However, the credits for these tracks are incorrect; Carmichael is listed as arranger on many of them, but the scores are the original ones by Nelson Riddle).

If you close your eyes, you can swear that you are in the studio. Such is the warmth and clarity of the recordings, whose sources were the original tapes. Too often, reissues have to make do with copies several generations away from the originals. Indeed, the original LPs were two or three generations removed from the tape running through the machines at the time of recording. One reason was that it was necessary to prepare recordings so that they could be played back on even the cheapest record players. The bass was usually diminished or, in engineer parlance, “rolled off.” Because Blu-ray allows us to hear what is on the tapes without any alteration, we can more clearly detect subtleties in the sound, as well as differences between the recording studios Capitol used.

In 1951, Capitol’s main west coast studio was in the former KHJ radio station on Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. The capability was single-channel monaural, and while the studio often had glorious sound, some of the recordings from that era sound slightly compressed. A great example is Cole’s “Almost Like Being in Love.” Previous issues of the song had frequencies so pinched that it sounded as if the master tape had been damaged. On Blu-ray, the track still sounds somewhat compressed, but since the bass is reproduced exactly as recorded, with no rolloff, the result is fuller—more satisfying.

By 1956, Capitol had built its famous Tower. The ground floor had three studios for recording, with an echo chamber below the floor. When I produced two sessions there some years ago, I saw and heard first hand how great that complex is and what it is possible to do there. Studios A and B can be combined into one large room, with engineers able to use either set of recording equipment. Studio C is a smaller room that can be used for smaller ensembles, overdubbing and surround mix-downs. In 1956, the engineers were figuring out how best to record in the rooms. The recordings in those early years ran the gamut from beautifully balanced to distorted, sometimes with microphones placed so high that the sound is indistinct and nebulous (Capitol recorded a Nelson Riddle album in stereo that was never released due to poor microphone placement). Cole was fortunate; his stereo tracks from 1957-58 are beautifully recorded. They’ve never sounded so clear and natural as in this Blu-ray album.

Capitol also had an excellent studio on 46th Street in New York City. Many of the 1961 re-makes were done there. It had a totally different studio sound from the L.A. studios. Veteran studio musicians told me several times that they loved recording there. 46th Street had a beautiful 3-track tape machine. Cole’s vocals are on one of those tracks, with a touch more echo (as far as I know, 46th Street did not have an echo chamber, so this is pure ambience). You can hear the difference from previous issues of this material. The unissued tracks are a mixed bag. Back then, recordings may have been withheld from release for a variety of reasons. Take your pick:

The artist may have turned in a less-than-good performance (not the case with Cole; he agreed to record some poor songs, and he gives 100% on each one).

The arrangement was rejected (not the case here; most of the unissued tracks were arranged by Nelson Riddle).

The executives didn’t like the song (the producer and the top execs at a label frequently disagreed).

The writers of the song didn’t like the performance and refused to grant a license.

Are these tracks essential? I say yes for the arrangements alone. If you ask me, any new Nelson Riddle music is most welcome. What Riddle (pictured here with Cole in the studio) does with some of these songs is a lesson in professional arranging; he often turns straw into solid gold. In a word, they are gorgeous! Of the two tracks with daughters Natalie and Carole, one was originally issued and one was held back. These recordings are charming. It’s easy to hear that Natalie already had a sure ear and had listened to her dad. Her phrasing and intonation tend to be spot-on. Carole is clearly scared. She can sometimes barely be heard.

The alternates of previously issued tracks include some studio chatter. When working on a recording project, choosing which ‘take’ to issue is an art and a challenge. In some cases, alternate vocal or instrumental performances are better than the tracks that came out, but they often have musical mistakes or poor balance. The Cole estate clearly wants his fans to have more of Nat’s life work, and we are in their debt. We are also indebted to Universal for making this Blu-ray available. I really appreciate the care that went into this release. I’ve already played the album several times. I am still knocked out by the sound. So let’s think of other albums that should be available in this format. The Concert Sinatra is first on my list.

What would be first on yours?

Thanks to Jeff Sultanof for his illuminating Blu-ray and Nat Cole insights. It’s always pleasure to have him aboard.

For a Rifftides post on the question of vinyl vs. digital and for reviews of a few recent LPs, go here.

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Frank Zappa (1940-1993), a gifted musician who dipped his toe into jazz, never demonstrated more than a smidgeon of what he knew about the genre. But he left us with the memorable observation, “Jazz isn’t dead. It just smells funny.” A web search shows that lesser wits have adapted Zappa’s line to all kinds of topics from politics to marketing management and, of all things, science journalism. None of those endeavors seems to be dying, either. For years, people have been predicting the end of jazz. Perhaps to them the sustained explosion of recordings seems an enormous death rattle.

All right, jazz is not dying. So, once again we leap into the breach in a heroic doomed attempt to keep up with the never-ending stream of new albums and reissues. We will bypass those that smell funny.

Kerri Politzer, Below The Surface (PJCE)

Kerry Politzer is a pianist married to a pianist, George Colligan. In 2011, they moved from New York City to Portland, Oregon, where both have day gigs on the music faculty at Portland State University. In New York, Ms. Politzer recorded a few albums, but her professional life as a pianist there was mainly below the surface. In Portland, it is not. She is emerging. Her resourcefulness and vigor at the keyboard and her depth as a composer reach fullness in this recording. The 10 compositions are hers.

Ms. Politzer’s quintet includes some of the brightest musicians in Portland’s bustling jazz community. One of them is her husband, but this is not a two-piano album. Colligan has high visibility as a pianist and occasional trumpeter with his own groups as well as with Buster Williams, Lee Konitz and other major figures. Here, though, he is the drummer, playing his original instrument as if he hasn’t missed a day of practice. His solos joyously behind a repeated rhythm section figure on the Latinate “Empty House.”

Trumpeter Thomas Barber, is known for his own band Spiral Road and work with Dick Titterington and Darrell Grant. Barber capitalizes on the intervals in the astringent harmonies of Ms. Politzer’s title tune to fashion a solo whose opening downward chromatic figures have a yearning quality evident in much of his work here. Alto saxophonist David Valdez melds with Barber in the front line and solos throughout with a cool tone and a warm flow of ideas. Bassist Andrea Niemiec, a native Oregonian who has been on the Portland scene for more than a decade, has a big sound that could have benefited from being higher in the audio mix. She is important to the trio track “Echo Says,” in which Ms. Politzer manages the neat trick of being contemplative while generating hard ¾ swing. The final piece, “In Spring,” is unaccompanied piano, lasts slightly less than two minutes and left this listener wanting more.

Miguel Zenón, Identities are Changeable (Miel Music)

This audacious venture by the lavishly talented alto saxophonist is two projects in one. It is a dramatization using the recorded voices of several people talking about their Puerto Rican origins, their lives in New York and their senses of national identity. It is also Zenón’s debut as a composer and arranger for a large ensemble made up of his quartet and 12 horns. Zenón, pianist Luis Perdomo, bassist Hans Glawischnig and drummer Henry Cole solidify their reputation as one of the most important small groups of this century.

The music follows seven previous Zenón albums based in his close identification with the culture and traditions of his native island. His alto solos are brilliant. Expanding on concepts he developed in earlier albums, Zenón’s writing incorporates the complex rhythms of which he is a master and does it with skill that melds jazz, Latin and Caribbean folk strains into music so individual that it defies classification. Repeated hearings disclose new harmonic depths, rhythmic wizardry and surprises like the unison bebop saxophone section passages in the track called “Through Culture and Tradition” and the forthright counterpoint in “My Home.”

However, repeated hearings can require listener commitment and a fair amount of patience. The voices often do not augment the music but collide with it. In some instances they are simply distracting, in some poorly recorded. Behind the voices, sounds of the city no doubt intended to add local color can sometimes override concentration on the music. Those flaws do not negate Zenón’s accomplishment, but they detract from it.

Delfeayo Marsalis, The Last Southern Gentlemen (Troubadour Jass)
The Marsalis brother who plays trombone teams up with his pianist father Ellis, bassist John Clayton and drummer Marvin “Smitty” Smith for 11 standards and two originals. The music reflects Delfeayo’s (and Ellis’s) penchant for class in repertoire and performance. Their ballads, particularly “Nancy,” are exquisite. In a brisk version of “Speak Low,” the CD’s longest track, father’s and son’s solos and their exchanges with Smith demonstrate that that a fast tempo need not limit elegance. It is an indicator of the equanimity suffusing the production that in his literate liner note essay Delfeayo quotes Miss Manners (Judith Martin) about the influence of African slaves on development of the storied Southern graciousness of the pre-Civil War era. Delfeayo’s use of a wa-wa mute and a New Orleans street-beat treatment of the Sesame Street theme make it one of the album’s many delights.

George Van Eps, Once In A While (Jump/Delmark)

Van Eps (1913-1998) is a hero to guitarists for his development of a seven-string instrument that, combined with his chording technique, made it possible for him and succeeding generations of guitarists to accompany their own solos. He does that in this reissue of recordings he made in 1946 and 1949 for the Jump label. He also interacts with pianist Stan Wrightsman and saxophonist Eddie Miller, whom Cannonball Adderley once called, “the first of the cool tenors.” Supremely relaxed and irresistibly rhythmic, Van Eps shines on 25 tracks. None is much longer than three minutes. None needs to be.

More reviews of recent releases to come on Rifftides

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The new video recording of an acclaimed theatre piece recounts the surreal workings of pianist Fred Hersch’s mind during a long medically induced coma. Documentaries about trumpeter Clifford Brown and the composer, arranger and vibraharpist Gary McFarland recall major artists who died as their brilliant careers were flowering.

In 2008 Hersch had been feeling unwell and one day found himself unable to get out of his bathtub. His partner Scott Morgan rushed him to New York’s St. Vincent‘s Hospital, where doctors discovered that he had pneumonia. They eventually determined that the condition was unrelated to the AIDS/HIV that Hersch has kept at bay for more than two decades. (The DVD was released on World Aids Day, December 1.) Still, the pneumonia was so severe that the doctors made the unusual decision to put him into a deep sleep that would help protect him from tissue infection until it was possible to treat the disorder.

The coma lasted six weeks, during which Hersch had dreams, some beautiful, some bizarre, some funny, all dramatic. He remembered many of them when he returned to consciousness. He told his friend the theatrical producer Herschel Garfein about the dreams. In 2005 the two had created an admired musical setting of Walt Whitman’s Leaves Of Grass. Now, they set about using Hersch’s coma dreams as the basis of a jazz theatre production.

The presentation was recorded in performance before an audience at Columbia University’s Miller Theatre in the spring of 2013. It is a wondrous blending of Garfein’s story telling, new music by Hersch and virtuoso acting by Michael Winther, who also sings beautifully. Winther plays both Hersch and Morgan, often subtly melding the characters, delivering their lines conversationally without sacrificing anything of timing or the individuality Garfein wrote into the parts. He ranges around the stage, fading into the wings when the focus goes to Hersch and the 11-piece ensemble conducted by Greg Kallor. Judicious lighting shifts are part of the success of such moments. The stagecraft is simple and canny. Eerie rear screen projections are important to the atmosphere. Front screen transparencies now and then aid the narrative.

Hersch (pictured) performs with bassist John Hébert and drummer John Hollenbeck in his rhythm section. The horns include trumpeter Ralph Alessi, saxophonist and flutist Adam Kolker. Among the strings are violinist Laura Seaton and cellist Dave Eggar. Hersch has moving solo moments. The full chamber orchestra plays compositions that enhance Winther’s descriptions of the dreams. In one sequence, Hersch and Thelonious Monk are confined in cages and ordered to write new pieces. Whoever finishes first will be freed. Hersch is in a panic. Monk is relaxed and smiling. In another, Hersch dreams that he and Morgan are in a huge airplane outfitted like a luxury hotel or spa. Served by exotic flight attendants, Hersch orders “a Bombay, a Tanqueray, give me that old Jim Beam. I’ll have a Manhattan and an Old Fashioned. Where is my daquiri?” He gets drunk. Morgan gets worried. In a dream sequence called “The Knitters,” Hersch tells of finding himself looking down at a group of women, perhaps in a courtyard. They are knitting, and whispering, “We end as we begin.” He puzzles over what they symbolize—the hope of life, the inevitability of death, the Fates? Kolker’s churning tenor saxophone solo reflects on the answer.

In “The Jazz Diner in the Woods,” Hersch is consigned to play a dreadful gig backing an incompetent singer. We catch glimpses of a menu featuring dishes like Don Cherry Pie, Jimmy Cobb Salad, Mysterioso Meatlof, Bright Mississippi Mud Pie. Here, the alto sax solo is a slice of bebop served by Bruce Williamson. Hersch has a sense of humor in his coma dreams.

Toward the end, Hersch’s brain summons up “The Orb,” a green glow that seems to contain Scott’s face. He senses Scott saying, “Come to me. I love you.” For a month and a half, Scott has been by Fred’s side in the hospital, massaging his arms, speaking to him, hoping but never certain that Fred will return to consciousness. In a final sequence, the real Fred Hersch improvises a beautiful soliloquy, then gets up from the piano, looks over at Winther playing Fred Hersch on parallel exercise bars and becomes his own mirror image matching Winther’s movements. He is learning to walk. He is on his slow way back to the recovery that has allowed him to resume his career in full.

This summary doesn’t begin to suggest the intricacy of the Garfein script or the subtlety and beauty of Hersch’s music. As often with superior works of the imagination, it may not be possible to absorb the production’s complexities in one viewing.

Within its first two minutes, this skillful documentary tells of Clifford Brown’s death. The trumpeter’s presence and example remain so pervasive in jazz that the mere statement of the fact can still administer a shock. Brown’s life ended in a crash in the rain as he slept in the back seat of a car on a Pennsylvania highway just after midnight on June 27, 1956. He was not yet 26. By the age of 18 his mastery of the instrument was so complete that after Dizzy Gillespie first heard him, he said, “How in the hell can somebody who plays the trumpet like that not be known by me?”

Soon enough, everyone who seriously followed modern jazz knew. This film produced by veteran music educator Don Glanden tells Brown’s short story through the recollections of members of his family, teachers, colleagues, and friends with whom he grew up in Wilmington, Delaware. The soundtrack, with rare exceptions, is from Brown’s recordings. Interviews, dovetailed to create a narrative flow, include insights from Robert “Boysie” Lowery, Brown’s first trumpet teacher when Clifford was 12.

Running commentary comes from trumpeters Gillespie, Donald Byrd, Arturo Sandoval and Clora Bryant; collaborators including Max Roach, Harold Land, Sonny Rollins, Herb Geller, Jimmy Heath and Quincy Jones; and—most movingly—the late LaRue Brown Watson, the trumpeter’s widow. Rollins tells of calling on Brown, years after his death, for inspiration when his own flagged. LaRue speaks of quickly progressing from skepticism about the value of Clifford’s music to being swept off her feet when he asked her to “marry my music and me.” The clip is perfectly placed in the production.

Glenden uses the classic documentary approach of letting the film tell the story without a narrator. He creates an understanding of Brown’s congenial but firm personality, his clean life in a hard living milieu and the dedication behind what more than one observer identifies as the trumpeter’s genius.

Gary McFarland thrived for a decade as one of the most admired young artists in modern jazz. In 1971 he may have been on his way to wide popular success when he was either murdered or died of a foolish mistake. He swallowed a dose of the artificial heroin called methadone and suffered a fatal heart attack. He was 38. No investigation has determined whether McFarland and a friend knowingly drank the methadone or someone slipped it into their drinks at a lower Manhattan bar. Both died, McFarland almost instantly of a heart attack, his friend the writer David Burnett in a coma a few days later.

Now, despite the self-renewing freshness of his work, McFarland is largely overlooked outside of a core of admirers whose memories circumvent the quick-replacement mentality of the modern music business. This film by Kristian St. Clair could help lift the veil around the work of a musician whose quick rise from a small Oregon town to the top of the New York jazz milieu led the critic Gene Lees to identify him as an adult prodigy. In his scores for Gerry Mulligan, Anita O’Day, John Lewis, Stan Getz, Bob Brookmeyer, Bill Evans and others, McFarland managed to make his harmonies rich while also open and sunny. Unrestricted by conventional scoring practice, he created unique relationships among sections of the orchestra and produced an identifiable musical personality. His later work embraces a lighthearted pop-rock-samba sensibility but also, in the album America The Beautiful: An Account of Its Disappearance, a clear-eyed evaluation of the country’s 1960s foreign policy, political and environmental quagmire.

The new DVD, re-edited from an earlier version, is expanded with more and better images of McFarland in action, including the making of his famous Fresca commercial in a television studio snowstorm. The film places McFarland in a community that in the 1960s was still enjoying what a number of critics and historians of the music, including this one, have identified as the final period of a golden age of jazz in New York. The closeness of that community and the fellowship of its members are highlighted in a section of the film devoted to the midtown Manhattan bar Jim And Andy’s, off-duty headquarters for dozens of the music’s leading figures.

St. Clair’s film reports everything known about the circumstances of McFarland’s death, including the sparse recollection of drummer Gene Gammage, who survived drinking some of the methadone that killed McFarland and Burnett. It has interviews with McFarland’s widow. Musicians who express unreserved admiration for McFarland and his work include Grady Tate, Clark Terry, Bob Brookmeyer, Steve Kuhn, Bill Kirchner, Richard Davis, Gerry Mulligan, Sy Johnson and Antonio Carlos Jobim.

Forty-three years on, it grows less likely that the mystery of McFarland’s death will be solved. The importance of this film is its documentation of his intelligence, his joy in making music, the enduring quality of much of his work and the standing he enjoyed among an impressive cross section of his contemporaries.

Footnote

It is likely that to most of the listening public, McFarland was a major star compared with Warne Marsh (1927-1987). A tenor saxophonist, Marsh was one of the musicians who studied and performed with pianist Lennie Tristano. With and without Tristano, he often teamed in influential recordings with alto saxophonist Lee Konitz. Marsh inspired contemporary saxophonists who have gained far more renown than he did, among them Mark Turner and Anthony Braxton. His son, K.C. Marsh, intends to call attention to his father’s importance by making a documentary film. As most such projects must in the climate of today’s cultural economy, Marsh is asking for help in producing Warne Marsh: An Improvised Life. For details about what he needs, and to see him make his case, go here.

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Alexander Eydelman, who founded the Moscow Jazz Art Club in 1993 and has been its only president, writes stories under the name Aleksander Antoshin. Through the help of Rifftides Moscow correspondent Svetlana Ilicheva, Mr. Eydelman has agreed to our publishing one of his stories.  The tale set in the 1960s helps put in perspective some of the ways in which Russian jazz fans bucked the Soviet system’s suppression of their efforts to hear American music.

The alarm clock rang at eight sharp. I cursed this damned punctual tin can and then, forcing my eyes open, stared lifelessly into the empty whiteness of the ceiling. I knew I had to make myself get up, I definitely had to—since I had promised Valery, Val, my best friend, to help him with the repairs on his can, an ancient “Moskvitch.” I raised my hands, palms gripping an imaginary gymnastic bar, a habitual exercise, and then—writhing and groaning—struggled to pull myself up, but every time, after each painful effort, my hands—with this imaginary bar—ended by falling back heavily on my chest. To anyone watching, it would all have looked funny and even idiotic. But there was no one to disturb my romping around as I fought against this stubborn ghostly bar. Another series of jerks—hands, legs, body almost in a knot—and a mighty spring inside me threw my body and soul out of the bed.

The outside door shut, leaving behind me the wet darkness of the entrance hall, and I was immediately immersed in the warmth and bright light of the summer morning that had enveloped the city. Val lived in an apartment block not far away, on the bank of the Yauza river, a tributary of the Moskva. I set off beside the cast-iron parapet of the embankment. The river ran by, its murky waters patterned with oily stains rushing towards its estuary. In the courtyard, by his father’s old crate, a Moskvitch, stood young Val. His early bald patch made him look much older than I, though we were the same age.

‘Well, Val, let’s get started, we haven’t much time. Got a date at four,’ I said.

I lifted the car with a jack, spread a mat under it and crawled on my back to take off the gear-box. Everything in this jalopy was greasy, dirty, everything leaked and dripped. Moreover, it appeared that the clutch was broken, too. Curses and groans accompanied my superhuman efforts to undo the rusted bolts and nuts as I gradually managed to make some progress. Then, at last, the gear-box was free.
It was at this moment, that I suddenly heard the music – mysterious and unfamiliar. It was jazz, I knew, jazz I loved so much, as I used to spend nights listening to it on my short-wave radio (1). The music I was hearing now sounded, however, absolutely new to me.

(1)In the early Sixties, when these events took place, as well as in the earlier period, the Soviet regime did not favour this kind of music, so young jazz lovers usually listened to the nightly jazz programmes on the BBC or the Voice of America.

The pianist played an ornate, lacy melody evoking associations with Bach’s themes. Absolutely precise phrases, each in its proper place, lined up in a polyphonic series, mutually complementing and merging into one intriguing and enchanting tune. A saxophone entered with a beautiful mellow shave joining the current of piano tones, and followed them with improvisation full of trilling drive and then, solo, building up an airy crystal-clear edifice of sounds.

I crept out from under the car. Val gazed at me inquiringly.

‘What ‘s the matter? Need something?’

‘No. Yes. I need to know, where that music’s coming from.’

‘From Zhorka’s flat. See that window on the second floor? He must be drinking now, I reckon, is Zhorka. When he’s had a couple he usually puts his tape-recorder on to max.’

Dirty and messy as I was I set off in the direction which Val had shown me and, stopping under the window, looked up. The alto sax went on weaving its intricate and, at the same time, simple and melodious pattern. It seemed as though this music was spiralling high up, I could visualise it clearly – winding higher and higher, into the skies. Heavenly music. But who was playing it?

My legs carried me to the front door drawn by the sound, which was getting stronger as I approached. Poor neighbours, they must hate this Zhorka, and his jazz. Second floor. Volume at full. White button of the doorbell. I looked at my hands, covered in grease, then at the shining whiteness of the button, and cautiously pressed it with my nail. The recorder, at top volume, seemed about to explode, and hardly anybody could hear my short, shy ringing over the music. Then I resolutely pressed my dirty finger on this virgin white button again. At last, the door opened. On the threshold, in the twilight of the hallway, stood a lad in a white T-shirt. His round face gleamed red – with booze and with the joy of life reigning over these premises. His small round eyes beamed tipsy good humour and his lips sported an amicable smile.

‘Who’s this, Snow-white?!‘ he said. ‘Snouu-wahy-tie, Snouu-wahy-tie!’ he kept repeating, choking with laughter and rejoicing at his own joke. Exhausted with laughing, he stared at me again, and asked:

‘Who are you? And why are you so dirty? What do you want?’

‘I want to know what music that is, and who’s playing?’

‘Ah, that’s it. C’min then, Snow-whitie,’ he said again collapsing with laughter.

I stepped forward into the room with the roaring recorder, I saw sheets of music paper and copies of American magazines scattered over the piano, an exquisite candlestick , a big decanter and glasses on a coffee table, and a Himalayan mass of empty bottles in the corner.

‘My name’s Zhorka. Want a drink?’

I introduced myself and agreed to the treat. Zhorka took two tumblers and poured some liquor from a decanter.

‘Straight?’ he asked.

‘Straight,’ I said promptly – not thinking about the consequences. I took the glass and tossed down its contents. Fiery fluid – it was pure alcohol – caught my throat, my mouth was burning, tears spurted from my eyes. I groped for water – and at once found a glass in my hand: Zhora who had been observing me in silence, and with interest, had thoughtfully prepared it beforehand. Then he drank his own glass and we began a dialogue which has continued for many years now.

‘Stunning music! This concert was recorded in 1957, it’s called “Jazz Impressions of Eurasia”. Know who’s playing?’ he asked. ‘It’s the Dave Brubeck Quartet. Know Brubeck? No? Fantastic pianist, yes, he is. Top-level! There is also Paul Desmond with alto, then, too, Joe Morello on drums, Jo Benjamin on bass. All the compositions are Brubeck’s. Now they’re playing his dedication to Chopin, named “Dziękuję!” – meaning “Thank you!” in Polish. Now, listen, listen!’

A drunken tear appeared in his eye.

I listened to Brubeck’s solo, enjoying every sound, every harmony, every passage of this miraculously subtle, delicate melody bridging times – bringing together the 19th and the 20th centuries.

Then the composition ended. Zhora switched the tape-recorder off and with undisguised curiosity launched into questioning me on my modest person, my background, then asking where I got my infatuation with jazz, what I had read on the subject and what I read in general, and what I usually did in my leisure time. I answered all his questions in detail appreciating the fact that he was listening attentively to my spontaneous revelations, not once interrupting me.

‘And what was the first tune, the one I heard in the courtyard?’ I asked switching from answers to questions.
Zhora said nothing but went to the recorder and put it on “Rewind”, then started the tape from the beginning, and, as the first sounds filled the room, he asked :

‘This one, you mean? Oh, that’s a real masterpiece! It’s called Brandenburg Gate, but it’s not by Bach, it’s Brubeck’s own piece!’

We gave in to the music, for a long while uttering not a single word and wholly absorbed by the fascinating tunes. I saw, however, that now and then Zhora glanced at me – to see how attentive I was and how receptive to the music. I could understand his curiosity, I realised that this exquisite concert was a kind of litmus paper to test me.
Keeping silent and once in a while draining our glasses we went on listening up to the end of the tape. From the start, Zhora had been sitting at the piano and, as the music progressed and the liquor in the decanter accordingly regressed, a sentimental mood more and more crept over him, leaving wet traces on his red cheeks. Suddenly he started playing a tune in the same mood as the dedication to Chopin which we had just heard, it was also beautiful and unknown to me. Zhora finished the core theme and, driving it with his right hand into series of variations, while his left hand added even more ornate chords.

‘And what’s this? What terrific music!’

‘Like it? Very good, matey. This, my dear, is Mazurka in A minor by Chopin. Good music, as you’ll agree. And it may not be quite jazz, at least, not the kind we are used to… But only fatheads, narrow-minded fatheads, and there are plenty of those, stick to one single thing and refuse everything else. Savvy? And, now, look at Brubeck, a born American, a jazzman to the bone, he wrote marvellous music, but dedicated it to the great Europeans…’
Suddenly there was a whistle outside the window. And at last remembering Valery, I looked over the balcony.

There was my poor abandoned friend, helplessly waving his arms and appealing to my conscience. At this moment Zhora came to my rescue:

‘Val, stop being silly! Your mate won’t do anything useful for you, anyway, not after all he’s drunk. You guys better call it a day. Come on up now. There is some booze left for you!’

Val thought for a bit, shrugged his shoulders and ran for the entrance door.

We revelled late into the night. Zhora’s old Soviet-made recorder worked non-stop, the American jazzmen, one after another, testing its stamina. Never before had I heard so much wonderful jazz, I was brimming over with happiness, realising that something very important had happened in my life…

* * *

Years passed. In 1996, I found myself in Copenhagen at a concert of the great pianist Michel Petrucciani, an unhappy dwarf in life and a happy giant in music. The concert was in a circus building packed to the brim. Petrucciani played solo; there was absolute silence in the huge auditorium, but at the end of each piece the audience exploded with thunderous applause.

The programme came to an end, the audience stood applauding and shouting encores. The little man walked on his crutches back to the piano, sat down and thought. The audience froze. It was as though you could hear the musician’s heartbeat. And then he touched the keys. With the first chord I felt a lump in my throat and stinging in my eyes. And to prevent myself from crying, I took deep breaths. Michel was playing Chopin’s Mazurka in A minor.

During Brubeck’s last visit to Moscow, there was a reception in the Spaso-House, the residence of the US Ambassador, and the Maestro played there with Russian musicians. As the time for the last piece came, Dave said he was going to play his favourite piece. And sitting down at the piano, he played his magical dedication to Chopin – ‘Dzękuję!’.

#

©Alexander Eydelman

The author is the Founder (1993) and President of the Jazz Art Club in Moscow.
The story was translated by Rostislav V. Zolotarioff, a Moscow-based  freelance journalist .