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| Centennial Celebration |
| Lester Young |
| első megjelenés éve: 2009 |
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| (2009)
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CD |
| 3.726 Ft
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| 1. | Jumpin' With Symphony Sid
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| 2. | Tea For Two
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| 3. | I Can't Get Started (With You)
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| 4. | Pennies From Heaven
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| 5. | I'm Confessin' (That I Love You)
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| 6. | Oh Lady, Be Good
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| 7. | Just You, Just Me
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| 8. | Undecided
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| 9. | I Cover The Waterfront
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| 10. | Lester Leaps In (mislabeled as "Up-N Adam")
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Jazz / Bop, Cool, Swing
Lester Young - Sax (Tenor)
Abbey Anna Project Assistant
Andrew Pham Project Assistant
Ashley Kahn Liner Notes
Bill Potts Piano, Engineer, Producer, Original Recording Producer
Chris Clough Project Assistant
Earl Swope Trumpet
Evelyn Haddad Project Assistant
Flip Phillips Sax (Tenor)
Hank Jones Piano
Herb Ellis Guitar
J.C. Heard Drums
Jim Lucht Drums
Jimmy Hole Package Design
Joe Tarantino Mastering
Larissa Collins Art Direction
Max Roach Drums
Nick Phillips Compilation Producer
Norman Granz Original Recording Producer, Producer
Norman Williams Bass
Oscar Peterson Piano
Ray Brown Bass
Rikka Arnold Editorial
Roy Eldridge Trumpet
A 100th birthday celebration of a true jazz giant; tenor saxophonist Lester Young. This collection celebrates the mature Lester Young of the 1950s, a time when his powers of eloquence and subtlety remained undiminished, while his tone had developed a more mature--one could say darker--edge. Lester Young is considered one of the three most important tenor saxophonists of all time (along with John Coltrane and Coleman Hawkins). He is one of the true jazz giants; a man who became a legend by coming up with a completely unique conception in which to play his horn. This collection features performances by Ray Brown, Roy Eldridge, Herb Ellis, J.C. Heard, Hank Jones, Jim Lucht, Oscar Peterson, Bill Potts, Flip Phillips, Max Roach, Earl Swope and Norman Williams, and includes insightful liner notes by noted jazz historian Ashley Kahn.
This collection celebrates the mature Lester Young of the 1950s, a reminder of a time when he would blow into town for a week performing with a local rhythm section, or for a one-night appearance as part of an all-star, Jazz at the Philharmonic tour. A time when his powers of eloquence and subtlety remained undiminished, while his tone had developed a more mature-one could say darker-edge.
Tracks 1 through 7 are culled from recordings made in December 1956 during Young's week-long run at Olivia Davis's Patio Lounge in Washington DC. The house band was the Bill Potts Trio-pianist Potts, bassist Norman Williams, and drummer Jim Lucht-who were all in their mid-twenties and thrilled to be accompanying the 47-year old master in residence. "Our six-night labor of love," Potts called it.
Young arrived with a repertoire that was pretty much set in place-rhythm numbers, slower ballads, and a few original blues. There were also a few newer melodies he had discovered "by listening to records by Sinatra and other good popular singers, which he preferred to current jazz," according to historian Dan Morgenstern.
"Jumpin' with Symphony Sid," one of Young's best-known compositions, abounds with good humor and his own funky feel for the blues. The oldie "Tea for Two" is taken at a brisk clip; Young's five choruses ring with playful invention. Note the four-note sequence he toys with (a kind of "sheets of sound" moment) and returns to later (1:43 and 2:12). About Young's ability to ably handle faster tempos, Morgenstern writes:
"One of the fascinations of late Lester is the degree to which he was able to lay back on the stream of jazz time, like a great swimmer knows how to let the current carry him, but not to where he doesn't want to be. Rhythm was his springboard, swinging his element..."
"I Can't Get Started" takes its time, and Young's solo is an excellent example of his priority for the pretty. The same can be said of "Pennies from Heaven"-a tune so overplayed even by 1956 standards, yet lovingly treated by Young's lyrical mastery. Listen to his happy exhortations during the sidemen solos, and his thank you in response to the "little claps"-what Young called applause. Also, catch what was the boisterous level of crowd noise-standard for the day, so unlike the church-like atmosphere of jazz clubs today.
"I'm Confessin' (That I Love You)" swings lightly and politely (to borrow from Satchmo), Young displaying his signature feel for the lower register of the horn. "Oh Lady, Be Good"-a tune Young had helped make a standard while with Basie-pushes up the tempo a couple of notches, as local trombonist Earl Swope sits in. "Just You, Just Me" (which Young liked to call "Just Us") reveals the authority with which Young could balance a delayed sense of time with a bright and buoyant feel for melody.
Young's 1956 performances are typical of his sound in a more intimate setting, while the final three tracks of this collection, pulled from Jazz at the Philharmonic tours of the early ‘50s, show off Young's more consciously public side. Produced by Norman Granz with a penchant for teaming up older swing-era veterans with more modern jazz and/or R&B-inspired players, the JATP traveling jam sessions proved on a nightly basis that jazz was essentially jazz, and that all great improvisers spoke the same language.
"Undecided," the chestnut made famous by Chick Webb with Ella Fitzgerald, was recorded in 1952 in Germany. In the pressure-cooker company of high-powered soloists like trumpeter Roy Eldridge, pianist Hank Jones and fellow tenor saxophonist Flip Phillips-as well as bassist Ray Brown and bebop master Max Roach-Young proves the lessons learned from years playing in horn sections. When called upon to wail and excite, wail he could and excite he did.
A year later in Hartford, Connecticut, Young blew alongside pianist Oscar Peterson's quartet of the day, which featured guitarist Herb Ellis, bassist Ray Brown, and drummer J. C. Heard. For "I Cover the Waterfront," obviously Young's showcase for the evening, he reaches for, and expertly tugs the emotional strings of the well-known tune. Fittingly, the evening's set and this collection close with Young's now ubiquitous flag-waver "Lester Leaps In"-eliciting whistles, cheers, and more little claps.
Today, Young's sound continues to cast its influence wide and far: it is one of the most recognizable of the jazz tradition, one part of the primer every creative musician should hear and must acknowledge. On the centenary of his birth, Young is deserving of top praise not only for the enduring template he created, but for maintaining a singular voice when others would have him be someone he was not.
Lester Young was, as Nat Hentoff has insightfully written, "a paradigm of live and let live, a loner who wondered why everybody didn't just cultivate his garden, growing whatever he wanted there, instead of honking and stomping in other folks' space."
He played as he lived, and the loneliness in his music was real. When Young died on March 15, 1959, he was just 49, living by himself in a hotel room in midtown Manhattan. "It's the same all over," he said in his last interview days before his death, "You fight for your life until death do you part, and then you got it made."
---Ashley Kahn, April 2009
Ashley Kahn is the author of A Love Supreme: The Story of John Coltrane's Signature Album, and other jazz titles. He often contributes to National Public Radio's "Morning Edition."
Lester Young
Active Decades: '30s, '40s and '50s
Born: Aug 27, 1909 in Woodville, MS
Died: Mar 15, 1959 in New York, NY
Genre: Jazz
Styles: Bop, Cool, Mainstream Jazz, Swing
Lester Young was one of the true jazz giants, a tenor saxophonist who came up with a completely different conception in which to play his horn, floating over bar lines with a light tone rather than adopting Coleman Hawkins' then-dominant forceful approach. A non-conformist, Young (nicknamed "Pres" by Billie Holiday) had the ironic experience in the 1950s of hearing many young tenors try to sound exactly like him.
Although he spent his earliest days near New Orleans, Lester Young lived in Minneapolis by 1920, playing in a legendary family band. He studied violin, trumpet, and drums, starting on alto at age 13. Because he refused to tour in the South, Young left home in 1927 and instead toured with Art Bronson's Bostonians, switching to tenor. He was back with the family band in 1929 and then freelanced for a few years, playing with Walter Page's Blue Devils (1930), Eddie Barefield in 1931, back with the Blue Devils during 1932-1933, and Bennie Moten and King Oliver (both 1933). He was with Count Basie for the first time in 1934 but left to replace Coleman Hawkins with Fletcher Henderson. Unfortunately, it was expected that Young would try to emulate Hawk, and his laid-back sound angered Henderson's sidemen, resulting in Pres not lasting long. After a tour with Andy Kirk and a few brief jobs, Lester Young was back with Basie in 1936, just in time to star with the band as they headed East. Young made history during his years with Basie, not only participating on Count's record dates but starring with Billie Holiday and Teddy Wilson on a series of classic small-group sessions. In addition, on his rare recordings on clarinet with Basie and the Kansas City Six, Young displayed a very original cool sound that almost sounded like altoist Paul Desmond in the 1950s. After leaving Count in 1940, Young's career became a bit aimless, not capitalizing on his fame in the jazz world. He co-led a low-profile band with his brother, drummer Lee Young, in Los Angeles until re-joining Basie in December 1943. Young had a happy nine months back with the band, recorded a memorable quartet session with bassist Slam Stewart, and starred in the short film Jammin' the Blues before he was drafted. His experiences dealing with racism in the military were horrifying, affecting his mental state of mind for the remainder of his life.
Although many critics have written that Lester Young never sounded as good after getting out of the military, despite erratic health he actually was at his prime in the mid- to late-'40s. He toured (and was well paid by Norman Granz) with Jazz at the Philharmonic on and off through the '40s and '50s, made a wonderful series of recordings for Aladdin, and worked steadily as a single. Young also adopted his style well to bebop (which he had helped pave the way for in the 1930s). But mentally he was suffering, building a wall between himself and the outside world, and inventing his own colorful vocabulary. Although many of his recordings in the 1950s were excellent (showing a greater emotional depth than in his earlier days), Young was bothered by the fact that some of his white imitators were making much more money than he was. He drank huge amounts of liquor and nearly stopped eating, with predictable results. 1956's Jazz Giants album found him in peak form as did a well documented engagement in Washington, D.C., with a quartet and a last reunion with Count Basie at the 1957 Newport Jazz Festival. But, for the 1957 telecast The Sound of Jazz, Young mostly played sitting down (although he stole the show with an emotional one-chorus blues solo played to Billie Holiday). After becoming ill in Paris in early 1959, Lester Young came home and essentially drank himself to death. Many decades after his death, Pres is still considered (along with Coleman Hawkins and John Coltrane) one of the three most important tenor saxophonists of all time.
---Scott Yanow, All Music Guide |
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