100 Years of Bird

 

This morning I visited five internet sites professing to rank the greatest saxophonists of all-time. Four of the five bestowed the honor on Charlie Parker, and the fifth put him at number two behind John Coltrane. This accurately represents Bird’s foremost position in jazz hierarchy.

My first exposure to Bird was not a recording, but an arrangement of the bebop classic “Groovin’ High.” When Bird recorded this uptempo tune with Dizzy Gillespie, his 16-bar solo represented perfect balance of improvisation and composition. The arranger transcribed the solo note for note and cleverly added four supporting saxophone parts. The result was an exquisite blend of melodic and harmonic elements. It was as difficult as any classical etude.

Today marks Charlie Parker’s 100^th birthday, and his influence has not diminished since his death in 1955 at age 34. Bird and a small number of like-minded instrumentalists changed the course of jazz and brought an enthusiastic cadre of young musicians along for the ride.

Charles McPherson offered a typical story of the effect of hearing Bird for the first time, in our 1998 interview:

CM: I grew up in Joplin, Missouri, which is a little town south of St. Louis. I was there up until about nine years of age then I moved to Detroit. But during the time that I was there, I did have occasion to see various bands, coming from Kansas City, territorial bands. This is when I was  maybe six. Every year in the summertime these bands would come to this park in Joplin and play for a week. I was quite impressed with the bands, with the music and with the way the horns look, just the physicalities of the nice, gold, shiny horn.

During the 50s, you didn’t have jazz in the schools. We just played the regular school type things. We played marches and for football games, morning auditorium and all that. It was fun playing and I really liked it, This is what I wanted to do. There were some jazz records around my house, but not a lot. And I did get interested in jazz and a student at school told me about Charlie Parker. I’d never heard of him. And he said, “You should really check this Charlie Parker out.” So I did. I went to a little candy shop in my neighborhood and on the juke box there was a Charlie Parker record, a little 45rpm. I think he was playing “Tico Tico,” which is a Brazilian samba song. And it just blew me away. I knew immediately that this is what I wanted to do. It made perfect sense to me. I didn’t need to be nurtured or taught how to listen to this music. I was about 14, when I heard that, I had no history of hearing a lot of jazz records, I had no concept of what’s considered bebop and modern jazz or any of that. It was like this is the way music should go. This is the way an instrumentalist should approach this. I felt that. I immediately said okay, I’ve got to get these records. Then I was told that this guy was a member of a group of musicians that play a certain genre of jazz, and it’s called bebop. There was like a school of them. So I said oh? That’s what that is. I had no idea that Charlie Parker represented anything but a jazz musician. I knew nothing about schools and styles. Then I just zeroed in on that. He was definitely my main influence.

View Charles’ YouTube video here.

The draw of Parker’s innovations compelled numerous aspiring jazz artists to New York City. Phil Woods offered his own variation on Bird’s magnetism:

PW: I graduated high school at the age of 16 and I wanted to go on with my music education. I went to the Manhattan School of Music for a summer course. I wanted to be in New York, that’s where Charlie Parker was.

MR:         You had to major on the clarinet, didn’t you?

PW:         Yeah. But clarinet, I think it served me well. I could work on my Mozart and with the keyboard stuff work on Bach, and I went to composers workshops. I sort of minored in composition. But at night I would study bebop, Charlie Parker, I’d have the radio on and listen to broadcasts from Birdland.

MR:         When was the first time you saw Charlie Parker play live, and what kind of effect did it have on you?

PW:         The first music I ever played of jazz, my teacher gave me transcribed Benny Carter solos. And then within that month, Ellington came to town and I saw Johnny Hodges. And then I picked up the latest record of this guy called Charlie Parker and it was “KoKo.” And that was it. I mean between Benny Carter, Hodges and Parker all in one dose, I said yeah, man, let me at it, my course was very clear, especially after hearing Bird. The first time I saw Bird would be on 52^nd Street when I was studying with Lenny Tristano, I was still in high school. That’s where I first heard Charlie Parker. I think he was sitting in with Milt Jackson and Howard McGhee.

MR:         What kind of person was he to you?

PW:         Sweet. I remember one day he asked me, “Did you eat today, young man?” I mean he didn’t know me from a hole in the wall, I was just another alto player looking at his heels, and he said, “did you eat today.” The misconception is that Charlie Parker was stealing everybody’s money and using it to buy drugs, but he was very nice to young musicians. That’s often overlooked. This is my only real Charlie Parker story up close — I was working in a place called the Nut Club in the Village, Sheridan Square. Playing for strippers, “Harlem Nocturne” ten times a night. This joint had so much class they would hand you like little wooden hammers as you walked in the door, so you could beat the shit out of the table for your favorite strippers. So somebody said, “Bird’s across the street jamming.” And he was over at Arthur’s Bar, which is still there to this day, it’s a little dinky joint. I walked in and there was Bird and he was playing on the baritone sax. Now let me preface this, at this period I didn’t know if my mouthpiece was right, I didn’t like the reed, I don’t like this horn, it’s not happening, I need new stuff, you know. So I got up my nerve and said, “Mr. Parker, perhaps you’d like to play my alto?” And he said, “That would be very nice, son.” Man I ran across Seventh Avenue and I got my horn, and I’m sitting — Bird was there and I was sitting there and the piano was there, just a drummer — a snare drum and a piano and Bird. And I’m sitting there. I hand him the horn. He played “Long Ago and Far Away,” Jerome Kern. And I’m listening to this guy and it seems there’s nothing wrong with my saxophone. The saxophone sounds pretty darn good, you know what I mean? And he says, “Now you play.” And I says oh Jesus. When kids talk about being awestruck, I know about awestruck. I did my feeble imitation of the master. He said, “Sounds real good, son.” Oh man, this time I flew over Seventh Avenue, and I played the Bejesus out of “Harlem Nocturne” that night. But I mean just those few words were so important.

Here’s a link to the full Phil Woods interview.

The lore of Parker’s talent and life are legion, most prominent among them is the story behind his nickname. Legend has it that a yard bird (chicken) crossing the road fell victim to the band’s car, and Charlie insisted on bringing it to their destination for dinner. Buddy Collette offered an competing tale in his interview in Los Angeles:

BC:  Bird had this meeting with Jimmy Cheatham. He said that all those stories are phony, that’s not what happened. He said when he was 14 years old he used to go out to the park with a couple of his buddies, a drummer or a guitar or bass player. Before school, at 6, 7 in the morning, so they could get a little practice in because at home they couldn’t get it in. They’d get home from school and they’d have to do work, so they’d get this hour or two early to play, just jam and do tunes and things. And he said that the neighbors could hear them. They were about a half a mile from the residential area. The cops would come by and they’d wave to them. They were just friendly neighborhood kids and they’d be jamming. So they said the neighbors called him the Bird. “Oh that’s just the Bird out there practicing in the morning.” So it was a kind of a cute story. They wanted to play so much that they would go out there, but that horn would always be going.

 

Buddy’s YouTube is located here.

In the 90s I recall a Fed Ex television commercial featuring the world’s fastest talker. His supersonic, perfectly articulated verbal delivery came to mind when I recently listened to some classic Charlie Parker recordings. His rapid-fire ideas matched with peerless technique remains a wonder to behold, even 66 years after his death.

Still the One

Cannonball Adderley

Everyone has a short list of memorable events, occurrences that make such an impression that we can recall exactly where we were when they happened. I was born in 1950, so my list includes the Kennedy assassination, the first landing on the moon, and the Beatles appearances on the “Ed Sullivan Show.” Also on my list is the date August 8, 1975. Forty years ago today, I was in my car outside Rome, New York when I heard the radio announce that Julian “Cannonball” Adderley had passed away.

I’ve written about Cannonball before, and he is still my all-time favorite jazz artist. As an up-and-coming saxophonist I was first influenced by the cool toned and somewhat dispassionate Paul Desmond, who became popular alongside Dave Brubeck. But Cannonball offered something else: a perfect balance of technique, tone, and passionate delivery. The fact that he was an engaging speaker and invited the listener into the music was a big plus.

I was so into Cannonball’s recordings that I noticed when he switched saxophones, from a King Super 20 to the more iconic Selmer. I was not the only fan who noticed. During my interview with Charles McPherson, a major player in the world of jazz saxophone, we discussed this change.

MR:   Can we get a shot of you holding your horn? I’m trying to recognize what kind of horn it is.

Charles McPherson

CM:   It’s a King. Most people play a Selmer, and this is a King Super 20.

MR:   Yeah. Cannonball used to play it.

CM:   Yeah Cannonball and Bird. Yeah. And it’s a very nice horn, it’s very human-like. Very much like the human voice.

MR:   It’s interesting you say that because when I hear your tone — actually the thing that attracts me to a player is the tone first. And I hear that in your sound. And I noticed when Cannonball switched from King to Selmer that I was disappointed.

CM:   Unbelievable. I mean I know that. But I’m surprised that — well you said you play saxophone.

MR:   Yeah, but I heard it.

CM:   Isn’t that something, because I did too. And so you really do know. Because that’s a subtle thing, but it is a difference. And I remember it as a CD or record, whatever, where he did play Selmer for a while. And it was great, and it’s still great ‘cause he’s great. And I remember that oh this is great, but it doesn’t have that pop or that warmth either. And the Selmer is a great horn, and he sounded great on it. But this King, it was just something about that that, I don’t know just Cannonball sounded great on this. And Charlie Parker sounded great on this horn. I’ve heard other people on this horn that don’t sound so great, and I hope I’m not one of them.

I’d like to take a brief look at three recordings that personified the Cannonball Adderley legacy.

Cannonball burst into the New York jazz scene in the mid-1950s and his 1957 recording of the uptempo “Spectacular” demonstrated his mastery of the demanding and sometimes frantic bop style. He had so absorbed the language of Charlie Parker that the critics jumped on the bandwagon and hailed him as the new Bird. “Spectacular” is an impressive display of technique and chordal-based improvisation.

Ten years later Cannonball and his quintet had progressed into a style that critics called “soul jazz.” From the album “Mercy Mercy Mercy,” “Sticks” provides a striking example of Cannonball in full blues/gospel/soul mode. “The Sticks” is a 12-bar blues with an ear-catching melody. Brother Nat plays three exciting choruses; near the end of his third he engages in some stuttering double-tonguing. Cannonball, always aware of his musical surroundings, jumps on Nat’s phrasing at 1:27, roaring into a solo that has the live audience completely in his corner.

One year later, again in a live situation, Cannonball displayed his masterful approach to a ballad. The song “Somewhere” from “West Side Story” provided him with a highly expressive vehicle and his huge tone filled the room. If you listen to Cannon’s voice at the end of the song, it sounds like he actually choked himself up with the intensity of the song.

Drummer Roy McCurdy spent twelve years with Cannonball and spoke enthusiastically about his experience. Here he speaks of a unique method for keeping in sync with the brothers:

Roy McCurdy

RM:   Did you ever see Cannon and Nat live?

MR:   Oh, yeah.

RM:   They were really funny to me, because I was behind them all the time, looking at them. And this brother was short and Cannon was tall. And they had a way of snapping their fingers and moving, and their behinds were both in sync you know. And they would be snapping and the behinds would be in sync.

MR:   It’s almost as if you guys were creating a style as you went along.

RM:   Yeah. It was.

MR:   Did you have a name for it or did you let other people name it?

RM:   We just let other people name it. It was just music for us you know. We didn’t want to be in one particular slot all the time, like just straight ahead jazz or something. We wanted to be able to do all kinds of things and have some fun. And not only did we do funk and soul and Gospel and jazz, we also experimented with different time figures and things too at that time. Like 7/4 time, 5/4 time and things like that. We did “Seventy-four Miles Away.” That album was 7/4 time.

Vocalist Nancy Wilson credits Cannonball with jumpstarting her career, and during our interview I told her of my enthrallment with one of her early albums, “Nancy Wilson/Cannonball Adderley.” Oddly enough, the critics were not kind to this recording.

MR:   This particular album, I can’t imagine anybody saying anything bad about it.

Nancy Wilson

NW:   Oh it was the fact that Cannonball Adderley had kind of stepped out of the jazz thing, into the pop. Because this was a huge across the board album. It was not just a jazz album. “The Masquerade Is Over,” “Sleeping Bee,” these songs just popped out everywhere. And that was the good thing about radio in those days and music is that the focus wasn’t so narrow then. We were able to play concert venues, Carnegie Hall where we were also able to go into, the south side of Chicago and play The Southerland. So you could do so many more things then than you can today. The labels kind of keep you out of places. Whereas before we tried to broaden the scope. I believe that Cannonball Adderley took jazz out of the sawdust and he was one of the more commercial jazz artists. And he made his audience understand what he was doing.

It’s hard to say what Cannonball Adderley would be doing with his musical career if he had lived. Other artists, such as Benny Carter and Milt Hinton remained productive into their eighties and nineties. The avante garde saxophonist Kidd Jordan offered his opinion on what Cannonball’s music might have evolved into, and gave us a bit of insight into his personality:

Kidd Jordan

KJ:   Cannonball was one of my favorite players too. And look, changes didn’t mean nothing to him, you know that huh? Cannonball was playing by ear. I mean he could hear changes like that, and that’s why he went and locked in all them patterns that people was playing. Well you know Cannonball, and he sounded like a first alto player, that was another thing.

MR:   That’s for sure.

KJ:   That’s right. Cannonball could lead us saxes man. I listened to that Cannonball and they’re talking about first alto players, as a soloist he’s got the same thing that all those first alto players had. You know? And changes didn’t mean nothing. Believe me. Cannonball could play through ‘cause he could hear ‘em. Now that’s a case that that’s a complete musician. And look, before he died he told me he said, “Kidd, you know what? I’m going to play some of that crazy stuff, you see the next album I do? I’m gonna do some of the crazy stuff you’re doing.” But he died before that. Now that would have been something.

MR:   What kind of guy was he?

KJ:   Oh easy, happy-go-lucky, I mean one of the most beautiful cats I ever knew. And I got — he and Alvin Batiste was great friends. And me and Alvin was brother-in-laws you know, we’ve been brother-in-laws for 50 years now, so every time Cannon would come in they’d be cooking gumbo and all, and it would be party time when he’d come to town.

I know I’ll spend this weekend listening to some of my favorite Cannonball from the LPs that I saved my money for back in the early 60s. You can read our previous blog on Cannonball entitled, “Mercy Mercy” from May of 2009.