Nancy Wilson 1937-2018

On the heels of our tribute to Joe Williams, we now learn of the passing of vocalist Nancy Wilson at the age of 81. Nancy and Joe shared a number of parallel lines throughout their singing careers. They had a common manager in John Levy; they both recorded albums with Cannonball Adderley, George Shearing, and Count Basie; and both objected to being typecast as a certain style of vocalist. I was fortunate to sit with Nancy Wilson in November of 1995 for an interview, and she addressed the issue of stereotypes:

NW:   I have to say about jazz critics, they really gave me the pits for a while. They felt that the Cannonball Adderley album was a compromise for Cannon. Because I was a pop artist.

MR:   No kidding?

NW:   Oh, yes. You don’t know the stuff they did to us. But my point that I’ve always tried to stress is I came into this business with a gift, the voice is a given. It was a gift from God. I didn’t put any labels on it. I also decided to leave my home to do this, to be commercial. I mean the object of the game for me was why would I want to, why would anybody in their right mind want to give up their security, their home, all the things that mean happiness to me, to go out to only want to fulfill somebody else’s idea of who and what I am. I figured that I was going to do this on a major scale or I didn’t want to do it. Because I could go home, go to Carnegie Tech as opposed to Central State, and be a doctor or be something in medicine, and I’d have been fine. But the voice was always out front. But I have never apologized for being a commercial artist. That is why I do what I do, is to sell. I want to be heard, I want to reach as many people as I can. I believe in that mass thing. You know I want everybody to know who I am if I’m going to do it.

I recall being surprised to hear this recollection, as the Cannonball Adderley-Nancy Wilson LP is one of my absolute favorite recordings.

One thing Nancy did not have to deal with was performance anxiety. Again from her interview:

MR:   Can you recall as a child, were you always pretty comfortable in front of an audience? 

NW:   It never occurred to me that you should be nervous. When I found out I was so grown that it didn’t make any difference. Then I found out people actually get nauseous and tremble and shake. Well I don’t want to do this if I have to be sick before I go on. But some people do. Some people just feel that that’s a part of it. I like being relaxed. I like taking it in stride. I love it. I keep it in its proper perspective, and it allows me to continue to do it. As long as I do it this way I can do it.

Nancy was awarded three Grammys and was an NPR host for Jazz Profiles. She considered herself a storyteller, and she chose the songs in her repertoire based on their strong narrative element.

This interview was conducted early on in our oral history project, when I was still developing an interviewing style. I will always remember the dignity and class that was part of Nancy’s persona. You can view the complete video here.

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.

John Levy: Musician Turned Manager

Anyone in the arts who needs a manager loves to find one who has paid the same dues: artist first, manager second. When a musician needs a manager, it’s a comfort to know that the person running their career has experienced similar trials and tribulations, someone who knows the areas of concern, and doesn’t have to be educated about the day-to-day issues related to the work of a musician. John Levy, owner of John Levy Enterprises Inc., passed away on January 20, 2012, just three months shy of his one-hundredth birthday. John fit the description of musician turned manager better than anyone else in the entertainment industry.

John was born in New Orleans on March 12, 1912, and he ignored his father’s advice to find work in postal system for security. He became a jazz bassist and played with the greats, or the soon-to-be greats.

Typical of the musical chairs that went on in the heyday of jazz, John moved from being the bassist with Billie Holiday, to a brief stint with Buddy Rich, and then into a fruitful relationship with George Shearing. Eventually his skills with the day-to-day logistics of playing gigs became apparent, and John became a full-time manager. His client list eventually included Cannonball Adderley, Ramsey Lewis, Nancy Wilson, Dakota Staton and Joe Williams.

In our interview for the Hamilton College Jazz Archive, conducted in May of 1995, John related the atmosphere in the fifties, and the exponential growth of his business:

JL: That was the time when Basie finally broke up and had the six pieces, because it was really rough out there for big bands. But groups like George [Shearing’s] was really hot, and Dave Brubeck, and that was the hottest things going, playing the colleges. The big band just cost too much to travel. And the economics of it at that time was even worse than they are now. I mean they’re bad enough now, but for a big band it was terrible. But anyway, that’s how I got into that end of the business. And then one by one different people came along. And for years I’d known Joe Williams. And when he left the Basie band he called me one day and said “come and take this telephone out of my hands.” And that was it. No contract. No nothing. And the other people I guess came along through the record companies. In those days, especially Capitol Records, almost anybody who was anybody that came through the label that didn’t have management (in jazz that is) I’d get a call and they’d say “do you want to manage this person?” Or they’d recommend me. I remember Dakota Staton was one. So a lot of the people that I had at that time were on the Capitol label. Nancy Wilson came along through that. Through Cannonball I met Nancy, and it just went from one to the other. And all of a sudden I found myself —

MR: Somebody take the phone out of your hands —

JL: Yeah. I needed somebody to take the phone, that’s right, that’s right.

Just like musicians are hired on their reputations, the quality and honesty of managers is a topic of conversation with musicians. Nancy Wilson, a longtime client of John’s, talked about the start of their relationship:

NW: I met Cannonball though, with Rusty Bryant, in New York City, on the corner standing at 52nd and Broadway. That’s where we met. Cannonball had just come up. He was with John Levy. John Levy, I knew the name. If you were in this business, you knew who John Levy was. John Levy was the former bass player with George Shearing, who became George’s road manager, eventually his manager, and because he did such a good job for George, that just opened the door. By the time I went with John, he had Ramsey Lewis, Gene Harris, The Three Sounds, he had Cannonball, I mean he had so many wonderful artists that he nurtured and made sure that they took care of the business and did wonderful things for them. So the object of my strategy was, if I’m going to do this, the only person who I would trust to help and be there for me would be John Levy.

MR: What a rare commodity — to have a musician, a fine musician, who would step into that role. “I want to be with him.”

John himself spoke about the challenge and the changing responsibilities of being a manager in today’s music business:

JL: Managers like myself, they don’t exist today with the upcoming people, because in most cases they are lawyers or accountants that do the managing. And they have no idea of what it’s about, but there’s so much legal stuff going on, as I call it “legalistic” — the legalese of the business.

MR: Is it getting harder?

JL: Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh yeah. A person like myself who is not a lawyer, and I know about contracts, I know enough about it, I’ve been it long enough that I can draft one and I know exactly what’s happening with it. But they won’t accept that. You have to be a lawyer. Because you can, the record company can be sued if the artist signs with them without having a lawyer represent them. So it’s gotten to that point, where, like everything else in this country, anything you do, you have to have a lawyer almost to do it. Normally oh, it’s just pages. I have a contract, a Nancy Wilson contract that has forty pages on it, for Columbia Records. Forty pages. And it gives you one thing on page five and takes it away on page nine.

MR: And then it’s got something right at the end that says “if we forgot to say anything in this contract” you know — don’t forget about that.

JL: They’ve got it worded, and you’ve got to go through all of that stuff today. And it makes it a little difficult.

John was not a man who was afraid to say no to the powers that be, and he related the status of a project he was working on during our 1995 interview:

MR: I think the musicians must have always thought of you as being on their side.

JL: That’s right. And I was always on their side. I still am.

MR: Yeah. That’s good.

JL: Oh, yeah. When it comes down to negotiations and anything about money, well what about the musicians? And you know, we’re talking about a tour next year with Nancy and Joe, for Columbia Artists. The people at Columbia Artists were talking about, “well, the sidemen, how do you want to work that?” You know, okay, we know what Nancy gets, we know what Joe gets, the group that’s going to work with them together and we worked all the details of that out, who’s going to play for who, and we won’t carry a lot of musicians, we’ll carry a small group. And it got down to the point of what the musicians are going to get paid. So the first couple of figures they brought us I said “oh, na, na, na, na, na. They have to get more than that.” And they have to get certain conditions and certain things for them. Because I still feel like a musician.

John found time to author the book Men, Women and Girl Singers and subtitled My Life as a Musician Turned Talent Scout, written with his wife Devra Hall. He was honored frequently for his contributions to the music business, and in 2006 he received the highest award in the jazz world, the National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Masters Award.