Jeff Parker - Master Guitarist

Photo by Jeff Newberry

 

The last time I met up with Jeff Parker was 2017, when he came to town with Tortoise, the long-standing Chicago group that had the corner on the term "post-rock," due to their vast, swirling sound. After their soundcheck, Parker and I settled into the group's tour bus for a Before & After listening test and talk for JazzTimes magazine. 

Towards the end of meeting, he casually described himself as a "frustrated bebop guitar," which at the time seemed like a modest, somewhat self-deprecating comment that hinted that some deeper style lurked underneath his own work. The former quality comes to mind because Parker has chops to spare, straddling a strong melodic sense with a knack for effects that expand his sound. But a listen to his work with the New Breed (New Breed, Suite for Max Brown) travels to places far beyond the realm of bebop.

One interesting quality to both albums is the way Parker combines elements that shift around the beat but still work. In addition to jazz and modern rock, he also has an affinity for beat making and loops, as a fan of artists like the late J Dilla. The beat that opens "Executive Life" on The New Breed has a hiccup to it but it still keeps the flow going. "Build a Nest," which kicks of Max Brown, has vocals from his daughter Ruby, also feels a little off-center but in a way that adds to the music. 

Along with those album, the prolific guitarist also released For Folks in 2021, a solo recital that includes lyrical versions of the standard "My Ideal" and Thelonious Monk's deep cut waltz "Ugly Beauty" along with original works. The double LP Mondays at the Enfield Tennis Academy (Eremite, 2022) consists of four side long improvisations in a quartet with drummer Jay Bellerose, bassist Anna Butterss and saxophonist Josh Johnson. Sometimes spare, sometimes repetitive thanks to loops, the mood often creates a trance. 

In thinking about all of these releases and the variety between them, it becomes clear that Parker ought to bring an exciting element to Saturday's Pitt Jazz Concert, which is helmed by his longtime friend drummer Chad Taylor at the University of Pittsburgh (click here to read my talk with Taylor).

Parker and I caught up last week by phone. Still a resident of Los Angeles, he was working in New Orleans at the time.

What's happening in New Orleans?

There was a Tortoise show a couple days ago. I also had a trio gig with bassist James Singleton and Quin Kirchner, the drummer from Chicago. Then I'm playing a duo gig tonight. Kind of a duo show, with a singer named Gabrielle Cavassa. Joshua Redman is going to play a few tunes with us too.

Kind of all over the place!

The way I like it.

The last time you and I talked, about five years ago, when you were here with Tortoise. One of the things you said at the end was you described yourself as a "frustrated bebop guitar player." It's funny because I was listening to Suite for Max Brown and didn't get a sense of that. But I'm just wondering, with albums like that and all that you do, is there a string connecting it to bebop?

Yeah, of course. I mean, I find that whole era of music inspiring. The ideas that those guys were dealing with were so advanced. It was progressive. That's the thing that I really get from it. Not just tangibly what's happening in the music, but what's behind it, in terms of dealing with ideas. And they're advanced. And moving the music forward. I call myself a frustrated bebop player because that music is difficult to play. Well you know, man, what's the point of me presenting myself as an artist, as someone who is in this revisionist role? I'm trying to make my own music. I mean, I'm not like a bebop guitar player. I'm a musician. I'm a composer. I think compositionally. If you analyze some of my music, you can definitely hear that in the harmony and maybe in some of the counterpoint stuff. But I'm not trying to play music that somebody was making 80, 90 years ago at this point.

It's interesting when you think about that music too because back when Charlie Parker or Fats Navarro were playing, it was a risk to play that. But they were playing what they feel. Listening again to the Suite for Max Brown, how much of that was creating in the studio vs. live playing?

Most of it. Almost all of it. Part of it was by the time and also out of necessity. Because just scheduling couldn't work out. So I would have musicians come by my place here and there, and they recorded what they can. The way I even deal with the New Breed music, that's what it is: me, stitching together musical ideas to make it into a tapestry. Conceptually, that's what it is. It's me dealing with samples and beats. My interest is in production, using the studio to make this kind of work that's based more in sonics and how it captures and exploits that space. 

When you're putting stuff together do you have a pretty good idea of what you want, going in, or do you give yourself a clean slate and see where it goes?

Definitely the latter. It's very experimental. A lot of times I might just have an idea that's more of a blueprint and the music might come out of something I want to experiment with, in a general sense. Then the music comes out of that, as opposed to the other way around. 

That can keep it exciting too. It's a discovery for the listener, but you get to be the listener as it takes shape too. How much of a chance do you get to play that stuff live? When the albums came out, did you get to perform those tracks?

Yeah. We toured. That album came out right before lockdown. Luckily we were able to get in about a week or 10 days worth of touring. And when we were touring, the country was closing up behind us. That tour was the last thing a lot of people saw before we were locked down for a year and a half.

We played it some, and still do. The New Breed band played at the Chicago Jazz Festival in late August. And we've been doing sporadic things. We played the Wexler Center in Columbus. We played a show at the University of Iowa.

When we play it live, it's different. That's one of the things I deal with. I'll have us improvising to music that I've recorded, that's on a grid. The improvising makes it sound more organic. When we perform it live, rather than play to a grid, I'll have whoever is in the drum chair triggering drum samples, so they can improvise with the samples material. Whereas in the studio, it's opposite way.

That's what I was wondering: how do you approach it live - recreating it vs. expanding on it.

At the end of the day. it is improvised music. It's an improvised process. that's what I'm doing. You know, most composition - I probably speak for most musicians in all kinds of music - comes from improvising. Wherever musical ideas come from. The composer sits down at their chosen instrument and they start to experiment with ideas until they come up with something that's tangible enough to work its way into being documented. New Breed records are for sure, that's what's behind them. When we play it live, I try to keep that spirit - that, as musicians, we can express ourselves within this constructed framework. 

Another thing I just listened to was the Monday Nights at the Enfield Tennis Academy. How does that group compare to the New Breed?

It's pretty different. But similar, you know? Because I had a residency with that group on most Mondays for a few years, until people got crazy busy. Now we hardly play at all. But for a while we started out just playing standards. Then we settled into this way of improvising. After we'd been playing almost every week for a few years, the improvising was very deliberate. It involved us introducing new ideas and sticking with them. Over a long period of time, these improvisations would develop. 

I was just talking to someone about this yesterday. It's not random. We're improvising but it's very deliberate in what we're doing. I can tie it directly with my other work. It's based in stagnant movement like looped drums and stagnant activity. Then, kind of using that concept to improvise with. And it's deliberate. It took us [time in] developing this musical relationship. We never talk about it. But it's an area that everyone in the band was interested in exploring.  

You mean, the loops are steady and you use that as a foundation to improvise off of that?

Yeah. Off of the idea. It doesn't have to be like that. We don't talk about it. But you can tell by what everybody is, how we're communicating with one another, that's the thing that everyone is thinking about. 

A couple things stuck out to me. It shows that you don't have to play a lot to be effective. Sometimes the bass and the drums might be kind of spare but it works. It's what the situation calls for. 

Yeah. Exactly.

The other thing is, with the loops going, it creates kind of a trance that carries it too. Personally, sometimes the loops can be a bit too much, but after awhile when you get used to  them, you realize it's not about what you think. Just let it take you somewhere.

That's what it's like to make beats. That's where a lot of the concept came from. I don't know if you heard the first New Breed album. That one came more directly out of my making beats - me being inspired by [J] Dilla and DJ Premiere, Pete Rock and my heroes [like] Mad Lib. My heroes in hip hop, producers and experimenting in that medium. And adding that to whatever musical ideas I was having. 

When you're making beats - dealing with samples and then the production mode - you just listen to a loop. Man, you can listen to it for hours. You're tweaking it and making little changes. You get into this zone. It's very solitary and it's very much about the way music sounds. You get into this repetition thing. It's a unique way to compose music. A lot of the New Breed music, and you know, the way we do the improvising with the ETA quartet ... and my solo guitar stuff. It's all very much based in, I don't know. trying to invite people into my world. And have them feel what that feels like. Get into the space of this music, which puts you in this meditative space. 

Any thing you wanted to talk about? New releases?

I have a new album coming out on International Anthem/Nonesuch of the ETA quartet. They just announced it. The release date is November 22. It's called The Way Out of Easy. It's that ETA quartet, another live recording. I think it was January 2, 2023. It's a double album, four long tunes. There's one composition that I wrote, the rest are improvisations. 

In addition to the concert on Saturday, Nov. 2 at Bellefield Hall, the afternoon will feature three free seminars. 1 p.m. - trumpeter Ingrid Jensen; 2 pm. - bassist Reggie Workman; 3 p.m. - Chad Taylor. These seminars take place in the Frick Fine Arts Building, 650 Schenley Drive.
At 3 p.m. tenor saxophonist Brian Settles and vocalist Jessica Boykin-Settles will be at the Afro-American Music Institute, 7131 Hamilton Ave., Homewood.

The concert takes place at 8 p.m. $20.

Chad Taylor & the 54th Pitt Jazz Seminar & Concert

The Pitt Jazz Seminar and Concert is synonymous with the turning of the leaves. Created by the late Dr. Nathan Davis in 1970, the annual event brought seasoned jazz musicians to town for a series of free seminars, culminating in a concert that harkened back to the days of blowing sessions, where everyone took part. 

When Geri Allen and, later, Nicole Mitchell succeeded Davis, things began to evolve, pushing the music out of its hard bop comfort zone. Mitchell's 2019 concert ruffled some feathers but last year's event, under the direction of Dr. Aaron Johnson, got things back on track.

The 54th annual event will honor bassist Reggie Workman and hometown drummer Roger Humphries. It coincides with the recent arrival of drummer Chad Taylor, who now serves as Director of Jazz Studies at Pitt. Taylor's musical c.v., is vast and fascinating. He and Rob Mazurek have helmed various Chicago Underground units (often Duos, with some Trios in there too). He has also played with Fred Anderson, Marc Ribot and James Brandon Lewis, to name just a few. As a leader, Taylor also released several albums, one of which - The Daily Biological  - was this writer's favorite album of 2020. 

Taylor and I caught up last week, right as he was boarding a train on the way to a rehearsal, and we discussed Pitt, music and teaching. (A link to info on the concert appears at the bottom of this entry.)

Mike: Are you in town now? Are you hopping between cities? 

Chad: Yeah, I'm doing a lot of back and forth. Right now, I'm on my way to New York for a rehearsal. But thing will get more settled in Pittsburgh next semester. I bought a house near the South Side slopes. I'm getting that all set up now. I'm excited.
One of the things going on is that I got this fellowship, the Pew Fellowship. One of the stipulations is you have to be a residence in Philly. So I can't sell my house in Philly until that fellowship is over. So that's why I have been doing a lot of back and forth. It's a two-year fellowship.
So right now I see myself as living in Pittsburgh and I'm also living in Philly. I'm sort of living in two cities at the same time!

Is this typical for a jazz educator these days - bouncing around between cities anywhere?

For a lot of people. One thing that has changed about the position at Pittsburgh, is that, until I came along, the position was being Director of Jazz Studies. Now the position is Artistic Director of Jazz Studies, which means I don't have all the day-to-day administrative stuff, the committee meetings and other things that a director would normally have. And I can concentrate more on the shape of the program and the direction the program is going in. That differs from what Nicole [Mitchell] and Geri [Allen] were doing.

Is Aaron Johnson handling some of that day to day stuff?

He is. He's also the Chair of the Music Department. But in addition, we're getting ready to hire somebody next year who going to have a role....Did you know Michael Heller?

Yeah. Did he write the book about the loft scene [Loft Jazz: Improvising New York in the 1970s]?

Exactly. He's left and went to Brandeis. So we're getting ready to take his place. And the person who gets that position is going to have more role of being administrative stuff and being on committee meetings.

How did [your appointment at Pitt] come about? Did Pitt come to you, or did you hear about it and jump at the opportunity?

Well, I knew about the position. I knew when Nikki left that the position was going to open up and I let Nikki know that I was interested in doing that position. I had been looking for an academic position for quite awhile now. Maybe seven or eight years. 

I started working with Nicole in 1997, when I moved back from New York. So we have some history. She told me that she thought I'd be great for the position. And that's when I started pursuing it.
There was some back and forth. It took about two years. I did a residency that NIcole helped set up. I had a chance to work with the students and i had a chance to do some teaching and really have some insight into the program. Then I applied for the position. And it worked out. 
I'm excited about being at Pitt. And I'm excited about the direction that I want to take the program. 

In jazz academia, things are getting smaller and smaller... I really think jazz is getting bigger. It's just how we're looking at it. Because it's not just a genre of music. It's a process. It's a way of people coming together and taking these different elements of music and  putting them in a new way to create something different.

Pittsburgh is known for its past contributions to jazz. But when it comes to modern music that pushes the edge, the kind of stuff that you often play, that doesn't get talked about a lot. As you're getting set up, how do you approach that?

That's a good question. That's one thing I'm super excited about. First off, Pittsburgh is a hard bop town. You got Art Blakey, Stanley Turrentine, Ahmad Jamal, all these great musicians. That's what I grew up playing. I grew up in Chicago. I grew up playing organ jazz and hard bop. One of the first bands I was in, I was playing with .... you know, back then Rob Mazurek [Taylor's long-standing partner in the Chicago Underground Duo] was a hard bop trumpet player. He had a band with Eric Alexander. Those were some of the first gigs I did. I love that music. I grew up with that music and that music is still very much a part of me. I still do gigs like that.

I also, as you know, do a lot of progressive music, creative music as well. I love doing that, Now one of my goals with this position is to embrace all of jazz, the whole shebang. One of the ways I'm going to do that is by having musicians who have all these broad range of styles that they can play. 

If you look at the programming this year, you have someone like [bassist] Reggie Workman. He has the hard bop credentials. If anybody has hard bop credentials, it's Reggie Workman. He played with Art Blakey for years. But he also played with Coltrane and he also has his own music which has more open structures and is more adventurous. He's somebody that can go between both those worlds.

 
So can somebody like [alto saxophonist] Immanuel Wilkins. Which I didn't even realize until recently. I did a gig with him a couple years ago in Philadelphia with [tenor saxophonist] Odean Pope, just the three of us. We didn't play any compositions. We didn't rehearse. We just played for two hours straight, improvised music. I was just so blown away with what Immanuel -  and Odean - were doing.  Immanuel, I think he's 26, 27. He really knows the history of the music. He can play hard bop but he also has his own thing. 

Someone like [guitarist] Jeff Parker is someone else who can go between both those worlds. Sumi [Tonooka, piano], who I've known for a while now, also goes between places. But she's done a lot of work as a composer, working with string ensembles, orchestras. And really an incredible pianist who I think is going to bring a lot to this ensemble.

The whole idea with having people who love jazz and are able to go between these different areas. Because one thing I see that's happening in jazz academia, things are getting smaller and smaller. Less people are applying. Less people are interested in becoming a jazz musician. Jazz record sales are declining. It's always, 'Okay, jazz music is getting smaller.' I really think jazz is getting bigger. It's just how we're looking at it. Because it's not just a genre of music. It's a process. It's a way of people coming together and taking these different elements of music and  putting them in a new way to create something different. When you look at jazz like that, it keeps getting bigger and bigger. 

So my idea is really to expand this idea of what jazz is. And basically have people understand that jazz is for everybody. So when people say to me they don't like jazz, I always get confused. What do you mean you don't like jazz? What is jazz to you? Usually what I find out is that they have a really narrow idea of what jazz music really is.

I hear jazz in everything. You think about it like this, Mike. The drum set was an invention that was made in America to play jazz music. So if you hear a drum set in any sort of music, you are hearing something that was created for jazz. There's a connection there. I hear jazz in all sorts of things. I don't see it as something that's old fashioned. I think it's really relevant today. One thing I have in an agenda at Pitt is to really broaden the idea of what jazz is. 

It's true. When you're talking artistically it's branching out into so many styles, whether your're talking abouit Robert Glasper or Tim Berne, there's something going on there. 

And it's for all generations. It's not for old people, it's just your grandparents' music. It's not noise or this hipster thing. It's a whole spectrum. It's for everybody. 

Now we've just got to get more people to listen and pay attention.

Exactly! And not be afraid of it. You know what's interesting is, I went to Salvador, in Bahia, Brazil, a couple years ago. I was at a nightclub. In this club, they had a DJ spinning all this great Brazilian music. And everybody was dancing. You had grandmothers dancing with their grandchildren - in the nightclub! You had all ages. It wasn't like a big pickup scene, though I'm sure there's some of that. The point is that, they were playing this music and you had people that were five years old and people that were eighty years old. They were all getting down, dancing, appreciating it. And jazz has that potential too. It should be like that. It's for everybody. 

What is like teaching jazz in 2024?

People want to know how it relates to them. They don't want to have it be just a historical perspective, like this is something that happened a long time ago, and this is just a history course. They want to know, how does jazz relate to me now? 

The course that I'm teaching is one that Nicole Mitchell was teaching before. It's called Creative Arts Ensemble. For this class, it's a multi-disciplinarian class, meaning, it's open to all the arts - dancers, people into theater, people into photography, people in visual arts. We talk about ways of collaborating, different artistic practices, as well as collaborating as a class. It's been a lot of fun to teach. Something about Pitt - the number one elective course at Pitt is Jazz History. 

I took that class when Nathan Davis was there.

Oh! I think it has to do with the fact that Nathan had built this thing up. I taught the class when I was in my residency. Some people think it's an easy A, which it shouldn't be. I don't think it is. I think that once they get there, they realize, "Oh, I'm going to have to learn something." But I bring that up to say there is so much amazing talent at Pitt. In this class I'm teaching now, it's not a big course. It's small.. We have a couple students who are political science majors and they're incredible musicians, incredible vocalists. You see that in the big band too. You have all these non-music majors who are incredibly talented.

The challenge though, is the undergraduate program needs some work. We don't have many people who are majoring in jazz in the undergraduate program. So that's one of my goals - to create demand for people to become a jazz major.

The graduate program is going strong. There's a lot of history there. Geri and Nicole both focused on that. But we are at a point now where, in order to make the program relevant, we have to have demand for the undergraduate jazz program. That's one of the biggest challenges I have, and Pitt has. Because right now, the students who want to major in jazz, aren't going to Pitt. They're going to Duquesne. 

Maybe your name can draw some of the more adventurous types.

What's great about Pitt is it's a huge school that has all these different schools within the school. They're all willing and able to collaborate. You have this incredible amount of resources. One of the ways I plan on drawing more students into the undergraduate program is to create avenues for them to combine jazz with other arts - not even other arts -  with other fields that they could be interested in. So in other words to have - I don't know what you would call it - like a jazz major/minor kind of thing. You could major in jazz but also have access to these other areas, and maybe have a dual degree.

Are you thinking of combining it with marketing or media?

Absolutely. There are a lot of areas that could be explored in creating some really innovative types of programs. And I get the feeling the school is open to that. The other thing is we have an amazing [recording] studio. It needs a little bit of work but we're getting it in shape. We can offer students access to the studio and also courses in learning how to use the studio as a part of their degree.  

What's great is I got the dean to put a significant amount of money every year into the studio, keeping it up to date and for hiring people to work in the studio. That's something that can really be used as an incentive to pull in more students. 

With all the groups that you're involved in, are you going to try and present some of your bands while you're here?

Yeah, one thing that's great about my academic program is that I can focus on my own bands. I don't have to rely on being a sideman and doing all this touring for income. I'd like to have my ensemble play at Pitt, maybe not necessarily on campus but you know, doing gigs at Con Alma or other venues. 

Anything else that you wanted to mention?

I think we touched on a lot. I'll be interested to see how the Pitt concert is received. We're going to be doing some weird stuff. I shouldn't say "weird," but we are going to be doing some adventurous things. Overall, we'll be playing standards as well. We're going to be mixing them in. So we're going to be bringing both of those flows together. We'll see what happens. 

Taylor, with James Brandon Lewis, at Club Café, March 2023

A complete schedule of events can be found here. 

CD Review: Lina Allemano's Ohrenschmaus - Flip Side

Lina Allemano's Ohrenschmaus

Flip Side

(Lumo Records) Bandcamp link

Andrea Parkins joins the trio of Lina Allemano (trumpet), Dan Peter Sundland (electric bass) and Michael Griener (drums) on three of the seven tracks of Flip Side. Her accordion, electronics and "objects" add to the quick free romps, which all riff on the album title and explore different textures in their movements. "Sidetrack" is the longest, at nine minutes, beginning softly with scrapes and drones that could be emanating from any of the players. Initially, no one rises to the forefront; making the track serve as a prologue to what will follow. Things starts to coalesce in the final minutes. Allemano moans a note that sounds straight out of  Miles Davis' '70s wah wah (though she uses no pedals). Then the track mysteriously fades. 

"Sideswipe," three tracks later, picks up where the previous quartet session left off. This time, Parkins' accordion is more prominent, doing a wild dance with the trumpet. By the time the group gets to "Sidespin," Parkins is most prominent, using her accordion like an organ. This final blast barely lasts four minutes, but none of that time is wasted.

The remaining trio tracks find Ohrenschmaus ("ear candy") also vary widely. Sundland's slapped bass in "Signal" sounds like a funk groove that has won't hold together, thanks to Griener's clackety percussion. Allemano seizes the setting for some dirty growls. "Heartstrings" slowly takes shape with some moody mute blowing but "Stricken" is the album's centerpiece. Here, Sundland and Griener play slow and minimally, like a funeral march, while Allemano plays a melancholy line first with a Harmon mute than open. The mood is so spare, it could fall apart instantly, but it moves on with Sundland bowing and plucking. The results sound both dramatic and full.

"The Line," the final trio track before "Sidespin" alternates melodies played by trumpet and bass, with a series of outbursts full of press rolls, bass thumps and eventually some high whoops from the trumpet.

Allemano and her comrades have many moods, but all of them have a fun sense of adventure at the core. 

CD Review: Jason Stein - Anchors

Jason Stein

Anchors

(TAO Forms) www.aumfidelity.com/collections/tao-forms

The history of jazz music is filled with numerous stories of musicians dealing with various ailments. Many, of course, were a bit self-induced but a lifestyle of playing clubs and traveling extensively can take a physical toll on anyone. So too can mastering an instrument. Trumpeter Steph Richards suffered from potential focal dystonia, a neurological condition that causes muscles to freeze, making it impossible to play. She eventually overcame the condition by altering her technique on her instrument.

Though the liner notes to Anchors don't specifically his condition, bass clarinetist Jason Stein suffered from a similar physical ailment that impacted his playing. Having studied with percussionist Milford Graves, who saw a deep connection between music and good health, Stein worked to heal himself. Cold-water plunges and breathwork were part of the process, along with myofascial trigger point therapy, which helped him locate the source of an injury. 

The music on Anchors is inspired by Stein's healing journey, with titles like "Cold Water," "Holding Breath" and "Crystalline" coming from different aspects of it. Although the bass clarinetist has recorded a few albums in recent years in a trio with bassist Damon Smith and drummer Adam Shead (adding pianist Marilyn Crispell for this year's spi-ralling horn), this is his first session as a leader in six years. This corner of his output has ranged from blends of steady rhythm sections and adventurous flights on his horn to solo recitals that probe the more guttural extremes of the instrument (In Exchange for a Process, Leo). Anchors brings the varied approaches together.

The album features bassist Joshua Abrams, of Natural Information Society, and drummer Gerald Cleaver, whose list of collaborators includes Nels Cline, Matthew Shipp and fellow drummer Devin Gray. Boon, a one-named multidisciplinary artist and songwriter from Chicago, produced the album, penned the liner notes and plays acoustic guitar on the opening and closing title tracks. 

"Anchors I" and "Anchors II" are gentle pieces with the bass clarinet echoing the guitar's sparse, single-note lines in the first and playing in unison in the latter. "Holding Breath" gives the trio the chance to move at their own pace, building from free understated movement into a steady groove where the rhythm section keeps the momentum going while Stein stretches out. For the first three and half minutes of "An Origin," Stein intones a single low note as bass and drums flex beneath him. When this shapes into more of a structure, he solos in a manner that feels Monk-like, taking simple phrases that he shapes and reshapes repeatedly. 

The album also incorporates wild blowing in with more subdued moments. "Cold Water" evokes feelings of a plunge into that object, leading to a thoughtful conclusion that grasps the healing power that can be found in it. "Boon" by contrasts, comes off like a free ballad, while "Crystalline" is driven by Abrams' arco work and Cleaver's cymbal rolls, tempting Stein to dabble just a bit in his horn's upper register.

Like any good concept album, the ideas behind the music bring greater understanding to the work while the performance simultaneously stands on its own, even without the details of the notes on hand. It might necessitate a close listen to appreciate the trio's (or duo's) work but that's always a crucial element with this music. 

For Tito, Sergio and Mr. Jones

When I first starting dreaming about starting a band as a young kid, the instrument that I wanted to play was guitar. My dad's upright bass was cool, my brothers' brass instruments also had some charm, but that guitar seemed to offer more options. It could wail just as easily as it could coo. It rocked.

One of the first guitarists that I looked up to was Tito Jackson of the Jackson Five. Not only could he play (or so it seemed), he could move around while he did it. As a kindergarten kid, with limited access to what was happening musically in the early '70s, Tito was all I needed to see to seal the deal. Plus, he had the same first name as Tito Puente, the great Latin jazz bandleader, whose Greatest Hits album I got for my birthday around the same time.

The above photo comes from the inner sleeve of Get It Together, the J5's 1973 album. The outer cover had the initials GIT die-cut, so you could see the picture of the band underneath. That red Gibson ES 345 just looked so cool in Tito's hands. During "Hum Along and Dance," the brothers yell, "Play it, Tito," which cues a wild guitar solo that channels the outer space velocity of both Jimi Hendrix and Funkadelic's Eddie Hazel. It might be the work of an anonymous session guy, but if that IS Tito, he was a monster on the guitar. The truth might not be ever found without extensive research, so out of respect to Tito and my youthful mind, I'm just going to assume it was him. 

My friend Eric, who lived up the street from me up until halfway through First Grade, and I used to listen to this album a lot, as well as the Jackson 5 records that I peeled off the back of Alpha-Bits cereal boxes. That was the way I first got to hear "I Want You Back," "ABC," "Goin' Back to Indiana" and "Sugar Daddy." (The record of "Maybe Tomorrow" eluded me, but I never liked that song as much when I finally heard it.) 

In our naïve minds, the Jacksons all played their own instruments. This idea was probably fueled by photo we saw of them once picking up instruments in the studio, a realization I had when I came across the photo again more recently. Clearly Tito and Jermaine handled guitar and bass. Somehow, we thought Jackie handled keyboards and Marlon played congas. That left Michael on.... drums? Why not? Micky Dolenz "played" them in the Monkees and he sang lead most of the time. No reason Michael couldn't do it either. 

I still have that same copy of Get It Together, a birthday present from my great aunts, which, if I got it for my sixth birthday, means it had only been out for a month. Initially, I probably wished it had some of the hits, but that didn't stop me from playing it. Now, it stands as an overlooked part of the band's career, heading in a solid funk direction. "Hum Along and Dance" is a great dance number with two heavy grooves in it, begging to be sampled. (One of the brothers is way off in the harmony parts, but that's a small price to pay.) Ironically, that song was originally done by the Temptations, clearly as a filler song with not much too it. That J5 really fleshed it out. 

When Michael Jackson went on to superstardom, Tito kind of faded into the background. Next thing you knew - as a friend pointed recently to me - Eddie Murphy made him a punchline during his Raw comedy hit, which really zapped Tito's cred. I never gave up on him. While I never had a chance to hear his solo album from a few years ago, it was cool to see him reviewed in downbeat, doing something new that wasn't aimed at cashing in on the family legacy. RIP, Tito.

Around the same time that I was about to discover the Jackson 5, there was a triumvirate of musicians that my dad turned me on to: Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass, the 5th Dimension and Sergio Mendes and Brasil 66. I couldn't get enough of them. Too young to read, I knew each one by the album cover and I could figure out side one from side two by the shapes of the words on the labels.

In the case of Sergio's Equinox album (above), Pop had it as a pre-recorded cassette and when I was good enough to be granted access to his tape stash (which also included 5th Dimension's Greatest Hits), Equinox was usually one of the first ones I'd grab. Years later, I picked up a cheap vinyl copy and, even as a 19-year old punk kid, it still conveyed breezy magic. Bossa nova arrangements of songs like "Night and Day" and "Watch What Happens" got stuck in my brain and likely created a standard for what was possible with music. The Portuguese-language songs like "Triste" and "Gente" were also really catchy too, cuing me into different countries and languages out there. The group's version of Little Anthony's "Goin' Out of My Head" is from a different album (their debut) but Lani Hall's heartbroken delivery set the standard for how I thought that song should sound. It sounded really dramatic.

In the early 2000s. I was working as Arts Editor at a short-lived alt-weekly paper called Pulp. One day my phone rang and after I picked up, I heard an accented-voice say, "Hello, Mike? This is Sergio Mendes." It wasn't completely out of the blue. He was slated to perform at the Manchester Craftsmen's Guild and I had informed the venue that I wanted to preview the show. But hearing the voice of the legendary guy saying my name gave me a thrill. I had to call my dad and let him know. The interview took place about a week later and I saw the show, which was a little on the Vegas slick side. A few years later, Sergio's career received another major boost, when he collaborated with the Black Eyed Peas. 

But for me, it's those early albums that still retain the magic. Thanks for everything, Sergio.

I've included the cover of The Fool On the Hill not only as an homage to Sergio, who passed on September 5, and to my dad (whose been gone almost 10 years, and who owned that album), but also to recall a joke that my sister Claire and I had about the cover shot. Sergio looks happy as a clam in the photo while everyone else look sad or dead serious. Karen Phillips, on the right, looks especially pissed off. Why? Claire and I always thought they were mad that they didn't get to sit in the chair.

In closing I must pay tribute to James Earl Jones, who also left us recently. Mister Jones had one of the most distinctive voices in movie and television of course. Darth Vader is all well and good, but my first exposure to him came with a record that I bought from the Arrow Book Club, the program through Scholastic Books where we were album to order books and occasional records through school. Jones read the adaptation of John Henry that Ezra Jack Keats published. I didn't buy the book at that time, so I only had that deep voice to take me into the story. 

To say that he brought things to life was an understatement. Of all the records to lose while growing up, this was one of them. But I can still hear the opening lines: "A hush settled over the hills. The sky swirled soundlessly around the moon." He was so dynamic, yet warm. Years later, when I volunteered to read to my son's class, I ordered that book so I could channel Mr. Jones as I read it. I probably didn't come close to his delivery, but I did pay homage. 

Thanks, Mr. Jones. 

CD Review: Miles Okazaki - Miniature America

Miles Okazaki

Miniature America

(Cygnus) cygnusrecordings.bandcamp.com

"In the context of the road trip, it seems that Miniature America could be a roadside attraction, just beyond that hill in the distance. It's announced on a billboard that promises something you've never seen before, a one-of-a-kind curiosity." 

These words come from Miles Okazaki's liner notes to his newest album, a thought that adds a cinematic element to the 22 tracks. If the music herein was a roadside attraction, the experience might play tricks on the mind, blurring the line between reality and bleary-eyed hallucinations that come after long hours on the interstate. The brief tracks (11 of them don't even last two minutes) exit as quickly as they enter, making them feel like fleeting dreams, or something seen from the corner of the eye.

Okazaki has assembled a group of seven musicians and three vocalists to help create this exquisite work. The instrumentation includes no bass, drums or any type of percussion. Along with Okazaki's guitars come three saxophones (Caroline Davis, Anna Webber, Jon Irabagon), trombone (Jacob Garchik), vibraphone (Patricia Brennan) and piano (Matt Mitchell). The voices of Fay Victor, Jen Shyu and Ganavya do everything from create angelic choirs to repeat selected lines of poetry or excerpted phrases from Immanuel Kant. The latter occurs in "The Cocktail Party" which evokes its name as Mitchell plays the album's languid theme while disembodied voices chatter in the background. Or maybe the foreground.

The brevity of the pieces works in their favor since they provide passing glimpses into varied and detailed scenes. "Chutes and Ladders" presents 61 seconds of group improv, most of it bathed in reverb. In "Deep River" Victor savors one line of poetry while Okazaki flows around her. The combination of guitar, vibes and piano in "Follow That Car" has a fine layer of distortion floating on top of it, which isn't easy to detect at first. 

When things go on longer, the album feels like a suite that's reaching a finale. "In The Fullness of Time" lasts over six minutes, as Ganavya takes liberties with the melody that first entered in "The Cocktail Party" while Irabagon plays wildly off in the distance. A few tracks earlier, all three of the vocalists turned that same melody into a hymn in "The Firmament."

Throughout the album, Okazaki acts more like a bandleader committed to the sound of the group rather than acting as a major soloist, though his rapid picking does get ample room in tracks like "The Funicular" and "Zodiacal Sign." Along with his standard electric and acoustic guitars, he utilizes a quarter-tone and fretless guitars to toy with the sound through channel-crossing slides and plinks.

When the album concludes, the voices of everyone involved repeat more final lines of poems, and what could be unsettling actually comes off sounding warm and a tad humorous. And it feels like the parting words of those unusual roadside folks - who might not be there if you turn around to look back at them.

LP Review: Harold Land - The Fox

Harold Land

The Fox

(Contemporary/Craft) craftrecordings.com/products/the-fox-contemporary-records-acoustic-sounds-series-180g-lp

The Acoustic Sounds vinyl reissue of Harold Land's The Fox fulfills an important task not only because it shines a bright, crisp light on a great album but also because it helps to elevate the profile of three criminally overlooked jazz musicians. 

First on that list is, of course, tenor saxophonist Harold Land. Even during his fruitful years, albums like Harold In the Land of Jazz and West Coast Blues seemed to lament how recognition and great attention seemed to evade the man who once played in a band that was poised (legitimately) to be the one of the most revered acts in jazz - the Clifford Brown-Max Roach Quintet. Land left the group to take care of his family, and Sonny Rollins held the tenor chair until Brown and Richie Powell died in a car accident. While some of Land's later recordings helped elevate his name, he still could use more props.

Trumpeter Dupree Bolton, Land's foil on The Fox, also had the cards stacked against him. Leonard Feather's liner notes of this album emphasized the mysterious background of the gifted trumpet player by citing a quote that Bolton gave to a downbeat editor about running away from home at the age of 14. (He offered no other information about himself.) In 2009, a somewhat lackluster collection of performances offered some background in the notes about Bolton's life, much of which was spent behind bars. The info could be found in my writeup at this link. Suffice to say, Bolton's incredible technique and improvisation ideas were inversely related to his personal life. More on that in a minute.

Finally, there's pianist Elmo Hope. The one time close associate of Thelonious Monk, who was judicious in his choice of piano playing friends, Hope died in 1967 at age 43, leaving behind too few recordings of some really advanced compositions. He also recorded a few blowing sessions that featured John Coltrane on his way up, thereby capturing both players in their young and ambitious phase. The Fox was recorded in 1959, when Hope was living on the West Coast, and he wrote four of the six tracks, so this album really does him right. 

Bassist Herbie Lewis and drummer Frank Butler complete the lineup. Not to downplay their efforts but both were pretty well-documented players throughout their lives. And they also elevate the music here. 

The quintet barrels out of the gate immediately in the Land-penned title track. In some ways, it's built like a standard bop theme that's played at a rapid tempo. But on closer examination, the harmonic direction sounds like Ornette Coleman's version of bebop. You're expecting a return to the A part after Land tears it up for a few bars. But no, the theme is over and Land has jumped into the solo. 

While some greenhorns have trouble maintaining a bebop tempo, the tune seems to have trouble keeping up with the band; they play like they want to break away. Land has to blow a long note in his second chorus to catch his breath. Bolton matches his speed and ingenuity. Following the Hope ballad "Mirror-Hand Rose" they bring the energy back up with another tune by the pianist, "One Second, Please." 

The pianist gets the first solo on his "Sims A-Plenty" which goes to great lengths in support of the staying power of his work. Delivered with a catchy shout from the horns at the start and finish, this one should be a hard bop standard. "Little Chris" also proves that the right combination of West Coast players could write and blow with as much fire as their East Coast cousins.

It might come as a surprise that when Contemporary Records released The Fox, it was already a reissue. The small Hi-Fi Jazz imprint released the first edition in 1960, a full nine years before Lester Koenig had the smarts to give this ace session a second chance. This new edition might not have the Saul White painting of the original, but the cover profile of Land is enough to capture the gravity of the music in these grooves, and invites everyone to reexamine this overlooked classic. As far as the reissue goes, the pressing captures the fire of the quintet. Among other things, it can make a listener lament that Dupree Bolton - who sounds somewhere between the groundbreaking of Dizzy Gillespie and the forward vision of Booker Little - had so few chances to pursue his muse.