Dexter

I sometimes get a little stuck - maybe a family member isn't doing well, or I suffer a financial setback or the accumulated stress of single parenthood drags me down.  When that happens, I pull the Dexter Gordon playlist out of my iPod.  Dexter fixes bad moods, you see.

He was a very tall man - 6 feet, 6 inches tall.  He did not scuffle as a kid - his father was a prominent African American physician in Los Angeles who looked after patients such as Duke Ellington and Lionel Hampton.  Dexter started playing when he was 13 years old; by the time he was 17, he was in Lionel Hampton's band.

Dexter is my favorite tenor saxophonist.  He never over-played.  He had the instrument completely under control and had all the technique in the world, but he never flaunted it.  His tone was large and round, he hung behind the beat by a few micro-seconds; this somehow made everything he played more emotional and deep.  He had a tendency to slide up to higher notes; he used vibrato sparingly, but  perfectly - it always enhanced his art and never created a distraction. He could swing so hard, and he had conquered all the intricacies of be-bop. But his ballads would rip the soul out of your body.   He was a major influence on John Coltrane, but I don't think 'Trane matched Dexter's lyrical magic.  He was a natural - threw down an Oscar-worthy performance as Dale Turner in "'Round Midnight" in 1986.  Here is version of "Body and Soul" from that film.

When I listen to Dex, I feel a space opening up in my chest, pressure and gloom dissipates.  I can't explain it.    He was a poet of the jazz saxophone.

Dexter Gordon died of kidney failure in Philadelphia 23 years ago.  He was 67.  He was playing almost to the end.  At his memorial service, there were no eulogies or prayers, just great music from a group of Dexter's fellow jazz musicians, led by the great trombonist and Dexter Gordon collaborator Slide Hampton.  This is what Dexter requested.

This past February 27 was the 90th anniversary of Dexter Gordon's birth.  The world is a better place because he lived and picked up the saxophone.

Yoko Noge and Jazz Me Blues at the Velvet Lounge

I finally made it out to see Yoko Noge and her "Japanesque" Jazz Me Blues band last weekend - they had a date at the Velvet Lounge in Chicago. The Velvet Lounge is operated by the great saxophonist, Fred Anderson; he has run the joint since 1982 - it moved from its spot on S. Indiana around the corner to Cermak about a year ago. I am ashamed to admit that this was my first visit to the Velvet. Fred was at the door, collecting cover charges, last Saturday night. My jaw dropped - this would be like Charile Parker covering the door at Birdland.

The picture above is Yoko with her husband, soprano saxophonist Clark Dean. Clark didn't play with the band during the set I saw at the Velvet Lounge - Jimmy Ellis was playing alto. Mr. Ellis is up there with Fred Anderson, Sonny Rollins, Von Freeman and other senior practioners of the jazz saxophone art. He has performed with a huge range of talented people - from Nat King Cole to Sun Ra. His work with Yoko Noge last Saturday was stunning - his tone was keening and beautiful, his demeanor was joyful.

The rest of Yoko's band was equally killer. The regular bass player with my band, E.G. McDaniel, was in the rhythm section; Jimmy Burns, the blues superstar, played guitar and contributed some vocals, and Joe Junkins was on drums. Rounding out the band were some Japanese instrumentalists. Tatsu Aoki played the shamisen (the traditional Japanese 3-stringed cross between a guitar and banjo - you would recognize its sound if you heard it). It was a total hoot to hear Aoki-san jamming away on the shamisen, plinking out blues riffs. He usually plays bass in Yoko's band. There were also two taiko drummers in the band - I didn't catch their names - but they contributed much drive and flash to the music.

Yoko Noge is a unique musician. She plays piano with authority and power - not surprising since she learned her craft from the legendary Erwin Helfer. And her voice - wow! It is hard to describe. Very soulful, not "sweet" - Yoko is not a typical crooning female vocalist. At times, she reminded me of the late, great Betty Carter - adventerous, unconventional and delightful. Yoko projects a warm, kind aura - you feel better about life when you are in the same room with her

So now I am an offical Yoko Noge fan. Anyone who has not heard this great musician needs to get with the program. She plays every Monday at Andy's in Chicago. Go see her!

Frank Morgan - Heir to Charlie Parker - RIP

Be careful who you idolize, and how you idolize them. That is the message of Frank Morgan's life. He had an all-consuming admiration for Charlie Parker, and learned how to blow be-bop alto like the Bird. He also took up the Bird's bad habits, and ended up in and out of prison due to his use of heroin. From the late '50's through the mid'80's, Frank was off the scene due to incarceration - robbery, drug posssession, etc. He would get out, do another crime, and go right back in. He finally played his first New York club engagement in 1986; he got clean and stayed clean.

Frank gave us 20 years of great jazz; he found out he had cancer just last month and he went down quick. here is the Washington Post obit.....

Frank Morgan: 1933 - 2007
Noted jazzman who made a comeback

Heir to the hard-bop style of Charlie Parker had 30-year hiatus caused by addiction
By Adam Bernstein

The Washington Post

December 19, 2007

Frank Morgan, 73, a jazz saxophonist of impeccable ability, whose claim to the mantle of the celebrated Charlie Parker was clouded by his heroin addiction, died Dec. 14 at his home in Minneapolis. He had colon cancer and kidney failure.

Mr. Morgan, whose father was a guitarist with the vocal group the Ink Spots, was considered in his teens a promising interpreter of hard bop, a swing style of lightning pace.

Despite a 30-year absence from performing caused by addiction, he was remembered as someone who could bring emotion to the frantic sound in a way few had mastered since Parker. Parker, one of the great geniuses of saxophone, died from drug abuse at 34 in 1955.

Trumpeter Wynton Marsalis once said of Mr. Morgan's playing: "What comes out of his horn is soulful, full of fire and timeless."

In 1955, Mr. Morgan debuted as a solo artist with a beautifully made hard bop collection, but for the next three decades he was sidelined by heroin addiction and arrests. He served prison terms in California penitentiaries and formed a small ensemble at San Quentin prison in the 1960s with another addict and sax player, Art Pepper.

He credited a conversion to Islam during the end of what he called his "prison career" as a turning point for the better as well as an acclaimed series of performances at New York's Village Vanguard jazz club in 1986. A year earlier, he cut his second album, "Easy Living," which won praise.

With a bebop revival under way in jazz, Mr. Morgan made the most of his second chance. He said he was able to wean himself off drugs through methadone.

He was leader on more than a dozen albums. Among those he played with were Marsalis, pianists McCoy Tyner and Hank Jones, guitarist Kenny Burrell and singer Abbey Lincoln.

As a youth, he played the guitar but switched to alto saxophone after his father took him to hear Charlie Parker in Detroit. The younger Mr. Morgan said he began copying Parker's drug habit in hopes of channeling his talent. He was a full-blown addict when they met again a few years later.

In 1987, New Yorker writer George Trow collaborated with Mr. Morgan on a musical about his life, "Prison-Made Tuxedos," that ran off-Broadway in 1987. But Mr. Morgan, who performed in the show, expressed ambivalence about having to relive those years every night.

"I mean, I want to remember it, but I didn't want to dwell on it and deal with it again every night," he said. "I saw a lot of people killed. I'm out of that now."

Once asked why so many jazz musicians became addicts, he replied: "It's about being hip. Jazz musicians would rather be dead than not be hip."

Another Living Musician I Love - Frank Catalano

Frank Catalano is a torch-carrier, bringing the hot jazz tenor sax into his generation. He has been playing seriously for two thirds of his life - started around the age of 10, and he is about 30 now. Frank was one of those jazz band geeks in high school, but a hugely talented geek. He was playing in jazz clubs at the age of 17, and he has led his own group for years. He has also played with a long list of stars, ranging from Tony Bennett and Betty Carter to Santana and Destiny's Child.

One word describes Frank's playing - INTENSE! Take Michael Brecker, Sonny Rollins, Ornette Coleman and Dexter Gordon, mix well, then filter through a young man's high-energy persona, and you get Catalano's tenor sax sound. What is the source of this fire and fountain of ideas? He is a young cat from the 'burbs ferchristsake - his old homies are probably zoned out on video games all day. Frank is not the standard 20-something suburban slacker - he is a piece of work, people.

Oh, and here is the the cool Catalano story - he cut off the middle finger of his right hand while working on an old car when he was 16. After reconstructive surgery, he went back to the sax and mastered it - I am sure there was pain and frustration along the path. So Frank isn't some golden child of privilege - he is a determined S.O.B.

I was delighted to play with Frank on a couple of Mystery Band gigs last year. He is a good-natured guy, not arrogant at all (I might be arrogant if I could play like him).

So buy his record - it is good stuff.