Thursday, February 23, 2012

Sumi Tonooka

Sumi Tonooka Now - Live at the Howland (Artists Recording Collective ARC 2369)
For the past dozen years, Sumi Tonooka has been devoting much of her time to teaching, both privately and at Rutgers and SUNY. She has also been involved with saxophonists Chris Burnett and Erica Lindsay in the founding and development of a recording company, Artists Recording Collective. Then there has been work as a composer, with special concentration on scores for film and television documentaries. Not surprising therefore that Tonooka’s presence on the bandstand has been rather less prominent than it was a few years ago. Born and raised in Philadelphia, she spent time in Boston studying with Margaret Chaloff and Charlie Banacos, then Detroit, where she recorded with Marcus Belgrave, before heading back to her hometown where she worked with Odean Pope, studied with Stanley Cowell, Bernard Peiffer and Dennis Sandole, led her own trio and also worked with Philly Joe Jones for a couple of years. In the early 1980s, Tonooka moved to New York City, playing clubs, festivals, making records, regularly leading her own trio and quartet, working often with leading jazz figures, including Rufus Reid, Akira Tana and John Blake Jr. In the late 1990s, Tonooka moved out of the city to pursue the teaching and composing facets of her busy professional like. Fortunately for all lovers of jazz piano, she has continued to make occasional records, of which Initiation (Artists Recording Collective ARC 2000) is a fine example. This was recorded back in 2004 although not immediately released and is a collaboration with Erica Lindsay (backed by Reid and Bob Braye). The co-leaders separately composed all the music and it provides insight into their distinctive and powerful yet subtle skills.



On 26 June Sumi Tonooka will release a double-album that presents her live in concert at the Howland Cultural Center in Beacon, NY, on 22 March 2011. A solo concert, it was recorded and is presented here in its entirety. On the first CD, Tonooka plays music by jazz composers such as Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk and Mary Lou Williams. Among the pieces are Heaven, which is a lesser-known work by Ellington, Monk’s Evidence and a pleasing medley of Williams’s music including Waltz Boogie and   Dirge Blues. There are also some popular standards, among them Cole Porter’s All Of You and Jerome Kern and Johnny Mercer’s I’m Old Fashioned. On the second CD, all the music (except an encore) is composed by Tonooka and from this it is clear that her compositions stand comfortably alongside those of her famous forerunners. Included are Phantom Carousel, Mingus Mood (which is also on Initiation) and At Home. The encore is a jaunty stroll through Eubie Blake’s I’m Confessin’, which wittily looks at piano music of a long-past generation through contemporary eyes. Indeed, that particular performance is an appropriate closer to an exceptional concert as throughout the two discs there flows a strong sense of the melodic undertow that has marked Sumi Tonooka’s work across the past two-and-a-half decades. This is music that is not only melodically captivating, but is also intelligent, warm, and a vivid portrayal of how she has embraced much of what has gone before in the history of jazz piano and is helping to keep it alive and flourishing





Remember to take a look at Jazz Journal’s website. If you are not already a reader, this is where you can subscribe and thus correct that omission.

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Jeff Hamilton - Jazz Journal Critics' Poll

Jeff Hamilton Trio Red Sparkle (Capri Records 74114-2)

Hard to accept is the description of Jeff Hamilton as a “veteran” , but that’s how he is described in the press release accompanying an excellent new CD from this master drummer. When he first appeared on the jazz scene back in the mid-1970s, his youthful appearance allied as it was to sprightly playing was a joy to many who feared that subtle, rhythmic and always swinging drumming was fading from the jazz scene. These days, happily, there are many drummers who play like this, and I suppose that it must be acknowledged that Hamilton has rather more gray in his hair than most of the others. But listening to his playing on this CD you would certainly never know it. He is joined here by the regular piano player and bass player of the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra, and the fluid interplay of these three fine musicians, Hamilton, Tamir Hendelman and Cristoph Luty, makes clear how attuned each is to the others. This musical empathy provides one of the reasons why that particular big band is so good and so popular. But this is trio time, and as the spotlight shifts from one to another it is fascinating to hear how all consistently contribute to the group’s overall well-being. Hendelman is a thoughtful pianist, popular with singers, who need a musician of subtlety and grace. But he is also a soloist of distinction and his always inventive playing is a source of great delight. Luty plays with a solid sense of swing, urging along his companions and finding in his solo moments touches of brilliance, especially apparent when he takes an arco solo on, appropriately enough, a Ray Brown composition. But this is Hamilton’s group, and although throughout he makes clear that this is a joint enterprise, the ears are constantly drawn to his tasteful accompaniment, especially notable in his brush work, and in solos that are crisp and perfectly timed and placed. Red Sparkle, in case you are wondering, was the color of Jeff Hamilton’s first drum kit. Fortunate for all of us, it wasn’t his last.






 
 

Those of you who subscribe to Jazz Journal will have already seen the February 2012 issue wherein are the results of the annual Critic’s Poll. Some thirty reviewers have picked their ten best CDs from 2011 (votes are allowed for five new releases and five reissues). Out of interest, the winners are:
(New Releases) Jan Lundgren -Together Again...At The Jazz Bakery; Bobby Wellins - Time Gentlemen, Please; Michael Garrick - Tone Poems; Tommy Smith - Karma; Mathias Eick - Skala; Lee Konitz/Brad Mehldau/Charlie Haden/Paul Motian - Live At Birdland; Gary Burton - Common Ground; Kurt Elling - The Gate; Exploding Star Orchestra - Stars Have Shapes; Joe Lovano Us Five - Bird Songs

(Reissues)
Duke Ellington - 1932-1940 Brunswick, Columbia, Master; Louis Armstrong - The Ambassador Of Jazz; John Coltrane - Original Album Series; Buck Clayton - Complete Legendary Jam Sessions; Miles Davis - The Bootleg Sessions Vol. 1; Joe Harriott - The Joe Harriott Story; Coleman Hawkins - The High And Mighty Hawk; Charles Mingus - Blues And Roots; Sonny Clark - Sonny’s Conception; Ornette Coleman - Original Album Series

My choices were:

(New Releases) Marcus Shelby - Soul Of The Movement; Warren Vaché/Alan Barnes - London Session; René Marie - Voice Of My Beautiful Country; Karrin Allyson - ’Round Midnight; Alan Barnes/Ken Mathison - Glasgow Suite. (Reissues) Buck Clayton - Complete Legendary Jam Sessions; Duke Ellington - Complete 1932-1940 Brunswick, Columbia Master Recordings; Jimmy Rushing - Rushing Lullabies + Brubeck And Rushing; Blue Mitchell - Blue’s Moods - Louis Armstrong - Satchmo: Ambassador Of Jazz

For the rest, and they make fascinating reading, you need to see the magazine and if you are not a subscriber then take a look at Jazz Journal’s website where you can correct that omission in your jazz reading.



Friday, February 3, 2012

Dave Tough


Little Giant

During his short and troubled life, Dave Tough consistently proved himself to be a masterful drummer, comfortable in a wide range of settings, willing to confront and overcome stylistic revolutions. He always displayed musical, technical and intellectual gifts, that might well have taken him to the top of any artistic pursuit and served him for a generous lifetime. At times, he seemed to have the ambition for this; but he also had disturbing flaws that not only circumscribed his career but also tragically shortened his life.

He was born, David Jarvis Tough, on 26 April 1907, in Oak Park, Illinois. He first played drums while a small child and he was still a Chicago schoolboy when he became a member of the Austin High School Gang. This was a loose gathering of white tyro jazzmen who were fascinated with and deeply influenced by black jazz musicians whose playing set alight the clubs and speakeasies of 1920s Chicago. The Gang formulated what became known as Chicago style jazz and Dave, who early mastered the art of playing subtle and infectiously swinging drums, was a significant member of the group. In that same decade, he visited Europe and also spent time in New York City where he made records under the nominal leadership of other members of the Chicago school, notably Eddie Condon and Red Nichols.

He began the 1930s inauspiciously, spending many months inactive through illness, a portent of the future. Tiny and frail, he was repeatedly struck by illnesses that more robust individuals might have shrugged off; and he gave himself no help by drinking heavily. By 1935, however, he was ready to make a mark in a different area of jazz. Until now, the bulk of his work had been in small groups, but the big bands that would dominate the forthcoming swing era were now on the rise. He played first with Tommy Dorsey, then moved swiftly and often fleetingly through many bands: Red Norvo, Bunny Berigan, Benny Goodman, back to Tommy Dorsey, then Jimmy Dorsey, Bud Freeman, Jack Teagarden, Artie Shaw, and others, including depping with Woody Herman.
There were several reasons for his restlessness. Dave insisted on musical perfection: while this was a characteristic shared by some of the leaders for whom he played, it was ignored by others. Added to personal differences, he had an intense dislike for the characterless music demanded by the realities of commercial success that were a sometimes onerous feature of life in the swing era. And there was his own occasionally unstable personality, a characteristic aggravated by his drinking, which was now sometimes excessive. In his private life, he flouted the racial taboos of the time by marrying a black dancer. He also found himself often at odds with former musical associates, and sought to establish an alternative career as a writer. He was briefly inducted into the military during World War 2, playing for a short while in the US Navy band directed by Artie Shaw, but was soon discharged on medical grounds.



It was shortly after his discharge that Dave made his greatest impact on the jazz world when he joined Woody Herman. As the records of Herman's First Herd were played around the world, fans of big band jazz became aware that for all his physical frailty, tiny Dave Tough was a powerful giant among drummers. Yet, despite his undoubted playing skills, Dave had serious doubts about his suitability for bop. His drinking habit had by now became uncontrollable. Observers at the time remarked upon the combination of his discomfort with his role in the changing jazz scene and a deterioration in his physical and mental state, and how it led inexorably to fits. Sometimes, and deeply disturbing to fellow musicians and audiences alike, these fits occurred on the bandstand.
Many of the people who knew him, did their best to help him; not just musician friends but also the writer Leonard Feather and impresario John Hammond Jnr. But Dave would not be helped; portents of disaster had shadowed his entire professional life, and finally they came to pass. Exactly what happened one winter night can never be known. He appears to have fallen in the street while walking home from a gig. Maybe he had another fit; perhaps he was drunk; or he might simply have slipped or stumbled in the dark. Whatever the cause, he fell, fractured his skull, and died from the injury on 9 December 1948 in Newark, New Jersey. His body lay unclaimed, indeed unrecognized, in the morgue for three days.

Whether playing in the small Chicago-style groups of which he was a charter member, or in any of the big bands to which he brought uncommon fluidity, he consistently demonstrated his subtle talents. It was with Woody Herman, however, that Dave Tough reached the apogee of his brief but shining career. In that band he exceeded even his own high standards, urging along one of the finest of the period's jazz orchestras with sizzling enthusiasm, flair and irresistible swing that was rarely equaled and almost never surpassed.




Recommended CDs (all with Woody Herman): The Complete Woody Herman (1945-7) 7-CD boxed set (Mosaic 223); The Woody Herman Story 4-CD boxed set (Properbox 15); The Thundering Herd: Original Recordings 1945-1947 (Naxos Jazz Legends 8.120739); The V-Disc Years (Hep CD2/3435 2)

For more about this remarkable musician, go to Drummerworld where among many things there are several excellent photographs.