Modesto Briseño (1938-1965) was one of jazz’s shooting stars that blazed briefly in the 1950s and 1960s.
Continue ReadingBud Shank
ZARDI’S – 1954
Zardi’s 1954. 1954 provided a cornucopia of modern jazz for Los Angeles jazz fans. In addition to booming business at the city’s leading jazz clubs, jazz impresarios Gene Norman and brothers Norman and Irving Granz staged sell out concerts to meet the growing demand for modern jazz. Gene Norman continued to wear several musical […]
Continue ReadingFRANKLY JAZZ with Frank Evans
Jazz returned to the television screen in Los Angeles in the summer of 1962. The first program was created for syndication by Steve Allen who hired Jimmie Baker to produce the shows. Baker was a veteran jazz TV producer who had been one of the creative forces responsible for the award winning Stars of Jazz […]
Continue ReadingJohnny Mandel – I Want To Live!
The producer of I Want To Live, Walter Wanger, and the featured jazz artist in the film, Gerry Mulligan, shared a common past. They both served jail time at the Sheriff’s Honor Farm in Castaic, forty miles north of Los Angeles. Wanger served three months in the summer of 1952 for shooting and wounding a Hollywood agent that he suspected of having an affair with his wife, actress Joan Bennett. Mulligan served four months in the fall of 1953 on drug charges following his arrest at The Haig earlier that spring while he and Chet Baker were performing at the club.
Continue ReadingJohnny Mandel & Dick Bock
Johnny Mandel had a noteworthy role in the early success of Dick Bock’s Pacific Jazz label. From February of 1954 until August of 1958 Mandel’s composing/arranging hand embellished eleven albums.
Continue ReadingJack Lewis / East Coast
Jack Lewis produced the RCA Victor Jazz Workshop series of albums while head of A&R in New York.
Continue ReadingThe Haig – Part Six
The Bud Shank Quartet returned to The Haig at the beginning of 1957. The Ad Lib column in the January 9, 1957, issue of Down Beat noted that Shank’s return gave a boost to business. The same column mentioned that the Jimmy Giuffre Three spent a week at The Haig in December.
Continue ReadingThe Haig – Part Five
Bud Shank, Buddy Collette, Curtis Counce, and Art Pepper were among the jazz artists featured at The Haig during 1956.
Continue ReadingThe Haig – Part Four
Newspaper ads for the Haig in 1955 were sparse. It seems that John Bennett relied on the good graces of Down Beat for the occasional mention of who was performing at the club. The twice a month publication of the magazine required considerable lead time before each issue went to press. The “freebies” were noted […]
Continue ReadingThe Haig – Part Two
The Gerry Mulligan Quartet continued their engagement at The Haig in January of 1953. Bob Whitlock departed the quartet before Christmas and was replaced by Carson Smith, a logical choice by Mulligan as Smith had demonstrated his chops during the initial engagement at the Black Hawk in September of 1952. The quartet’s version of “My […]
Continue ReadingJAZZ CITY PART SEVEN JULY – DECEMBER 1956
The Australian Jazz Quartet/Quintet engagement that began in June carried over to July 5, 1956. The Chet Baker Quintet opened the following day, Friday, July 6, 1956. The Chet Baker Quintet appeared on Stars of Jazz the next Monday, July 9th, with the addition of Bill Loughborough on boo-bams, a percussion instrument consisting of calf skin stretched over varying lengths of timber bamboo. Chet would frequently play boo-bams during the engagement at Jazz City.
Continue ReadingJAZZ CITY PART SIX JANUARY – JUNE 1956
The December 28, 1955, issue of Down Beat magazine ran a short column announcing a series of West Coast bookings for Miles Davis’s current combo with Paul Chambers, Philly Joe Jones, Red Garland, and John Coltrane. The new quintet had a recent release on the Prestige label, MILES, that featured the new quintet. Miles Davis’s new quintet opened at Jazz City on Friday, January 6, 1956. The quintet’s engagement ran through Thursday, January 19, 1956. Prior to heading north to San Francisco for their booking at the Black Hawk, Paul Chambers joined a combo led by Kenny Drew for Jane Fielding’s second album for Herb Kimmel’s Jazz:West label.
Continue ReadingBUD SHANK / CHET BAKER THEME MUSIC FROM “THE JAMES DEAN STORY”
The recording date for the Pacific Jazz / World Pacific session that produced the above album has consistently been given as November 8, 1956 in jazz discographies. Jorgen Grunnet Jepsen’s JAZZ RECORDS 1942-1965 Vol. 1: A – Bl entry was one of the first discographies to annotate the album. This pioneering work was accomplished at […]
Continue ReadingLIGHTHOUSE AT LAGUNA
Jazz became a permanent fixture at the Lighthouse Cafe in Hermosa Beach when Howard Rumsey convinced the owner, John Levine, that a regular music offering would attract patrons to the bar/cafe who would linger and leave with a lighter wallet. Levine was skeptical at first but agreed to give Rumsey a trial run. The trial […]
Continue ReadingTHE FIRST LIGHTHOUSE ALL STARS RECORDINGS PART THREE
CONTEMPORARY RECORDS This research was originally published in the Dutch discography journal, Names & Numbers, No. 42, July 2007 and No. 44, January 2008 in slightly different form. The recordings to be examined are commercial recordings that were issued on the Skylark, Lighthouse, Tampa and Contemporary labels within the time frame of the early […]
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