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Samuel Chell | Kenosha,, WI United States | 02/27/2008
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Fresh Sound Records has done it again, following up last year's welcome single-disc reissue (at least outside the U.S.) of Stitt's '70s Cobblestone sessions, "Tune-Up" and "Constellation," with two 1959 West Coast dates for Verve featuring Sonny on alto in the company of a crack California rhythm section (Lou Levy, Mel Lewis and Leroy Vinnegar). And the remixing, pressing, documentation, production values, and liner notes are once again worthy of their subject. (I'm not sure if the reason the discs are scarce in the States has more to do with violated copyrights and legal problems or the sad state of the U.S. marketplace where jazz is concerned. Even though I got this late '07 release from Amazon, I've had to order other Fresh Sounds reissues from Spain.)
I would only have to question the back-cover blurb suggesting Sonny was clearly better on alto than tenor, especially after hearing him go live on numerous tenor match-ups (sometimes against three other tenor giants). Simply listen to him duel Rollins on tenor on "The Eternal Triangle" (including the 4-bar exchanges) and try to convince the listener that tenor was not Stitt's main instrument. But it's true that on tenor Sonny could be more basic, more predictable, more prone to "communicate" with the average listener by playing fewer notes with the help of a Hammond B3 organ and his Selmer Varitone device.
Certainly on alto Sonny was never surpassed during my lifetime (he would sometimes go to the smaller horn if, as was the case once with Dexter, he sensed he was losing the advantage in a "serious" face-off). I can hear him saying "Don't call me Bird!"--most likely in an impatient and angry tone, not implying Bird was superior or inferior but that Sonny Stitt was his own man. From Stitt's POV (I even asked him once) musicians like Louis Armstrong, Art Tatum and Lester Young had as much of an influence on his alto style as Charlie Parker.
As the liner notes suggest, Sonny was always mindful of two things: melody and perfection. It never seemed to occur to him that he was a virtuoso if not pyrotechnophile. He even called Tatum's playing commendably "simple" because the pianist never strayed far from the main melody. And that's one of the reasons Sonny is so challenging (Oscar Peterson called him the trickiest horn player to accompany): you start to take all of that blistering technique and fluid virtuosity for granted, thinking you've heard it all. Keep listening--not just to the primary choruses and main phrases but to the fills and even turnarounds. He's playing secondary melodies in between the main melody and tertiary melodies on the turnarounds, in a mere 4-bars executing at a level few others dare dream about let alone realize!
The rhythm section on this occasion is sufficiently "giving" to allow Sonny all of the breathing room he needs to display his inexhaustible vocabulary, including articulations and tonal qualities, on the smaller horn. On his contemporaneous Verve date with Oscar Peterson, the accompaniment is at times just a bit too busy (Oscar's combative instincts are not easily contained), and on the '70s Cobblestone and Muse dates the rhythm is almost overly aggressive (Duvivier's bass is over-amplified or boosted and has an exaggerated sustain on both sessions). Moreover, as much as Stitt liked Barry Harris as an accompanist, Lou Levy is a more inventive soloist and provides at least equally enabling support.
As is the case on so many Stitt recording sessions, the program is an embarrassment of riches. The producers would have done much better to have started with "Sunday," on which Sonny is simply flying (ironically, he doesn't get off the ground when he calls the same tune on a later, disappointing date on Impulse--"A Jazz Message"--with Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers (including McCoy Tyner). On the present recording, after "Sunday" and "Just Friends" the programming of "All of Me" at an identical tempo is anticlimactic. I'd recommend listening to the latter tune all by itself because Sonny plays notes that are an entire octave above the register of the horn.
It's the only "down" moment on the recording to my ears. The last song I heard Sonny play at a club was "The Gipsy," and this recorded version is at least the equal of the version he submits on the date with Oscar. His singing (yes, you heard me right) on his own tune, "That's the Way to Be," is a sheer delight, atoning for his vocalizing on the inferior and amateurish, widely bootlegged tape recorded at Ronnie Scott's in London. And I don't recall another Stitt recording of "It's You or No One": even though an uptempo tune, he owns it so completely he double-times it! He plays tenor on the last tune, "Just the Way You Look Tonight," reminding us of how much alike the smaller and bigger horns could sound in the hands of Stitt.
As for the Stitt-Bird comparison, Bird had the "advantage" of not being so completely documented as Stitt. I've never heard any musician on any instrument approach Bird's 4-bar break on the 1947 Carnegie Hall recording of "Night in Tunisia," and Bird's tone could sound almost like it was "doubling" itself, as though there were two altos playing in unison. On the other hand, Stitt's sound on alto or, for that matter, on tenor is hardly lacking. "Pure," or "clean," can be misleading, so let's say Stitt's tone is clear, honest and true, an "embodied" and direct sound with no room for raspiness, spittle, breathiness, overtone clutter. Like his lines, it goes to the heart of the matter--lucid, impeccable, logical--but cut out of the same soulful cloth as the best blues. There is no more exemplary, perfect player than Stitt: Tatum is, in many respects, his closest musical equivalent.
If you have the Mosaic box with all of Stitt's Roost and Roulette recordings, you're pretty well equipped. Nevertheless, this Verve date practically demands a place in any collection of Stitt and, for that matter, jazz recordings. Though I've only made the discovery in the last few days, 1959 yielded another masterwork besides Miles' "Kind of Blue.""
ALTO DOMINANCE
John M. | 11/13/2007
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Finally some more Sonny Stitt Alto dominated Quartet sides. Sonny Stitt- Complete Original Quartet Recordings( with Hank Jones(1CD) is Alto dominated. NEW YORK JAZZ and PERSONAL APPEARENCE definitely are not. This is 2LP's on 1 CD recorded with the Lou Levy Trio on consecutive days in 1959 for Verve Records. He plays Alto Sax on the first 14 tracks and Tenor on the last. It is Sonny at his best."
