Jazz on the Beach 196: Miles, Coltrane, Evans, Parker, Nina Simone, Harold López-Nussa, Hugh Masekela, Dom Salvador, Charles Lloyd
Jazz giants, new releases, hard boppers and more
This week’s Jazz on the Beach radio playlist features giants of 20th century music Miles Davis, John Coltrane and Bill Evans. From Miles there’s Footprints from Miles Smiles (Columbia, 1967), with his Second Great Quintet of tenor saxophonist and song’s composer Wayne Shorter (‘Bring the book'), pianist Herbie Hancock, double bassist Ron Carter and drummer Tony Williams.
From Coltrane there’s the magnificent A Love Supreme, Pt. 1: Acknowledgement from A Love Supreme (Impulse! 1965), with Coltrane playing tenor alongside pianist McCoy Tyner, double bassist Jimmy Garrison and drummer Elvin Jones.
Bill Evans plays solo piano on Peace Piece from Everybody Digs Bill Evans (Riverside, 1959), recorded on 15th December 1958, just a few months before the sessions on 2nd March and 22nd April featuring all three musicians that would become Kind of Blue.
There’s also a 20-year-old Miles playing alongside alto saxophonist Charlie Parker on the west coast recording of Moose the Mooche (Dial, 1946), a nod to Parker’s dealer, Emry ‘Moose the Mooche’ Byrd. The rest of the Septet on that 28th March session are tenor saxophonist Lucky Thompson, pianist Dodo Marmarosa, double bassist Vic McMillan, drummer Roy Porter and guitarist Arvin Garrison.
Another undisputed jazz giant is the pianist and vocalist Nina Simone. There’s her version of Duke Ellington’s Mood Indigo from her debut Little Girl Blue: Jazz as Played in an Exclusive Side Street Club (Bethlehem 1959), for which she recorded 14 songs in one 13 hour session with double bassist Jimmy Bond and drummer Albert ‘Tootie’ Heath in late 1957.
I particularly wanted to play this track after hearing the latest Tomorrow’s Warriors Big Band, featuring mostly 15-25 year olds, perform a joyous set of mainly Ellington repertoire (including Mood Indigo), at the Deal Music and Arts Festival last Sunday.
Speaking of Tomorrow’s Warriors, there’s a track from the saxophonist, Tomorrow’s Warriors alumni and mentor Binker Golding’s first solo album Abstractions of Reality Past and Incredible Feathers (Gearbox Records, 2019). The impeccable You, That Place, That Time features Binker on tenor with Ezra Collective’s pianist Joe Armon-Jones, double bassist Daniel Casimir and drummer Sam Jones. I’m looking forward to hearing new music from him at Ronnie’s at the end of August.
Among the new releases on this week’s playlist is the brilliant Cuban born pianist Harold López-Nussa with Benny Moré’s composition Bonito y Sabroso from Nueva Timba (Blue Note, 5th September). This is the first new music I’ve heard since 2023’s fabulous Timba a la Americana, and again features his brother drummer Ruy López-Nussa, double bassist Luques Curtis and harmonica virtuoso Grégoire Maret. The tracks were recorded live at Le Duc des Lombards in Paris (where López-Nussa now lives), and were ‘reshaped and enhanced’ in post production with electronics and beats from José Angel Blanco, a.k.a. El Negro WADPRO.
The godfather of Brazilian soul music, pianist Dom Salvador, gets the Jazz is Dead treatment from producers Adrian Younge & Ali Shaheed Muhammad. Safira has a strong African spirit and comes from Dom Salvador Jazz is Dead 24 (JID, 11th July), featuring Salvador’s Fender Rhodes, Younge playing bass guitar, marimba, electric guitars and pedal harp, drummer Leo Costa, percussionist Gibi dos Santos plus horns and flutes.
There’s a second track from vocalist Lauren Scales, tenor saxophonist Mike Flanagan and pianist Chris Grasso’s really enjoyable Many Rivers (Truth Revolution Records Collective, 8th August), with the rhythm section of double bassist Luques Curtis and drummer Charles Haynes. This time it’s a fine version of the Charlie Parker classic Star Eyes with Flanagan mixing up two Bird intros while Scales is in wordless mode.
There’s also more from Jason Miles’ tremendous new band Lisbon Electric 4tet (JMM, 28th April), with the deeply grooving Lisbon Street Mix of Chude. the keyboard and synth maestro sounds like he’s having a great time with drummer Vicky Marques, bassist Yami Aleolel and drummer Tiago Oliveira.
We’re hard boppin’ as always, make that twice this week with tenor saxophonist Hank Mobley. First with Remember from Soul Station, (Blue Note, 1960), featuring pianist Wynton Kelly, double bassist Paul Chambers and drummer Art Blakey. And second, on pianist Sonny Clark’s title track from My Conception (Blue Note, 1979), recorded in 1959 with trumpeter Donald Byrd and Chambers and Blakey once again.
From the Summer of Love there’s tenor saxophonist Charles Lloyd’s Forest Flower - Sunset from the million selling Forest Flower: Charles Lloyd at Monterrey (Atlantic, 1967), recorded at the Festival the year before with pianist Keith Jarrett, double bassist Cecil McBee and drummer Jack DeJohnette.
And from the following year, the South African trumpeter Hugh Masekela’s massive US chart topping single Grazing in the Grass from the album The Promise of a Future (UNI, 1968), with guitarist Bruce Langhorne, alto saxophonist Al Abreu, pianist William Henderson, bassist Henry ‘Skipper’ Franklin and drummer Chuck Carter, who plays the song’s signature cowbell.
And finally, the marvellous singer Samara Joy has a major London show coming up this weekend, so there’s Everything Happens to Me from her debut Samara Joy (Whirlwind, 2021), featuring the astonishing guitarist Pasquale Grasso, double bassist Ari Roland and drummer Kenny Washington. She will be performing at the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall on Saturday 19th July, with her octet and the BBC Concert Orchestra.
In the meantime, here’s Samara four years ago when the album was first released and it was still possible to see her in an intimate setting.
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Mine keeps playing the June 25 list. Was something miss uploaded?
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