Jazz On The Beach 96 & Blues Beach 30
Jazz On The Beach 96 & Blues Beach 30
Al Tanner Quintet, Rudolph Johnson and country blues
When it comes to great album titles, this one has to be right up there. As you can probably guess from the cover artwork, this 1967 album by Bay Area pianist Al Tanner was a strictly low budget affair recorded in front of an audience in the studio and released on the private Touché label. But don’t let that mislead you, as Happiness Is... Takin' Care Of Natural Business... Dig?! is a terrific soulful and modal jazz record, and this week’s show features Tanner’s deeply grooving composition The Magi featuring his regular trio of double bassist Edgar Williams and drummer William ‘Smiley’ Winters expanded into a quintet with the addition of tenor saxophonist Roy Henderson and trumpeter/flautist George Alexander.
There was minimal promotion of the album apart from servicing a handful of jazz writers and magazines, but that didn’t seem to worry Tanner much. He had no itch for touring or the big time in general, and was happy just to work the clubs around San Francisco where he was highly respected and to participate in music education and community events. Props to Gerald Short’s Jazzman Records for unearthing and reissuing this album as part of their Holy Grail series.
Also this week, another selection from the twenty albums released by Black Jazz Records in the early seventies. This time it’s tenor saxophonist Rudolph Johnson’s The Traveller from The Second Coming released in 1973 which was produced by label founder Gene Russell and features our friend (and for the past few years a Broadstairs resident) Douglas Sides on drums, along with pianist Kirk Lightsey and double bassist Kent Brinkley. Johnson was terrific - a fiery and expressive player who deserved to be far better known (as did Al Tanner) and this music has the excitement of prime era Coltrane from a decade before.
In response to so much positive reaction to Aya’s Samba by Japanese double bassist Eiji Nakayama last week, there’s See Sea Town from the same album (Johnny’s Disc Record 1978). And speaking of bassists, there’s a fine version of Herbie Hancock’s Cantaloupe Island by Leon Lee Dorsey with guitarist Russell Malone and drummer Mike Clark (Jazz Avenue I 2023).
We say a sad goodbye to the great Tony Bennett, who once said, ‘I’m not a jazz singer, I’m a singer who likes jazz’. But his wonderful collaboration with pianist Bill Evans on Cy Coleman’s When In Rome from The Tony Bennett and Bill Evans Album exquisitely bridges the gap between the Great American Songbook and jazz. May his memory be a blessing.
Among the new music this week there’s the atmospheric Woodpecker from Tingvall Trio’s new album Birds (Skip Records), Maridalen’s Landkjenning (Jazzland) from their next album coming in September and singer/multi instrumentalist Ganavya’s beautiful Forgive Me My featuring harpist Alina Bzhezhinska and produced by Shabaka Hutchings for his Native Rebel Recordings. And as always, we’re hard boppin’ to a pair of Blue Notes: Fred Jackson’s Dippin’ In The Bag from Hootin’ And Tootin’ (1962) and Thad Jones’ Tariff from Detroit - New York Junction (1956).
Listen to this week’s Jazz On The Beach on Mixcloud - here’s the link
We’re down deep in the country (well, mostly) on this week’s Blues Beach with some of the true heroes of early blues including Blind Blake, Tampa Red, Leroy Carr, Ma Rainey, Robert Johnson, Charley Patton, Memphis Minnie & Kansas Joe McCoy, Lead Belly and Blind Willie McTell.
This music these artists made is the bedrock of rhythm and blues, rock and roll and rock music in general, and is the source and inspiration (and very often downright plagiarism) that fuelled the British Invasion of the sixties and the rock music that followed it. Some day soon I’ll do a show on the bluesrocking Zeppelins, Humble Pies and Foghats that reworked these artists themes and words for their own audiences, but for now, listen and enjoy the originals…and the best.
Listen to this week’s Blues Beach on Mixcloud - here’s the link
Radio Times
Broadcasting live from Deal Radio, 69a High Street, Deal, Kent CT14 6EH
Listen live to Jazz On The Beach every Wednesday from 10.00pm - midnight and Blues Beach every other Thursday from 6.00pm - 7.00pm via the internet on DealRadio.co.uk or the TuneIn Radio app.
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Catch Up on Mixcloud
All Jazz On The Beach shows - here’s the link
All Blues Beach shows - here’s the link