Jazz Focus

The Saturday Night Swing Club was a regular radio show from the middle of 1936 through 1939 and featured a shifting cast of great musicians - the house band which included players like Mannie Klein, Bunny Berigan, Will Bradley, Pete Pumiglio, Dave Harris, Claude Thornhill, Lou Shoobe and Johnny Williams.  Also featured here are Red Allen, Roy Eldridge, Chick Webb, Adrian Rollini, Billy Kyle, Dick McDonough, Carl Kress, Raymond Scott, Casper Reardon, and the Jimmie Lunceford Orchestra with Willie Smith, Joe Thomas, Trummy Young and Jimmy Crawford.

Great sides for Blue Note and Commodore made in NYC when Bechet was visiting from France - with Jimmy Archey, Ray Diehl and Wilbur DeParis (tbn), Joe Sullivan, Art Hodes and Ralph Sutton (p), Pops Foster, Walter Page and Jack Lesberg (sb), Slick Jones and George Wettling (d)

Some of the first recordings by the well-known pianist, here in trio form with Ron Crotty on bass and Carl Tjader on drums/vibes/percussion.  Mostly standards, these tunes feature highly sophisticated arrangements using humor and extensive classical techniques!

Ivy Anderson was one of the most overlooked singers of the era - great with jazz, novelty, blues and ballads and was one of Ellington's prime tone colors during her decade-long tenure with his band.  Here she sings a mix of Ellington tunes as well as older standards and songs composed for various Cotton Club reviews during the middle 1930's - with the expected excellence from Cootie Williams, Rex Stewart, Lawrence Brown, Joe Nanton, Barney Bigard, Johnny Hodges, Harry Carney and the rest . . .

Great band sides led by the great tenor player early in his career - some while on tour in Europe, some in New York.  With Conte Candoli, Frank Rossolino, Lars Gullin, Lee Konitz, Al Cohn, Art Blakey, Dick Hyman, Jimmy Gourly, Henri Renaud and many others.

Martin Block usually just spun records on his WNEW show, but for a while he was hosting thirty minute jam sessions, several of which have been preserved . . here featuring Charlie Shavers, Charlie Teagarden and Bobby Hackett (trumpet and cornet), Jack Teagarden and Vernon Brown (trombone), Joe Marsala and Pee Wee Russell (clarinet), Dave Matthews (alto sax), Herschel Evans, Kenneth Hollon and Bud Freeman (tenor), Ernie Caceres (baritone), Fats Waller, Howard Smith and Joe Bushkin (p), Eddie Condon, Teddy Bunn and Carmen Mastren (guitar), Sam Shoobe, Artie Shapiro and Milt Hinton (bass), Cozy Cole, George Wettling and Zutty Singleton (drums), and Lionel Hampton (vib) on long performances unencumbered by time limits!

Thomas led several sessions featuring great jazz contemporaries playing his compositions and arrangements (see previous show) but he also participated in several at the same time led by drummer Cozy Cole and featuring an array of talent - Don Byas, Coleman Hawkins, Hank D'Amico, Emmett Berry, Eddie Barefield, Clyde Hart, Billy Taylor, Budd Johnson and others.

Interesting band led by the great pianist Hines for the first eight or nine months of 1954 - including Gene Redd (trumpet and vibes), Dickie Wells (trombone), Morris Lane and Jerome Richardson (tenor sax), Leroy Harris (clarinet/alto/bari), Carl Pruitt and Paul Binnings (sb), Eddie Burns, Hank Milo (d).  Studio sessions and live dates from the Club Hangover in San Francisco

Saxophonist Walter "Foots" Thomas was never known as a great jazz player (he recorded numerous solos in his early days) but by the 1940's was highly regarded as a composer and arranger.  He also was associated with the publisher and entrepreneur Joe Davis, for whom he assembled recording bands.  Here are four sessions by these Thomas-led groups including Emmett Berry, Doc Cheatham and Charlie Shavers (trumpet), Eddie Barefield, Budd Johnson and Ernie Caceres on clarinet, Hilton Jefferson and Milt Yaner on alto sax, Johnson, Coleman Hawkins and Teddy McRae on tenor sax, Billy Taylor and Clyde Hart on piano, Milt Hinton and Slam Stewart on bass and Cozy Cole and Specs Powell on drums.

Third Stream before it was called that - several students of Darius Milhaud including Brubeck, Dave Van Kriedt (ts), Dick Collins (tpt), Bill Smith (clarinet), and Jack Weeks contribute arrangements of originals and standards using counterpoint, fugue and other classical techniques.  With Paul Desmond (as), Bob Cummings (bars), Ron Crotty (sb), Carl Tjader (d) and Bob Collins (tbn)