[FawltyTenor]

I dug this track out when an old thread was revived about the classic Goodbye Pork Pie Hat tenor solo (the Columbia one) by John Handy. Thought it would make more sense to post here...

(The original thread) http://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?60089-Who-plays-this-tenor-solo

My dusty old track is from a primitive 1989 demo... (Wow, I'm getting old...) No tenor on this one...I'm on alto...with all my youthful exhuberance and very little "real world" playing experience...

Not the greatest sound quality, but hey, it was 1989 on an old Tascam portable cassette studio...this was shortly after my father passed away, I'm sure that influenced how I played...it was a very somber time for me.

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_songInfo.cfm?bandID=1122869&songID=11165773

 

[jlima]

very nice and inspirational, thank you.

 

[mrpeebee]

That's a nice oldy Shawn, I enjoyed it very much. Great alto solo and sound already early in your sax career .

 

[Mike1955]

Not a bad recording Shauwn.
And I dig your playing on it. Goodbye Pork Pie Hat is a beautiful tribute in concept by Mingus for Lester Young.
You did the piece proudly...

 

[Wade Cornell]

Nice track. Tone and phrasing very together, recording isn't that bad and has character. Would you have played this a lot differently now?

 

[sax23]

Nice recording and great phrasing on the solo! I alos noticed that the bass player is super audible right before and at the beginning of the sax solo. Was that intentional? For me bass is like cow-bell, I always want more.

www.ReedsForLess.com

 

[FawltyTenor]

Sax23- I think between eq and maybe some phasing, there's a funkiness to the bass sound. I also did an edit in there, there was also a soprano solo before...

Wade - Not sure I'd "approach" it differently, but I'm sure it would come out differently. (Cluttered up with more notes, perhaps). When I hear this now, I seem pretty patient and in the moment. Not necessarily typical of my playing at that time...

Goodbye Pork Pie Hat is a great jazz standard, but just doesn't get called as often as other ones like Round Midnight, for example.

This was a kind of "rehearsal" group, getting together around once a week learning tunes and gearing up for the demo. Only did a few gigs, then played a bit as a quartet before disbanding. It was basic jazz repetoire, played mostly in a straight-forward manner. A lot of bop based stuff and ballads...

As the youngest member, it was a great learning experience for me. We shared a lot of records as well, so I also got exposed to a lot of great music I'd never heard...

Shawn

 

[dogster]

awesome playing here is one i found with Gerry mulligan thas amazing

 

[Koen88]

I must say I never heard this song before.. I think this was a beutiful introduction to this song with very nice playing and a nice tone, comes close to how I sound actually..

oh and just a detail I was at the respectable age of 1 at that time :mrgreen:

 

[FawltyTenor]

The Mingus Ah Um recording is maybe the most famous version of this, although Mingus recorded this as Theme for Lester Young on Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus. Both are classic recordings and highly recommended, along with the Anthology that was on Atlantic.

Mingus is an fascinating figure and great composer...while a number of his tunes are jazz standards, his compositions often had surprising twists and turns or changes of texture/mood. A lot of Duke Ellington influence in some of his earlier work, and like Duke, he had a lot of strong individual voices playing in his bands.... Booker Ervin, John Handy, Dolphy, Charlie Mariano, Jack Walrath, Jimmy Knepper, Roland Kirk, Jacki Byard, George Adams...

 

[PowerOfSoul]

Wow, really excellent playing, Shawn, on one of my all-time favorite tunes. So nice to hear another version of it. Indeed, not overdone, but still you make it your own and create some great melody. A lot of feeling in your playing here. Thanks for posting this.

The Mingus Ah Um recording is maybe the most famous version of this, although Mingus recorded this as Theme for Lester Young on Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus. Both are classic recordings and highly recommended, along with the Anthology that was on Atlantic.
...

Yep, two of my faves. Tenor fans, Booker Ervin (I think it's him) wails (almost literally) on the Mingus^5 version---you gotta hear it. (And Eric Dolphy is amazing on "Hora Decubitus" on the same album---one of his farthest-out solos.)

The Mingus Ah Um version is on youtube:

Thanks again Shawn.

Howard

 

[FawltyTenor]

It's fun listening to these old tracks...I decided I had a few more tracks that weren't too embarraing to u/l and share in this thread...as far as the (crude) arrangements, we just kind of came up with these. I always had these ideas for surprise endings, like ending with the bridge on Killer Joe (and using it as an interlude), or when we played My Little Sude Shoes, after repeating the last few measures we ended on the pentultimate note leaving the listener hanging.

Interesting, while my tastes and approach have evolved since then (I sure hope), I've held certain tendencies for a long time...simple motifs contrasted with an occaisionaly flurry of notes, and frequent melody quotes (a lot of my favorites liked to do that...Woods, Dexter, Rollins).

Killer Joe (another basement demo track)

All Blues (live fm broadcast)

Watermelon Man (live)

ps: Watermelon Man was one of the few "electric" things we did...I love the funky electric bass on this one!

On the radio broadcast, some years back WBEZ Chicago DJ Larry Smith hosted a "live jazz party" every Friday night. If you were a jazz fan in Chicago, you'd definitely remember this wonderful personality. Local bands would come in and play some tunes, chat, and plug their upcoming gigs. In between, he played lots of great mainstream jazz. I loved his show, and jumped at the chance to play a couple sets on the radio. Funny, we didn't really have anything to plug at that time. The radio broadcast was the gig...