Listening to Prestige 693: Morris Nanton

LISTEN TO ONE: Theme from "Lawrence of Arabia"

 Some jazz musicians never quite get the recognition they deserve. Often it's because they flame out too quickly. Drugs put an end to their career. Or they move to Europe, and whatever reputation they build there doesn't travel across the Atlantic, and while Europe and Japan may have the real dedicated jazz fans, the USA has the tastemakers and the important labels and the reputation builders. Or maybe they just don't click. Their first album fails to sell, and their rccord label decides to move on. And after a while, it's time to get a real job with a paycheck and a retirement package. 

None of those things were true of Morris Nanton. This was his first record for Prestige, but he had made two previous for Warner Brothers, and he would make two more for Prestige, giving him a quite decent catalog of five LPs. He didn't flame out or die young. And he didn't move to Europe. In fact, he lived his whole life in his hometown of Perth Amboy, New Jersey, and he continued to play, and receive the love and approbation of audiences, in New Jersey clubs for six decades, including a 22-year stint with long-time partner Norman Edge at The Cove in Roselle, NJ, where -- according to his obituary in the Newark Star-Ledger, "such jazz greats as Rashan Roland Kirk, Don Elliott, Sal Nistico, Babs Gonzalez, and Joe Morello shared the spotlight with the group." And Nanton didn't need to have Kirk or Elliot on the bill to draw a crowd. A 2004 profile on the All About Jazz website describes a Thursday night at Shanghai Jazz in Madison, NJ, a Chinese restaurant/jazz club:

On this particular second Thursday, the Northeast was swept by record wind-storms. Inside the safe haven of Shanghai Jazz, several regulars blamed the weather for what they considered a poor turnout. While only a handful of seats remained empty, they were used to sitting shoulder to shoulder when the Morris Nanton Trio hits. Most clubs in Manhattan would be delighted with that level of turnout, even on a more hospitable night.

The CD explosion that began in the 1980s, and continued through the early years of the 21st century, gave a career boost to a number of musicians, as labels started repackaging and reissuing for CD much of their catalogs, even recordings that had sat on the shelf for a couple of decades. And here's where Morris Nanton's story really gets depressing. According to that same All About Jazz article, 

Currently, if you want to hear Nanton and Edge, you will have to attend one of their live shows, or spend hours searching used records stores, because none of the five sessions they recorded together is available on CD...Sadly, it is unlikely any of these sessions will be reissued on CD anytime soon. Fantasy Records, owners of the Prestige catalog, has rebuffed Nanton's reissue inquiries and has turned down his offer to buy the session masters. 

Nanton died in 2009, without ever seeing any of his LP recordings released on CD. 

We can't feel too sorry for Nanton. He had a pretty good life in many ways. He had an unusually good rapport with his bass player and musical partner, fellow Garden Stater Norman Edge, whom he met shortly after mustering out of the army (he was a Korean war vet), and with whom he would work throughout his career (Edge had one previous Prestige date, with Gene Ammons).  They easily transcended the racial divide (Nanton was African American, Edge was white), to the extent that, as Edge said, Morris was like a second son to his mom, and he was like a second son to Mrs. Nanton.  They recorded with different drummers (Prestige veteran Oliver Jackson on this session), but throughout most of their careet in the New Jersey club scene, their drummer was Jeff Brillinger, who also played with Stan Geta, Hod O'Brien, and Woody Herman.

And althoigh the CD explosion psssed him by, Roberta, one of his Warner Brothers albums, can be found on Spotify and Apple Music, and various albums, including this Prestige debut, are represented on YouTube.

So what's the music like? It is seriously worth a listen. Nanton was slotted by Warner Brothers for a role that was popular at the time -- jazz interpretations of Broadway shows and movie themes -- and he brings some of that to this session, with the themes from Lawrence of Arabia and Black Orpheus.

Nanton takes a bold, percussive approach to the piano, and while he's respectful of the show tunes that were his bread and butter, he's not afraid to put his personal stamp on them either. "Lawrence of Arabia" is known for the lush orchestral arrangement of Maurice Jarre, and that's something you're not going to duplicate with a piano trio, so a whole different approach is called for. Nanton's version begins with a driving drum intro by Oliver Jackson, and then the piano comes in with an approach that is so percussive I had to check the session log to make sure he hadn't switched in a set of vibes. 

The "jazz versions of well known movie themes" fad wasn't always a rewarding one, but Nanton makes it awfully good listening here.

Two 45 RPM singles came out of these sessions. First was "Theme from 'A Boy Ten Feet Tall'" / "Ja Da," the second side of which became Nanton's closest bid for a hit. Second was  "The Sweetest Sounds" / "The Theme From 'Black Orpheus.'"    

Cal Lampley produced the session. He had been a producer for Columbia for a number of years, and had recently begun branching out to work for other labels. His arrangement/production of "Misty," recorded by Richard "Groove" Holmes, would become Prestige's biggest selling single of all time, reaching #44 on the Billboard charts.

Nanton's album was title Preface. Would that it had been the preface to more of a recording career, and more national acclaim. But Morris and Norman did all right, and I'm glad that Listening to Prestige gave me a chance to hear them.