Listening to Prestige 341a: Willis Jackson

Going back in time, to pick up a session I had not been able to find at the time: Willis Jackson with his original partners, Jack McDuff and Bill Jennings.

Conguero Buck Clarke makes an interesting addition to this version of the Jackson group. Clarke, born and raised in Washington, DC, is not a percussionist in the Latin tradition--perhaps more Afrocentric. He contributes strongly to the group's sound, particularly on the showpiece of the session, the ten-and-a-half-minute "Keep on a-Blowin'." Jackson, of course, made his reputation as a hard-blowing rhythm and

blues tenor man, with titles like "Blow, Jackson, Blow." The classic honking tenor instrumentals of rhythm and blues were cut for the 78 and later 45 RPM jukebox market, and their intensity was tailored to three minutes and generally one soloist. "Keep on a-Blowin'" is very different from that. There's enough blowin' by the Gator, with some solid fills and call-and-response by McDuff, to make for a very satisfactory two-sided 45, and in fact Prestige did release one. But there's more, and appropriately so, with two sidemen as good as McDuff and Jennings. In fact, the over ten-minute cut is more or less divided into thirds, with Jennings soloing in the middle and McDuff at the end. I don't know how the tune was edited for the 45 RPM release, but they certainly could have done it the way it was done on Bill Doggett's classic two-sided "Honky Tonk": tenor sax solo on one side and guitar on the other.

Rudy Van Gelder keeps Buck Clarke's conga beat prominent throughout the number, and it's a welcome addition. Even with Ray Barretto's work on a number of recordings for Prestige and other labels, hand-propelled drums were still a rarity in jazz, and were rarely thought of in any context other than Latin music, which is why Buck Clarke didn't get a lot of dates.

A fact acknowledged by Clarke in a 1988 interview, looking back on his career. He had fallen in love with the congas early, and had never been tempted to switch to a more popular instrument.

The interview, by James Graves, and now posted on YouTube, gives another fascinating look into a less-known life in the jazz business. Clarke, born and raised in Washington, DC, went to work as a young teenager for a man who owned a sign company, and was Duke Ellington's cousin. His boss used to play jazz records for him -- the Duke, of course. and Oscar Peterson. "Then Dizzy Gillespie, and I was hooked."

The hook was sunk in deeper when his boss played him records of Gillespie with Chano Pozo:

 and knew I wanted to play percussion. Something spiritual happened to me, as though someone had said to me “this is what you will do.” It was tough, because there was little or no interest in bongos or congas for jazz at that time [the late 1940s].

Clarke started out playing the black vaudeville circuit, known at the time as "jig shows," then started to get gigs around the DC area with dance bands who wanted to include a few rhumbas -- this was before the mambo and cha-cha craze. On one of those dance gigs, with a band called Wesley Anderson and his Washingtonians (not Duke Ellington's Washingtonians), he found that the band was to be augmented by a guest star:

I was excited to be asked because they had some great musicians in that band, including Eddie Jones who had played for several years with Count Basie. But I was really excited when I found out who else had been hired for that one gig—Charlie Parker.

Bird and I hit it off right away. There were even moments on the stage when it was no one but me and him playing. It didn’t get recorded, but it’s recorded in my head, and it will be until I leave this world. 

I never saw Bird again, but in my mind I could hear him telling me, OK, kid go for it. You got it, now go for it. So I hit the road. 

Clarke hit the road, playing his congas and bongos, playing everywhere someone would let him, still resisting the temptation to switch instruments:

And still I had people asking me, “When are you going to play a real instrument? You want to play jazz, you need to pick up a saxophone or something.” But for me, playing percussion was like touching the earth.

A highlight of those days included a gig with Arnett Cobb when he was 19 or 20, where he says he really learned how to play with a band, and finally arriving in New York, where he got a chance to play with Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers.

Clarke made an album for the tiny Offbeat label in 1960, and two more for Argo in 1961 and 1963, but as far as getting called by name jazz musicians went, the Willis Jackson gig was pretty much of a one-off. But when a new decade rolled around, and percussion became the staple of jazz music that Clarke had always predicted it would, things changed, He recorded in the 1970s with Les McCann, Cannonball Adderley, Jimmy Smith, Herbie Hancock, Freddie Hubbard, Nina Simone, the Isley Brothers, John Mayall and others.

The session, produced by Esmond Edwards, ended up all over the place, which is probably one reason that it didn't create much of a calling card for Clarke. "Sportin'" (by Jackson and Jennings) and "Where Are You?" went to Cookin' Sherry. "Keep on a-Blowin'" (Jackson and McDuff) went on Cool "Gator." "This Nearly Was Mine" was on Blue Gator. "It Might as Well Be Spring" and "This'll Get to Ya" were on  Together Again!, which had put together leftover tracks from various sessions, and was released in 1965, after  Jackson, Jennings and McDuff had gone their separate ways. "Dancing on the Ceiling" was held off until 1966 and Together Again, Again!

"Keep on a-Blowin'" was one two-sided single, and "This'll Get to Ya" was the other.

Listening to Prestige 341: Arnett Cobb

Two days in the studio with Arnett Cobb and a quintet, rhythm section augmented by congas, but with a different piano player and a different conguero each day, continuing the pattern he had established on his previous Party Time session for Prestige, with Ray Bryant and Ray Barretto.

The piano guys were two more of the best young players on the scene, 30-year-old Tommy Flanagan and 25-year-old Bobby Timmons. Flanagan had made his Prestige debut in 1956, newly arrived from Detroit, on an abbreviated Miles Davis session.

He would shortly thereafter be tabbed for one of the decade's most important albums, Sonny Rollins' Saxophone Colossus, and would make his debut as leader the following year with a trio: Overseas, recorded in Sweden. By the time of this recording, he was a solid regular with the label, with 15 recording dates as leader or sideman.

Flanagan's versatility could be amply illustrated right at this moment in time: just two weeks before he went to Englewood Cliffs to record with one of the veteran masters of good-time, mainstream jazz, he had seen the release of a session with young players who would be standing jazz on its year: John Coltrane's Giant Steps.

Bobby Timmons had recorded once previously for Prestige, with Clifford Jordan and John Jenkins, but he was best known for his work with Blue Note, particularly with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers.

Danny Barrajanos took the conga chair for the first day. He was primarily known for his work with Harry Belafonte and Miriam Makeba. Buck Clarke, who came in for the second day, was more of a jazz figure, with credits that would include Freddie Hubbard, Herbie Hancock and Les McCann.

Latin percussion was still a somewhat outside-the-box idea for a modern jazz album, and one might think of Cobb as an inside-the-box kinda guy, but boy, does he know how to make it swing! Listen to the work they do on "Blue Lou," composed by Edgar Sampson, one of the few composer/arranger/ musicians of his era to move back and forth between mainstream and Latin jazz. He played with Duke Ellington, Rex Stewart, Fletcher Henderson and Chick Webb (for whom he composed "Stompin' at the Savoy" and "Don't Be That Way"); and worked as an arranger for Marcelino Guerra, Tito
Rodgriguez and Tito Puente. And raised a musical family--his daughter Grace co-wrote "Mambo Inn" with Mario Bauzá. "Blue Lou" is a killer, with Barrajanos pushing the beat throughout, getting some wild and crazy sax playing of Cobb and smoking solos from Flanagan, Taylor and himself.

"Blue Lou" was followed on the session by a Cobb original called "Blue Me." One can't help but wonder if the original title had been a mite dirtier.

The second day found the musicians in a mellower mood, but Buck Clarke shows how much a conguero can contribute there, too. Listen to "The Nitty Gritty," a Cobb original. It's interesting that Cobb didn't use any Bobby Timmons originals, as hot a composer as he was then. But Timmons adds his soul jazz piano to Cobb's already soulful playing, and his Illinois Jacquet-style honking.

The sessions became a little mixed on record. "Down by the Riverside" is Timmons and Clarke, but it Arnett Cobb--More Party Time, which otherwise comprised tunes from the first day. The traditional spiritual joined Stephen Foster's "Swanee River" as tunes you wouldn't necessarily bring to a modern party. "Fast Ride" was slipped back to Movin' Right Along to complete the trade. Both albums were released before 1960 was out.
was included on

"Lover Come Back to Me," from the Flanagan/Barrajanos session, was a two-sided 45 RPM single release. The Sigmund Romberg melody is from New Moon, the last operetta to be produced on Broadway. One tends to think of operetta as a form more likely to produce cornball chestnuts like "Stout Hearted Men," which is also from New Moon, but "Lover Come Back to Me" has proved a most satisfying challenge to many a modern jazz musician. So has another aria from New Moon, "Softly, as in a Morning Sunrise," which Cobb recorded on the second day.

"Ghost of a Chance" was the single from the second session to be released on 45 RPM, as the flip side of "Smooth Sailing," from Cobb's first Prestige album.

Esmond Edwards produced both sessions.


VERY CLOSE TO BEING READY TO TAKE ORDERS FOR LISTENING TO PRESTIGE VOL 3!