Alex Henderson

 

Stan Getz

By Alex Henderson



Since Stan Getz’s death from cancer in 1991, a fair amount of previously unreleased material (both live and studio recordings) has come out posthumously--and that’s in addition to the countless Getz reissues that labels have provided in the 1990s. The amazing thing about the abundance of Getz recordings available on CD is that very few of them are disappointing. One of the finest and most celebrated tenor saxophonists of all time, Getz was remarkably consistent. From the late 1940s to the early ‘90s, the caressing, Lester Young-influenced saxman (who was nicknamed “The Sound”) seldom let us down.

A companion CD to Concord’s 1996 Getz release, Your’s And Mine: Live At the 1989 Glasgow Jazz Festival, Soul Eyes boasts five more previously unreleased songs from that Scotland festival as well as three selections recorded live at Musikhusit Aarhus in Copenhagen, Denmark only three weeks later. Getz, who commanded a loyal, appreciative following in Europe, brings his recognizable and ever appealing tone to pieces by pianist Kenny Barron (“Voyage” and “Fijada”) and alto sax legend Gigi Gryce (“Stan’s Blues”) as well as the title song, a gorgeous ballad that pianist Mal Waldron wrote in the 1950s.

Getz’s performance on Billy Strayhorn’s “Blood Count” is especially poignant. Duke Ellington’s partner and soulmate wrote the haunting standard when his health was failing, and similarly, Getz was only two years from his deathbed when the recordings on this CD were made. Having been battling cancer, Getz plays “Blood Count” like he truly relates to what Strayhorn was going through--like someone who’s  reflecting on his own mortality. And yet, the agony of cancer hadn’t robbed Getz of his enviable technique. His chops and tone are still quite enviable on the Glasgow material as well as on three songs recorded in Copenhagen: Duke Ellington’s “Warm Valley,” the pop classic “Hush-A-Bye” and the standard “Slow Boat To China.” In Glasgow, he is joined by Barron (one of the finest   pianists of the last 30 years) drummer Ben Riley and bassist Ray Drummond, who is replaced by Yashuito Mori in Copenhagen.

Born in Philadelphia on February 2, 1927, Getz wasn’t even old enough to vote when he played with trombonist Jack Teagarden in 1943 and when he joined Stan Kenton’s big band in 1944. Getz played with Jimmy Dorsey in 1945 and Benny Goodman in 1945 and 1946, but it was when he was in Woody Herman’s Second Herd from 1947-49 that he really started to become well known. Along with Zoot Sims, Serge Chaloff and Herbie Steward, Getz made history as part of the first edition of The Herd’s sax section The Four Brothers. It was Getz who contributed the lovely “Early Autumn” to Herman’s repertoire.

Both Getz’s work with Herman and his early small group recordings on his own in the late 1940s made it clear that his style was deeply indebted to Lester “The Prez” Young, whose breathy tenor offered a subtle alternative to Coleman Hawkins’  hard-edged aggression. But like fellow Young disciples Zoot Sims and Al Cohn, Young developed an attractive sound of his own and became quite distinctive himself.

The type of softness that characterized Getz, Sims, Paul Desmond, Gerry Mulligan and Chet Baker (not to mention Miles Davis!) was labeled “cool jazz” in the early 1950s. Essentially, “cool” was bebop--but played with restraint and subtlety (although one could argue that swing giant Young was the godfather of “cool.”)  Getz was one of the most popular jazzmen of the 1950s, when he recorded numerous albums and played with a long list of greats that includes Mulligan, Lionel Hampton, Horace Silver, Jimmy Raney, Harry “Sweets” Edison, Jimmy Rowles and Oscar Peterson.

It was in the early 1960s that Getz joined forces with Brazilian greats like composer Antonio Carlos Jobim and singers Joao & Astrud Gilberto and helped popularize bossa nova--a fusion of “cool jazz” and  samba. Getz may not have single-handedly invented Brazilian jazz (alto saxman Bud Shank and guitarist Laurindo Almeida had first combined jazz and Brazilian music in 1953), but he certainly did more than anyone to popularize bossa nova. At a time when jazz was losing more and more of its popularity, Getz and the Gilberto Siblings had major hits with “The Girl From Ipanema” and “Desafinado.”

       But when the recording industry milked bossa nova for all it was worth (much as it would later milk everything from disco to gangsta rap), Getz rebelled in the mid-1960s and got away from recording so much Brazilian-oriented jazz. Getz acknowledged modal post-bop in the 1960s and fusion in the early ‘70, but he did so on his own terms and usually sounded like he was being true to himself. Through it all, The Sound never lost his love of melodic playing.

Getz first recorded for Concord in 1981, when he united with pianist Lou Levy, bassist Monty Budwig and drummer Victor Lewis for the session that gave us The Dolphin and Spring is Here. These albums found the tenor man in an entirely acoustic setting after a lot of electric experimentation in the 1970s. 1981 was also the year in which the live Keystone Corner performances heard on the Concord CD “Spring Is Here” were recorded. That CD, released posthumously in 1992, finds that same quartet embracing such time-honored standards as “Sweet Lorraine” and “Old Devil Moon” at the famous San Francisco club. When The Sound caresses “Easy Living” and “You’re Blase,” we’re reminded that no one played ballads more seductively.

Getz recorded frequently in the 1980s, and he continued to record right up until three months before his death--when Verve recorded the sessions heard on People Time. Getz’s playing is surprisingly convincing on that two-CD set, and an occasional shortness of breath doesn’t prevent him from achieving the type of excellence he was known for.

Getz was 64 when he finally lost his battle with cancer on June 6, 1991. It was a tremendous loss for the jazz world, but thankfully, he was more than well documented during his long career. And with Soul Eyes, Concord Jazz offers yet another reminder of just how great he was.

-August 1997

      Alex Henderson has written about Stan Getz extensively and presently contributes to Jazziz, The All Music Guide, All About Jazz and many other national publications.