Music Monday - John Pizzarelli

Things ain't what they used to be. (In fact, they never was.) The Profile (more than you really wanted to know) is here.

This is John Pizzarelli jamming after hours during the 2002 Jazz Festival in Ottawa. It's after the show. He's just one of the guys. A fine musician.

These are the most popular pages: Alison Young Art Pepper Barney Kessel Bettie Page Curl-up-and-dye Edgar Degas and the lost Ginger Nude Ginger Panda Gnat Trap Little Annie Fannie Marilyn Resident Alien Sunday Funnies

Alison Young and the moment.

Things ain't what they used to be. (In fact, they never was.) The Profile (more than you really wanted to know) is here.

Never throw away any picture. We are all we have. The camera tried hard to get a shot for me but the lighting and the inept operator gave only this marginal result. The shutter was open too long and Alison Young moved. That’s okay. The memory of listening to her play live comes back just as well with this shot as with any other. As my wife and others will attest, when I hear a really talented musician or a really wonderful performance, I tend to weep. Yes, I know. As I sat in the dark at an after-hours jam session during an Ottawa Jazz Festival, I was often a bit misty eyed. Talented musicians, relaxed before a small audience, played as they felt, often only for their own appreciation. Good stuff. One such night, a young fellow played an alto sax solo backed with rhythm and piano. His technique was good, polished; his chorus was fresh and welcome. Then as he finished, he unhooked the alto from its neck strap and handed it to a red-haired girl standing just out of the spotlight. After a couple hearty solo piano choruses, 19 year old Alison Young stepped into the light and began to play that same alto sax. And tears came instantly to my eyes. Yes, I was impressed. It was the same saxophone but nothing else was the same. Her tone and range set her apart. Her attack and enthusiasm made it fascinating. Most of all, her inventiveness kept the listener sitting up straight. I’ll never forget it. When she finished we all realized we had been holding our collective audience breath. Every moment of our lives has that possibility to connect with someone. Each moment has that ability to be an important moment in someone’s life. Perhaps as a race we are losing that capability to empathize with our fellow humans. We have become protectorates, isolationists in our own being. We fear or loath connection so much that we avoid sharing any of ourselves. We only perceive the surface of others, not the warmth within. A child knows how. A child has the ability to freely observe moments from everything, collecting, mimicking and blending. But just like the fairy tales and goblins, this talent fades away as adulthood comes jack booting down the life path. We can rail on about conservation and brotherly love. We can preach about faith and hope and charity. We can be reliable or lie and make work or leisure for ourselves. We can vote and debate and scoff and complain. But in the final analysis: we are all we have. Never throw away any moment. We are all we have.

These are the most popular pages: Alison Young Art Pepper Barney Kessel Bettie Page Curl-up-and-dye Edgar Degas and the lost Ginger Nude Ginger Panda Gnat Trap Little Annie Fannie Marilyn Resident Alien Sunday Funnies

Alison Young and the Ottawa Jazz Festival

Volunteering at the Ottawa Jazz Festivals for three or four years was a fun thing for those times. Volunteering 16 or 20 hours of time got a free pass to go to any of the festival shows and events: A fair trade. The festivals last for ten days in July. Many famous and legendary musicians attended and performed in those years. The main stage hosts a sparkling train of stars. Some are relatively novice, introducing new sounds, new arrangements, new approaches to the music. Others were already well known by the echoes from the vinyl canyons of 12 inch microgroove records, in layers of years and years and years. David "Fathead" Newman does his version. There were many outdoor concerts but the favorite time was the late night jam sessions in a meeting room at the Ramada Inn near Confederation Park. There was no stage. It was about 90 people sitting at tables in a semi-circle around the performers. Many of the sidemen and leaders would show up there, in different combinations. They would combine their instruments, their techniques, their talents in various ways to produce some of the liveliest and interesting music ever heard. But then, that is the unique quality of jazz: It is never the same way twice. It is ever new. After attending those sessions so many years in a row, memory has begun to blur them into one long session with too many musicians to remember. Break Time Host John Geggie always started things with a trio of himself on bass, Nancy Walker piano and Nick Frazer or Joel Haynes on drums. Then the day’s performers wandered in, some carrying instruments, some just a drink. The regular outdoor concerts were on three stages, all day for ten days. Then the jams went on each night, most of the night. John Pizzarelli, no socks, just jammin'. He was fun. At various times the jam sessions included, Ravi Coltrane, members of the Basie Band, John Pizzarelli, a half dozen from Sandoval’s band, a couple from the Yellow Jackets or Maria Schneider’s band. Sometimes the room was half musicians. Those who wanted, played. Those who didn’t listened. Some years included Jane Bunnett, Lavay Smith, Cleo Lane, Lou Donaldson, Brad Mehldau, Nnenna Freelon, Masekela and Hassan Hakmoun and his sinter and heck, too many, too many, too many to remember. There were many memorable performances and musicians, but none, NONE, sticks any more than one young girl, a local from Ottawa. Alison Young usually strode into the room, sat for a bit with her attitude and her pout. She examined the scene, absorbing. John Geggie would finally coax her to sit in. She would eventually give in and play a set. It was always a treat. She borrowed an alto sax or sometimes brought her own. She could fit in any combination group but sounded best with just Geggie, Walker and Haynes backing her. Now here is what was so memorable about her: This lady here plays a fine lot of jazz. It is one of those incongruities that the mind has trouble digesting. The stun is witnessing phrasing and technique indicating decades of practice and study, coming from a girl too young to have done any of that. She played alto with an authority and command that was beyond her short years. She was too young to have learned those changes, those runs. Watching Alison Young perform with the facility and inventiveness of a much more mature musician makes the mind grasp for explanations. She must have simply been born with the experience; she couldn’t develop it in such a short time, could she? Are we discussing reincarnation here? Did a valuable, restless, ethereal piece of some long-gone jazz musician attach itself to her aura when she was born? Or maybe all of it? Are we hearing Parker, Desmond, Pepper? Trumbauer? The professional jazz musicians in the room would pause and stare and then look at each other. They heard it too. This kid here has some fine chops. One of the following years, while strolling an Ottawa side street, the sounds of jazz came tumbling through a pub door. There was a live five piece band in the corner and yes, it was Alison Young on alto. Seeing her in a working environment enhanced the appreciation of her abilities. The stroll was postponed until the set was over. In 2001 there was a little additional volunteer work at Judy Humenick’s Jazz Camp, then held at Christie Lake near Perth, Ontario. Several seasoned jazz musicians such as Rob Frayne, Floyd Standifer, Frank Lozano and Nancy Walker assembled at the lake side campground cabins with a number of jazz hopefuls and students just to rub shoulders and have clinic sessions and then, a final concert. They were short some kitchen help so that’s where the volunteers filled in. During the day the musicians divided up into groups, percussion, vocal, reeds and worked with the pro on their techniques. If one wandered anywhere near the reed session, Alison Young could be heard, unmistakably. On the last day of the camp, a collective concert was given. Spouses, friends, parents and the volunteers gathered in the main building and fought for seats. Alison’s mother attended and chatted a bit. She could be seen at once as a proud mother of a very talented girl and frustrated mother of a young woman with a mind of her own. I told her that I thought her daughter was a genius. An apprehensive glint passed quickly from her face as it sunk in that I was sincere. Then she smiled and said, “Well, she’s a handful.” I never saw her again. Each group performed what they had been rehearsing. Alison dominated her set easily. Then the professionals and teachers jammed one last time. The pros all had CD’s to sell. The volunteers ran a brisk business at the CD sales table. And the Jazz Camp was over for another year. At the last Ottawa Jazz Festival attended it was learned that Alison would be moving to Toronto to continue studies. Here is another link about the VERNON ISAAC MEMORIAL SCHOLARSHIP(VIMS). You can hear her by going to her Myspace Page and clicking on this treatment of “Oh Lonesome Me.” Alison is heard in the sax solo at the end. This sound is perhaps somewhat in the style of the solo by..is it Lenny Picket(?) in the SNL closing theme. Moving and iconic in the very least. I ranted about this artist previously here...

These are the most popular pages: Marilyn Art Pepper Gnat Trap Alison Young Resident Alien Ginger Panda Barney Kessel Sunday Funnies Yes, I refuse to use Kleenex until THIS stops. Things ain't what they used to be. (In fact, they never was.) The Profile (more than you really wanted to know) is here.

Jam night at the Ottawa Jazz Festival 2003

Jam night at the Ottawa Jazz Festival 2003, originally uploaded by anyjazz65. elhawk says: Great shot Jazz. I would have liked to have been there. I have also seen Hassan Hakmoun play live. That was in 1992 at the Reading, Rivermead WOMAD festival (World of Music Arts and Dance). Hassan is a Moroccan and his music is based on the trance music of the Gnawa musicians of his country. Not all sintirs have only one string, some have three. The one he was playing at WOMAD had three and it was amped up. He had a full band at that gig and was playing some crazy kind of dance music, which must have been related to Sufi dervish music. But he was also using feedback techniques with Hendrix style wails and screams. It was an amazing set. It was going on inside one of the big marquees so there was a lot of wild dancing going on. The drum in the picture I believe is a dumbek, an Arabian drum sometimes ceramic sometimes metallic. I used to have a ceramic one but my then small child knocked it off a table and smashed it sadly. Did you notice whether this one had a snare? Commonly they do. The first time I heard a sintir though was in Morocco itself in the Djma El Fna (the famous central square in Marrakech). It was being played there by a cross legged solo musician in traditional style. The sound was very drone like and hypnotic, almost unearthly in nature. anyjazz65 says: Thanks elhawk. I had a feeling you would connect. I attended those sessions 4 years in a row so in my memory they have begun to blur into one long session with too many musicians to remember. The side-men and sometimes the stars of many groups would show up and participate or sometimes just listen. I hosted the Hospitality Room during the day for the festival and got to chat with many of the musicians, and at night I absorbed the free-for-all music. The venue here was a small meeting room in the downtown Ramada Inn in Ottawa, Ontario. There was no stage. It was about 90 people sitting at tables in a semi-circle around the performers. Anyone who could stay up very late could see the musicians who had done their set on one of the three stages during the festival day, but now were just enjoying themselves. I attended every night. The musicians from various bands and groups wandered in and sat in, blending combinations that still make my head numb. Host John Geggie always started things with a trio of himself on bass, Nancy Walker piano and Nick Frazer drums. Then the day’s performers wandered in, some carrying instruments, some just a drink. A half dozen from Sandoval’s band, a couple from the Yellow Jackets or Maria Schneider’s band. Sometimes the room was half musicians. Those that wanted to played. Other years included the Basie band, Jane Bunnett, Lavay Smith, Cleo Lane, Lou Donaldson, Brad Mehldau, Nnenna Freelon, Masekela and heck, too many to remember. The regular concerts went on all day for eight or ten days. Then the jams went on most of the night. One set in particular that blew me away was John Pizzarelli. He was loose and inventive and displayed flawless technique. I was sitting almost knees to knees with him. I don’t remember which year now. I should dig out the pictures from that year I guess. And there was a local teen age girl who played tenor now and then. She was good with three “o’s”. I’ll think of her name eventually. 2007 update: Her name is Alison Young . Anyway, the picture here of Hakmoun is just how it looked. The small room made you feel as if you were IN the music. His music was so hypnotic and gripping I am not sure how I got home. There may have been three strings but I only remember one. I think the drum had a snare, I remember now remarking to someone about it, wondering if it was standard or just something he added. Sorry I don’t remember more right now. When I do, I will add it here.

These are the most popular pages: Curl-up-and-dye Marilyn Art Pepper Gnat Trap Alison Young Resident Alien Ginger Panda Barney Kessel Sunday Funnies Yes, I refuse to use Kleenex until THIS stops. Things ain't what they used to be. (In fact, they never was.) The Profile (more than you really wanted to know) is here.