"LIVE AT MONTEREY 1960"

BIG 'P' (6:18) Jimmy Heath

BLUE DANIEL (7:15) Franck Rosolino

THE CHANT (9:15) Victor Feldman

THE OLD COUNTRY (6:16) Nat Adderley

DIS HERE (8:45) Bobby Timmons

and 5 others tracks by Duke Ellington and his Orchestra 

Duke Ellington Orchestra - Cannonball Adderley Quintet

Live At Monterey 1960 Part II

The annual Monterey Jazz Festival first took place in September, 1958 and was founded by writer Ralph Gleason and disc jockey Jimmy Lyons. For many years it has provided a location for high quality jazz and blues at three venues on the Monterey County Fairgrounds but the third Monterey Festival was something special. That was the year Duke Ellington premiered his Suite Thursday, a four part work actually commissioned by the Festival and inspired by John Steinbeck's novel of that name, which was set in Old Monterey.

For many years there were rumours that recordings of the 1960 Ellington contribution existed but it was not until Status issued "Live At Monterey" (Status DSTS 1008) that those rumours became fact. Now the remainder of Duke's evening at the festival is presented here, coupled with a brilliant and previously unissued set by the late Cannonball Adderley's quintet.

Sharing the stand that Saturday night with Ellington was the "new" Cannonball Adderley Quintet, "new" in the sense that this was the first appearance of the band since Britain's Vic Feldman had taken over the keyboard position from Bobby Timmons. It is a particularly fine set of five tunes by one of the most successful and popular jazz groups of the day. Cannonball was an assured, witty front man but, most importantly, a swaggering, confident alto player whose broad-toned work acknowledged the influences of both Charlie Parker and Benny Carter. His brother Nat was, and is, a talented cornetist who obviously admired Miles Davis at this time (no man is an island) and the entire group was one of the most exciting and compatible units of the Sixties and Seventies. With Feldman at the piano the music is elevated to an even higher plane, thanks to Vic's sensitive support to the soloists and his own unique solos. It was Vic who enriched the Adderley library with trombonist Frank Rosolino's waltz Blue Daniel, a tune the quintet was to record less than a month later while appearing at the "Lighthouse" in Hermosa Beach. Sadly this concert recording features two players who have since passed away; Cannonball died on 8 August, 1975 at the age of 46 while Vic Feldman was the victim of a fatal asthma attack in Los Angeles on 12 May, 1987; he was 53.

At the end of DSTS 1008 we heard Ellington promising to come back later; when he did, he brought with him the inimitable Jimmy Rushing and probably set the pattern for many Montereys to come, namely a blues evening. The conjunction of the great jazz singer who came up with the bands of Bennie Moten and Count Basie plus the sophisticated music of Duke Ellington had been encapsulated on record in 1958 (at the Plaza Hotel in New York) and again in 1959 at the Newport Jazz Festival. Duke's musicians clearly loved working with Jimmy and the chance to provide an extemporised backing provided a contrast with the music usually presented by Ellington. Sunnyside Of The Street is great fun with Jimmy in excellent voice and a solo by Johnny Hodges. Goin To Chicago is a joint Rushing-Basie blues first recorded in 1939; Sam Woodyard stresses the off beat, Lawrence Brown's trombone is prominent in the first chorus and the band comes up with a real Kansas City-style riff behind Jimmy. Sent For You Yesterday takes us right back to the early days of the Moten band and sports an alto solo from Russell Procope and a familiar "we're gonna rock" vocal riff from Jimmy. You Can 't Run Around was a deserved encore from Mr. Five By Five and the band in exuberant mood. The blues mood continues after Jimmy has left the stage as the band plays the first two parts of the third movement of Duke's "Toot Suite" titled Red Carpet. It is Procope again, this time on clarinet, while part two is a feature for the splendid wa-wa trombone work of Booty Wood, who gets into his solo with a quotation from Ellington' s Just A Lucky So And So.

The appearance on record of this music is especially welcome for none has ever been issued previously. Most important, it is of the highest quality and demonstrates again what a productive period was enjoyed by those of us who were avid jazz enthusiasts during the Fifties and Sixties.

Alun Morgan.

Cannonball RDV