Favorite Things: Resonance Celebrates Wes Montgomery, Charles Lloyd For Record Store Day, Plans Lost John Coltrane Concert For Fall

Resonance Records, known for its deluxe archival packages of recently-discovered recordings from jazz greats including Bill Evans and Wes Montgomery, has a busy 2014 ahead. The label has recently announced plans for two Record Store Day releases with more unheard Montgomery music and one RSD exclusive with never-before-released material from Charles Lloyd.  Then, this fall, the label will premiere a live performance from John Coltrane for the first time on commercially released CD.

Resonance’s Echoes of Indiana Avenue preserved early 1957-1958 recordings from the influential guitarist Wes Montgomery, and as such was the first full collection of unheard Montgomery material in over 25 years. On Record Store Day – Saturday, April 19 – Resonance will issue two rare recordings from even earlier in the late artist’s career, both with the Montgomery-Johnson Quintet (Buddy, Monk and Wes Montgomery plus Alonzo Johnson on saxophone and Robert Johnson on drums).

Wes Montgomery and the Montgomery-Johnson Quintet is a limited edition 10-inch vinyl release produced in cooperation with Sony Music. Culled from a recently-discovered lost recording session for Epic Records, these recordings are amongst the earliest known recordings of Wes Montgomery and his brothers, plus the now-legendary Quincy Jones as a producer. Jones organized the session after knowing the Montgomery brothers through his tenure in the Lionel Hampton Orchestra, and it predates his 1957 debut album This is How I Feel About Jazz which was produced by Creed Taylor. Resonance has designed this release as it might have appeared in 1955 with vintage art, logos, and the classic period Epic label. Liner notes include highlights of an interview of Quincy Jones conducted by Ashley Kahn in 2013. These five songs (“Love for Sale, “Leila,” “Undecided,” “The Blues” and “Far Wes”) will also be featured on the 2-CD or 3-LP Resonance release Wes Montgomery: In The Beginning, due later this year. The RSD 10-inch vinyl collectible is limited to 2,000 copies.

It’s joined on RSD by Wes and the Montgomery-Johnson Quintet’s Live at the Turf Club. Sourced from recordings made by 22-year old Butler College student and devoted Montgomery Brothers fan Philip Kahl, Turf Club also makes its first-ever commercial appearance. Kahl had access to the brothers at this period of time, recording them at three different venues. (All three recordings will appear on In the Beginning.) The six tracks here were captured at Indianapolis’ Turf Club in 1956. On “Going Down To Big Mary’s House,” Debbie Andrews of Duke Ellington’s band drops in to supply guest vocals. Resonance first obtained these recordings in 2011 from Buddy Montgomery’s widow Ann, who also provided never-before-published photos taken at The Turf Club. Resonance tracked down the original quarter-inch tape reels, and Bernie Grundman was enlisted to remaster the music for optimal sound.  The RSD release of Live at the Turf Club is limited to 2,000 copies on “whiskey-colored” translucent 10-inch vinyl. The album features “Wes’s Tune”, “Fascinating Rhythm”, “Six Bridges to Cross”, “Down To Big Mary’s”, “Caravan” and “Django.”

Also on Record Store Day, Resonance unveils Live at Slugs from multi-instrumentalist (and to fans of The Beach Boys, “Feel Flows” flautist) Charles Lloyd.  Recorded at the long-gone Manhattan nightspot Slugs Saloon, Live at Slugs features Lloyd’s 1965 all-star quartet with guitarist Gabor Szabo, bassist Ron Carter and drummer Pete LaRoca.  Resonance describes the release:  “Slugs was a staple of the Manhattan Jazz Scene from 1965 to 1972, and was the intersection of music and counterculture. Live at Slugs was recorded by Swedish visionary Bjorn von Schlebrugge, who accompanied Lloyd to his Manhattan gigs. This release features the earliest recording of the Charles Lloyd classic composition “Dream Weaver,” (which would later be recorded with Keith Jarrett, Cecil McBee, and Jack DeJohnette for Atlantic Records on the album of the same name). The interplay between the musicians is remarkable, especially the musical dialogue between Lloyd and Szabo which goes back to their days together, playing with the late, great, Chico Hamilton. This special limited edition 10-inch record is to commemorate the upcoming Charles Lloyd release Manhattan Stories, out later this year on Resonance Records.”  The RSD-exclusive vinyl pressing at 33-1/3 RPM is limited to 2,000 copies worldwide.

After the jump: what does Resonance have planned from John Coltrane?  Plus: full track listings for all releases!

Jazz It Up with New Verve Records Box Set

More than half a century after visionary music impresario Norman Granz founded his third and arguably most successful label, Verve Records, the label will be celebrated in style next month with a new book and a five-disc box set, The Sound of America: The Singles Collection.

Granz had previously come to prominence in the jazz world a decade before, when he organized a diverse jam session of a concert at Los Angeles’ Philharmonic Auditorium in 1944. This regular session turned into a full-fledged concert tour, and “Jazz At The Philharmonic” became one of the biggest national platforms for jazz musicians (both black and white) in North America. Recordings of the shows were licensed to Mercury Records, then in turn to two of Granz’s own labels, Clef and Norgran.

But it was Verve, founded in 1956, that enjoyed the greatest success, largely thanks to two factors: the rise of the 12″ long-playing record album, and Granz signing his biggest client as a manager to the label. Ella Fitzgerald, who’d been wooed to Verve from Decca, made some of the greatest recordings in jazz history during her years there, starting with her legendary Songbook series, which found her interpreting the catalogues of Cole Porter, Rodgers & Hart, Duke Ellington, George & Ira Gershwin and many more.

From there, Verve was, at one time or another, home to a who’s who of jazz luminaries, including pianist Oscar Peterson, trumpeters Dizzy Gillespie and Louis Armstrong, organist Jimmy Smith, saxophonist Stan Getz, guitarist Wes Montgomery and even vocalists like Bing Crosby and Mel Tormé. Today, the Verve label still exists as a home for new and catalogue jazz; current acts include operatic tenor Andrea Bocelli and jazz vocalist Diana Krall.

The Sound of America: The Singles Collection features 100 tracks – not only sides from the Verve years, but a handful of pre-Verve jazz singles on Clef and Norgran – over five discs, “over 20 of which have been out of print for years.” All the discs are contained in their own individual slipcases, packaged in a box with a lift-off lid alongside a 48-page book of liner notes. The box hits stores December 10, just over a month after the publication of Verve Records: The Sound of America, an exhaustive written history of the label from producer/researcher Richard Havers.

The full track list and order links for the box set are after the jump.

Original Jazz Classics Celebrates 60 Years of Riverside with Evans, Montgomery, Baker, More

From its headquarters at 553 West 51st Street in New York, New York, the Riverside Records label presided over an impressive roster of jazz talent.  Founded in 1953 by Orrin Keepnews and Bill Grauer, Riverside was home at one time or another to Sonny Rollins, Art Blakey, Alberta Hunter, Johnny Griffin, plus a number of artists currently being recognized with deluxe reissues from the Riverside catalogue: Thelonious Monk and Gerry Mulligan, Cannonball Adderley and Milt Jackson, Chet Baker, Wes Montgomery and Bill Evans.  That “Who’s Who” of jazz is represented via five new titles as part of Concord Records’ Original Jazz Classics series celebrating Riverside’s 60th anniversary:

• Thelonious Monk and Gerry Mulligan, Mulligan Meets Monk (1957)
• Cannonball Adderley with Milt Jackson, Things Are Getting Better (1958)
• Chet Baker, Plays the Best of Lerner and Loewe (1959)
• Wes Montgomery, So Much Guitar! (1961)
• The Bill Evans Trio, How My Heart Sings! (1964)

All five titles are available now, newly remastered by Joe Tarantino and expanded with bonus tracks and new liner notes by writers including Neil Tesser (Mulligan and Monk), Willard Jenkins (Adderley and Jackson), James Rozzi (Baker), Marc Myers (Montgomery) and Doug Ramsey (Evans).  Producer Orrin Keepnews’ original notes have been reprinted, as well.  After the jump, we’ll take a closer look at each of them!

“The Very Best Of” Jazz: Concord Launches New Series With Davis, Rollins, Coltrane and More

If you’ve ever felt it might be a daunting task to “get into” jazz, Concord Music Group just might have the perfect releases for you.  Concord is home to many of the genre’s greatest labels, including Prestige, Contemporary, Riverside, Milestone, Fantasy and Pablo.  With the new series simply titled The Very Best Of, the Concord team has offered an affordable, entry-level look into five of the most influential musicians of all time: Miles Davis (trumpet), John Coltrane (tenor saxophone), Sonny Rollins (tenor saxophone), Chet Baker (trumpet) and Wes Montgomery (guitar).  All five titles in the series are in stores now, and offer a selection of their most enduring music, primarily dating from the 1950s and early 1960s.  They capture these artists in the early portion of their careers, i.e. Davis before Columbia, Coltrane before Atlantic, Montgomery before Verve, when they were all breaking new ground and honing a personal style.  Each title – effective as either an introduction or a sampler – offers uniform design, remastered sound and new liner notes from authors including Neil Tesser, Ashley Kahn and Doug Ramsey.

For a musician who has influenced every guitarist from George Benson to Jimi Hendrix, Wes Montgomery is remembered for a body of work that lasted just over ten years.  Montgomery didn’t enter a recording studio until 25 years of age, didn’t record as a leader until another ten years had elapsed, and was dead ten years after that, felled by a heart attack at age 45.  The guitarist’s work can be divided into three distinct periods at different labels: Riverside (1959-1964), Verve (1964-1966) and A&M (1967-1968).  The latter two stints were spent under the aegis of producer Creed Taylor, who shaped Montgomery into a pioneer of the crossover jazz market, sweetening his recordings with strings and encouraging him to record the latest pop/rock hits. Concord’s The Very Best of Wes Montgomery is drawn from the pure jazz recorded at Riverside.  Montgomery’s sound was, even in his earliest days, instantly identifiable.  He made radical use of octaves (playing the same note on two strings, one octave apart) and chord melodies, and was inclined to play with his thumb rather than a pick, making his sound one of the most recognizable in all jazz.  The new set’s eleven tracks are drawn from eight of Montgomery’s Riverside albums, bookended by 1959’s The Wes Montgomery Trio and 1963’s Boss Guitar.  As you’ll find with all of these albums, a number of other luminaries appear as sidemen, here including Wynton Kelly (piano), Philly Joe Jones (drums), Milt Jackson (vibes) and Ron Carter (bass).  A number of Montgomery originals have been selected (“Four on Six,” “West Coast Blues,” “Cariba”) as well as covers of standards and pop songs (“Gone with the Wind,” “Canadian Sunset”) and jazz classics by Duke Ellington and Thelonious Monk.  For those only familiar with Montgomery’s hit Verve and A&M albums, these eleven tracks will likely be a revelation.  In any event, they’re a solid starting point to explore the sadly-truncated career of a true great.

Among the artists chosen to inaugurate this series, Chet Baker stands out as the only one to have a career as both instrumentalist and vocalist.  Both sides of Baker are on display in The Very Best of Chet Baker, which consists of 14 tracks recorded between 1953 and 1965 from the Riverside, Prestige and Fantasy catalogues.  The collection’s earliest song, Rodgers and Hart’s “My Funny Valentine,” hails from Baker’s 1953 debut as part of The Gerry Mulligan Quartet.  It quickly became a signature song for the young trumpeter, whose tone was one of restraint, intimacy and smoothness.  A major player in the West Coast school of jazz, the handsome young Baker was courted for motion pictures and groomed for stardom, but a drug problem kept him running from the law and the court of public opinion throughout his entire life.  Other than drugs, the one constant was his great musicianship, whether playing or singing.  Four of his vocals are represented here, including three from Chet Baker Sings: It Could Happen to You (1958) and one from Chet Baker with Fifty Italian Strings (1959).  Baker’s cool, relaxed take on “Do It the Hard Way” from Rodgers and Hart’s Pal Joey is a particular standout.  Many of Broadway’s finest songwriters received sympathetic treatment from Baker.  In addition to four songs from the Rodgers and Hart songbook, two come from Lerner and Loewe, and two more from Jerome Kern (with Oscar Hammerstein II and B.G. DeSylva).  Pianist Bill Evans joins Baker on two selections from 1959’s Chet, and Herbie Mann’s tenor sax enlivens “Almost Like Being in Love” and “I’ve Grown Accustomed to Her Face,” both from 1959’s The Best of Lerner and Loewe.  Baker continued to record until his untimely, mysterious death from a hotel window in 1988 (Was it suicide?  Was it an accident?  Was it something else?), but this collection preserves the musician in his prime.

After the jump, we explore sets from John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins and the Miles Davis Quintet, plus we’ve got full track listings with discographical annotation, and pre-order links!

Wes Montgomery’s Lost Recordings Discovered On “Indiana Avenue”

Though Wes Montgomery died in 1968 aged just 45, the Indiana-born jazz guitarist made such an impression that his body of work has influenced an entire generation of guitar players, from George Benson to Pat Metheny, Jimi Hendrix and everyone in between.  In a period of roughly ten years, Montgomery had three distinct periods at different labels: Riverside (1959-1964), Verve (1964-1966) and A&M (1967-1968), the latter two under the aegis of producer Creed Taylor.  Maverick producer Taylor moved Montgomery away from his pure jazz roots to the vanguard of the “mod jazz” movement, or crossover jazz-pop-soul, often with a full orchestra at his disposal.  But Montgomery’s technique, with radical use of octaves (playing the same note on two strings, one octave apart) and chord melodies as well as the inclination to play with his thumb rather than a pick, made his sound one of the most recognizable in all jazz.

The discovery of unheard Montgomery material has been a rare one, so the upcoming release from Resonance Records is a significant one.  Echoes of Indiana Avenue is being touted by the label as the first album of previously unheard Montgomery music in over 25 years, and its tracks emanate from Indianapolis, Indiana, circa 1957 and 1958, when Montgomery was on the cusp of his breakthrough.  Echoes of Indiana Avenue arrives next Tuesday, March 6, which would have been Montgomery’s 88^th birthday.

What will you find in this Montgomery treasure chest?  Just hit the jump to find out!

Release Round-Up: Week of September 27

‘Tis the season! The big guns for the fourth quarter are starting to be drawn.

Elvis Presley, The Young Man with the Big Beat / Elvis Presley: Legacy Edition (RCA/Legacy)

The newest Elvis box set is all about 1956: five CDs of complete studio masters, outtakes, vintage audio interviews and live material. For the casual fan, the Elvis Presley Legacy Edition includes the Elvis Presley and Elvis LPs with the hit non-LP singles of that era. (Official site)

Pink Floyd, Dark Side of the Moon: Experience and Immersion Editions / Discovery Remasters (EMI)

So you have all the basic remasters of every album, and the deluxe and mega-hyper-deluxe editions of Dark Side. Merry early Christmas! (Official site)

Nirvana, Nevermind: 20th Anniversary Deluxe Edition (DGC/UMe)

A lot of ways to celebrate the definitive grunge album for its 20th anniversary. Which one are you getting? (Official site)

The Smiths, Complete (Rhino U.K.)

The most mega of mega-boxes for The Smiths is out now in the U.K., and will be out in October in the States. (Rhino U.K.)

Sting, 25 Years (Cherrytree/A&M/UMe)

A 3-CD/1-DVD overview of Sting’s solo career. If you have all his albums, you’re probably going to want to wait until the price dips below its current Amazon price tag of $110. Like, way below. (Official site)

Wes Montgomery, Movin’: The Complete Verve Recordings (Hip-o Select/Verve)

Did Wes record it for Verve? If yes, it’s here, five discs’ strong. (Hip-o Select)

Davy Jones, David Jones: Deluxe Edition (Friday Music)

No Monkee-ing around here! Jones’ Colgems solo LP, exapnded and remastered. (Sorry about the pun back there.) (Amazon)

Barenaked Ladies, Hits from Yesterday & The Day Before (Reprise/Rhino)

A simple best-of for the Canadian rockers. (Official site)

The Jesus & Mary Chain, Automatic / Honey’s Dead: Deluxe Editions (Edsel)

The next links in the chain of 2-CD/1-DVD reissues! (Another pun! See what I did there?) (Official site)

Buck Owens, Bound for Bakersfield 1953-1956: The Complete Pre-Capitol Recordings (RockBeat)

Another fun one from RockBeat! (Amazon)

Wes Montgomery’s Verve Years “Movin'” to CD on New Box Set

Hip-o Select announced their latest box set release just before the weekend: a massive chronicle of legendary guitarist Wes Montgomery’s output for Verve Records.

Montgomery was already an influential jazz player in the late ’50s and early ’60s when signed to Riverside Records. His thumb-picked guitar stylings influenced countless axe men, from Pat Metheny to Jimi Hendrix, and his plethora of recordings from the era give even the most seasoned fans much to treasure. But when he joined Impulse! Records founder Creed Taylor at Verve, something interesting happened: Montgomery began to infuse his jazz style with a more traditional pop bent, adding brassy and string-infused arrangements from the likes of Don Sebesky and Oliver Nelson and covering more pop-oriented material, including Little Anthony and The Imperials’ “Going Out of My Head” (his performance would win a Grammy) and the Sherman brothers’ classic “Chim Chim Cher-ee” from Walt Disney’s Mary Poppins. Though Montgomery would be taken from the music world not long after signing with A&M, passing away from a heart attack at the too-young age of 45, his music has lasted more than a lifetime.

And on Movin’: The Complete Verve Recordings, every note of this fertile two-year period is covered. The five-disc set includes all eight of Montgomery’s original Verve albums and a host of bonus material. While none of the bonus content is unreleased, owing to Verve’s heavy output of posthumous releases and CD bonus tracks, 82 tracks is a lot of ground to cover, and with sleek packaging and new liner notes from writer Marc Myers, you can be sure you’re getting the real deal on this set.

The box is available September 27, and can be pre-ordered after the jump.