CD Review: Artie Shaw & His Gramercy 5 * The Complete Commercially Released Recordings * Jasmine Records * 2008

In September of 1940, Artie Shaw decided it was time to go the way of other bandleaders by adding a "band within a band" to his shows. Tommy Dorsey had done this as early as 1935 with his impishly named "Clambake Seven", as had Bob Crosby with his "Bobcats"--the group most responsible for presenting Irving Fazola to the world beyond New Orleans. These bands were designed to preserve and promote the older style of New Orleans polyphonic improvisation. Throughout the Swing Era different approaches to ensemble jazz had developed, most notably written arrangements and a different type of aural tradition known as "head charts"--motivic arrangements communally developed by bands such as the Fletcher Henderson and Basie bands, often left unnotated.

Benny Goodman had joined the trend for small groups in 1935, though in a more forward looking way, hiring Teddy Wilson to form a trio with himself and Gene Krupa. The group was expanded to a quartet with the addition of Lionel Hampton in 1936, producing music that was no longer a direct representation of New Orleans or Chicago, but something altogether different. One more major expansion of the group took place with the additions of Charlie Christian and various other players; the Goodman Sextet becoming Benny's small ensemble of choice from 1939 through the mid 1950s.

Considering all of these, which had gained considerable success over the years, Shaw's entry into the small group fray was quite late. When he finally entered, it was with a unique twist: this would be the group to pursue his old ideas concerning "chamber jazz"; ideas which had met with only sporadic success. In an era that prized "hot and loud" music, Shaw had never been at home. His ideal was cooler, more introspective, less bombastic. While the first cuts by his new group would feature some distinctly "hot" numbers, it would ultimately be remembered for its reflective romanticism.

The first version of the band was comprised of Artie's clarinet along with Billy Butterfield on trumpet, Al Hendrickson on guitar, Jud DeNaut on bass, Nick Fatool on drums, and the novelty for which the first Gramercy 5 will always be know, Johnny Guarnieri on harpsichord.

 The first recording session of the Gramercy 5 took place on September 3, 1940, and was emblematic for the group's direction. There were two Shaw originals: "Special Delivery Stomp", derived from his earlier big band chart "Man from Mars", and a blues, "Summit Ridge Drive", named for Artie's Hollywood address at the time. Then there were two 'standards': "Keepin' Myself for You" and "Cross Your Heart."

"Summit Ridge Drive" became a major hit, selling over a million copies while taking advantage of the new craze for jukeboxes, and establishing credibility for the new band.

The next session took place three months later, on December 5, 1940. Once again there were two Shaw originals and two standards. "Dr. Livingstone, I Presume" was to contain Shaw's most explicit klezmer reference as a composer, while his sarcastic "When the Quail Come Back to San Quentin" paradoxically provided a canvas for many of his more baroque and inspired solo musings in future years. The standards recorded that day were to become almost synonymous with the group: "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes" (a miniature gem of aural poetics) and "My Blue Heaven", the solo of which contains one of Shaw's earliest veiled references to Stravinsky's Petrushka, a piece he would return to more than once.  

The group continued to develop past its initial line-up, with each reiteration adding a layer or two of depth and innovation. Reassembled in 1945, Roy Eldridge was featured on trumpet, Dodo Marmarosa on piano instead of harpsichord, and Barney Kessel on guitar. This was the group that laid down a succession of Shaw's most biting original tunes--"The Sad Sack" (short for "sad sack of shit"--a term used to describe worthless soldiers in WWII), "The Grabtown Grapple" (which predated Charlie Parker's similarly named "Scrapple from the Apple"), "Scuttlebutt" (Artie's ode to arguments), "The Gentle Grifter" and "Mysterioso" among them. Sometimes brooding, always intense, these tunes brought a satirical edge to small group jazz similar to Mahler's moments of symphonic sarcasm or Shostakovich's bitter parodies. This continued throughout the '40s, with Shaw adding tunes like "Crumbum" and "Nothin' From Nothin'" to the catalogue.

Also like Mahler, while capable of being artistically critical and biting, Shaw was very rarely pessimistic in an ultimate sense. Over the course of his career he recorded many songs of disappointment and even bitterness, but only one ("Gloomy Sunday") strikes as despairing, self-pitying, and hopeless. A more typically Shavian message comes at the end of 1950's Gramercy 5 recording of "There Must Be Something Better Than Love"--the end of which dismisses the title sentiment with the final rhetorical questions:

But if there's something better than love who's got it?
Who wants it?
Do you?

Often emotionally confrontational, Shaw's love tunes from this period were certainly not facile.

The last group to be known as the Gramercy 5 was an entirely reconstituted group, both in sound and personnel. With Hank Jones on piano and Joe Roland on vibes, especially, the group took on a truly pellucid, ruminative, and romantic quality that has rarely if ever been matched, and was finally to realize Shaw's vision of clear, deep, chamber jazz. This is the group that laid down the now famous "Last Recordings" and "Final Sessions" of Artie Shaw, which were kept unreleased for several decades. They were the summit of Shaw's achievement and as complete a look at his career's importance as we were ever to get--a last will and testament before, like Prospero, he "broke his staff and drowned his book."

Immediately apparent to Shaw enthusiasts is the difference in tone from these recordings. Gone is so much of the bitterness, the biting sarcasm, and the frustration-laced wailings of so many of Shaw's earlier recordings. Peace, so difficult to convey in music, gentleness, and warmth are dominant in new ways in this music--it exudes a pure, fresh romanticism seemingly untainted by darker elements often associated with the term. After these sessions, Shaw packed up his clarinet and never recorded again.

This 5-disc set from Jasmine Records, entitled "Six Star Treats" is perhaps the most essential box of jazz clarinet recordings available. Not only does it bring together, for the first time, all of the studio recordings of the various groups to work under the Gramercy 5 name, but it provides alternate takes and many live performances, including some tunes the group never recorded in the studio.

Towards the end of disc one, for instance, there are clips from a Bing Crosby broadcast featuring the Gramercy 5 performing Gershwin's "I Was Doing Alright" and Rodgers & Hart's "You Took Advantage of Me", both of which are given masterful interpretation and neither of which was recorded in studio. There are also some rare alternate, shorter takes released as singles of the last Gramercy 5. "Besame Mucho", "Tenderly", and "Stop and Go Mambo" are each presented in this alternate form, giving a rare and brief glimpse into the "head arrangement" process that Shaw had used throughout the life of the ensemble.

The transfers of these recordings are consistently good, though collectors will also want to own other versions. The RCA Victor "Complete" disc (which is nowhere near complete, but contains only the studio recordings from 1940-45)  has exceptionally good sound, and the original issues of the "Last Recordings" have not only good sound quality, but important interview liner notes with Shaw.

But as it stands, this 5-disc set is the very best out there for Artie Shaw and His Gramercy 5. It is the most comprehensive box of Shaw's most important recordings. It couldn't be more essential. Five Good Reeds indeed.

Artie Shaw * A Legacy * Book-of-the-Month Records (71-7715) * 1984

While it is generally assumed that the first release of materials from the final Gramercy 5 sessions was delayed until the early 1990s, Shaw actually released fifteen tunes from those 1954 sessions as part of a four LP set entitled Artie Shaw: A Legacy through Book-of-the-Month Club Records in 1984. That this obscure release didn't garner much attention made it possible to re-release an expanded version of the sessions in the following decade, with few noticing.

For those who prefer vinyl, this set might be the best place to get many tracks of that final Gramcery 5. Included are arguably the definitive versions of the following tunes, most of them Shaw compositions (marked with * below):

Begin the Beguine
Don't Take Your Love From Me
Dancing in the Dark
The Chaser (*)
Sunny Side Up (*)
Cross Your Heart
Back Bay Shuffle (*)
How High the Moon
Star Dust
Summit Ridge Drive (*)
Stop and Go Mambo (*)
Scuttlebutt (*)
Grabtown Grapple (*)
When the Quail Come Back to San Quentin (*)
Frenesi
The Sad Sack (*)

There are important omissions from this list, to be sure (especially Shaw's other originals, such as "Lyric" and "Lugubrious" ), but those aside, it would be difficult to come up with a better set list drawn from the final sessions.

The program notes, written by Gene Lees and based upon discussion with Shaw, provide a unique window for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of the man and his music. Lees was able to draw reflections of particular precision and depth. For example, at one point in their discussion Lees accused Shaw of being a hopeless romantic, to which Artie replied:

All right. Let's ask ourselves a question about 'romantic.' If 'romantic' is to believe--in spite of everything and in spite of the fact that we die at the end of it all--that there is some good to be got out of this experience called living, then, yes, I suppose I'm a romantic. I believe that living is the only crap game in town.

Look at the glory, look at the marvel, look at the wonder of life...The simple miracle of existence is the thing I just can't get past.

The entire booklet is worth reading, but here are some sample quotes:

 On 'Swing' and 'The Chaser':

Let's consider that word. It's a verb, not an adjective or a noun. If jazz doesn't swing, it isn't jazz. Now here, the whole thing gets so comfortable that you forget all about tempo. The tempo takes on an identity of its own and becomes in effect another member of the group.  You suddenly don't think about the music. It seems to take over, coming to life. "Swing" becomes a verb. The music begins to swing--but not the way a pendulum swings; a pendulum is always a victim of entropy, the tendency of all things in the universe to slow down. Maybe it's life against death we're talking about.


On 'Stop and Go Mambo':

This was my somewhat sardonic answer to the outbreak of mamboism...It starts with a quote from Dizzy [Gillespie] and Charlie [Parker], as my little bow to the bop era...The whole thing was meant as light humor, an element I find sadly lacking in most jazz. Point is, it's one thing to be serious, quite another to be solemn.

My last arpeggio is actually based on Scriabin's so-called mystic chord...The Notes--to take some of the mystery out of the word "mystic"--are F, B, E-flat, A, D, G. I come back down on a G major arpeggio. Try it on your bazooka sometime.


On Bebop:

Once Charlie and Dizzy and some of the others like Thelonious Monk came along and changed the entire face of jazz--actually they were the first wholly new influence since Louis Armstrong, who was a seminal figure--the music couldn't possibly have remained the same.

The point is, they had been listening to the same music I had listened to all of my life, so I never was uncomfortable with the 'new' chord structures they were playing. In the early days, if you played an E major chord (based on the third of C major), most musicians would say you were playing "out of the chord." Lots of them, in fact, would think you were deaf. Actually, though, it was an old thing as far as modern "serious" music is concerned.

After Dizzy and Charlie came along I was, for the first time in my life as a player, able to stretch out and do what I had always wanted to do but what audiences wouldn't hold still for when I was at my zenith. At that time I had to stay within the frame of what mass audiences understood. So it was a great relief when the boppers arrived. I was quite comfortable with those guys.


In addition to the 1954 Gramercy 5 session material, sides six, seven, and eight contain some extremely rare recordings.

Side Six features an air check of Artie Shaw performing the Mozart Quintet with the WOR string quartet (the notes list this as being from 1947, though Simosko's discography says it was actually from 1949--see Simosko, p.115).

Side Seven contains a rare live concert of Shaw performing the Nicolai Berezowsky four movement Concerto for Clarinet with the National Youth Symphony in Carnegie Hall, 1948.

The first movement baffled the audience totally. But by the second movement they apparently began to understand that there was was humor in the piece, and at the end of that movement they finally unbent enough to laugh. The last movement is the toughest thing I have ever played on the clarinet...There's one segment of ten or eleven seconds that I spent almost three months practicing. But the third movement [Andante Sostenuto] is the one I find a really beautiful thing.

Finally, a serious collector of Shaw's work might purchase this set for Side Eight alone. It features three pieces--Alexander Krein's "Hebrew Sketches, No. 2, Op. 13", for clarinet and string quartet (from the WOR air checks), Shaw's own "The Blues" (the lesser-known sketch for his later "Concerto", performed with Paul Whiteman at Carnegie Hall in 1938), and his "Interlude in B-flat", recorded live in the Imperial Theatre, NYC, 1936. The first is beautifully executed, and the remaining two are among the most important performances of Artie Shaw's career. For those wanting a fuller picture of Artie Shaw's genius, these performances are essential.

Ten Essential Jazz Clarinet Recordings (10)

10. Artie Shaw * The "Complete" Gramercy 5 * 1940-1945

There were many recordings in the running for this final spot in my Ten Essential Jazz Clarinet Recordings series. Benny Goodman's Sextet recordings from the 1940s, and later in the 1950s were a worthy contender, as were the performances of Omer Simeon and Johnny Dodds in Jelly Roll Morton's 'Red Hot Peppers' sessions of 1926-27. I even flirted with the idea of adding Jimmie Noone's Apex Club recordings. But none of those could dislodge my conviction that Artie Shaw's Gramercy 5 recordings from the 1940s should bookend this list.

Shaw's first Gramercy 5 was unlike any other group in the history of jazz to that point, for at least one odd fact: the group employed a harpsichord instead of a piano. There were at least two reasons for this. First, from his earliest forays into band leading, Shaw pursued a concept he called "chamber jazz" in contrast to the loud bands of the day. Second, the Gramercy 5 recordings had a very specific purpose: they were 'juke tunes', recorded for the booming juke box market. As anyone who grew up in diners with jukeboxes can attest, these devices were very treble-heavy, which accounts in part for the success of 'jangle rock'--treble heavy guitar bands reproduce tolerably well on juke boxes.

The jangling of Shaw's harpsichord (played by Johnny Guarnieri on most of the recordings) presents a tantalizing option of where our culture might have headed if the adolescent phenomenon of rock n' roll hadn't been permitted to lobotomize the nation for commercial reasons. That musing aside, the early Gramercy 5 displays another extremely important aspect of Shaw's art, which is perhaps best called the poetics of jazz--a quality for which the literary-minded clarinetist was virtually unsurpassed in jazz history.

When listening to a Shaw tune, the attentive listener is always hit with extra-musical associations, often built around the lyrics. In the case of a tune like 'Smoke Gets in Your Eyes', the lyrics inform the meaning of the performance--Shaw's romantic statement of the theme echoing the narrator's story of love, loss, and regret, while the harpsichord clucks along somewhat cynically-- the 'warning friends' of the lyrics--only softening at the end in sympathy with the reflective Shaw. Anyone who knew the lyrics of this popular song would have felt how perfectly, yet with such economy of means, this tune was expressed.


But this poetic wasn't relegated to standards with lyrics. Shaw's own 'Dr. Livingstone, I Presume' is a humorous trip through the world of Jazz through Artie's eyes. Beginning with 'Jungle beat' tom-toms used so often in every band from Ellington to Goodman, and associated with the African roots of jazz, Shaw eventually rips into a klezmer tinged solo--almost as though he was greeting Benny Goodman, the other famous Jewish jazz clarinetist, in jungles of Africa. Benny had recorded klezmer tinged tunes such as 'Bei Mir Bist du Schoen' as early as 1938, and Artie's own theme song 'Nightmare' owed a debt to an unspoken klezmer background. 'Dr. Livingstone' merges a bluesy jungle floor show impression with that klezmer style, to brilliant witty effect, paying homage to two very important cultural strands in jazz clarinet history.


The complete Gramcery 5 sessions from 1940-1954 are now available on a five disc set from Jasmine records. Be advised that the RCA single disc marketed as the "Complete Sessions" (licked to in this post) is not at all complete, but only the recordings from the early 1940s. This CD was released in the late 1980s, before Shaw himself released the four discs comprising his last sessions, and RCA has never bothered to change the innacuracy on the cover!

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9. Stan Hasselgård  * California Sessions

Åke "Stan" Hasselgård, who on November 23, 1948 died tragically in a car crash at age 26, is one of the most brilliant and neglected of jazz clarinetists. Befriended by his hero, Benny Goodman (perhaps the only clarinetist who was invited by Benny to share the bandstand in his Sextet), Hasselgård's relaxed sound, natural swing, and remarkable bop ear seemed to have marked him for jazz greatness.

Despite his Swedish upbringing and musical education, Hasselgård's sound seems to have emerged straight from the American jazz scene. Later clarinet boppers were often drawn from conservatory trained ranks, and their sounds lack the full, relaxed quality of the swing masters. This is part of what makes Hasselgård so enjoyable to listen to: no conservatory stuffiness, no mere pattern patter. Because of this, his few recordings are truly essential.

The Hasselgård Sextet seems to have grown conceptually out of the Goodman Sextet. It's delightful to hear Goodman veteran Red Norvo, who was directly responsible for bringing together Benny and Teddy Wilson, present on Hasselgård's recordings too. But the Swede was able to take Benny's concept farther into modern jazz territory, and seems a harbinger to Artie Shaw's last Gramercy 5 of 1954. Indeed, these recordings sound as though they might have served as an influence upon Shaw's greatest work.

Ten Essential Jazz Clarinet Recordings (1)

[ The following series of posts will focus on small groups, where jazz soloing tends to show itself in purest form. The intent is to give a sort of primer for those interested in the rich history of jazz clarinet. I hope to follow up with other lists, including Big Band clarinet and classical clarinet essentials.

The list is my own opinion only. The order is based upon many criteria, including historical importance for the development of the instrument in jazz, virtuosity, and cultural importance. I'm starting with number one, because I really hope to inspire readers to buy copies of this music, and think the earliest on the list are the most essential. ] 


1. Artie Shaw & his 1954 Gramercy 5 * Last Recordings: Rare and Unreleased (released 1992) * More Last Recordings: The Final Sessions (released 1993)


The four CDs which comprise the "Last Recordings" and "Final Sessions" of Artie Shaw are not only the musical last will and testament of a great jazz clarinetist; they are one of the finest sets of jazz recordings ever made. Because Shaw refused to release them until nearly four decades afterwards, they didn't have an impact on the jazz culture they might (and perhaps should) have, and therefore can never be fully evaluated culturally in the way that the Armstrong Hot Fives, Miles Davis Quintet, or Coltrane Quartet recordings can be. This might not be coincidental. Shaw, more than any other jazz great, truly hated the "show business" side of the jazz industry and yearned for music to be appreciated outside of the trappings of marketing. By distancing his greatest recordings from the time they were made, he allowed them to be heard first as music. And what incredible music they made.

Coming out of retirement one last time in the Winter of 1954, Shaw put together his last Gramercy 5. The ensemble was comprised of:

Hank Jones, piano
Tommy Potter, bass
Joe Roland, vibraphone
Irv Kluger, drums
Tal Farlow, guitar (NY Sessions, February & March 1954)
Joe Puma, guitar (Hollywood Sessions, June 1954)

Shaw knew exactly what he was after with this last ensemble. He had been approached by New York club owner Ralph Watkins to play an eight-week stand at his 54th Street club, the Embers. After he accepted, Shaw employed his musicians for an highly unusual six weeks worth of paid rehearsals in preparation.

"Intense rehearsals," Hank Jones said. "It was a considerable length of time, enough so that we were quite familiar with his music and the way he wanted to play it. Artie was a super-perfectionist: he wanted things absolutely, exactly the way he intended to have it sound." [Nolan, pg 281].

The group went on to play a stint in Las Vegas later that year.

The music was intended by Shaw to sound "clear, pellucid" which he likened to the waters of a mountain lake, so pristine that you can see to the bottom. The metaphor is apt, and a worthy goal for jazz musicians: it implies a transparent honesty. Many such lakes exist up where Shaw had lived on a farm for much of the early '50s near Shekomeko, NY--a place he said he wished he could have remained.

"Picardy Farm..." he would write nearly thirty years later. "Good God, the emotions those two words evoke. The place where for the first time in my life I had found a real home, a warm sense of security, and a feeling of calm and peace of mind." [Shaw, pg vi]

That sense of pristine beauty, clarity, and peace of mind is never far away in these recordings, and has probably never been equalled in jazz history.

Each and every track of the set is worth the price alone. The standards represented are almost always my favorite versions of the tunes.  Artie's "My Funny Valentine" surpasses even Chet Baker's version for me--there is a warmth to Shaw's that is more mature than the occasionally dark, slightly obsessive hints found in Baker's. Likewise, Artie's "Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered" and "Tenderly" set a new bar for ballad singing. In his hands, "Bewitched" is transformed from what can easily turn into a cabaret tune with sleazy undertones into a deeply tender, innocent love song. Shaw's second solo is perhaps the most breathtaking--quoting "The Song is You" sotto voce while the band miraculously billows his melodic line upwards, the music lifts beyond genre, creating a moment of romantic stillness and sincerity that I've never heard equalled. This is grown up music, not adolescent pandering. "Tenderly," too, receives perhaps its most mature and perfect utterance with the Gramercy 5 and Artie blending into that crystal clear lake he envisioned.

The Last Recordings function as a personal retrospective, a summation of the era Shaw recorded them in, and an anticipation of the later work of Sonny Rollins, Miles Davis, and even Coltrane (Shaw's "Besame Mucho", in particular, moves in direction that heralds Newk and Trane). Had they been released in their era, they would have been divided into at least five or six albums worth of LPs. Who knows what shock waves they might have created at the time, and what impact they would have had on both jazz history and the status of the clarinet in jazz?

While writing this, I checked Amazon for links--it appears that these particular discs are now out of print, which is unfortunate, as the the liner notes contain important interviews with Shaw himself. Fortunately, Jasmine Records has released a five disc set containing the complete Gramcery 5 recordings, which I heartily recommend for any collection of jazz clarinet. That aside, I encourage interested readers to buy copies of the original releases while they are still available.

 

***
Works cited:

Nolan, Tom. Artie Shaw: King of the Clarinet. Norton, 2010.
Shaw, Artie. The Trouble with Cinderella: an Outline of Identity. Da Capo edition, 1979.