J.J. Johnson - The Eminent J.J. Johnson Volume 2
Released - June 1956
Recording and Session Information
WOR Studios, NYC, June 22, 1953
Clifford Brown, trumpet #1,2; Jay Jay Johnson, trombone; Jimmy Heath, tenor, baritone sax #1,2; John Lewis, piano; Percy Heath, bass; Kenny Clarke, drums.
BN503-2 tk.3 Capri (alternate take)
BN505-2 tk.8 Turnpike (alternate take)
BN507-0 tk.12 It Could Happen To You
Van Gelder Studio, Hackensack, NJ, September 24, 1954
Jay Jay Johnson, trombone; Wynton Kelly, piano; Charles Mingus, bass; Kenny Clarke, drums.
tk.10 Time After Time
Van Gelder Studio, Hackensack, NJ, June 6, 1955
Jay Jay Johnson, trombone; Hank Mobley, tenor sax; Horace Silver, piano; Paul Chambers, bass; Kenny Clarke, drums.
tk.3 Pennies From Heaven
tk.6 Viscosity
tk.9 You're Mine You
tk.11 Daylie Double
tk.15 Groovin'
tk.16 Portrait Of Jennie
Session Photos
Photos: Francis Wolff
Track Listing
| Side One | ||
| Title | Author | Recording Date |
| Daylie' Double | J. J. Johnson | 06-Jun-55 |
| Pennies from Heaven | Johnny Burke, Arthur Johnston | 06-Jun-55 |
| You're Mine, You | Johnny Green, Edward Heyman) | 06-Jun-55 |
| Turnpike" [alt. take] | J. J. Johnson | 22-Jun-53 |
| It Could Happen To You" (alternate take) | Johnny Burke, Jimmy Van Heusen | 22-Jun-53 |
| Side Two | ||
| Groovin' | J. J. Johnson | 06-Jun-55 |
| Portrait of Jennie | Gordon Burdge, J. Russel Robinson | 06-Jun-55 |
| Viscosity | J. J. Johnson | 06-Jun-55 |
| Time After Time | Cahn, Styne | 24-Sep-54 |
| Capri [alt. take] | J. J. Johnson | 22-Jun-53 |
Credits
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Liner Notes
It was not until the summer of 1955 that J.J. Johnson, name band musician and soloist respected and imitated during the past decade by innumerable performers all over the world, finally won a Down Beat poll. In informed quarters there were audible murmurs of "About time too"; in other sympathetic hip circles the reaction was "Better late than never."
Blue Note record fans were way ahead of the critics who awarded Jay Jay this belated crown. The amazing young trombonist has been an important part of the Blue Note catalog ever since his first appearance years ago with Howard McGhee's All Stars on BLP5012.. He was heard as sideman with Miles Davis on 1501 and 1502 and with Kenny Dorham on BLP5065. in addition to appearing as a leader in the three outstanding sessions listed and described below.
The place of Jay Jay Johnson in jazz history parallels that of Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker on their respective instruments. He was the first, and by all odds the foremost, of those who showed in the mid-1940s that it was possible to translate the rhythmic, melodic and harmonic innovations of bop into terms of that cumbersome and not too easily manipulated instrument, the slide trombone.
Jay Jay earned his nickname from his fist and last initials: he was born James Louis Johnson. A native of Indianapolis, Indiana, he showed his first musical talent as a pianist in 1935, when he was eleven years old, and took up trombone three years later. After working with Clarence Love and Snookum Russell in 1941-2, he acquired his first taste of widespread recognition as a member of the Benny Carter band, with which he toured from late '42 until '45 (Max Roach was a member of the orchestra during this period). When Count Basie decided a new sound was needed in his trombone section, Jay Jay was the one who instilled it, for several months in 1945-6. Then came a long period of free-lancing with various combos in the hectic whirl of the jumping Fifty-second Street of those days. Jay Jay freelanced with Dizzy Gillespie, Woody Herman and a flock of bop units. For more than a year he was on the road with Illinois Jacquet's band.
By this time Jay Jay was the acknowledged king of his style in modern jazz circles. A board of critics and musicians assembled by Esquire had elected him the new trombone star of the year in 1946. Before long his fame had reached international proportions. With the advent of war in the Far East, Jay Jay teamed up with Oscar Pettiford in a USO unit that entertained the troops in Korea and Japan. On returning home, though, Jay Jay found that the bottom seemed to be falling out of the music business. The pickings were so lean during the next few months that in August, 1952 he took a job as a blueprint inspector at a Sperry factory in Long Island, limiting his musical activities to an occasional one-night gig or record session. Then things began looking up again, and in June 1954 Jay was able to give up his daytime chores to return to the occupation for which his talent and years of patient practice had originally designed him. "Coffee Pot" from 1954. He has worked pretty steadily since then, often in partnership with Kai Winding. During all the ups and downs he has never lost the esteem in which jazzmen and fans always held him.
Jay Jay's sessions for Blue Note form a striking illustration of the variety of ideas, styles and moods with which he has associated himself over the years. Each session shows a new setting, a different approach and an equally attractive presentation of the unique Johnson facility.
JAY JAY JOHNSON SEXTET with CLIFFORD BROWN
Jay Jay's companions on this dote are Clifford Brown, the extraordinary young trumpet star from Wilmington, Delaware, already familiar to Blue Note listeners from numerous other LP appearances; Jimmy 'Little Bird' Heath on tenor and baritone sax and his brother Percy Heath on bass; John Lewis, the brilliant pianist and arranger; and Kenny Clarke, paterfamilias of the modern drum school.
Turnpike is built on o simple, jumping two-note phrase around the tonic. Observe Clifford Browns use of the “cycle of fifths” chord pattern on his second solo chorus; the others follow suit in their solos.
Lover Man, has been recorded dozens of times, but never more charmingly than in this trombone solo version, played by Jay Jay throughout except for an eight-bar piano interlude.
Get Happy is the 1929 Harold Arlen composition long familiar as a standard among jazzmen. Note the particularly happy blend on the release of the opening chorus and the loose agility of Jay Jays two solo choruses An interesting feature is the rhythmic suspension effect in the last eight measures of each chorus. Clifford Brown's solo shows a superb sense of continuity; John Lewis, too, turns in two fine choruses.
Sketch 1 might aptly be titled John Lewis' Mind At Work. An ingenious sample of Lewis' ability to make the most out of a modest instrumentation, it employs a variety of approaches; Jimmy Heath playing a melodic baritone line against brass unison, Clifford Brown playing muted double-time effects against abrupt punctuation, a typical Jay Jay solo, then a return to the original slow mood and a simple unison horn ending.
Capri is a fast original by former Hampton saxophonist Gigi Gryce, built on a rising and falling phrase. All four soloists contribute handsomely; a special point of interest is the Jimmy Heath tenor solo which seems to suggest how he got his nickname, for his style is strongly reminiscent of the rare tenor saxophone contributions of Charlie Parker.
It Could Happen to You, Jay Jay performs this beautiful tune in a style that combines o respect for the melody with o reflection of his individual personality.
JAY JAY JOHNSON QUINTET with MINGUS, KELLY
In this unusual session Jay Jay maintains the musical interest of the group, participating as the only horn man involved and changing the overall sound by the inclusion of Sabu Mortinez. Sabu is one of the younger generation in the Afro-Cuban drum dynasty of which Chano Pozo may be said to have been the founding father. Wynton Kelly, the pianist. is a youthful star born in December, 1931, in Jamaica, B.W.I. Both before and offer his Army service, which ended in June, 1954, he was a member of Dizzy Gillespie’s combo. Wynton was featured in his own LP on BLP5025?. The rhythm section is completed by Kenny Clarke and the very able Charlie Mingus.
Joy is an up-tempo blues in which Wynton, Jay Jay and Sabu are all heard to an advantage and ingenious use is made of modulations.
Old Devil Moon, a 1946 product of Finian's Rainbow, starts in mysterioso style with a captivating introduction in which Mingus sets a vamp. Sabu keeps busy throughout. Wynton has some very Cuban moments, and generally the tune is invested with a new and unconventional spirit.
The 1948 song Its You Or No One is a Julie Styne-Sammy Cohn Opus first introduced to jazz lovers by Sarah Vaughan. The unexpected key change in the second eight measures undoubtedly explain why this tune appeals so much to musicians.
Too Marvelous for Words. Two things to watch for are, first, the fine balance and blend between the two drummers, and second, the effective use of rhythmic breaks of three-beat intervals behind some passages of Jay Jay's solo.
Coffee Pot, a fast-moving 32-bar original by Johnson, features him on the second chorus accompanied by just Mingus and Clarke. Wynton Kelly’s choruses seem to show some Bud Powell influence, plus his own brand of single-line originality.
Time After Tame was one of the better pop songs of 1947 (you may remember having heard Sarah Vaughan do it). Here it makes a fine solo vehicle for Jay Jay in one of his more melodic moods.
JAY JAY JOHNSON QUINTET with MOBLEY, SILVER
Still another type of group is represented by this session. Here the blend is that of two horns that belong together as naturally as the two hands of a pianist; trombone and tenor sax. Honk Mobley, Jay Jay's choice on tenor, is a Gillespie alumnus whose work with Horace Silver on BLP5058 and BLP5062 attracted favorable attention. Horace also, of course, is too familiar to Blue Note customers to need any introduction here, while Kenny Clarke remains on drums as the one constant element of the three otherwise variegated Johnson sessions. Paul Chambers, a youthful and highly schooled musician, has come to prominence during the past year as a member of the Johnson-Winding quintet.
"Daylie" Double, composed by Jay Jay, is dedicated to the popular Chicago disc jockey Daddio Daylie. A simple melodic theme on which the tenor is used mostly in thirds, it offers a point of departure for all the soloists, including a last chorus in which Jay Jay and Hank trade four-bar phrases with Clarke, then return to the ensemble theme and land on a major seventh ending.
Pennies From Heaven, a standard among jazzmen ever since Basie recorded it some 19 years ago, opens unexpectedly with Chambers playing the melody of the last half-chorus. Then the two horns enter to play a variant theme in both unison and harmony. Jay Jay takes the second chorus, muted, while Horace lays out in the rhythmic accompaniment. Mobley's solo shows unusually fine sense of time and control.
You're Mine You, a tune that has been too rarely recorded, was produced by the same team (Edwin Heyman and Johnny Green) that wrote Body and Soul, Jay Jay takes the melody solo, in a style that is at once languorous and sentimental yet vigorous and virile.
Groovin' is a medium-slow original with a truly groovy feel to which the two-beat bass work and funky piano background contribute conspicuously. For our money, Horace almost steals the show on this one with his authentically blues-like yet unmistakably modern 16-bar contribution. After a return to the theme, there is an old-timey “blue seventh” ending.
On Portrait of Jennie, a 1948 composition rarely performed by jazz musicians, Jay Jay plays the melody muted, at an easy medium tempo, stepping out for 16 bars while Horace takes over.
The next title, Viscosity, means a sticky gluey-like thickness, and frankly, we can't see anything viscous about the bright rising inflections of the 40-bar chorus. On the contrary, Jay Jay has seldom sounded more fluent and supple. He and Hank and Horace all take their solo turns, proceeding in what might presumably be called a viscous circle.
This session is the most recent of Jay Jays impeccable contributions to the Blue Note catalog. Like its predecessors it offers substantial proof that his is one of the truly individual and exciting voices in modern jazz.
-LEONARD FEATHER
(Author of The Encyclopedia of Jazz)
Cover Design by JOHN HERMANSADER
Photo by FRANCIS WOLFF
Recording by RUDY VAN GELDER
RVG CD Reissue Liner Notes
The year 1954 was clearly the turning point in J.J. Johnson’s career. In June, he left the day job as a blueprint inspector that he had assumed in 1952 and returned to work as a full-time musician. Two months later, he recorded the first “Jay & Kai” session with fellow trombonist Kai Winding, a partnership that would continue for the following two years and bring both players to the peak of popularity in the jazz world.
Johnson and Winding had participated in a 1953 live recording with two other trombonists, Bennie Green and Willie Dennis, that originally appeared under the title Jazz Workshop on a pair of Debut 10" albums. The first of the more intimate two-trombone sequels was recorded for Savoy, and quickly spawned other Jay & Kai recordings on the RCA subsidiary “X”, Prestige and Bethlehem, where the pair had a minor hit with their arrangement of “It’s All Right With Me.” In the same month as the second session on the present CD was recorded, Jay & Kai began an affiliation with Columbia that would find the pair recording material for five separate LP s in the space of a year.
The collected Jay & Kai recordings would make a fascinating boxed set, particularly given the different approaches each label took to documenting the group at a time when 78 singles, 10" albums and 12’ albums were all being issued. Even in its most extended blowing performances on the “X” label, however, there was far more emphasis on clever arrangements with Jay & Kai than was heard on Johnson’s Blue Note dates. That — plus Johnson’s ongoing ambition to document his music minus additional trombones — probably explains why Blue Note did not jump on the Jay & Kai bandwagon.
Instead, producer Alfred Lion provided Johnson with two opportunities to continue recordÃng as a stand-alone leader in the months leading up to his Columbia contract. Both of those sessions are included here, and find the trombonist in two distinct quintet settings. The first was convened on September 24, 1954, a month to the day after the initial Jay & Kai Savoy date. Rudy Van Gelder had replaced Doug Hawkins as Blue Note’s primary engineer by this point, and had slo become the first choice of Savoy and Prestige, hence this date (as well as its mate here and the Jay & Kai dates for the two other labels) was taped in the original Van Gelder Studios. It features bassist Charles Mingus, who had organized the four-trombone date for Debut in the previous year, and who had teamed with drummer Kenny Clarke on the first Jay and Kai sessions. Conga drummer Sabu Martinez, leader of his own Palo Congo session for Blue Note in 1957, added a Caribbean touch, which made the Jamaican-born Wynton Kelly (just returned to Dizzy Gillespie's combo after Army service) a particularly apt choice on piano.
Clarke introduces “Too Marvelous For Words,” then Martinez adds a Latin tinge when the full group enters and a most effective groove ensues. The details and overall sense of development in Johnson's arrangement are as impressive as his trombone playing. He introduces a scored break behind the first half of his second solo that is carried into the subsequent 16 bars of ensemble/Clarke exchanges as a kid of mini-shout chorus. There is also a lovely written coda.
Harmony and rhythm are also important structural elements on the up-tempo blues “Jay." Kelly opens in what would become a trademark ebullient vein with just Mingus and Clarke in support for three choruses; Johnson appears with an eight-bar transition passage that modulates to the basic theme with Martinez now aboard. Four bars of stop-time launch Johnson’s smoking seven choruses. Kelly returns for three more, this time with congas included; and trombone functions like a third drum in the eight-bar exchanges before leading the full group through three final choruses, each ¡n a different key.
Mingus is prominent on the introduction to “Old Devil Moon,” where each part meshes into a medium tempo of great flexibility. Not just Clarke and Martinez but the entire rhythm section were on the same page through most of the date, and the effortlessness of the shifting support matches that of Johnson's lyrical solo. Kelly has a couple of opportunities to quickly flash his knowledge of Afro-Cuban piano.
“It’s You Or No One” reminds us that Johnson was in that select circle (also including Bud Powell, Miles Davis and the Jazz Messengers) that defined which standards were ripe for widespread exploration by modern jazz musicians. In this case, a pop song others would come to favor at a fast pace is given a ballad reading more reflective of its origins. Johnson shows his strong feeling for melody, while Kelly's beautiful introduction and half-chorus solo are darker than usual, revealing a rarely-noted sign of Monk in his conception.
There is more sensitive trombone on "Time After Time" with Martinez once again layout out. Mingus, who is unmistakable in support, seems to resist the double time on the second chorus, creating a tension that hardly deters Johnson’s lyrical inventions.
“Coffee Pot” is Johnson’s line on “All God’s Children Got Rhythm,” already a favorite set of changes among Blue Note artists (see Ike Quebec’s “Suburban Eyes” by Thelonious Monk, Benny Harris’s “Reets’ And I” by Bud Powell and Horace Silver’s “Mayreh” by Art Blakey). Clarke again sets us the full quintet, Johnson takes his first solo chorus strolling on bass and drums only, and Kelly is more redolent of Powell than usual. The performance, like the others with Martinez, help make this session a key early example of Latin jazz.
The June 1955 Johnson session produced the final 10" LP in Blue Note’s 5000 series, and the leader’s last without Kai Winding for the next 13 months. Tenor saxophonist Hank Mobley and pianist Horace Silver had previously recorded with the trombonist for Blue Note in March, on Kenny Dorham’s Afro-Cuban album, and were in the midst of establishing themselves as part of the original Jazz Messengers cooperative. Clarke is the drummer here, as he was on each of Johnson’s three Blue Note sessions (the first comprises The Eminent Jay Jay Johnson Volume One). Paul Chambers, who had been working with Jay & Kai during his first year in New York, would soon begin his historic tenure with Miles Davis. Three of the six pieces recorded produced alternate takes, which are heard after all six of the originally issued masters.
“Pennies From Heaven” receives another intriguing arrangement. Chambers begins playing the last half-chorus of melody, then Johnson’s variation on the changes appears in a well-scored chorus. The trombone, muted and strolling, is incredibly fleet and agile, blowing phrases that would enter the modern vernacular on the instrument. With Silver laying out, Clarke’s era-defining beat is heard in particular relief. Mobley sounds like Sonny Rollins with added nonchalance, on a master take performance that is one of his early gems. The alternate was cut first and is excellent, but Mobley made the choice easy here.
The master take preceded the alternate on “Viscosity,” and again both versions contain fine playing. The master features a particularly robust Johnson on open horn, a terrific Silver solo, and a more vibrant Clarke on the out chorus. Johnson’s composition is an unusual 40-bar ABCAB form that also stretches the soloists harmonically.
Further evidence of Johnson’s knack for telling details can be heard in his arrangement of the ballad “You’re Mine You,” including the scored horns behind the piano introduction, the tenor sax harmonizing on the final eight bars, and touches of bowed bass. Silver’s brittle, sometimes caustic accompaniment sets a distinctive mood that Johnson picks up in a couple of asides during his forthright reading of the melody.
“‘Daylie’ Double” was named for Chicago deejay Daddy-o Daylie, who received a second tribute on Blue Note when Cannonball Adderley recorded his brother Nat’s “One For Daddy-o” on Somethin’ Else. The Johnson original, based on the changes of “Get Happy” with an altered bridge and pedal point at bars 25-28 of each chorus, is an example of making something new and challenging out of familiar material. The alternate, cut at the end of the session after the following two titles, finds Johnson’s lip still strong, though his ideas are fresher on the master take.
“Groovin” delivers the medium-tempo funk that Silver (with Mobley and his other Jazz Messengers partners) was popularizing at the time. It is Johnson’s composition, with an early example of Chambers “in two” behind the theme, and conversational tenor and trombone on the bridge. Johnson strolls on his chorus and moves effortlessly over his horn, while Silver returns behind Mobley before taking his own sanctified half-chorus.
Clifford Brown and strings had recorded “Portrait Of Jennie” earlier in 1955. Johnson’s version is taken at a bouncier tempo, with muted trombone giving a relaxed reading in a performance suitable for dancing. It completes the trombonist’s final session for Blue Note as a leader, though he would return with Silver and Chambers to record Sonny Rollins’s second date for the label nearly two years later.
— Bob Blumenthal, 2001
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