BLP 4100

Jimmy Smith Plays Fats Waller

Released - July 1962

Recording and Session Information

Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, January 23, 1962
Jimmy Smith, organ; Quentin Warren, guitar; Donald Bailey, drums.

tk.1 Everybody Loves My Baby
tk.2 Ain't She Sweet
tk.4 Ain't Misbehavin'
tk.8 I've Found A New Baby
tk.11 Honeysuckle Rose
tk.14 Squeeze Me
tk.16 Lulu's Back In Town

Session Photos

Photos: © Francis Wolff/Mosaic Images 
https://www.mosaicrecordsimages.com/

Track Listing

Side One
Title	Author	Recording Date
Everybody Loves My Baby	Jack Palmer, Spencer Williams	23 January 1962
Squeeze Me	Fats Waller	23 January 1962
Ain't She Sweet	Milton Ager, Jack Yellen	23 January 1962
Ain't Misbehavin'	Harry Brooks, Andy Razaf, Fats Waller	23 January 1962
Side Two
Lulu's Back In Town	Al Dubin, Harry Warren	23 January 1962
Honeysuckle Rose	Andy Razaf, Fats Waller	23 January 1962
I've Found a New Baby	Jack Palmer, Spencer Williams	23 January 1962

Liner Notes

"WELL, I really love the organ. I can get so much more color from it than the piano that it really sends me. " (Fats Waller)

There is no doubt that if Fats Waller was living today, he would probably be one of the most successful television performers. His assortment of highly technical music skills and his unusual but happy way of putting across a song would brighten the video screen as no other performer.

Fats enjoys a unique position in American music. He was a brilliant pianist who displayed an energetic but feathery touch and transferred this technique to the organ. He is credited with paving the way for the vast pool of organists currently the vogue of the music scene in America.

As a performer, he was known for his charm and his wit. He could take the most simple song and turn it into a masterpiece.

His list Of composing credits include such enduring evergreens as "Ain't Misbehavin'," "Jitterbug Waltz," "'Squeeze Me," "Honeysuckle Rose," "I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter," and others.

Thomas "Fats" Waller was a remarkable musician whose magnetic personality shrouded his musical brilliance. People remember his singing. They watched him seated at the piano, with his derby cocked carelessly to one side, the ever present cigarette dangling precariously from his mouth while he injected his special brand of humor in his songs. But Fats was all music.

This year, 1962, marks the nineteenth anniversary of his death. The sudden eclipse of his career at 39 years old shocked the music world on December 15, 1943. The news of his death penetrated the American people deeply despite the involvement of the country and her Allies in the great war against the Axis powers during World War II.

America was mourning her many deaths on the blood-spattered battlefields in Europe and Asia, but she stopped to mourn one of her favorite sons who passed away en route to New York, his birthplace.

The rotund gentleman of the piano with the somewhat gravel voice brought joy and laughter to thousands of music lovers in America and Europe. He opened new doors for musical expression. Greatly influenced by the late, great James P. Johnson, his piano playing placed him in a position of being an important innovator in that many pianists have carried on the Waller tradition.

Aside from his piano work, he was equally lauded for his composing ability with such writers as Andy Razaf, Clarence Williams, and Spencer Williams. But it was his ability on the Hammond organ that has helped to keep his image alive.

And one of the main persons responsible has been the incredible James Oscar Smith.

Jimmy Smith has become the modern pioneer of the Hammond organ, who recognizes his debt to Fats Waller. His acknowledgement to Fats is neither maudlin nor saccharine. It is one of genuine appreciation to the one man responsible for paving the way to the unending possibilities of musical expression on the organ.

In this tribute to Fats Waller, Jimmy does not desecrate the master. Rather, he pays due respect to the compositions closely associated with Fats and blends subtly a texture of modern touches.

There are similarities with Jimmy and Fats. Fats loved the organ because of the color he could derive musically — Jimmy views the organ as an instrument of challenge able to project for him the burning music within his soul. Fats thought of the organ as the instrument of his heart, and so does Jimmy.

Fats Waller fans will welcome this set of warm and sincere tributes. New fans who never discovered the joy of Fats Waller works before are in for a musical treat of rare dimension.

Fats speaking of his organ solos commented, "I'll never forget sitting down at the console of that magnificent organ in the H. M. V. studio on the outskirts of London. It reminded me of the Wurlitzer Grand I played at the Lincoln Theater in Harlem when I was a kid, sixteen years old.

Jimmy Smith creates a pipe organ sound of the Fats Waller era here on this album. He recreates the humor and the intense joy that Waller received when playing. But this is not imitation; this is Jimmy's interpretation based on appreciation for the Master.

In this album Jimmy continues to show reasons why he is referred to as incredible, for he performs admirably under each category.

Where the temptation for a lesser musician to "cook" at the expense of the artist's original intent and spirit in a tune, Jimmy remains within the strict confines of the tunes, nudges just gently with taste to add his own embellishments.

Donald Bailey, his long time drummer, and Quentin Warren, his guitarist, add the strong but quiet complement to the album. Although the solo work is primarily Jimmy's, their presence is noticeably heard and felt on each track. The rapport of the three establishes rare empathy of musicians with great respect for each other.

If by chance, this is your first introduction to the fantastic Mr. Smith, may I suggest you complete your library by checking the Blue Note LPs [he previously recorded]. Among them you'll find an array of settings that Blue Note has recorded since Jimmy first burst on the jazz scene a few years ago.

Jimmy has had a previous meeting with Fats in an earlier album, Jimmy Smith Plays Pretty Just for You, Blue Note 1563. In that album, the classic "Jitterbug Waltz" was interpreted. Since that time, Jimmy has continued to expand and mature. The evidence is displayed through the increasing number of admirers and imitators in the present organ school.

"Everybody Loves My Baby" — Fats always believed in the melody. Here Jimmy Smith adheres to the melody line for the song that proudly proclaims "Everybody Loves My Baby." The tune dates back to 1924, written by Spencer Williams and Jack Palmer. Fats recorded it in 1940.

"Squeeze Me" in comparing the 1939 version of this tune with Jimmy's efforts here, it is amazing how the traditional Waller flavor is maintained throughout. The strong beat of Warren's guitar is very close to the guitarist on Fats's date. While Fats sang the lyrics on his recording, Jimmy's playing has the same tongue-in-cheek feeling of Fats's singing.

"Ain't She Sweet" — one of those true evergreens of Fats. Once again the superb organ work of Jimmy's supplants the vocal. As Fats would sing, confidentially ain't she sweet, when you see her walking down the street." Jimmy maintains a swinging bass line on the walk.

"Ain't Misbehavin'" Fats's wit and charm in combining part of a nursery rhyme and the desire to be faithful, made this one of the biggest tunes he recorded. Once again Jimmy dips into his bag and produces a fresh and appealing sound for this often recorded Waller gem. It was one of Fats's hits in 1929.

"Lulu's Back in Town" — the joyous homecomin' for Lulu is another Waller landmark. Here, Jimmy and the trio paint an infectious bit of happiness of the town celebrating Lulu's return. The trio paints the celebration with a strong tinge of blue.

"Honeysuckle Rose" probably the best known of the Waller tunes. Jimmy establishes a groovy foot-patting beat before applying a typical Smith-ion touch to the rose. He adds a touch of the "Jitterbug Waltz" flavor in one of his phrases, strides in Waller tradition, and returns to the melody.

"I've Found a New Baby" — from the Chicago swing era and recorded by the old Chicago Rhythm Kings, Waller enjoyed playing this tune. Jimmy updates this stomp a bit more than the others but maintains the stride-like Waller laying throughout.

— DEL SHIELDS
WDAS FM Philadelphia

Photo by FRANCIS WOLFF
Cover Design by REID MILES
Recording by RUDY VAN GELDER

RVG CD Reissue Liner Notes

A NEW LOOK AT JIMMY SMITH PLAYS FATS WALLER

With all due respect to original annotator Del Shields, his implication that Fats Waller's talent on the Hammond organ outshone his renown as pianist, vocalist, composer, and/or bandleader, either during Waller's lifetime or at any point thereafter, is simply not true. While theatre organ gigs sustained Waller early in his career, and while he recorded on the instrument both early (1926, with Fletcher Henderson) and late (shortly before his death in 1943, for V-Disc), those performances were occasional events in the massive Waller discography, and in any event were confined until 1940 to larger pipe-organ consoles. The compact, electric Hammond keyboard was a evolutionary new invention in Waller's last years, one he might have embraced with highly influential results had he lived. This is not to disparage Waller's actual achievements, or to suggest that his role as a pioneer have not been duly noted. "Waller was the first musician to play jazz successfully and tastefully both on the pipe organ and the Hammond organ," is how Leonard Feather's Encyclopedia of Jazz put it.

Jimmy Smith, in contrast, had been hailed as the instrument's seminal stylist virtually from the outset of his Blue Note recording career. The same edition of Feather's Encyclopedia asserts that "[Smith's] relationship to previous jazz exponents of the Hammond organ parallels those of Charlie Christian and Jimmy Blanton to earlier guitarists and bassists, " a judgment that, given Waller's untimely passing, must also apply here, Yet Smith clearly appreciated Waller's talent, and honors it in one of the more unusual products of Smith's career.

Unusual in the first instance because Smith approaches the music with an uncommon restraint, playing down the virtuosity that he otherwise put on such generous display. There are no swelling crescendos here, no screeching held notes, and none of the superhuman tempos that led Babs Gonzales to liken Smith to the racehorse Nashua. The strategy is nothing if not apropos, as Waller rarely displayed his substantial technique as an end in itself. Smith must have also considered it fitting on four tracks to work various degrees of squishiness into his sound, an homage to the huge pre-Hammond keyboards that Waller employed on the majority of his organ recordings. Even when Smith is closer to his standard sound on "Just Squeeze Me, " "Lulu's Back in Town," and "Honeysuckle Rose, " the atmosphere is decidedly restrained.

It is also somewhat surprising that only three of the seven compositions are Waller's, and his most familiar titles at that. Others, most notably Ralph Sutton on a memorable 1951 Columbia date and Tom Talbert in his neglected Atlantic masterpiece Bix Duke Fats, had honored Waller by emphasizing the breadth of and hidden gems among his output. Smith is more concerned with Waller the popular performer than Waller the composer, though it is odd that he chose to include "I've Found a New Baby," where the sole documented performance by Waller is a 1938 aircheck in duet with James P. Johnson, and "Ain't She Sweet, " which Waller never recorded.

One area in which Smith followed Waller's lead was in keeping his sidemen under wraps, to the point of not allowing a single solo by guitarist Quentin Warren or drummer Donald Bailey on the album. At least Waller found occasional space for Gene "Honey Bear" Sedric's reeds, Herman Autrey's trumpet, and Al Casey's guitar. The present trio may be the best working unit that Smith ever led. It provides perfect grooves throughout the session, but for a better sense of its overall skills listeners must consult Crazy! Baby, recorded two years earlier.

Smith had made surprisingly few visits to Rudy Van Gelder's in those intervening two years, which can be read a couple of ways. Alfred Lion had grown skilled in recording enough material for two or more discs when the prolific organist went into the studio, as he did on two sessions with added horns in the spring of 1960. At the same time, Smith was nearing the end of his Blue Note contract and might have been saving himself for grander productions and bigger paydays on the horizon, a vision realized a mere two months later when producer Creed Taylor surrounded the trio with Oliver Nelson's orchestrations on the chart-topping Verve album Bashin'. The sense that the Blue Note/Smith alliance was near its end may have led Lion to create what was the organist's only concept album for the label, one that yielded a pair of singles from its program but (unlike "Walk on the Wild Side" from Bashin) no hits. The wider world was apparently awaiting the pyrotechnics that this subdued but still substantial collection so studiously ignores.

— Bob Blumenthal, 2008