Jazz history books keep breaking down the music into categories. Ragtime. New Orleans, Bebop, Post-bop, New thing, Soul jazz, Fusion are all terms that we have seen used in profusion. And, in a sense, we can be thankful for the designations since they, at least, attempt a clarification of a music that continually defies definition. Jazz musicians themselves tend to look on such categorization with responses ranging from bemusement to rage. Jazz musicians hate to be type-cast.
Still we are able to identify key figures with the terms. If the terms themselves were dropped in favor of the men who best represented the music, our list might read: Joplin, Oliver, Condon, Basie. Parker, Blakey, Coleman, Smith, and Benson. That doesn't move us any closer to solving the problem, because for each player that seems to fit the mold, there are countless others unsuitable to any of the styles mentioned above. Benny Green was certainly a maverick whose trombone style did not easily fit into one particular bag.
You can listen to Green's earliest work with Earl Hines Band in 1946 or to his last recorded solos (the Newport Jam Sessions of 1972) and not notice any appreciable change in his style. The essence of Benny Green is in his sound. It is quite simply the biggest. fattest, most natural trombone sound of any player to emerge since the end of World War ll. Harmonically, Green benefitted from a close friendship with Dizzy Gillespie while a member of Hines' band, yet he was never a real bebop player. In his associations with big bands (Hines, Ellington) or small groups (Hines, Charlie Ventura), he was called on to play a wide variety of music, but at the head of his own combos, his repertoire reflected what he preferred: ballads, blues, standards with a bit of Latin rhythm. As an instrumentalist, he had much in common with Gene Ammons, a frequent bandstand companion.
When Green was with the Bop For The People Band, Charlie Ventura used to introduce him as "The Duke." By the time this date was recorded he was known as "Fluke" among musicians (Hear Babs Gonzales references in "Encore".). His first name has been spelled both "Bennie" and "Benny." In 1961, Ira Gitler, in his notes to Green's Glidin' Along album on Jazzland, reluctantly noted a preference for the latter, although Gitler's own biography in The Encyclopedia Of Jazz In The 70s still lists the former!
What really got Benny Green's career off and running was a 1953 session for Decca which produced a hit record, Blow Your Horn. A follow-up session produced another winner, I Wanna Blow (which has been used as a theme by Illinois Jacquet in recent years). Prestige singles of "Say Jack" and "Hi-Yo Silver" also were strong juke box items. It is significant that while the music in this album has never been issued on LP, six titles were available on Blue Note 45s.
This music here is from the third of four Blue Note sessions made by Benny in the period March 1958 — January 1959. His companions are players familiar to him. Tenorman Eddy Williams was a part of Walkin' And Talkin' (Blue Note 4010); Sonny Clark was on Soul Stirrin' (Blue Note 1599); Paul Chambers got his first major break with Green and recorded with him on his first two Prestige sessions while Jerry Segal was the drummer on his second Decca session.
The composer of the previously unissued "It's Groovy" is not known, but it could well be Benny himself since the line has much in common with other Green blues. Solos are by Green, Williams, and Clark and each man exhibits the basics of his personal style. Benny builds to a boil with simple phrasing and repeated notes; Williams, a native of Chicago of whom little is known, reflects some Dexter Gordon in terms of sound, but is fluent, swinging and generally reflective of the postwar Chicago style of straight ahead tenor players; and Sonny Clark is one of the great unsung heroes. Between 1957 and 1962, Sonny Clark made more Blue Note sessions than any pianist and Alfred Lion was very careful in his selection of pianists!
The solo order is the same for the My Fair Lady favorite, "On The Street Where You Live," which is given a rousing treatment.
A rare muted trombone by Benny is a highlight of "Can't We Be Friends?" which opens with a strong Williams solo. Following Green, Sonny Clark plays a typically inventive chorus (Does there exist an univentive Sonny Clark solo?); then it's P.C. for a half chorus with the ensemble returning on the bridge to take it out.
"Ain't Nothin' But The Blues" is certainly that. Williams, Benny and Clark essay the most basic of jazz forms in the heavy medium tempo favored by Benny for the blues. Horns riff behind the piano solo as the track fades out. The 45 version of this was faded a bit earlier, and here we get an extra chorus plus of Sonny Clark!
Side 1 closes with the 45 master take of "Encore". Side 2 ends with the alternate master. The differences are discussed later in these notes.
Williams opens up "Bye Bye Blackbird" in his best Dexter bag, followed by Benny and Sonny before a return to the theme with a taste of bass.
Harold Ousley's "Minor Revelation" is one of the first recorded compositions by that fine Chicago saxophonist. Some hand-clapping over Sonny's vamp serves as an introduction and Benny opens up after the strutting theme. Rhythm picks up aggressively behind Williams' solo, but settles down behind Clark. A return to the hand-clapping and vamp precedes the closing melody.
The Kern-Hammerstein chestnut, "Why Do I Love You?", is the second previously unissued track here. As a jazz vehicle, the song is best remembered in Charlie Parker's 1951 recording. Typically flowing solos from Green, Williams, Clark (who sounds here, as elsewhere in the album, that he might have been listening to Hank Jones) and Chambers lead us back to the closing line.
The inimitable Babs Gonzales leads us into his "Encore." His melody here is Illinois Jacquet's "Flyin' Home" solo. Babs sang this solo, with a different lyric, on a "Flyin' Home" recorded on Johnny Griffin's first record date in 1953 for Okeh. The performance here is alternate to the original 45 version, although there is no appreciable difference in the arrangement. The 45 has Babs counting off the time and a reference to "Hinton's" instead of "Birdland." Solos by Green and Williams are better on the 45, but Sonny Clark's solo is fractionally better here. Each version fades on a second trombone solo which is muted on the 45 version. The take on hand was the one chosen for release on LP by Alfred Lion. Babs vocal reference to Benny's being "back in town" reminds one that Green was off the scene during 1957, and that his return was marked by his first Blue Note album, Back On The Scene (Blue Note 1587).
As we can readily hear on this album, Benny Green's Blue Note association, though brief, was a fruitful one. His work on Blue Note is every bit the equal of his work for other labels. After leaving Blue Note, he recorded for Bethlehem, Enrica, Time and Jazzland, prior to a pair of final sessions co-led with Sonny Stitt for Cadet (1964) and Prestige (1965). He continued to lead small bands throughout most of the 60s and was especially popular in his home town of Chicago. During the summer of 1961, he appeared at McKie's DJ Lounge as a part of the famous sessions that also included James Moody, Sonny Stitt, Gene Ammons, and Dexter Gordon. He would occasionally pop up on LPs as a sideman lending his special spice to sessions by George Benson and Booker Ervin. He joined the Duke Ellington Band for a period in 1969, and at the same time moved to Las Vegas where he worked in house bands. He appeared at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1969 and 1972. He died March 23, 1977, of cancer following a long illness.
Thus it may seem that with this album we have heard the last work of Benny Green. But there is more! In January 1962, Benny Green returned to Blue Note a final time as a guest (with Stanley Turrentine) on an Ike Quebec LP which has never been issued. Michael Cuscuna, who is responsible for unearthing the marvelous Blue Note "discoveries," has heard the material and pronounces it excellent. So the final chapter of the Benny Green story has, at this writing, yet to be heard. But until that time, you have The 45 Session (Minor Revelation), which is truly a major enjoyment!
-BOB PORTER
