Good Grief! It's Still Jim Martinez

Invisible Touch Music
By guest critic Derrick Bang
Buy CD: Good Grief! It's Still Jim Martinez

Vince Guaraldi has been gone for almost 40 years, but his signature themes are more popular than ever; all manner of jazz musicians have covered the “big three” — “Cast Your Fate to the Wind,” “Linus and Lucy” and “Christmas Time Is Here” — with more renditions popping up every year.

Northern California jazz pianist Jim Martinez includes the first two on his new album, which honors Guaraldi’s decisive musical influence on the neighborhood inhabited by Charlie Brown and the rest of Charles M. Schulz’s beloved Peanuts gang. But this isn’t a garden-variety collection of Guaraldi covers; eight of these 14 tracks are sparkling Martinez originals, all written and performed in Guaraldi’s larkish, Latinesque “Peanuts style.”

Martinez has Guaraldi’s facility for cute, clever melodic hooks that immediately sound familiar, even when heard for the first time. Better still, they’re catchy and instantly hummable, with the cheerful ebullience that always characterized Guaraldi’s performance style. You can’t help nodding in time to Martinez’s effervescent keyboard work; you also can’t help smiling.

He’s a generous leader, granting plenty of exposure to core band mates Josh Workman (guitar), Marcus Shelby (bass), and Tim Metz and Tony Savage, trading off on drums. Indeed, numerous tracks — such as Martinez’s “Chillin’ at the Warm Puppy Café” — feature engaging “duels” between Martinez and Workman, alternating vigorous solos and comping behind each other. (The title references the aptly named coffee shop adjacent to the Charles M. Schulz Museum in Santa Rosa, California.)

Workman’s deft guitar work also highlights the gentle, Brazilian-hued “Samba for Snoopy,” and the flamenco elements of the impish “Spike and the Cactus Club,” with its shifting time signatures; one imagines Snoopy’s rail-thin brother dancing with a rose between his teeth.

Shelby’s accomplished bass work powers the percussive “Bang!,” which Martinez fills with Guaraldi-esque flourishes; Shelby’s walking bass also drives the sassy “Blues for Beagles,” which gets additional snap from Lucas Bere’s smoldering tenor sax.

The lyrical “Waltz for Vince” feels very much like the style and delivery of Guaraldi’s early Fantasy albums, while “Schroeder Can Play” is a spirited finger-snapper granted plenty of swing by both Martinez and Shelby.

The band’s cover of “Cast Your Fate to the Wind” is slightly faster than Guaraldi’s version, with Martinez roaring through the lengthy improv bridge. “Linus and Lucy” also is up-tempo, with Metz’s propulsive drum work setting the stage for an initially faithful (but not slavish) adaptation that breaks away when Martinez takes the second bridge into entirely new directions. Guaraldi’s lively “Surfin’ Snoopy” is treated like a classic combo swinger, with Savage and Shelby setting the stage for vigorous solos by Bere, Workman and finally Martinez.

Martinez is equally adept at softer tempos, as with his worshipful handling of Guaraldi’s “Theme to Grace,” an interior theme from the Jazz Mass Guaraldi wrote for San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral in the mid-1960s. Workman and Martinez trade quiet, reverential solos in a manner evoking the latter’s numerous “Jazz Praise” albums. Similarly, Martinez’s “Thank You Sparky” is a hushed, heartfelt lament, with his keyboard backed solely by violin.

The album includes one vocal: a tender cover of Rod McKuen’s poignant title song to the 1969 film A Boy Named Charlie Brown, with Margie Rebekah Ruiz’s expressively soulful voice accompanied by Bere’s equally sweet sax solo and a string quartet.

The album is highlighted both by everybody’s tight solo and ensemble work, and by Martinez’s overall impish tone. Most of his original compositions are droll to begin with, and he enhances that exuberance with occasional quotes from sources as varied as Gershwin, “Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer” and Guaraldi himself.

This album’s dexterous musicality certainly is a selling point, but — most of all — it’s fun. As with Guaraldi’s many albums, you can’t help wanting to play this one again ... and again and again.

Holiday Jazz 2012: Swing Ye Noel!

By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.11.12

[Web master’s note: Northern California film critic Derrick Bang — still the eldest, youngest and only son of this site’s jazz guru, Ric Bang — has surveyed the holiday jazz scene for roughly 17 years, with lengthy columns that just keep growing. Check out previous columns by clicking on the CHRISTMAS label below.]

It’s getting harder to find this stuff.

Time was, I’d start haunting the holiday section at music stores shortly before Thanksgiving; the better brick-and-mortar outlets would be laden, with some even giving holiday jazz its own sub-category. Berkeley’s marvelous Amoeba Music continues that practice to this day, and therefore remains an essential part of my annual December rituals.

Closer to home, alas, the options aren’t nearly as diverse. Or rewarding.

Which brings us to the ever-more-ubiquitous online alternative. Although Amazon’s search engines continue to improve, one still can’t get reliable results from the phrases “Christmas jazz,” “holiday jazz” or similar choices. CDBaby is a bit better, although I still wade through a lot of non-jazz while hunting for the good stuff. Sadly, EJazzlines.com, once a great source for hard-to-find holiday jazz, no longer sells CDs.

On the other hand, being able to hear samples — at both Amazon and CDBaby — is a treasure.

Take comfort, then, from the fact that I’ve done the legwork and returned with tidings of jazzy comfort and joy. Patience may have been required, but it turned out to be a good year. Nog those eggs, don a Santa hat and prepare to swing!

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The season’s prize is a 2011 release that arrived too late for last year’s column: the Marcus Roberts Trio’s Celebrating Christmas (J-Master Records). This is what jazz is all about: a tightly arranged melodic dance between Roberts, on piano; Rodney Jordan, bass; and Jason Marsalis, drums.

I’m hard-pressed to cite a favorite track, although this group’s inventive approach to “The Twelve Days of Christmas” is first among equals: The tune, often redundant as an instrumental, is delivered here in 12 different styles, and with each day represented by one of the 12 major keys. That’s simply brilliant.

The trio’s handling of “Little Drummer Boy” is equally clever, with Marsalis establishing a peppy march beat that Roberts initially refuses to follow, choosing instead to play “behind” the beat at a much slower tempo. Roberts gradually picks up speed as the song continues, until finally all three musicians are in synch.

Jordan’s walking bass is the highlight of a velvet-smooth “I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” and he also dominates a short but deliciously whimsical cover of “Frosty, the Snowman.” “Let It Snow” has a south-of-the-border ambiance, with some great keyboard wandering and another nice bass solo.

“Winter Wonderland” blends striking percussion with Roberts’ New Orleans grease; “Jingle Bells” has a similar bouncy, New Orleans-style strut, with some more fabulous bass and drums action. This cut features one of Roberts’ many signatures: He fails to complete the line as the song concludes, leaving us a few chords shy.

“Silent Night” is delivered at a slow 6/4, with an achingly sweet call-and-response between piano and bass; later in the song, Roberts delivers similar counterpoint between his left and right hands. Sheer genius.

Three tracks are solo piano: “We Three Kings,” “O Come All Ye Faithful” and “Joy to the World.” Each is slow, deliberate and lyrical: a bit extemporaneous, with a touch of ragtime on “Joy to the World.” Stylistically, these evoke memories of Roberts’ earlier Christmas release, 1991’s “Prayer for Peace,” a solo keyboard album that was far more solemn.

“Celebrating Christmas,” in great contrast, is lively, vibrant and fun: an album that demands close attention because it’s so creative and joyous.

Holiday Jazz: How it all began

By Derrick Bang

[Web master’s note: Northern California film critic Derrick Bang — the eldest, youngest and only son of this site’s jazz guru, Ric Bang — began writing about the annual holiday jazz scene in 1997. His interest in the sub-genre began many years earlier, however, as the following essay explains. Quick links to these annual columns — archived within this blog — can be obtained by clicking on CHRISTMAS in the list of labels at the bottom of this post.]

It started reasonably enough.

Back in the Stone Age of the 1970s, years before our local National Public Radio outlet (KXPR) begat a sister station (KXJZ), the former catered primarily to local classical music enthusiasts. Jazz fans were restricted to the late evening hours, when most sensible people would be getting ready for bed. (I could argue that jazz fans rarely are sensible people, but that’s another discussion.)

Aside from the occasional one or two tunes that might pop up in the middle of otherwise conventional sets, jazz covers of familiar Christmas songs were restricted to a two-hour, 10 p.m. to midnight timeslot on Christmas Eve, appropriately dubbed Jingle Bell Jazz.

I lived for those two hours.

Although I grew up enjoying the holidays, and particularly its melodies, there was something faintly ... well ... corny about most Christmas music being played in the ’70s. It was the stuff of Muzak and easy-listening schlock, with gag-me choruses and more damn strings than you’d find in most symphony orchestras. Much like some aspects of the holiday itself, most Christmas music had become gaudy, overly commercialized, lowest-common-denominator pap.

Christmas jazz, though ... now that had an edge: some genuine bite and enough musicality that you’d stop and really listen to the stuff, instead of tuning it out the way you’d desperately ignore the junk you heard in department store elevators.

No seasonal trauma is too great that it can’t be alleviated by a warm fire, a warmer companion and a soulful interpretation of “Silent Night” or “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” by the likes of Oscar Peterson or Dave Brubeck.

And for an all-too-short 120 minutes every Dec. 24th, host Gary Vercelli played a tasty and delectable selection of hip holiday tunes, drawing from a woefully limited supply. Options were few back then: CDs weren’t even a dream on the horizon, let alone iTunes and other Internet downloading sources. LPs still ruled the roost, and many of those had gone out of print. That’s what made radio both good and bad: Avid listeners often heard things they didn’t own, but at the same time might have little chance of purchasing, short of a lucky find in a used-record store.

Larry Vuckovich: Somethin' Special

Tetrachord Music
By Ric Bang
Buy CD: Somethin' Special

Fans of mainstream jazz — particularly that dating back to the 1950s and ’60s — will love this album.

The Vuckovich family escaped from Tito’s communist Yugoslavia after World War II and obtained political asylum in the States in 1951. Larry, 14 at the time, had studied classical piano in his homeland, but was drawn to jazz by listening to Armed Forces Radio during the war. The family settled in San Francisco, and his love for jazz blossomed; he haunted the record shops and jazz clubs that filled the city at the time.

Before long, Vuckovich was sitting in with the likes of Brew Moore and Cal Tjader, who he met at the famous Black Hawk. Vince Guaraldi, Tjader’s pianist at the time, accepted Vuckovich as his sole student.

Over time, Vuckovich played, worked and recorded with many of the name musicians who visited San Francisco. He developed a special affinity with jazz vocalists such as Irene Kral, David Allyn, Mel Torme and Jon Hendricks: associations that demonstrated how these contemporaries felt about the young pianist’s talent.

This album teams Vuckovich with four artists from that same era: Scott Hamilton and Noel Jewkes, sax; Paul Keller, bass; and Chuck McPherson, drums. Two tracks — “Loving Linda” and “Zeljkos Blues” — are Vuckovich compositions; the rest are jazz tunes by Sonny Clark, Horace Silver, Tadd Dameron, Dexter Gordon and Thelonious Monk, along with three wonderful standards (“Stardust,” “How Insensitive” and “What Will I Tell My Heart”).

The musical format varies from solo piano (“Pannonica”) to quartets and quintets, depending on the presence of one or two horns. Hamilton is famous for the pure tone he elicits from his tenor sax; early in his career, he emulated Ben Webster and Coleman Hawkins, but more recently has developed a smoother sound with echoes of Zoot Sims, Don Byas and Stan Getz.

Jewkes plays tenor and alto sax, as well as clarinet. His style is a little “looser” than Hamilton’s, and they complicate each other nicely. Keller and McPherson form the backbone of a truly swinging rhythm section; they drive the beat deftly without intruding on the melodic line.

Guaraldi’s mentorship is evident in Vuckovich’s style; he’s innovative and melds impressively with his cohorts. The result is a smooth and swinging group.

Holiday Jazz 2010: A quiet year for seasonal swing

By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.16.10

[Web master's note: Northern California film critic Derrick Bang — the eldest, youngest and only son of this site's jazz guru, Ric Bang — has surveyed the holiday jazz scene for roughly 15 years, with lengthy columns that just keep growing.]

Santa seems to have misplaced some of his swing.

Some years are great for holiday jazz; others … aren’t. New releases are unusually slim this year; were it not for a selection of slightly older albums that only came to my attention during the past 12 months, I’d have precious little to discuss. 2010 offers no new CDs from name-brand jazz superstars, and — perhaps more surprising — also no new compilations from labels that have delivered the goods in previous years: Concord, Origin and several others.

(Sadly, Christmas from the Blue Note came to my attention too late for this article; it’ll be discussed at this time next year.)

I’d hate to think this results from a diminished interest in seasonal swing, but one year does not a trend make. I won’t panic unless 2011 is similarly bereft of jazzy ho-ho-ho.

But the news isn’t all bad. Music doesn’t require a 2010 copyright in order to be “new”; if you’ve not encountered something before, it’s still fresh. And you’ll find plenty to enjoy in the following list. If it’s not as long as my usual annual round-up, well, that simply means your bank account won’t be as threatened.

So, I see Santa on sax, Rudolph on percussion, and three elves standing atop one another to work that bass: Grab some egg nog and prepare to snap those fingers and tap those toes.

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Although not on the public’s radar as much as, say, Mannheim Steamroller, the a cappella group Take 6 is just as serious about the holidays: the newly released The Most Wonderful Time of the Year is the ensemble’s third seasonal release, following 1991’s He Is Christmas and 1999’s We Wish You a Merry Christmas. It can be hard to pigeonhole the group, since their style blends elements of gospel, R&B, vintage doo-wop and jazz … but when a bunch of guys sounds this good, they deserve to be praised.

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year is a shortish album, its 10 tracks clocking in at just shy of 35 minutes, but the contents are choice. You’ll marvel at the way the voices “cover” the background percussion instruments one would expect from an average rendition of these tunes; this is particularly noteworthy on “White Christmas” and a soulful reading of “Jingle Bells,” along with the enchanting “Sugarplum Dance,” a doo-wop variation on Tchaikovsky’s “Dance of the Sugarplum Fairies” (no vocal line on this one, of course).

The rowdier selections are a lot of fun, particularly “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch,” which opens with an argument between Claude McKnight III and Alvin Chea — over who should sing the bass melody line — and continues with all sorts of snarky side comments throughout the song.

But these guys have their sweeter side, as well: Their vocal chops are just as enchanting on the gentler arrangements, as with “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” and “I Saw Three Ships.”

You won’t want to miss this album … and while you’re at it, pick up the other two, as well.

Vince Guaraldi: The Definitive Vince Guaraldi

Fantasy Records
By Ric Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 3.4.10
Buy CD: The Definitive Vince Guaraldi

Vince Guaraldi is the best-known pianist in the world today, and I make that statement without reservation.

The millions of Peanuts fans know him from the musical association with Charles M. Schulz's comic strip characters and their unforgettable TV Specials. But Guaraldi had acquired an impressive fan base long before Schulz and Lee Mendelson — producer and director of all the animated shows — had even met.

Guaraldi, born in 1928, became a noted jazz artist in the early '50s when he joined vibraphonist Cal Tjader's group; Guaraldi further expanded his fame as a member of Woody Herman's Third Herd several years later. Guaraldi formed his own trio in 1955 and, until his death in '76, created numerous now-classic albums while under contract to Fantasy Records.

Guaraldi's own composition, “Cast Your Fate to the Wind,” catapulted him from a “good jazz pianist” to a truly famous jazz artist. That Grammy Award-winning tune was the catalyst that ultimately connected him to Peanuts and guaranteed success for the rest of his career, and a “forever place” up to the present day.

This double-CD album contains 31 tracks from his Fantasy recordings. The first disc features recordings made from 1955 through '63; most were done with his trio, although there's one beautiful solo piano cover of “Never, Never Land” and several other tracks with guest artists. Four are Guaraldi originals — “Calling Dr. Funk,” “Fenwyck's Farfel,” “Star Song” and the masterful “Cast Your Fate to the Wind” — and the rest are covers of familiar standards.

The second disc concentrates on 1964 and '65, with eight tracks devoted to the wonderful melodies from the Peanuts TV specials that the world re-watches annually. Finally, two tracks are previously unreleased: “Blues for Peanuts” and an alternate take of “Autumn Leaves.”

Both wonderful discs present Guaraldi at his finest. He loved playing, and it shows; his style was “light” and truly swinging. After the melody was established, his marvelous right hand would lay down chorus after chorus of groovy solo lines, which made it impossible to keep from moving with his beat. His left hand contributed perfect, light chords that always added, never subtracted.

My reaction to Guaraldi's music is perfectly captured by the members of the Peanuts cast, and particularly Snoopy, as they dance to “Linus and Lucy.” This is a must-have album!

Holiday Jazz 2006: Yule be swingin'

By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.7.06


[Web master’s note: Northern California film critic Derrick Bang — the eldest, youngest and only son of this site’s jazz guru, Ric Bang — has surveyed the holiday jazz scene for roughly 11 years, with lengthy columns that just keep growing.]

Researching this annual round-up just became a bit harder.

Whatever the chain’s other vices and virtues, Tower Records always displayed an impressive selection of seasonal music, and — at Sacramento’s Watt Avenue outlet — even divided the releases by genre. Flipping through discs to find new holiday jazz releases was an annual treat, and one I greatly anticipated each November.

But now, with Tower gone, my only local option is Borders. I’ve nothing but praise for their variety of books, but the music section has needed serious help for quite some time; it appears as if nobody even bothers to alphabetize the discs in many sections, let alone divide by sub-category. Have you ever tried to find a soundtrack in that mess?

Fortunately, the still-cherished “search the bins” experience remains a possibility, albeit with a bit more planning. Berkeley’s Amoeba Music sets up a dynamite display of holiday music in late November, and those folks also stock an impressive supply of used CDs and — wait for it — even LPs.

I call it paradise.

Even a visit to Amoeba, however, didn’t reveal all that much in the way of 2006 holiday jazz releases, which makes me wonder if the last decade’s “soft jazz”-inspired deluge finally might be receding. One year does not a trend make, but I am surprised by the relative scarcity of new material.

Thank goodness for the Internet, and for below-the-radar Web outlets such as cdbaby and ejazzlines.com. I’ve long shouted the joys of cdbaby, but ejazzlines is new to me this year ... and they even have a special section wholly devoted to Christmas jazz.

Thanks to such resources, I found quite a few recent and even older CDs to round out this yearly celebration of holiday jazz. As usual, an initially reasonable article therefore blossomed into a monster of redwood status, and I’ll be mightily impressed by anybody who keeps reading to the bitter end.

But the journey, as the say, is reason enough. I had my usual good time with all this music, and I hope some of it winds up in your home, as well.

Those who’ve grown tired of the same old-same old in seasonal jazz will want to run, not walk, to find a copy of the Classical Jazz Quartet’s Christmas (Kind of Blue 10014). This positively sublime album features some of today’s finest jazz stars: Kenny Barron on piano, Ron Carter on bass, Stefon Harris on vibes and marimba, and Lewis Nash on drums.

And you won’t find a trace of Rudolph, Frosty or the Chipmunks.

As befits the ensemble’s name, these guys have compiled an album of classically hued tracks: two stand-alone pieces — the “Hallelujah” from Handel’s Messiah, and Bach’s “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” — and an ambitious, six-movement arrangement of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker.

The overall tone may be on the occasionally solemn side, but the jazz chops are magnificent. Harris struts his stuff with a dynamic interpretation of the melody line from Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus”; he yields to Barron’s equally vigorous piano work, and then the entire quartet goes to town.

Bach comes next: Carter gently plucks the opening melody, which expands to include both piano and vibes until kicking into high gear after another minute or so. Many Christmas jazz albums serve nicely as background music, but you can’t help but pay close attention to these four guys; musicians who complement each other so well demand a listener’s full concentration.

As for the nearly 40-minute “Nutcracker,” all I can say is wow. The second movement — the “March” — is particularly delightful.

I’d love to have been in the studio while this album was recorded, because these guys clearly had a great time. And they just might help sway that Bach, Beethoven and Mozart-oriented friend of yours, who hasn’t yet found a reason to like jazz.