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Jason Crane Posts

Pinball Number Count

One of the favorite musical memories of my childhood is the Pinball Number Count from Sesame Street. I dare you to find a hipper 60 seconds of music on any kids show today.

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Vrabelize your new year

My good friend Jeff Vrabel has been a busy guy recently. For a small sampling of his wares, check out his recent reviews of new albums by Mos Def and Nas, and his Top 10 of 2006. Enjoy!

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Saxophonist Harry Allen on The Jason Crane Show

Visit The Jason Crane Show for my latest interview. This episode’s guest is tenor saxophonist Harry Allen. Turned on to jazz as a kid by his father, Harry Allen set his sights on becoming a professional. Along the way, he took a different path from the many Coltrane disciples, and that has made all the difference. You can find out more about Harry at HarryAllenJazz.com.

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Julius LaRosa and Why I Love Live Radio

Julius LaRosa

I’m sitting here listening to the Sunday Music Festa on Jazz90.1. My good friend Otto Bruno is interviewing singer Julius LaRosa right now, and reminding me why I love good, live radio. Otto and Julius are telling old show biz stories, playing great classic music, and just generally doing what radio was intended to do — bringing culture, humor, entertainment and information into our homes. For free.

You can find out more about Julius LaRosa at his official Web site.

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Otto’s back

My good friend Otto Bruno is back in two media: He’s (finally!) got a new entry on his blog, From Where I Sit, and he’s also on the radio tomorrow (New Year’s Eve) with his wonderful show the Sunday Music Festa. Tomorrow’s show features an interview with vocal legend Julius La Rosa. Don’t miss it. Tune in to Jazz90.1 in the Rochester area, or visit jazz901.org to listen live via the Internet.

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Our high-tech world

apple

I use my iPod in the kitchen, plugged into a set of speakers. I left the USB cable for the iPod on the kitchen counter on Christmas Eve, and it ended up resting in a small pool of water on the counter. The next day, the cable was all gummed up and it didn’t work anymore. I went to our local Apple Store today to replace the cable, and was amazed at how fluid and easy the entire experience was. A guy met me at the door. I told him what I wanted. He got me one off the shelf and asked if I was paying with a credit card. I said I was, and he whipped out a little scanner device maybe 50% larger than a Palm Pilot. He scanned the cable and swiped my credit card using this device. “Do you want us to send you a receipt via e-mail?” he asked. He already had my e-mail address on file. I said, “Sure, thanks,” and split. No lines, no counters, just quick and efficient service. Wacky!

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My grandpa’s band

Here’s a photo taken of my grandfather, Bernie Flanders, on August 15, 1930. He was 17 years old, and he played clarinet and saxophone in this band. My grandfather is standing, fourth from the left. (Click on the photo for a larger image.)

Bernard Flanders Band

My grandfather played a huge role in the person I became — particularly my love of jazz. Here’s more about that, excerpted from a larger piece I’m working on:

My grandparents have played a big part in my life. My grandfather was a saxophonist and clarinetist when he was younger. He played in a swing band with some guys from the GE plant where he worked. When I was growing up, my grandparents had one of those console stereos that was a piece of furniture. It looked like the bottom part of a hutch when it was closed up. It was painted white, and the speaker section along the front had a curtain covering it. To get to the controls, you opened the top of the console. Inside was a turntable and a receiver. My grandpa had a big collection of swing records – including an entire series of records by Glen Gray and the Casa Loma Orchestra. These records were made in the 1950s, when Gray decided to create an archive of classic swing tunes by recreating the arrangements of the famous big bands.

I learned every note on every one of these records. Unlike most kids in the late 70’s, who were memorizing the lyrics to “Detroit Rock City,” I was learning the horn parts to “Nightmare” and “String of Pearls” and “Take The A Train.” I also developed a real passion for Nat “King” Cole that continues to this day. My grandfather new most of the soloists from the records – particularly the sax and clarinet players. He and my grandma were also big Lawrence Welk fans, and they both knew the names of every musician and singer and dancer on the show.

My favorite album, and the one I learned the best, was Kenton In Hi-Fi. Kenton made this fantastic recording in 1956 for Capitol Records, and it features many of Stan’s biggest hits – “Artistry In Rhythm,” “Eager Beaver,” “Unison Riff,” and “Artistry Jumps,” to name a few. It also features the very gutsy tenor saxophonist Vido Musso, a ridiculous trumpet section led by Pete Candoli and Maynard Ferguson, and the drumming of the incomparable Mel Lewis. This record swings its ass off from start to finish, and it’s a huge piece of my musical upbringing.

I still love big band music, particularly when it gets cold. I’m not sure what the correlation is, but as the winter approaches, I pull out all my Ellington and Basie and drift back into the first half of the 20th century. I listen to swing music throughout the year, but the strong pull of nostalgia is only there in the winter.

* * *

Going back to music for a minute: I had a very strange musical upbringing. I listened to Nat Cole and Stan Kenton at a time when most kids were listening to disco and Kiss. As I got older, I stayed on my own course. I got some hand-me-down 8-track tapes when I was maybe seven years old. I can’t remember all of them, but my two favorites were a Kiss greatest hits collection (which I loved because Kiss was my cousin Todd’s favorite band, and thus my favorite band, too) and a collection of performances by Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops. I can only recall one song from that collection – and orchestral version of Burt Bacharach’s “Do You Know The Way To San Jose?” What kind of kid listens to big band, cheese rock, and the Boston Pops? Did no one in family own a radio?

One explanation for my early musical taste is that I spent so much time in the Hagyard Building with my grandparents, who didn’t listen to the radio all that much. It’s odd that they didn’t, because listening to the radio has been my grandfather’s main passtime for the past 15 years or so. I don’t remember listening to the radio a lot with my parents, which again is odd because they both worked at a radio station. I think I really started listening to the radio after we moved to New York State. Or at least that’s when I remember riding in the car a lot with the radio on, catching up on some of the music I’d missed.

Not counting the Kiss 8-track, I didn’t own my first rock record until I was in high school. I fell in with a crowd that was into prog rock. The first rock tape I remember owning was a copy of Signals by Rush, a Canadian rock band that my friend Jeff calls the “best all-girl band of the 70’s.” Somewhere around my freshman year, this group of friends turned my on to Yes, Genesis, Rush, King Crimson, the Moody Blues, Pink Floyd, Asia, Jethro Tull – all your prog rock favorites. I still love those bands now, although my tastes have broadened considerably since high school.

The first record I ever spent my own money on was Chuck Mangione’s 1978 album An Evening Of Magic: Live At The Hollywood Bowl. I got the album on cassette (two cassettes, if I remember right) and wore the thing out. In addition to Chuck on flugelhorn and electric piano, the concert featured Chris Vadala on saxes and flutes, Grant Geissman on guitar, Charles Meeks on the bass, James Bradley, Jr. on the drums, and a full orchestra. Vadala tears it up on every track. This album set the stage for my approach to jazz for years to come.

* * *

About the Kenton record: When I was first listening to it as a kid, it never occurred to me that I might one day talk to members of the band. And I don’t mean that I never thought I could reach those heights. I mean it literally never occurred to me that the band existed in the real world, and that some people had jobs that allowed them to talk to musicians.

I probably heard that record for the first time when I was four or five, and I got to know it well a decade later in junior high. Fifteen years after that, I interviewed Maynard Ferguson, one of the trumpeters on Kenton In Hi-Fi, and a legend in his own right. I didn’t ask him about that particular record, although we did talk about Kenton. He was a funny, approachable, articulate man, and he was very generous with his time as a guest on my radio show.

Before I ever thought about interviewing famous musicians, I thought about becoming one. As a young child, I took classical guitar lessons, but I was never very good and I didn’t last long. Right before I went into 7th grade, my cousin-hero Todd sent me his clarinet, which he’d traded in for an electric bass. I started playing clarinet in junior high, switched to saxophone in high school, and decided that being a professional musician was the life for me. As it turned out, though, I got much closer to the top level of performers as an interviewer than I ever did as a performer.

I’m not really sure when it was that I realized that musicians were actual human beings. Isn’t that strange? When do we cross that line of perception and discover that recorded sound is produced by regular people? How do we do it? I don’t think anyone ever told me that all those records were made by people just like me. I guess one day I just put together all the images I’d seen on TV with the records I’d been listening to and made the connection. All these years later, there’s still an element of magic and awe involved in talking with someone who was on a milestone recording.

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The White Hots have a new CD

White Hots

The White Hots are Rochester’s premier “chamber blues” band. If you’re in the area on December 11, this is one event not to miss:

The White Hots announce the release of Caught in the Act, our first CD with vocalist Tina Albright!

Come to our CD release party on Monday, December 11 from 7:30 – 9:30 p.m. at the Little Theatre Café, 240 East Avenue.

All three of our CDs are also available at any of our gigs (we are at the Little Theater the first three Mondays in December) or via thewhitehots.com.

Caught in the Act is dedicated to Dennis Monroe, the amazing musical talent who was our friend and fellow Hot. Dennis passed away earlier this year.

We look forward to seeing you!

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Anita O’Day, R.I.P.

One of my all-time favorite jazz singers is gone. Thanks for the music. You’ll be missed…

Anita ODay 1

ANITA O’DAY
October 18, 1919-November 23, 2006

Jazz Vocal legend Anita O’Day passed this morning October 23, 2006 at 6:17AM in West Los Angeles. The cause of death was cardiac arrest according to her manager Robbie Cavalina.

Born Anita Belle Colton in Chicago, Illinois on October 18, 1919, O’Day got her start as a teen. She eventually changed her name to O’Day and in the late 1930’s began singing in a jazz club called the Off- Beat, a popular hangout for musicians like band leader and drummer Gene Krupa. In 1941 she joined Krupa’s band, and a few weeks later Krupa hired trumpeter Roy Eldridge. O’Day and Eldridge had great chemistry on stage and their duet “Let Me Off Uptown” became a million-dollar-seller, boosting the popularity of the Krupa band. Also that year, “Down Beat” magazine named O’Day “New Star of the Year” and, in 1942, she was selected as one of the top five big band singers.

After her stint with, Krupa, O’Day joined Stan Kenton’s band. She left the band after a year and returned to Krupa. Singer Jackie Cain remembers the first time she saw O’Day with the Krupa band. “I was really impressed,” she recalls, “She (O’Day) sang with a jazz feel, and that was kind of fresh and new at the time.” Later, O’Day joined Stan Kenton’s band with whom she cut an album that featured the hit tune “And Her Tears Flowed Like Wine”

In the late’40s, O’Day struck out on her own. She teamed up with drummer John Poole, with whom she played for the next 32 years. Her album “Anita”, which she recorded on producer Norman Granz’s new Verve label, elevated her career to new heights. She began performing in festivals and concerts with such illustrious musicians as Louis Armstrong, Dinah Washington, Georg Shearing and Thelonious Monk. O’Day also appeared in the documentary filmed at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1958 called “Jazz on a Summer Day”, which made her an international star.

Summers Day

Throughout the ’60s Anita continued to tour and record while addicted to heroin and in 1969 she nearly died from an overdose. O’Day eventually beat her addiction and returned to work. In 1981 she published her autobiography “High Times, Hard Times” which, among other things, talked candidly about her drug addiction.

Her final recording was “Indestructible Anita O’Day” and featured Eddie Locke, Chip Jackson, Roswell Rudd, Lafayette Harris, Tommy Morimoto and the great Joe Wider. A documentary, “ANITA O’DAY-THE LIFE OF A JAZZ SINGER” will be released in 2007.

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Rutner & Wierenga! Wierenga & Rutner!

Here’s a message from my good friend Josh Rutner:

Mark it on your calendars! Josh Rutner and Red Wierenga will be bringing the Respect Aesthetic back to Java’s Cafe in Rochester, after several years away. Here’s the short take:

  • WHO: Josh Rutner (saxophone), Red Wierenga (piano) + a possible appearance by Respect’s drummer, Ted Poor!
  • WHEN: Friday, November 24th 2006 – 9:00 PM
  • WHERE: Java’s Cafe; 16 Gibbs Street, off East Avenue, Rochester
  • WHY: It’s been a while; we should see each other again!
  • HOW MUCH: No cover; tips would be greatly appreciated.

Josh and Red will be playing some great Respect Sextet gems, a bunch of new originals (and unoriginals, of course,) as well as a sampling from Respect’s
new project: SIRIUS RESPECT, THE MUSIC OF SUN RA & KARLHEINZ STOCKHAUSEN

We hope to see you back at the ol’ stomping grounds! Also, don’t forget that The Respect Sextet proper will be playing their annual “RESPECT THE HOLIDAYS” show at the Bop Shop on Tuesday, the 19th of December at 8PM!

Thanks,
Josh

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