"Unlike the other three, Byas came to national attention relatively late. He was past 28 when he joined Count Basie in January of 1941; by the end of that year, Basie's recording of 'Harvard Blues', with its beautiful opening tenor solo, had been released, and Don Byas was on the jazz map.
"It was during this key year in his career that Byas made the informal session recordings heard here. Minton's Playhouse wasn't far from the Savoy Ballroom, where the Basie band often played, and we already know from the very few pre-Onyx label things released from Jerry Newman's private collection that Byas was a Minton's regular.
"The Minton's sessions have become legendary as the supposed incubators of bebop, but it is not likely that the musicians jamming there in 1941 thought of them as anything but good sessions, period. Swing was at its peak, the war had not yet become a reality for America, and while every creative jazzman (then as now and always) was concerned with saying something new and personal, no revolutionary theories were being hatched.
"True, some unorthodox music was being played, but jam session music is by nature unorthodox - musicians happy to be away from routine playing situation want to take chances, try out ideas and experiment with new techniques. Still, the basic material - such as the five standards and one blues on this album - was tried aned true; the 'lingua franca' of jazz since the early '30s.
"Don Byas is definitely the boss of these particular jams, and perhaps it is in deference to him that the tempos are mainly on the relaxed side. Though he certainly could navigate at top speeds with the best, Byas throughout his career preferred comfortable tempos. He was, of course, one of the great balladeers in jazz.
"It is not unlikely that Byas' conception was touched by Herschel Evans, almost four years his senior, with whom he played in Lionel Hampton's 1935 California band. (It never recorded, but with such men as Evans, Byas, Eddie Barefield and Tyree Glenn aboard, it must have been a heavy group.) One feel this in the first solo Byas recorded; an obscure item, 'Is This to be My Souvenir', waxed in May 1938 by an all-star group organized by the late Danish jazz enthusiast Baron Timme Rosenkrantz and bearing his name. (Timme Rosenkrantz and his Barrelhouse Barons, to be exact.)
"One feels it here, too - in 'Stardust' and 'Body and Soul' - but Byas came from Hawkins first and was clearly his own man by 1941. The first notable characteristic is his sound, one of the most voloptuous on an instrument noted for richness of tone. Next, perhaps, is his suppleness of phrase, combining Hawkins' weight with a Benny Carterish grace - Byas' first horn was alto. And then, a mastery of changes equal to these two peers' (among the chief-runners in jazz up to then). It was this superb harmonic ear tha equipped Byas to participate, a few years later, in some the early manifestations of bop. Rhythmically, however, Byas remained firmly rooted in the classic patterns of swing. That is what made his playing in the final years of his life, when he was striving almost despeately to prove he was still 'modern', sound out of joint. But that's another story - one most of Byas' admirers would prefer to forget.
"Byas reached his prime, I think, a few years after these sessions - in the period 1944-46. When he left America in the fall of 1946 with Don Redman's big band (not to return to his homeland until June of 1970) all the elements of his art and craft were in perfect balance. Here, in 1941, he was about to put it all together, and later, in Europe, Byas' impact was considerable; it was due to his presence that post-World War II Europe could produce such major tenorists as Guy Lafitte and Barney Wilen. But the great days were those on 52nd St., when Don Byas was a favorite of both the swing establishment and the bop upstarts.
"This album offers significant illumination of the development of a great jazzman, at a stage in his career during which he recorded few solos longer than 16 bars. Here, he stretches out.
"Aside from some intriguing glimpses of young (22) Thelonious Monk and further proof (if any is needed) of the legitimacy of Kenny Clarke's claim to parenthood of modern jazz drumming, the only rival Byas has here for center-stage attention is Helen Humes, his colleague from the Basie ranks.
"To me, Miss Humes is one of the greatest female jazz singers - and I know that some people, among them Don Schlitten, Stanley Dance and Lester Koenig, share this opinion. Billie Holiday's senior by some two years, she first became widely known when she took Billie's place in the Basie band in 1938, though she'd made her recording debut some 10 years earlier, while in her mid-teens.
"Perhaps because of the not inconsiderable shadow cast by her associate in the Basie vocal department, Jimmy Rushing, Helen Humes has not been given her just due. Her voice has a lift and purity reminiscent of Mildred Bailey (and Ethel Waters); her effortless swing is not unlike Ella Fitzgerald's, and she is always in tune. There is a smile in her voice.
"After leaving Basie in 1942, Helen worked mainly as a single in New York, making some fine sides with Pete Brown. In 1944, she moved to California where she recorded with old Basie colleagues Buck Clayton and Lester Young (as well as with Dexter Gordon) and scored a hit with 'Million Dollar Secret'. In the '50s she toured and recorded with Red Norvo, worked in a musical ('Simply Heavenly'), appeared at Newport (in 1958), toured Europe (1959), made a couple of fine albums for Contemporary, and lived in Australia for a while. She now resides in her native Louisville, Ky. and at this write was scheduled to appear at the 1973 Newport in New York Festival.
"Helen Humes has recorded 'Stardust' before, but not studio version can compare with the one captured here. It is a masterpiece of jazz singing, on an improvisational plane euqla to that inhabited by the best instrumentalists. An opulent Byas solo follows her two perfect choruses; Joe Guy's muted trumpet (a la Roy Eldridge) brings us down a bit from these heights, but Helen's final half-chorus lifts us once more.
"Guy, a fixture on this album, was leader of the house band at Minton's. His regular crew included Nick Fenton on bass, Thelonious Monk on piano, and Kenny Clarke on drums, but other often relieved and/or sat in. Guy, however, rarely relinquished his claim to Jerry Newman's microphones, even when other (and better) trumpeters were on hand. Strongly influenced by Eldridge (who wasn't, then, among younger trumpet men?), he was a somewhat ambitious player, but lacking finesse and the ear for correct changes. At time he may sound, for a few bars, remarkably like Roy or Lips Page, but certain pet licks or lapses in imagination seen sober up the hopeful listener - it's only Guy once more.
"Nobody who's heard these cuts seems to know who the other trumpeter is. He appears on 'Uptown' and 'Body and Soul', and obviously is an admirer of Hot Lips Page. While lacking his model's drive and passion, he is tastier and more relaxed than Guy. Both, however, are gifted minor leaguers, no more.
"A mystery tenorman is also present. He is the second tenor soloist on 'Exactly Like You', but Monk is obviously Monk, as in the short, happy solo on 'Exactly' (hear him sing along, a la Ellington on his early records). The style is not fully formed yet, but all the elements are there. It's clearly him on 'Indiana' as well, with a very boppish flavor to the last four bars of the first solo. Clearly, too, Monk was (and is) a jazzman of the old school.
"It shouldn't be hard to sort out the soloists, but here's a wee guide (Humes, Byas and Guy do that lovely 'Stardust'; it needs not further comment than already given).
"On 'Exactly', at a nice tempo, it's Guy 'a la' Roy, Helen 'a la' Humes (dig the riffing behind her second chorus), pretty nice muted Guy (his best outing on this album), Don Byas (so relaxed as he sails in, using dynamics as well as tension to build), Monk (see above), tenorist No. 2, Guy (open and rough), Byas, tenorist 2, and then Helen swings on out. A very good bassist makes himself felt throughout.
"The blues, 'Uptown', starts with Guy. Byas' second chorus opens with a typical turn of phrase, the Lips-like trumpeter follows, and then the track fades on a piano solo (not Monk, but someone a bit Clyde Hart-like).
"'Body and Soul', that test-piece for tenors established as such not too long before 1941 by Coleman Hawkins, begins with Byas taking the lead from an unwilling Guy, the mystery trumpeter joining in the ensemble and taking the first solo. Then Byas presents his credentials in the rhapsody sweepstakes. Guy jumps it (a procedure established by Roy Eldridge in his classic 1938 version with Chu Berry), and Don follows in the new tempo, both trumpets backing him on the bridge and joining in the rideout. Nice drumming, too.
"Louis Armstrong made 'I Can't Give You Anything But Love' his own in 1929, and even Guy reflects that in his melodic opening chorus. A very mellow Byas overrides someone's aborted vocal; his second chorus has some fine doubletime passages, and altogether this solo is my favorite Byas on the album. Guy returns, and another trumpet joins him for the finish. The well-recorded drumming is obviously Kenny Clarke.
"The tempo comes up for 'Indiana', a tune Byas liked. Guy opens, Monk has a chorus (off mike), and then Don digs in - his fast style more developed at this stage than his slow start (this sequence pretty much holds true for all jazzmen). Hear Klook's accents, in there with BYas. Guy, Monk and Don come back for seconds, the trumpeter really on an Eldridge kick, and with more consistent chops than usual. Then, apparently because there was still time left on the disc, trumpet and tenor solo once more before jamming out together, good drums urging them home.
"Of the many hundred midnights of music at Minton's, here are some that were captured. We may conjure up others in our imagination, flawless, ideal. Undoubtedly, there were times when greater heights were reached, but here is a record of something that actually happened. Not an unheard echo of someone's dream, but a bit of reality, your ticket on a time capsule. (Dan Morgenstern. From the liner notes.)
Performers: Don Byas (t-sx), Joe Guy (tp), Thelonious Monk (pi), Kenny Clarke (dr), Helen Humes (vo), others unidentified (tp, t-sx)
1. Stardust
2. Exactly Like You
3. Uptown
4. Body And Soul
5. I Can't Give You Anything But Love
6. (Back Home Again In) Indiana
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