1. Four and One Moore
2. Crazy Day
3. Turnstile
4. Sextet
5. Disc Jockey Jump
6. Venus De Milo
7. Revelation - not on Revelation
8. May-Reh - not on Revelation
9. The Preacher - not on Revelation
10. Good Bait - not on Revelation
11. Bags' Groove

December 4 & 5, 1957

 LINER NOTES

Four and One Moore dates from an April, 1949 Prestige session with Stan Getz, Zoot Sims,, Allen Eager, Al Cohn - (hence the title). Three of those five are present to recreate the composition. Turnstile was recorded by the Baker-Mulligan quartet for Fantasy. Gerry had written it in 1949 and its original title was Gold Rush in commemoration of the centenary of that apogee of cupidity.

Sextet was recorded at the Haig in Los Angeles in January, 1953 when Lee Konitz added another line to the Mulligan Quartet. The piece wasn't in finished form at the time, and Mulligan had other plans for it, but as often happens when a work is recorded, its now likely to stay in this form.

Disc Jockey Jump, one of the first arrangements to win Mulligan national attention among musicians was written for the Gene Krupa band and recorded by Krupa in January, 1947.

Venus De Milo was one of several numbers Gerry wrote for the extraordinarily influential Miles Davis 1949-50 Capitol sessions. The original recording was in April, 1949 with, among others, Miles, J. J. Johnson, Gerry and Lee Konitz.

Revelation, so far as I can determine, has had two previous recordings. Teddy Charles and Bob Brookmeyer recorded it for Prestige in January, 1954 and Chet Baker cut it for Pacific Jazz in July, 1956. The piece had originally been written for Elliot Lawrence's band in 1948 or 1949, but Gerry doesn't remember Lawrence ever playing it.

It's intriguing that Bill Holman was selected to write the arrangements in that Holman, according to testimony of contemporaries, was strongly influenced by Gerry's writing during Gerry's few months with the Kenton band. Kenton was not especially attracted to mulligan's writing. "He thought my work was too simple," recalls Gerry, and Kenton accordingly assigned Gerry the dance band arrangements. "He made it sound insulting but I sneaked in, along the way, arrangements of Limelight and Walkin' Shoes." The men in the band were invigorated by the Mulligan charts and finally, after ten dance band arrangements, Kenton commissioned Young Blood which really revitalized the band for a time. "And when you get a guy like Gerry around a band," Miles Davis once noted in a conversation about the Kenton Philharmonic, " all the other arrangers start writing a little better."

Holman had been going through an almost inevitable stage in any writer's career during which be had tried to put everything he could think of in an arrangement. He gradually learned, influenced to some extent by Mulligan, - that knowing what to leave out is often more important than knowing what to put in. "It took me a while to learn that too," adds Mulligan, "and it wasn't until my writing for the Miles Davis sessions on Capitol that the ability to use space began to take shape in my work." "You've just got to have space in jazz writing," Miles says with customary definiteness. "Like Gerry and Gil Evans and Duke. Some guys try to fill it all up.

"I remember," Gerry says, "the first thing I brought into a Kenton rehearsal was rejected by Stan but the next time, Bill brought in an arrangement that sounded more like me than I did." In addition to their concern for linear writing that has space for soloists and that swings naturally, Mulligan and Holman are also alike in that they do not try to graft classical forms onto jazz. "I've always," Holman told Don Gold of Down Beat, "tried to write thing that sound like jazz, not Bach revisited." And about Gerry, Gunther Schuller has said "His was simply clear linear writing in jazz terms; he showed that attempts in modern jazz to emphasize polyphonic writing and playing had bogged down because of the self-conscious stiffness of the players. Where others had left the jazz field to take forms from classical music and then returned to try to put them into jazz, he eliminated that step and thereby eliminated stiffness in multi-linear playing."

"It seemed necessary, " says Gerry, "to clean out jazz writing. We'd gone as far as we could at the time with five-part chords and the rest of the up-and-down approach, and I think the linear emphasis helped open up ne possibilities. In my own work, its not that I always give every man his own line since I seldom use more than three lines, but there are more moving parts in my writing than was the usual case in modern jazz up until then. To complement the lines, I'll sometimes take horns of the same timbre and use them in unison, but it is true that the main direction in my writing is multi-linear."

Gerry has achieved an influence that, as John Lewis said recently in conversation, "has become so general, they won't know to give him credit in the next generation." In addition to strongly influencing the return of flowing polyphony to jazz writing (and its accompanying toughening of the resiliency of jazz scoring). Gerry has lot to do with reminding modern writers and players that humor in jazz was not a cardinal sin. Also, as Mulligan alumnus Bill Crow has observed, Gerry's writing "contained a lyric quality and a strong feeling for the 'good times' spirit of the Older, less organized forms in early jazz band writing and group improvising."

Another point that might be made about these performances in relation to the previous body of Gerry's work as played by himself is that for many years, Gerry had much more respect among musicians as a writer than as a player. It's only fairly recently that even his long-time associates are beginning to realize how much he has developed as a consistently cohesive improviser. Gerry himself feels that it's only been within the past year or two that he's been able to fully control his horn, that he's had "a direct line between my imagination and my fingers." The result of this deepening confidence in his capacity as a soloist can be heard on these recordings.

To summarize the integration of writing and playing in these Mulligan originals and Holman arrangements an opposite observation is Andre Hodeir's about previous Mulligan work to the effect that writers like Gerry "seem to have understood that the principal objective of the arranger should be to respect the personality of each performer while at the same time giving the group a feeling of unity. As for the personnel, they are nearly all, I would imagine, familiar to you. Allen Eager not as appeared on recordings to any considerable extent in recent years, having spent part of that time abroad. Dave Bailey is Gerry's regular drummer and bassist Henry Grimes is a new addition to the Mulligan unit. Grimes is 22, from Philadelphia, worked briefly with Sonny Rollins and with Charles Mingus when the latter was experimenting with two basses. Mulligan first heard Grimes when Henry was working with Anita O'Day at the Red Hill Inn. When Grimes came to New York some time later, he contacted Bailey who completed the liaison to Mulligan. Mulligan's is very pleased by Freddie Green's contribution to the date. In addition to the crisper sound Freddie gives a rhythm section, his presence, says Gerry, "seemed to center the tonality. It made a range for the bass to play in so that the intonation was much more clear-cut. Intonation seems to be a problem for the bass sometime in playing without the piano." Zoot Sims played to and tenor, including a number of the lead parts on the former instrument; Al Cohn was on tenor and baritone; Lee Konitz, alto; Gerry Mulligan, baritone; and Allen Eager, mostly tenor(but some alto).

Solo Box Score; Four and One Moore: (By the way, on Prestige this is listed on the label as Five Brothers whereas the track called Five Brothers is actually Four and One Moore, in case you want to check this against the original): Al Cohn, baritone; Zoot, alto; Gerry, baritone.

Crazy Day: Gerry, baritone; Allen tenor; Lee, alto; Al Cohn, baritone; Zoot, alto. There are eights then by Gerry, Allen, Lee, Al Cohn. Eights again by Zoot, Gerry, Allen, Lee. A third round of eights by Al, Zoot, Gerry, Allen. Then fours by Lee, Al, Zoot, Gerry, Allen, Lee, Al, Zoot. A final round of fours with Gerry, Allen, Lee, Al, Zoot, Gerry, with Lee playing the last eight out.

Sextet: Gerry, baritone; Al Cohn, tenor; Zoot, alto; Al Cohn, tenor and Gerry, baritone together.

Disc Jockey Jump: Lee, alto; Al Cohn, tenor; Zoot, alto; Gerry, baritone.

Venus De Milo: Gerry Mulligan, baritone; Lee, alto; Al Cohn, tenor; Henry Grimes, bass.

Revelation: Gerry, baritone; Allen, alto; Zoot, tenor; Al Cohn, tenor; Lee, alto

. -NAT HENTOFF 1958

These sessions were recorded in stereo, but the master tapes for them in that format cannot be located. So the mono masters have been used for this' CD.

In December, 1957, Dick Bock did a considerable amount of recording in New York in a two week period. With Mulligan, he recorded the 'Reunion' album with Chet Baker, 'Sing A Song Of Mulligan' with Annie Ross, 'The Mulligan Song Book' and an album with the Vinnie Burke String Quartet, which had a completed cover and catalog rumber, but was never issued. An edited version of "The Preacher' even came out on a disc jockey sampler. At last, four of the selections from that album are making their first appearance. Since the Sax Section album is devoted to music written by Gerry, we've selected the four tunes on the unissued album written by equally exceptional jazz composers. Bock also did two Chet Baker sessions in the same time frame, one of which with just guitar and a bass has recently been issued as 'Embraceable You' and another four tunes for woodwind ensemble by composer Bob Zieff which has finally been issued on the box set 'Chet Baker: The Pacific Jazz Years.'

Bassist Vinnie Burke's unique string quartet made an album of its own for ABC-Paramount in January, 1957. But Burke is best known for his part in the amazing Tal Farlow Trio with Eddie Costo. Cellist Calo Scott later worked and recorded with pianist Mal Waldron and was a frequent presence on the fertile sixties New York scene. Boston-based violinist Dick Wetmore, also an accomplished cellist and brass player, recorded an album with jazz composer Dave Coleman for the fledgling, now legendary Transition label. One track from that session was issued on a Transition sampler.

A discographical note. When "The Gerry Mulligan Songbook" was issued in stereo, producer Dick Bock did a bit of tampering. "Disc Jockey Jump" was edited; the solos of Lee Konitz and Al Cohn were removed. The stereo "Crazy Day"had a different opening ensemble and Mulligan solo spliced into the remainder of the master take. On the stereo "Turnstile," Mulligan' s solo is different. The solos of Eager on tenor, Konitz and Cohn on baritone are edited out as are the last chorus of eight-bar exchanges and the two choruses of four-bar exchanges.

-MICHAEL CUSCUNA

Revelation by Nat Hentoff

In the 1950's, the presence of Bird was, of course, pervasive. He had, after all, discovered a new hemisphere. Some musicians, whatever horn they played, tried to be Bird. Others, fusing what he had taught them with their own backgrounds and aspirations, tried to find their own musical selves. Miles Davis had gone that route in the late 1940's with what came to be called his "birth of the cool" recordings. Among other diverse searchers were Lennie Tristano, Charles Mingus, John Lewis, and the musicians in these 1953 and 1957 performances. The music in this set had a briskly fresh impact at the time; and now, it turns out, the music had staying power as well.

The two key conceivers were Gerry Mulligan and Lee Konitz. Gerry's special originality was as the creator of a thoroughly distinctive small combo gestalt (particularly the quartet with Chet Baker but also in terms of the quintet and the larger ensemble here). There was a collective Mulligan sound and interweaving mobility that tended to be cool on the surface, hot at the center, and unusually deft in the aura it often conveyed of highly poised wit (sort of like a younger Fred Astaire, had he been a jazzman).

Central to the highly original Mulligan ambience - it comes through as original now as it did two decades ago - was Gerry's writing: the arrangements, the originals, and the "heads." He had, and still has, a remarkably resilient sense of linear invention and continuity. His scores are spare and all of a part. That is, they keep building toward, and finally achieve, an authentic whole - and that's a quality which explains why musicians like to play in a Mulligan combo or big band. He neither overly constricts them nor leaves them so free that they get lost. I've always wished Gerry had written more in recent years, but at least we do have his work of the 1950's to indicate how organically he was able to have writing flow into improvising so that each buoyantly enhanced the other. There is also Mulligan the soloist, of which more anon.

Lee Konitz's jazz odyssey has been one of the more justifiably stubborn in the history of the music. He first impressed musicians with his work while in Claude Thornhill's band (1947-48). Even then the Konitz sound was like no one else's and the conception, while shaped in part by Bird, was going somewhere else. Then came Konitz's long association with Lennie Tristano, a period during which he learned a great deal about stretching, refining and distilling harmonic language as well as about extended linear improvising. Tristano is a very powerful force, and yet Konitz finally moved out of his orbit as well. Now, in the mid-1970's, Konitz is one of the most consistently original, challenging and continually surprising soloists in jazz. He is, in Duke Ellington's term, beyond category.

In view of Lee's present stature, which is bound to grow even higher, it is all the more arresting to hear where he was in these recordings. An illuminating guide to the thinking then of Lee - and other Tristano colleagues - is a statement by bassist Peter Ind, himself part of the Tristano group. He didn't write this about Lee specifically, but it applies to Konitz during these years:

"We can follow an idea as it develops and echoes, sometimes in multiple rhythm, rolling over the basic time, like a ball on an ocean breaker. As this occurs, so also does the original idea change, subtly confirming the underlying harmonic flow. As [the] line flows it indicates also the plasticity of the underlying harmony, sometime so far as to almost lose the inexperienced listener - but always resolving, often in a most unexpected way."

As you'll hear in nearly every Konitz solo in this set, the unexpected is just about the only predictable element in Konitz's music. When these sessions were made, by the way, the "dry ice" nature of Lee's tone was still strange in concept to some listeners and he was accues of being insufficiently intense, too cerebral. Listen now, however, and it's evident that Lee, always committed to spontaneity, played them too with great (though controlled) intensity.`

Of the other horns that figure in these proceedings, Zoot Sims, then as now, is the instant swinger who never flags. Lester Young first shaped Zoot, but the latter has steadily, almost inexorably, developed his own style and sound. Zoot is not only one of the most reliable players in jazz, but he is also able to fit into a wide range of contexts without diluting his own robust individuality and without obtruding on the spirit of the gathering. In a way, he's like the spirit of pure jazz. What I had forgotten about Zoot, until reminded on a number of these tracks, is the lithe, incisive quality of his alto saxophone playing.

Al Cohn, for many years a regular co-director with Zoot of an itinerant swing machine, tends to be less vibrant a swinger than Zoot - although at times, he too can shake a room from note one - but he is just as consistent as well as being an invaluable spur to a swinging ensemble.

The presence of Allen Eager in a number of these performances is a reminder of the considerable potential of this alto and tenor saxophonist who was an ubiquitous figure in New York City's modern jazz scene in the mid-and-late 1940's. Like Zoot Sims and Al Cohn, Eager had been a disciple, in part, of Lester Young; but he had gone farther than Al and Zoot toward transmuting his style into that of Charlie Parker-directed modern jazz. Listen to his solos closely; Eager's was an intriguing voice.

As a baritone saxophonist, Gerry Mulligan emerged in the late '40's and early'50's as the most important soloist on that instrument since Harry Carney. Gerry's playing, like his writing, focuses on fluid form. The structural dynamics, as is clear in his solos in this set, are lucidly, blithely designed in flight and in retrospect, make for an object lesson in improvisatory logic and wit. Gerry does not engage in baroque ornamentation or flashy rhetoric. Furthermore, he can make the baritone saxophone sound more nimble, more limber, more quicksilver, than anyone I've ever heard on the instrument.

I can't fully characterize Mulligan's music without also underlining the spirit he brings to a performance - of any kind. He loves to play, and it's an infectious enthusiasm. It was around the time of these recordings, as a matter of fact, that Gerry was adding significantly to his reputation as an insatiable jammer. I remember a couple of after-hours parties at the Newport Jazz Festival in the mid-1950's when Gerry, after having worked his way into several quite diverse sets toward the end of the concert itself, then proceeded for the rest of the night to jam with anyone - of whatever style and period -who wanted to play. And because his composer-arranger's mind is always working when he improvises, he would actually create differently apt ensemble scores in mid-flight for each different jamming situation.

It is Gerry's unabashed passion for the act of jazz that makes his participation in a session as near a guarantee as is possible that it won't collapse into cliches. It doesn't always work that way, but when he himself is in charge, the session usually does cohere, for he has little patience for coasting - his own or anyone else's. In fact, he is a genuine natural leader, and one of my great musical regrets is that Gerry was not able to continue as a big band director for he, along with Dizzy Gillespie, would have been two of the most sempiternally exciting big band leaders in modern jazz history.

As a small combo leader, as here, Gerry was always arresting to watch as you listened to his group. With body language, with meaningful, if not imperious, glances, he kept everything in functional motion, with particular attention to dynamics. Listen, for instance, to the tracks with Konitz, Baker, and rhythm section, for marvelously variegated illustrations of mulligan's finely nuanced ensemble leadership.

Chet Baker, who was still new-in a national sense-on the jazz scene when the first of these sessions were made, entered the consciousness of most of us as a unique phenomenon. I'm not saying everyone liked what he was doing. At first, I thought his tone too tentative and introverted, and his conception narrow. What happened, however, was that he stayed in the mind-after the music stopped. What he was saying was that personal, and cumulatively, the Baker sound and style became almost hauntingly necessary, once you'd been fully exposed to it. It's not enough to describe his playing as lyrical. The lyricism is a fusion of sometimes seemingly contradictory qualities - a vulnerability that nonetheless was often more closed than open, a considerable sounding of hurt and yet also of anticipation, a sensuality that was all the more challenging because of its lack of clear definition. There have been many more vital jazz trumpeters, but Chet Baker is surely his own man on that horn, and this is no small accomplishment.

Baker, as has been widely publicized, paid some horrendous dues - many of them of his own making in the years after these recordings, and I wondered if he could ever make any kind of substantive mark again in jazz. He was frail enough, to start with; and the battering, physical and psychic, he absorbed all these years, led me, and a good many others, to underestimate the man's dogged determination. For, as of the writing of these notes, Baker has been appearing in clubs and on recording sessions with increasing assurance and with no diminution of that strange, somewhat eerie singularity of sound and conception that you can hear on these sides when he first ascended to what was to be transient fame. Musicians who have worked with him tell me that Baker's time may have come again; and in view of the experiences he's had since the last ascent, he may now have a longer and more satisfying second career.

With regard to the rhythm sections, on the ten 1953 tracks, Larry Bunker is on drums and the bassists are Joe Mondragon or Carson Smith. There is no piano. The absence of a piano was at first rather disconcerting to some listeners when the Mulligan-Baker Quartet initially appeared. But Gerry, although himself a sometime piano player, wanted, as a hornman, relief from having the chordal directions continuously stated by a pianist or guitarist.'Why not have the harmonic design implicit in the lines of the horns?

The result, for the horn players, was more freedom for the imagination. (The pianist was not continually sounding road signs over their shoulders.) At the same time, of course, the horn players had to sharpen their ears, and keep them sharp. They had only each other, and the bass, to depend on for those harmonic signposts. And that led to very subtle harmonic interplay between Mulligan and Baker - and on these sides, Mulligan, Baker and Konitz. So subtle and absorbing that if you think about ft as you listen to these recordings, a pianist would have been an intrusion.

An additional benefit of Mulligan's pianoless combos was that they stimulated listeners to hear more sensitively, more sophisticatedly. The pianist, after all, had served as chordal road mapper for the listener as well as the players. With the pianist gone, it was instructive, and at times rather exhilarating, to realize how far you, the listener, could stretch your own ears as you were drawn into the Mulligan microcosm. And once they were stretched, they stayed that way. It has not often been remarked, but I think the Mulligan Quartet provided invaluable ear training to a lot of listeners who went on to be able to enjoy other groups - including those with pianos - much more knowledgeably than they had before.

On the seven 1957 sessions (with the four saxophones), there is a guitar, but the guitarist is Freddie Green, the man who has, for so long, been in charge of what he calls "the rhythm waves" for the Count Basie band. Freddie, while chordally precise, is primarily a master of moving time. So on these tracks too, the Mulligan penchant for suggested rather than explicit harmonic directions prevailed.

Note here, by the way, that except for Crazy Day, which was scored by Mulligan, all the other arrangements were by Bill Holman. The latter was an apt choice because his predilection too was for lean, open, but crisply ordered charts which maximized swinging without being so loose as to be sloppy.

I have not annotated each track because I didn't think it necessary. The music, both in score and in solo, is so clear that each listener can provide his own verbal responses. It seemed to me more worth your reading time to place these sessions, and their principal figures, in a historical and stylistic context.

At the time the sessions were recorded, however, I doubt if any of the participants were thinking twenty and more years ahead and wondering what the music would sound like then. Few jazz musicians do look ahead in that way. The essence of jazz is still immediacy, spontaneity, now. Even Duke Ellington, by far the most creative of all composers in American history, refused to speculate about the place of his music in the future. He was too eager to continue the next work, to hear it played, and then go on to the work after that.

Essential to the jazz spirit at this emphasis on immediacy is, nonetheless it's always beguiling for the listener to wonder what will last and then, decades having gone by, to re-listen to past enthusiasms and see if they have indeed lasted.

The music here has. More so, I confess, than I thought it would then. I knew Mulligan's worth, but I somewhat underestimated Konitz at the time, and I did not know how refreshing all of this would sound now. It swings and it breathes and it can still surprise. This is now part of classic jazz. It has more than survived.

Lee Konitz Meets Gerry Mulligan CD

The Gerry Mulligan Quartet with Chet Baker despite its prolific recorded output and its impact on jazz and the American public lasted for less than one year. Ensconced as the house band at The Haig in Los Angeles and able to record at its own discretion for Pacific Jazz (as well as single sessions for two other labels), this revolutionary, pianoless quartet crafted its own repertoire and arrangements and built a solid, prolific legacy.

Midway through its existence, the quartet settled on its finest bassist and drummer, Carson Smith and Larry Bunker respectively. At this junction, Mulligan, who had formed this unit through serendipity, luck and circumstance, sought to expand his musical horizons beyond this foursome, which had been an unexpected and overnight success well beyond the bounds of the usual jazz audience. He assembled and recorded on Capitol Records a tentette that was an outgrowth of the famous Miles Davis Nonet, which also recorded for Capitol, and for which Gerry had been a player, composer, arranger and founding member.

Another diversion from the quartet grew out of that group. By January of 1953, when he recorded the tentette, Mulligan felt confident that his quartet was ready to record live at their Los Angeles home The Haig. Dick Bock started bringing down his portable tape recorder to capture the band for possible record releases. One night, Lee Konitz, who was then a member of the confining, pompous, ponderous Stan Kenton Orchestra, came to the club to sit in. Konitz and Mulligan had worked together in '47 with Claude Thornhill's band and in 1949 and '50 with Miles Davis' Birth Of The Cool Nonet. And they would work together again in December of 1957 on a Gerry Mulligan Songbook recording.

The sequence of events that January of 1953 are not clear. The results are that Konitz sat in with the Mulligan quartet at The Haig for a night for six tunes and went into a studio with the quartet for three more tunes and also to the studio at Phil Turetsky's house with Joe Mondragon subbing for Carson Smith for two tunes and an alternate take. Because of liner note information given by producer Dick Bock, it was assumed that these three sessions took place in June of '53. But actually, several of the titles were released months before then. And in June, Konitz was thousands of miles away from Los Angeles earning his living with the Stan Kenton Orchestra.

Regardless of dates, this series of recordings was a major event. Lee Konitz had already become a major voice because of his rigorous training and experience with Lennie Tristano and because of several triumphant record dates that he had led including a version of George Russell's "Ezz-thetic" with Miles Davis. But on these sessions, Lee Konitz excelled and soared with an inspired fluency and lucidity that had never before been fully realized in his work.

Essentially, the Mulligan quartet with Baker provides with its own very distinctive identity a backdrop that highlights and inspires Konitz as the principal soloist. The Haig recordings start off this Compact Disc collection, and they include a previously unissued version of "Bernie's Time" which was first discovered by and issued on Mosaic Records in 1983. As one might expect, the repertoire here is a set of standards that any professional musician should know. But what they do with it is something else again. The first two titles "Too Marvelous For Words" and "Lover Man" are especially stunning vehicles for Konitz.

"Almost Like Being In Love," Mulligan's "Sextet" and "Broadway" are by the same working quartet and Konitz and were recorded at a professional Los Angeles recording studio, while "I Can't Believe That You're In Love With Me" (another Konitz "spectacular) and both takes of "Lady Be Good" were done at Phil Turetsky,s homemade studio with Joe Mondragon in place of Carson Smith.

It may have been that after several months with Kenton, that Lee Konitz was starved to play some real creative music or it may be that Mulligan's creative atmosphere and Baker's raw, instinctive talent inspired Konitz to greater heights. Whatever the circumstances or motivations, this is one of the finest bodies of work by Lee Konitz, a consistent and immensely creative jazz artist. It is also a testament to the Mulligan-Baker quartet which was as vital and innovative as any New York band of its time.

Now on CD in complete form for the first time is the full encounter between soloist Konitz and the Gerry Mulligan-Chet Baker Quartet. A rare and special musical occasion indeed.

- Michael Cuscuna