From Bossa Nova pioneers to Disco 2.0 newcomers, from Jazz Funk legends to cult soundtracks, they have released in just over a year several releases drawn from the large spectrum of their musical tastes. It’s time for them to explain their choice and go back to their own roots…

When did you start digging records?
Olivier: When I was a kid, they were selling vinyls at my local supermarket in the surburb of Paris, and they had turntables so you could listen to them, so I started buying 7” and 12” EPs and then LPs. It was mainly pop stuff from that time: A-ha, Dire Straits, U2. At around 10-11 year old, I also went deep into metal with Iron Maiden, Metallica, etc. I also bought records by groups from the French alternative scene like Les Bérurier Noir. I also had a lot of tapes, bought or duplicated from the local library – I still have these. My tape desk is still working and I’m even buying new cassette-only music, now that this format is hip again. Then by my mid-teenage years I switched all in one go to jazz (with Art Blakey), hiphop (with De La Soul, Ice Cube & Public Enemy) and soul/funk (with James Brown). I was influenced by the emergence of hiphop in my neighborhood and thanks to my city library and also to Radio Nova which was a key radio for me at the time, I had access to music. I discovered Paris’ indie records shops (Tikaret, LTD, Crocodisc, etc.) and I never really stopped buying records. By the end of the 90s I added electronic music on top and this mix pretty much what I’m still listening to.

Matt: I started buying records around 10-11 years old. I’d buy mostly 7”. One of the earliest one I remember buying was The Buggles’ Radio Killed the Video Star at my local supermarket. That was probably around 1979. Then I bought the early 80s music that was big at the time: Culture Club, Michael Jackson, Wham. I remember having a shock when I first heard “The Message” by Grandmaster Flash. I also remember buying the 7” of Malcolm McLaren, “Buffalo Gals” around that time. But that was it in terms of new releases. I didn’t like the 80s sound so I bought a lot of 60s, 70s music like Earth Wind and Fire, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, Pink Floyd. I was constantly digging deeper. Also my best friend was very advanced in his music taste so he guided me a lot. He’d listen to stuff like Steely Dan, Art Blakey and Miles Davis at 13 years old so I got into Jazz at that early age!. We were also Pat Metheny groupies. We had our ECM phase and then with Acid Jazz came in and I went into Rare Grooves and JBs. Another big shock around that time was Gil Scott Heron whom I discovered in 91 thanks to a Super Disco Brake compilation I’d bought. I was lucky to see him live in 92 and that was fantastic.

What LPs did you buy at first? Do you still listen to them?
Olivier: I think it was U2’s “Rattle And Hum” and Dire Straits’ compilation “Money For Nothing”, both in 1988. I discovered the songs “Helter Skelter” and “All Along The Watchtower” on “Rattle And Hum”, and I was very surprised when I discovered the original versions. All the more for “All Along The Watchtower”, because before discovering the Dylan song, I first thought it was actually by Jimi Hendrix! For Dire Straits, it was the beginning of a new addiction that lasted a few years and I bought all of their tapes. I don’t listen to them anymore and by the time my musical tastes evolved, I came to hate them, as one usually does with their teenage tastes! But I still have them. I have some kind of affection for them.

Matt: My father was into Rock’n’roll and Rhythm & Blues so I remember a Chubby Checker album as one of the earliest LP I bought. The first second-hand album I bought was Barry White’s Rhapsody in White album in the mid 80s. That’s when the series Magnum PI was popular and the opening music of the series which was inspired by “Love’s Theme”. My first LPs are at my parents so I don’t get to play them but I’d like to take them back one day

Do you have a particular style or favourite period?
Olivier: I have a strong Black Music basis, ranging from hiphop to jazz, funk and soul, to which you can add a lot of electronic music. Then I like some leftfield stuff revolving around punk, experimental, ambient drone…

Matt: I listen to a lot of different styles but I would say it tends to be mostly Black Music, whether it’s Funk, Soul, Jazz, Hip Hop, Afrobeat. For the last five years I’ve been mainly listening to Jamaican music: Ska, Rock Steady, Dub. and also to a lot of Philly Soul and Disco. I like to think in terms of city and/or era. For instance what were people listen to in 1968 in LA or in 1978 in Berlin or New York without necessary put barriers between genres. I try to recreate the mix of pop, jazz, disco, rock that was going on at the time.

 
Comme ça…

Are you still digging’, buying vinyl, visiting record shops?
Olivier: A lot! In Paris and everywhere I travel to. Certainly too much, budget-wise, space-wise… I’m actually re-organizing my vinyls and the question of ‘where does it all lead’ comes to mind. So I try to focus on my core tastes and be selective and straight to the point. Because it certainly won’t stop. In terms of what I buy, I’ve always bought new releases, I’m not really a digger of vintage music with original pressings. I prefer to buy what will be considered gems in 20 years! That’s what I did for 90s hiphop: I bought all these records when they first came out. Now I do the same with electronic music. And I also fill the gaps in my soul and disco collection.
Matt: I buy records on a weekly basis. I used to buy a lot of LPs in the 90s and 00s, mainly Jazz, Soul and Funk. Now I tend to buy more CDs than LPs so I don’t go for the very obscure expensive stuff. More like high quality reissues or classic albums I don’t have. Unlike Olivier I never buy new music. I always wait five to ten years if not more to see an album will stand the test of time. Many albums don’t survive the initial hype very long.

What was your first release on WeWantSounds?
Matt: It was a great compilation of French music from the Nouvelle Vague. We’re big film buffs and there is some incredible music made at the time with composers like Michel Legrand or Georges Delerue. That precise moment when French realized there was something more exciting than realist chanson. Same with Brigitte Bardot, France suddenly woke up and realized there was something more sexy than Raimu or Danielle Darrieux.

Why did you choose this name Wewantsounds: is it a statement?
Matt: We wanted something simple, catchy and straight to the point but without any indication of a music genre or specific era. We thought that Wewantsounds was fun and catchy. We imagine all these zombie-like music lovers cropping out after dark all starving and chanting “Wewantsounds”!

What could be your editorial/artistic direction?
Matt: We focus on the music we love trying to add interesting pop culture angles in the mix. We try to bring high quality music in an accessible way. We’re always puzzled to see that many people outside of the hardcore music circles tend to listen to the same thing because they don’t have all the keys to access the more interesting artists. There are a lot of “if you like this, you‘ll love that” out there but it tends to be very commercial.

 
Monika
Secret In The Dark (The Juan MacLean Edit)
 

What could be the label’s leitmotiv?
Matt: Listen to this cool music, you may not have heard about but you will love it

How do you decide on the choice of reissues?
Matt: There are no rules. We get excited by an idea and we just dig. Most of the time it doesn’t lead to anything: Either we discover it’s been done already or the rights are locked away or there is no real potential but sometimes we hit gold. In terms of concept, it varies. Sometimes it can be led by an artist, sometimes we want to chronicles a label, other times an era or style of Music. We tend to make the decisions organically as we go. We listen to a lot of music so we ping pong a lot of ideas back and forth: do you know this artist? Have you heard this track? What about reissuing that album? We should do a compilation around so and so genre etc.

And what about new artists?
Matt: We both ran labels in the past doing artist development. That’s actually how we met working on Palestinian hip hop group DAM ten years ago. Unlike reissues, artist development requires a lot more muscle and efforts as you deal with the artist, the manager, the touring agent etc. It’s a long chain and things can get more complex. Also you need to be able to sign the right artist who’s got enough of a fan base but the bigger they are the bigger the advance will be. Add to that other costs like tour support, marketing and promotion and the bill will be huge before you start marking a profit. It’s a gamble. With reissue, you won’t probably hit gold but it’s safer and the entry ticket is cheaper. Saying that, we’ll probably try, once we’ve grown to a size that allows a bit of risk taking.

Olivier you have made the selection for your DISCO 2.0 set. What is your role in the label? Is it dedicated to the more contemporary sounds?
Olivier: Thanks to my various jobs in the music industry – running a label, free-lancing as a music PR, working at Radio France and now writing as a journalist, I’ve always been deeply immersed in the music scene: getting new releases, checking out bands, going out to concert venues & clubs. So my aim is to be a curator scanning through the richness of these new scenes, French or international and creaming the best. There are so many incredible young bands and new trends that are bubbling under that deserve to reach a wider audience. We want to go beyond reissues and bring music to people purely on the basis of high quality, whatever the era it comes from.

From Bossa Nova, via Nouvelle Vague …. You have released thematic reissues like Bossa Nova or Sunday Mixtape: why this choice? Are there any others to come?
Matt: We’ve been all submerged by tons of music since the rise of Internet. When your work have something to do with music, your friends and family always ask for advice on some fresh or just good music, because everybody is lost in the flow. So we try to address this need: bring some nicely packaged music curated by connoisseurs for special occasions like Sunday morning mix. There is a big hype around playlists at the moment and we try to give it our own twist with a very selective yet accessible touch, for our compilations to be timeless trips. As we get more established, we’ll do more. We have projects in the pipeline and you can expect some soon in all kind of different genres, from modern punk to sextapes!

 
Afrique
House Of The Rising Funk
 

At the end of 2016, you released “Feeling Good”, a compilation from the Mainstream label, focusing on spiritual jazz, funk and soul. A second set is coming out in June focusing more on the jazz sound. How did you get the access to this catalog?
Matt: I love all that jazz-funk sound from the early 70s and was buying albums from CTI, Flying Dutchman, Groove Merchant, Prestige, Muse. One day in the early 90s I bought two Mainstream LPs in a second hand shop and just loved them. I’d never heard of the label but everything was cool about these: the music was amazing: funky and earthy and you had all these great session photos on the sleeve with this cool producer, Bob Shad, surrounded by young dashiki-dressed black musicians making this outstanding music. In the mid 90s when I started working in the music business I managed to get the contact – from Eddie Piller I think – for Shad’s Daughter Tamara who had inherited the catalog (Shad died in 1985) but I quickly heard that Sony had acquired the back catalogue from her, so I never pursued the idea. Then, last year, I found out it was still owned by Bob Shad’s family, who are none other than comedian producer Judd Apatow and his sister Mia and we got along really well.

Do you also plan to dig the more rock and psychedelic albums of this same label?
Matt: Yes there is some great music on that side as well, although the Big Brother/Janis Joplin master had been sold to Columbia. There are also some great jazz albums from the sixties in the catalogue as Shad ran Time Records as well. There is a beautiful Sonny Clark album for instance. We’re going to reissue this amazing 1967 album by Mauricio Smith called “Bitter Acid”. The title says it all. It’s a fantastic groovy Latin album mixing jazz and boogaloo produced y Joe Cain, very much in the Cotique/Tico vein. Our good mate London Latin DJ John Armstrong will write some new sleevenotes.

You will reissue two albums from the Mainstream catalog: Buddy Terry and Harold Land. Can you tell us more about these?
Matt: Beside the compilations, we thought it would be great to start reissuing original albums. The great thing with Mainstream is that the archives have been carefully preserved and the label still has most of the tapes and session photos. It’s like a goldmine and you can do a lot more. Buddy Terry is an amazing deep jazz album.I knew of Terry from his playing soprano sax in this amazing Art Blakey track called “Song for a Lonely Woman” which is a personal favourite of mine – it’s from the same sessions that produced “A Chant For Bu” famously sampled by A Tribe Called Quest. Anyway Buddy Terry recorded three albums for Mainstream and “Awareness” is the first one, recorded in 1971. It’s an amazing album that ticks all the boxes especially since Strata East co-founder Stanley Cowell is on there and it has a very funky version of his cult standard “Abscretions”. There is also an incredible line up accompanying them: Buster Williams, Cecil Bridgewater, Mikey Roker. It’s both funky and spiritual and you wonder why Terry didn’t get more exposure after these Mainstream albums as they are all amazing.
The Harold Land album is a personal favourite. We’re huge fans of the Harold Land-Bobby Hutcherson Quintet which made incredible music between 1967 and 1971. Land was older than Hutcherson and he was from the first bop generation that came up in the 40s/50s. He’s on the legendary 1955 Max Roach Clifford Brown quintet album which Bob Shad produced by the way. But in the 60s, following the Coltrane revolution, Land found a second life as this extremely inspired modal saxophonist and the association with Bobby Hutcherson, who was at the forefront of the post-bop scene of the late 60s, was a match made in heaven. The created a unique sound which was influenced by Coltrane but it was something else. This Mainstream album from 1971 featuring the rhythm section from Herbie Hancock’s Mwandishi Sextet (Buster Williams and Billy Hart) is their absolute peak. It’s very sophisticated music but very melodic and serene at the same time. We’re going to add a bonus track “Dark Mood” which was briefly released on a Mainstream compilation in 1974 but this is the first time the whole session will be reunited on one CD. And we’ve got some amazing session photos and have even gone back to the original picture to reconstruct the front cover so we’re very excited about it.

 
Alice Clark
Never Did I Stop Loving You
 

Dope classic of the soul, the Alice Clarke album has already been reissued, but rather cheap way. Do you plan to make a beautiful reissue, with why not unreleased tracks?
Matt: It’s a cult classic that should be up there with the Roberta Flack and Aretha Franklin albums. We are thinking about it but as it stands the specific cheap version you are referring to is a bootleg so we’d probably wait before reissuing it.

Nowadays, there are many labels which follow the deluxe model, more quality with lavish packaging at a higher price bracket… At same time, there’s also a more commercial LP market, with majors and mid-price labels releasing their back catalogue. Is it the (re)creation of the old market for the LP?
Matt: Probably but it’s a good sign as it means that the market is expending and diversifying. There is even a third tier for huge boxsets containing books, LPs, Memorabilia. Digital is great but it tends to become like radios especially since streaming is taking over from download. In the future you’ll just tune in to a few playlists to discover stuff and hopefully you’ll go and buy the record if you really like something. There is a cool edge about vinyl, the turntable, the object, the sleeve. It has become a lifestyle accessory. You will soon get turntable buyer’s guide pages in lifestyle mag if not already.

There are more and more reissues of back catalogue LPs, and more and more record labels (major or indie) are now releasing their new artists on LP, or EP. Do you think that the LP reissue market could ever reach saturation point?
Matt: There is a risk and you can never predict what’s going to happen. Trends are fickle. Ten years ago everybody wanted iPods, now it’s turntables. I think it will depend on the younger generation who didn’t grow up with the object. If some of them can be converted to the object then it will keep growing.

Have you received many negative answers from right owners on some of the LPs, artists, unreleased tapes, you were trying to reissue?
Matt: Yes we’ve had all the usual scenarios. The ones who don’t answer at all, those who answer but want a big advance, those who re ok but don’t want to give you the vinyl rights and those who say they are not interested. And you’ve got all the other ones who play the game and give you the tracks without problems. Which are the ones who end up on our releases you could say.

 
Harold Land
In The Back, In The Corner, In The Dark
 

What are your next releases?
Matt: On top of the ones we mentioned above, we are preparing a 70s London compilation with DJ Scratchy Sounds who was DJing with the Clash in the late 70s it will be a thrilling sonic mix of punk, garage, dub and R&B with a unique 70s London feel. We are also thrilled to announce the release of an incredible OST by Dave Grusin from “The Friends Of Eddie Coyle” a very cool gangster film directed by Peter Yates (Bullitt). Dave Grusin also composed the music for “The Three Days of the Condor” which is the more famous one but Eddie Coyle recorded two years before is even better. It never came out at the time so it will make its LP debut 45 years after the film was released! We’ve got the master tapes which sound amazing. It plays like a long hypnotic jazzy funky suite.

What is the LP you dream of reissuing?
Matt: “Nightclubbing” by Grace Jones but it’s already been done! It’s the meeting of so many talents: Chris Blackwell’s flair to reinvent Grace Jones as this ice-cold 80s diva, the unique blend of reggae, disco with a zest of punk played by the Compass Point Studio musicians, Grace Jones personality filtered by Jean-Paul Goude’s groundbreaking visuals. It suddenly grabbed everybody out of the 70s. It’s a 4 dimension masterpiece.

Olivier: There’s a French artist called Sig, who wrote the OST of his own indie movies, Louise (Take 2) and Sansa and worked with virtuoso violinist Ivry Gitlis. He’s a modern day hobo, travelling light all over the world and playing with musicians he meets along the way. In 2002, he came back from a long photo trip to India, where he had played and recorded some music. He finished the music in his Montmartre flat, which was completely empty except for a keyboard, a cello and some African percussions. It features famous Swiss trumpeter Erik Truffaz and his musicians. It’s a beautiful dreamy trip that was only released on CD, without a barcode, because Sig didn’t want one. I was the PR for this record, and although it was a tough one to push, it was a tremendous life experience working with Sig. He called everybody “my brother”. I still listen to it on a regular basis each time I need an escape. It doesn’t age. I’d love to bring this treasure to people’s turntables!

For the next Record Store Day, two small labels with very large ears (Sam Records and Saga) have teamed up to publish an unreleased Monk’s music studio session, the soundtrack of the movie Les Liaisons Dangereuses, in a beautiful box-set (2 Lps). More than dangerous, simply fabulous… In preview, the two deep diggers, Fred Thomas and François Lê Xuân, talk about this story.

photos: Courtesy of Arnaud Boubet / Private collection

How can someone possibly unearth an unreleased Monk studio session in 2017? Chance? Magic? Luck?
Luck and dedication! The most beautiful findings are often made by accident. Early in 2014 we got in touch with Laurent Guenoun, the custodian of Marcel Romano’s archives. In the Fifties, Marcel was the manager of saxophonist Barney Wilen, and we were looking for Wilen’s recordings that had never been released. No Barney, but Laurent announced that he did have some tapes that simply bore the words “Thelonious Monk.” We made an appointment to listen to these tapes shortly afterwards, imagining they might be copies of existing recordings or, at best, a concert, maybe the one Monk had given at Pleyel in 1954. A quick examination of boxes with titles of tunes by Monk or various scenes in Roger Vadim’s film allowed a glimmer of hope… could this be the actual recording session for “Les Liaisons Dangereuses”? Putting the first of those seven reels on the tape-machine was an emotional moment: some noise in the studio, and then we recognized the voice of Marcel. And then Monk! Monk moved on to the introduction for “Crepuscule with Nellie…” It was all there! The warm-ups, the discussions, the takes, moments of silence… We exchanged hardly a word while we listened to the tapes; we had a jubilant, almost unsettling feeling that we were in the same room as the session that had taken place fifty-five years earlier at Nola Studios in New York.

You are releasing it on the year of Monk’s hundredth anniversary…… Pure coincidence?
We won’t deny that Monk’s centennial celebration is a great opportunity to release such a project. But from the moment we found these tapes back in 2014 until now, we didn’t spare with our effort in the making of this project and all this time was necessary to create this record set.

This music was previously intended for the movie “Les Liaisons Dangereuses”. How did the pianist come to this session?
In the summer of 1958, Marcel Romano had convinced Roger Vadim to use Monk’s music for his new full-length movie, a modern rendition of Laclos’ book, “Les Liaisons dangereuses”. Romano was a serious Monk fan. They had met in Paris when Monk came for the first time on the Old Continent to feature at the third Salon du Jazz (Salle Pleyel, June 1954). In autumn 1958, he tried to have Monk to tour in Europe, and to record the soundtrack for Les Liaisons. in Paris. But Monk was facing difficult times in the US, including the loss of his NYC cabaret card, and could not come to Paris. Romano then flew to New York in June 1959 to record the soundtrack at Nola Penthouse Sound Studios.

He finally ended up not composing anything exclusive, original themes, for this soundtrack. How did he decide on the choice of the pieces he recorded?
That’s right. Monk was unable to compose for the movie merely due to a lack of time. When he came to NY, Romano had brought with him a detailed script containing precise timings for each scene that required music; he gave this to Monk who… asked to see the film. A screening of a working copy of the film — with sound that Vadim and Romano had added from records that were available — was organized for July 23.
He chose the repertoire based on his understanding of the story, and played around with the tempos in order to capture the character’s emotional state or circumstance, but he wrote no new music. On July 27, he simply recorded his usual repertoire: “Rhythm-a-Ning”, “Light Blue”, “Crepuscule with Nellie”, “Ba-Lue Bolivar Ba-Lues-Are”, “Well, You Needn’t”, and three versions of “Pannonica” (solo piano and ensemble). A piano solo blues improvisation and a gospel (“We’ll Understand It Better By and By”) were also recorded; they are both great interpretations that can be heard on the album.

Marcel Romano, as for other sessions that have become historical (“Ascenseur pour l’échafaud”), played an essential part in this story. Can you tell us more about this shadow character?
A lot more than these few lines would be necessary to pay fitting tribute to the work accomplished by Marcel Romano [1928-2007], to whom we owe the pleasure of being able to listen to this film music. After his first encounter with Monk in Paris in 1954, he would become an inescapable figure on the jazz scene in France: a concert producer and manager, a columnist for Jazz Hot, in charge of programming for the Club Saint-Germain… All his activities had only one aim: to share his passion for jazz and his love of musicians. From the end of 1957, when he played a part in setting up the recordings for the film Ascenseur pour l’échafaud, Marcel Romano had the privilege of being consulted by many filmmakers who loved jazz: following the example of Miles Davis and his recordings for Louis Malle, Art Blakey and his Jazz Messengers — booked to play a series of concerts at the Club Saint-Germain and the Olympia — would record the soundtrack for a film by director Edouard Molinaro. In the early 1960’s, Marcel took a leave of absence from the jazz world, but reappeared in the early 1970’s as a seller at the famous Champs-Elysées record store, Lido Musique.

There is also Barney Wilen in this session. Who had the idea to invite him into this quintet ?
French saxophonist Barney Wilen was Marcel Romano’s protégé since his first appearance in the Paris jazz scene in 1954. Since then he had been playing on numerous records including two soundtracks supervised by Romano (“Ascenseur pour l’échafaud” and “Un témoin dans la ville”). Barney was already in the US at the time as he had just made his American debut at Newport Jazz Festival. At Art Blakey’s request, Barney was to replace Hank Mobley when it was time for the Messengers to record the score of Liaisons Dangereuses. Marcel Romano proposed to include Barney as special guest in addition to Monk’s quartet, and it was a brilliant idea considering his performance during the recording session.

The official soundtrack for the movie was signed by Art Blakey on Fontana. What is finally the role of Monk’s music in this movie?
Monk’s music is predominant in the soundtrack of the movie; it is used as background music during the whole film. Blakey’s contributions were only used for what film people call “source music” (in this case, a party sequence and a nightclub sequence). These newly discovered tracks display the pianist at the height of his powers, but to conceive of this music as a film score may not be readily apparent. The tunes were nearly all part of Monk’s regular repertoire and together could have been released as another commercial LP.

You add alternate takes, including a “Light Blue” making of: do you think this long piece helps understand the spirit of Monk?
Yes, we believe that this sequence is a really fascinating moment of the recording session. It starts with Art Taylor, randomly playing a pattern, of the kind that percussionists play when checking the tuning of their drums. Monk hearing this drum figure immediately starts to play the intro of “Light Blue” on it. It takes a while for Art Taylor to get into the groove of the tune, but Monk doesn’t give up on him, even though he calls him names from time to time. This sequence demonstrates Monk’s creative genius, his patience and determination. It also allows the listener to feel the atmosphere of this recording session.
To date, this is the only known studio recording of this Monk composition.

You chose to release a limited edition on LP with many documents to describe the session and put it into perspective. How did you get access to all these pictures, including the magnificent portrait that serves as a cover for the box set?
Both Sam Records and Saga are labels that are trying to release records that appeal to the eye, and we’re putting a lot of effort in selecting and adjusting the documents reproduced in our releases. We managed to find people who had known Marcel Romano well. Among these people, some had kept photos and other documents. Arnaud Boubet from Paris Jazz Corner gathered a lot of photos including a number of color slides. It is thanks to him that this boxed-set is so well illustrated. We also would like to acknowledge the great job that Jérôme Witz, our graphic designer, has done with all these wonderful documents.

Can we expect more from you in the future?
Yes, indeed! But unfortunately nothing we can share at the moment.

Rio-based drummer, percussionist, composer and producer Stéphane SanJuan has been a member of Os Ritmistas, Orquestra Imperial, Cometa, among many others projects for twenty years… His affinity for rhythm began in his early youth, revealing itself through these top 5 tunes taken from records featuring the drummers that shaped his taste and style.

Art Blakey
Buhaina Chant

«The ultimate drumming album for me, incredible concepts, fantastic recording quality (R.I.P. Rudy Van Gelder) and beautiful playing by a lot of my main heroes like Art Blakey, Jo Jones, Patato Valdes and Sabu Martinez who also sings in the intro.»

Bernard Purdie
Cold Sweat

«As Mr. Purdie is the world’s most recorded drummer, he probably is the one that I’ve most heard and therefore was my main influence before I even realized who I was being influenced by. I didn’t know his name until I found this record and then more even about this wonderful artist. On this track, the drums are only on one side of the stereo mix, so when I was a kid, I would listen a lot to only the drums, then, to play along I’d listen without the drums and try to stick to the other players on the recording.»

Elza Soares

Deixa pra la

«My parents listened to a lot of Brazilian music and as Wilson Das Neves is the most recorded drummer in Brazil, he also is the drummer that I most heard, but who’s name I didn’t know until I discovered this record and then so much more about this phenomenal “sambista”. The king of samba drumming is at his best on this track, improvising upon Elza’s singing.»

Max Roach
Driva Man

«In my opinion, Max Roach was for the drums what John Coltrane was for the saxophone, a mad scientist, seeker, always looking to break the limits, he developed solo and harmonical concepts on the drums and in percussion. This track with singer Abbey Lincoln is sweet as a dream, but at the same time raw as his political statement.»

Art Pepper
The Trip

«This track helped me understand obsessional music and how to create a basic melody using the toms and then improvising on it. Elvin Jones plays a stunning pattern that gives a very full and rich base, then improvises around it using unbelievable dynamic skills for nearly ten minutes, taking you into a trance.»

As JC, he waited to be 33 to reveal his talents to the world. Born in Los Angeles, the saxophonist was brought up in a musical environment and began his professional career with new millenary. He has since played with numerous musicians, in various styles. In the Gerald Wilson big band, who was a guide for him, and with leaders such as Stanley Clarke or Raphael Saadiq, but also with Snoop Dogg or Lauryn Hill. During all those years, he took his time to find his own voice. His sound, a true singularity who is nevertheless reminiscent of his elders. A well-known partner of singer Kendrick Lamar, friend of bass player Thundercat, Kamasi Washington has now achieved fame of his own with his astonishing debut solo record, released by Braindfeeder, Flying Lotus’s label. Consisting in more than 3 hours of music, in a boxset of 3 LPs, the totemic ‘Epic’ finally puts this composer on the frontline. No doubt, a new Jazz star is born!

Photos by Mike Park

You grew up in Los Angeles what did you listen to as a teenager?
So the answer to this question is a little complicated because in my early teenage years is when I started to take music really seriously and I was kind of all over the place. I was really into Hip Hop and RnB from my earlier childhood, I had already liked jazz but by then I was really into it, I was also getting into European Classical music because of new friends I was making at my high school which was a music academy. So I was listening records like Snoop Dogg’s “The Doggfather”, Tupac “All Eyez On Me”, Nas “It Was Written”, Busta Rhymes “When Disaster Strikes”, Lee Morgan “The Gigolo”, John Coltrane “Transitions”, McCoy Tyner “The Real McCoy”, Eric Dolphy “Out to Lunch”, Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring”, Prokofiev’s “Romeo and Juliet” and a lot of other stuff.

When did you start music? Why saxophone?
My father is a musician so I started music very young at around 2 on drums, then around 5 I started playing the piano, then clarinet at 7. When I was around 11 or 12 I got really into Art Blakey’s The Jazz Messengers. My dad who is a saxophone player wouldn’t let me play saxophone because he wanted me to learn clarinet first. In fact he told me that they were the same and if I couldn’t play the clarinet then I wouldn’t be able to play the saxophone. So by 12 I was really trying to play songs from my favorite jazz records all of which had saxophone players. So the clarinet is similar to the saxophone but it’s not the same at all but I didn’t know that so I was trying to learn this music and it was so hard to try to play Charlie Parker solos on a clarinet and have them sound like he did. So one day my dad left his soprano sax out and I took it and from the first note I was already better than I was on clarinet. It was crazy because I didn’t even really know the fingerings but I instantly figured them out and I had been listening to so many saxophone players that I already sounded like one. There was no going back for me at that point my dad had to give in. It was kind of surreal.

What were/are your mentors? References?
My first and biggest mentor is my father Rickey Washington. He started me in music and has guided me my whole life. But I’ve learned a lot from many different people. After my father I would say a man named Reggie Andrew’s was my second biggest mentor. He was also my father’s teacher and a staple educational figure in the African American music community of Los Angeles since the 70s. Everyone in my band and most of the musicians that are really doing a lot in music in Los Angeles come up through him. Then there was the great Gerald Wilson who was one of Reggie Andrew’s heroes. I started with Gerald very young and played with him for almost 15 years and learned so much about the history of jazz, he was born in 1918 so he was there first hand. All of my idols were his friends. Harmonically he was my biggest influence so much of what I play comes from all those years hearing the dense one of kind harmonies he wrote for hi big band. There are literally dozens of others that I can and probably should mention like Issac Smith, Stanley Clarke, Harvey Mason, plus many many more but my dad, Reggie, and Gerald are my top 3.

Cherokee

What is the influence of Gospel and Soul in your music?
I mentioned earlier that when I first picked up the sax the connection was instantaneous. So literally that next Sunday my dad took me to play at my uncle’s church. My uncle played organ and piano. So my dad still hadn’t taught me the fingerings though I had figured most of them out by my self. Before this my dads approach to teaching me was very technical we would read every thing and used a lot of method books but when I switched to sax he wanted to develop my ear so he took me to church to play gospel. I grew up going to church so I knew all the songs but hadn’t played any of them before. So I had to use my ears and figure everything out. It was a little hard at first but after a while I could play any song that I could sing in my head. So you can say that I really learned how to play music through gospel. And I’ve always played gospel and I still to this day play at church.

Is there a specific California sound, for jazz or hip hop? If so how would you define it?
Though there is a vibe to the State of California as a whole but it’s too big to speak of one sound for it there are lots of sounds. Even my City of Los Angeles is really big and there are lots pockets that each have their own sound. The sound that many people are now starting to recognize is the sound from an area in south central Los Angeles called The Leimert Park Village. There is definitely a very specific sound from there. This sound really derives from all over south central, and the east side of Los Angeles but Leimert is the hub. That sound that you here on my album and the jazz elements of Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp A Butterfly comes from Leimert. That’s where myself and everyone in my band came up plus people like Terrace Martin and Issac Smith came up there too. It’s the center of African American Culture in Los Angeles. Growing up there we had three clubs that we went to. The World Stage, a club that jazz great and LA native Billy Higgins started. 5th Street Dicks the late night heavy modern jazz club that bands like Black Note grew out of. And Project Blowed a underground hip hop club that spawned groups like Freestyle Fellowship. We went to all of them all of the time. So the jazz from that area has roots in the classic forms of jazz from the world stage with a modern fire behind it with large influences from hip hop, RnB, and funk plus there’s an avant garde legacy left by masters like Horace Tapscott that’s mixed in there too.

You recorded three records in three years. Why such an emergency? What did you have to say?
So being a musician of a certain caliber a demand will grow for your services. Myself and everyone in my band were always gigging and going on the road. However at first and for a long time at least for me it wasn’t in jazz. My first tour was with Snoop Dogg and I stayed with him for years. Then my next big gig was with Raphael Saadiq and then Lauryn Hill. I love all styles of music and really enjoyed playing with all three of those legendary musicians but jazz was where my heart was. But during this time the only time I played jazz was in LA when I got home off the road. The same was true of many of my friends so we started recording and writing and playing as much as we could. I was making pretty good money so I built a recording studio in the back of my house. And I made a few records. The first two were just to document what we were doing musically. The gospel record I made for my grandfather as a present. I didn’t really push any of the records out but I had to make them to keep myself intact.

Do you feel you have evolved in terms of aesthetics during the last ten years ? more on the saxophone or in the compositions?
Yes I’ve grown a lot on the saxophone and in composition. First there’s so much music that I’ve been exposed to over the last ten years that has inspired me in my own music. Then on the saxophone I’ve come to a place where I truly except who I am and I am able to play what ever comes to me instead of feeling the need to prove who I am. It sounds really subtle but it’s a really big difference so often musicians get in their own way because they want to show that they can do this and that, and they know this and that. So they end up just playing this and that and never get to what really inside of them. It’s difficult because there’s the need to hone in your skills and a pressure to show that you have skills before other musicians will accept you. But I’ve learned to look past all of that because the greatest music that I will ever be able to make is the music that comes from my heart. In composition I’ve evolved in the size and scope of my ambitions. I no longer limit myself in what I hear in my head I just write it and figure out how to make it happen later.

You play the sax a lot on this record but in the end the listener gets to meet a new composer, a real author. How do you deal with this double hat?
Well the only real difficulty is that there are only 24 hours in a day. So what ends up happening to me is my focus becomes seasonal. So some weeks and even months at times I’m just really into the sax and I’m developing different aspects of the horn or different concepts of things I can play. Then some times I’m really inspired to write and music is just flowing out of me. And I like it this way because sometimes you need to step away from things to get a good perspective I feel that when I step away from the saxophone to compose when I come back to my regiment on the saxophone I’m rejuvenated and excited to get back in with a fresh perspective. And when I haven’t composed in a while I feel like the music that come is fresh and uninhibited by things I’ve already done.

Re Run Home

How long have you been working with The Next Step?
Is a band I started about ten years ago but it comes from a collective we now call the West Coast Get Down. The West Coast Get Down are a group of musicians that I’ve been friends with my whole life. They are Ronald and Stephen Bruner, Cameron Graves, Miles Mosley, Ryan Porter, Brandon Coleman, Tony Austin, and Patrice Quinn. We’ve been making music together our whole lives. I’ve known Ronald since I was three and Stephen since he was born, their dad and my dad played together. Brandon went to the same elementary school as Ronald and Stephen we met almost ten years before he started playing piano. Tony Austin is a little older than us but he went to the same school and we met him at the same time. I met Ryan in junior high in a program called Jazz America and I met Miles and Cameron in high school. I met Patrice Quinn last in my first year of collage. So we’ve been together a long time.

How did you record? Is it the music sum accumulated for seven years?
So about three years ago all the members of The West Coast Get Down decided to take a whole month off from doing any shows or tours and just focus on each other and record each others music. So we were in the studio 7 days a week from 11am-2am for thirty days. And we recorded an incredible amount of music like 190 songs, 8 albums, almost 2 terabytes of music. So I walked away with 45 songs recorded! My new album The Epic is made of my favorite tracks from that 45. For my music the whole band, two drummers, upright bass, electric bass, piano, keyboards, sax, trombone, and trumpet all recorded together in the same room. I wanted everyone to feel free to be spontaneous. If you try overdub then everyone is locked to what ever you record first. I encouraged them all to be as open as they wanted and to shape the music as they heard it. Then for the nine tracks that have strings and choir I wrote that music around what the band had already recorded. I felt like I would get the best of both worlds that way. I could the arrangements be as rich and full as I wanted them to be without limiting the spontaneous creativity.

Your universe reminds us a lot of Horace Tapscott, your California elder.
Yes I love Horace Tapscott! I love his music, his philosophies, and everything he did for the community that I grew up in. I only got to play with him once when I was really young at jam session at The World Stage. But his band The Pan African Peoples Arkestra has continued after his death under the leadership of Michael Sessions and I’ve played with them many times. Yes I’m a big fan all the records that came out on Black Jazz Records. They were really popular in LA and very important to that sound of Leimert Park that I talked about earlier.

How is the crossing of the jazz epic?
The Epic is doing very well so far people are really into it! I hope to bring as many of the members of The Next Step and The West Coast Get Down on the tour as I can. I hope we’re able to bring this music all over the world. I feel like the music we are making speaks to people in way that has been missing for a while. In LA we play at non-jazz clubs all the time for people who if you asked them before the show if they liked jazz they would say absolutely not but after they’re so into it they fighting to try and figure out how they can get more of the music. So we want to go out and share this all over the world. Hopefully it will happen.

How/when did you sign on Brainfeeder?
I meet Flying Lotus a long time ago when I was like 17 I won the John Coltrane competition and he was there with Ravi Coltrane. I think he was like 13 the same age as Thundercat who was playing with me. I think he and Thundercat stayed in touch. I didn’t see Lotus again till about 7 or 8 years ago. I knew that he and Thundercat had been working together and we randomly ran into each other at a jam session. Then a few years later he asked me if I’d like to do a record on Brainfeeder and I was like YES! Being on Brainfeeder has been great. It has definitely given me a lot more exposure and introduced me to a wider audience for sure but more than that it was cool because Lotus encouraged me to do what ever I wanted and that opened my mind to it’s self.

(this interview was published on a shorter version in French, for Jazz News Magazine)

 

His website, with european tour dates (november 15th, Paris Le Trabendo)

http://kamasiwashington.com/

 

His Top 5

Each month, we are focusing on a record label founded by an active digger. This month, Jules Do Mar (on right) from En Avant La Zizique Records talked about his passion: soul to soul.

When did you start digging records?
Since I was a teenager basically, like many kids at this time (80’s/90’s) we spent hours and hours looking from some cheap records in independent second hands shops and flea markets. It was not really an obsession, more something like a hobby, but the purpose was already the same as now : find records that nobody of our friends had already. During this time of this socalled « golden age of french alternative punk rock scene », I got a lot of DIY productions : 45 rpm, home made tapes, bootlegs, auto-production stuffs…
In my early 20’s, I lived for few years in London, and I guess that’s in this big city surrouded at the time by a huge vinyl offer, diggin became my favorite sport. I had access to a a range of music far much important that what I knew before.
In this days, I used to share a house with a bunch of people coming from different places like Brazil, Trinidad, Ireland and a « mods » couple from northern England (Liverpool/Manchester). All these guys introduced me to different music worlds that I didn’t specially knew before. Fantastic period, it was like a kind of Erasmus program for young diggers, but nobody’s was student anymore, just youngsters with crap jobs to pay the rent and… the wax !

What Lps did you buy at first ? Do you still listen them?
I guess the first ever I bought with my own cash was a Berurier Noir LP, or maybe a french obscure punk rock band from the parisian suburbs where I used to live called « les Rats », at one of their gigs probably. At this age, soon as the owner of a records shop told you to get this band or this one, you didn’t really bother, you’ll get it. It was also the time of the US/UK classics like Clash, Pistols, Television, Dr Feelgood, Cramps… Records i still listen occasionally, but not the french.
More or less at the same time, I started to get some hard bop jazz records like Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers, Coltrane, Max Roach, Monk. I’ m not sure I really understood this music but I had this feeling that one day I will be ready. The other truth is, I felt in love with the esthetic of jazz covers when I used to visit my neighbor, a real « soixante-huitard » with tons of LP’s in his flat.

Do you have a particular style or favorite period? And why?
If people watch our tiny catalogue, they could imagine we’re stuck in that R’n’B/Soul/Funk, but actually we are not. I don’t have a particular favorite style, but I must admit that I mainly dig 50’s, 60’s & 70’s american stuff, and when I said american, I definitively include the North, the Central and the South of the new continent called America.

Why?
Because it’s a migrant destination since few centuries now, and concerning music, there’s no better way to do so, mixing up people and cultures gave us up until now, the best results.

What was your first issue?
It was the vol 1 of our humble serie : Southern Sound ! Alvin « Shine » Robinson, an underestimated singer and great guitarist from NOLA with a singular laid back groove. He used to play as a sessionman for a lot of people in the area : Dr John, Allen Toussaint, Jessie Hill, Professor Longhair… And even Tom Waits and Carly Simon at some stages before his death in 1989. A good way to start, because we run out of our 500 copies quiet quickly.

Why En Avant La Zizique?
First of all, in this globalized market, we wanted to stick with a french name. I read the Boris Vian essai once, and I was amazed by how he understood the musical industry at the time (the late 40’s). Cleaver, funny and visionary. We know it’s a kind of slang difficult to translate, but it doesn’t seems to confuse the distributors and retailers abroad… So, we insist : En avant la zizique ! Because that’s what we’re talking about.

What is the esthetic line?
As a young artisanal imprint, we focus on 60’s & 70’s afro american music for the moment. Especially southern’s genre as Blues, Rhythm & Blues, Gospel, Soul and Funk. That’s what we like to play, to dig, to discover, and to tell the truth, that’s the microcosm we are in at the moment, with great contacts for licensing, researches… But if tomorrow we have the opportunity to release some punk music from Bangladesh or some Irish reggae, I mean why not if the story and the music is nice. The works of Numero Group, Light in the Attic, Sublime Frequencies, Strut, Universal Sounds/SoulJazz, Thomkins Square, Big Legal Mess, Ace Records… are inspiring us.

What could be your leitmotif of the label ?
Our name IS our leitmotiv : En Avant La Zizique ! Because that is what we’re here about, give a second breath to forgotten artists and recordings.

Why did you choose to focus only on 25 cm (10 inches)?
It’s not a definitive choice. The fact is, in the southern sounds serie, we are focusing on artists & who haven’t big recording career, so we plan to release only the best sides, we don’t like the idea of putting a maximum of songs like you can find in Charly’s R&B releases in 80’s : 15 tracks by side, but crap sound and crap design ! But tomorrow, we could go for 45 rpm boxset, or classy gatefold 12 inch. We just want some nice piece of wax, the one people would like to keep.

How do you decide on the choice of reissues?
Collegially ! We also see what is possible in terms of licence before presenting a new reissue project. Generally we’re trying to reach different people for different project at the same time, and we’re waiting to see what is coming back to us. Sometimes people come to our door.

Have you receive many negative answers on some of the artists you were trying to reissue?
No, not many, … But a lot of propositions En Avant La Zizique! records sadly could not afford.

There is more and more reissues of old LPs. Do you think that the LP reissue market could ever reach saturation point?
That is a point I often talk with digger friends, or other labels mate. When I see major companies re-press the Blues Brothers soundtrack, it make me laugh. You will find this LP in every single car boot sale or flea market in Europe for a couple of euros. So, yeah, in this days of « vinylmania », with a lot of companies surfing on this so cool vintage object to have, we might be able to reach a point were too many reissues will kill the reissue market. As it happens sometimes with trendy phenomena. At the same time, I can not blame this revival if it help indie labels, records shops and artists.
But what I am sure is there will always be some people crazy about music who will get their dope on wax. You know, this irreplaceable sensation to find a record you’re were looking for years, bringing it at home and spin it right away on your turntable. It’s Like a puff of good pot.

What are your next releases?
The newest is about Larry Birdsong, a Nashville born singer who started his career during the boom of rock’n’roll (in the mid 50’s) to slip to R’N’B, Soul or even Funk. We decide to focus on his late recordings, between 1967 and 1973, most of this titles have not been reissued on wax since they came out originally as 7 inch. And we have more stuff in our cellar. A gospel project, an anthology of a great psyche-blues-folk female singer, dozens of southern unsung heroes… Many ideas, many good music to re-release, but not much money to put this together. If some readers want to invest, make a sign.

What is the LP you dream of reissuing?
An hypothetical lost tape of something crazy recorded on Cadet/concept (subdivision of Chess). The backing band of Pigmeat Markham, or black rock band Black Merda jamming with some in house great vocalist like Marlena Shaw, Fontella Bass or Sugar Pie di Santo.
 

http://www.enavantlazizique.fr/blog/

 

The finest in jazz since 1939 ! This slogan is a trademark. In celebration of the 75th anniversary of Blue Note Records, YellowKorner pays tribute to Francis Wolff, the co-founder with Alfred Lion and in-house photographer of the prestigious record label, by publishing an amazing photo book and presenting a series of exclusive images seen through the lens of this master of jazz photography. From 1941-1965 Francis Wolff took thousands of photographs during the rehearsals and recording sessions that participate Blue Note Records legend.

Numerous portraits of legendary musicians as Art Blakey, Dexter Gordon, Herbie Hancock, Clifford Brown, Ornette Coleman, Wayne Shorter and many more, during record sessions, but also many pictures of these jazzmen in the city. All of them contributed in no small part to the success of the New York label. Mostly reproduced on the covers of the Blue Note discs, these powerful black and white shots gave a strong visual identity to the label, in connection with the unique designer Reid Miles. A myth was born.

YellowKorner further supports the importance of this anniversary by publishing 1939 copies of a hitherto unpublished work, written by Michael Cuscuna and telling the story of the creation and the dynamism of this historic label. Individually numbered and signed by Wayne Shorter, this superb collector’s item includes a collection of 150 exceptional Blue Note photographs taken during recording sessions.

http://www.yellowkorner.com/books/1652/blue-note.aspx

 
 

Since the late 60’s, the native from Connecticut has played an important role in jazz history. After hosting a radio jazz show and writing for ‘Down Beat’ and other music magazines, he started working for record companies : Atlantic, Motown, ABC, Freedom and finally… Blue Note. Since 1984, Michael Cuscuna has been a special consultant, producer and the reissue director of the mythical label… During the same period, he also managed Mosaic Records, the indie company well known for its reissue boxsets of jazz legends.

 
 

Before directing Blue Note, you worked for various labels such as ESP, Muse, or ABC … Is Blue Note the label you dreamed of working for?
There were two labels that I dreamed about working for – Atlantic and Blue Note. I was a staff producer for Atlantic in 1972-74. I was friendly with a lot of jazz musicians and many of them told me about great Blue Note sessions that they played on that had never been released. I started to keep a notebook with all of their memories and tried to contact Blue Note to get into the vaults to see what might be worth releasing. But George Butler was running Blue Note and his interest was not in jazz. The label had changed and was nothing like the old Blue Note. Finally in 1976 I met Charles Lourie who had just joined Blue Note and he was a great jazz fan. He got me into the vaults and I have been working with this material ever since.

What lays behind the identity of Blue Note? What makes the difference, gives it a different edge compared to other Jazz labels? The Pop dimension?
What gave Blue Note the creative edge and made it better and different than most labels is that Alfred Lion and Francis Wolff were interested in keeping jazz pure, BUT ALSO in helping to create a situation in which to make great jazz, they befriended artists, they had planning meetings and rehearsals and tried to encourage musicians to compose and make new music that they would be proud of. The difference was in the care and hard work they put into everything.

Do you think the history of Blue Note can be split in several periods? If so what are they and why?
The different periods of Blue Note are basically defined by the style of music they recorded at the time. The first period is 1939-46 when they recorded boogie woogie, New Orleans jazz and small group swing. The second period is 1947-54 when they discovered modern jazz and made great first sessions by Thelonious Monk, Art Blakey, James Moody, Kenny Drew, Wynton Kelly, Lou Donaldson and Horace Silver. 1954-67 is the period when Blue Note discovered its identity through sound (Rudy Van Gelder), design (Reid Miles), photography (Francis Wolff), production (Alfred Lion) and the style of the music (Horace Silver, Art Blakey with the birth of the Jazz Messengers). In this third period, the music grew and changed but it was basically the same creative team and the growing group of great musicians who recorded with the label, moving from soul jazz to hard bop to modal to avant-garde. Alfred Lion left in 1967 and Francis Wolff and Duke Pearson tried to keep the identity of Blue Note going until Frank’s death in 1971. The fourth period is the 70’s when George Butler ran the label. Some older artists like Horace Silver, Bobby Hutcherson and Elvin Jones stayed for a while, but the label’s sound was mainly controlled by the Mizell Brothers and Larry Rosen & Dave Grusin who were turning out successful, commercial albums by Donald Byrd, Earl Klugh and others. The next phase would be from 1985 when Bruce Lundvall restarted Blue Note to 2010 when he retired. In that era, we recorded a variety of music so it is hard to define what we have done. This is a different time.

To try and study the history of Blue Note, its evolution and singular aesthetic may sometimes sound like trying to understand the history of jazz. Why do you think this is?
Alfred Lion and Francis Wolff were jazz fans and they followed the music as it grew and changed. It is natural that people as smart and talented as them would mirror the evolution of the music in what they did. Sometimes they were followers like when they discovered bebop two years after other labels were recording it and sometimes they were the creators of change like when they signed Jimmy Smith before the organ was a jazz instrument and before the popularity of soul jazz.

Why do you think Blue Note succeeded in bringing together so many different artists, from Ornette Coleman and Cecil Taylor to Lou Donaldson and Lonnie Smith, without losing its originality and unity?
That is the key behind Blue Note. You could go from Ike Quebec to Jackie McLean to Lonnie Smith to Ornette Coleman and what is common about each artist is that they were making their best records for Blue Note. The sound, the packaging, the planning – it all makes each record special in the sense of Blue Note quality. We tried to do that in the 80’s. 80’s and 00’s. But of course we had different engineers, producers, studios and designers so we did not have the consistency that Alfred and Frank had.

What was the essence behind the fascinating Blue Note artwork? What kind of directions were given to the graphics designer to achieve such a harmonious and unique series of design?
This is very interesting. The early Blue Note designers like Paul Bacon and John Hermansader were modern designers and jazz fans. But by the time of the 12” (30 cm) LP, they settled on Reid Miles as their designer. Reid only liked classical music so he never listened to any of the hundreds of Blue Note albums that he designed covers for. And yet, he captured each album perfectly. The reason is that Alfred, who was a very enthusiastic and talkative man, would describe to Reid the spirit and intent of each album and Reid created the ideal design for each one. He also had that rare gift that every album cover looked different from the rest, but together they all looked like Blue Note covers.

There are some musicians that were all about Blue Note in their style but never got a release on the label like Mal Waldron or Charles Tolliver. What criteria did you mainly use to select your artists?
Well, Mal Waldron never recorded for Blue Note in any session, but I understand your question. Charles Tolliver and Woody Shaw were promised contracts with Blue Note but when Alfred sold the label to Liberty Records and didn’t like the way they were doing business, he told Charles and Woody that he didn’t want to sign new artists because he wanted to leave the label himself. Others like James Spaulding are a mystery. I asked James once why he never made a Blue Note album as a leader. He said, « They never asked me. » Well, James is a shy guy and probably he never asked them either! There is no logic to all of this.

Blue Note is by far the most collected and famous jazz label. Are you familiar with all the pressing details (the ear, the R, the deep groove, the flat edge etc …) that make it such a fascinating record series to collect and what is your opinion about it? And how did so many pressing variances occur?
I don’t know all the ins and outs of the collector details for Blue Note. Fred Cohen who runs the Jazz Record Center in New York City published a whole book about it. I am amazed at how collectable original Blue Note pressings and all the attention paid to little details like the label address on the pressings etc. By the way, the ear in the wax that collectors talk about is actually a P for Plastylite, the pressing plant that pressed all the Blue Notes in the 50’s and 60’s.

During the 90’s, Blue Note Japan reissued a number of previously unreleased sessions on LP including material by Jackie McLean, Andrew Hill, Bobby Hutcherson, Dexter Gordon, Lee Morgan, Wayne Shorter… Most of these recordings are awesome. Why weren’t they released at the time? Do you plan to release new issues of those recordings for the rest of the world?
Actually, in 1976 I started going into the Blue Note vaults for unissued material. I was amazed at the quality of a lot of it. Some artists like Lee Morgan and Grant Green recorded so frequently (probably because they wanted to earn more money) that the label could never put out everything, but much of what they did not release was every bit as good as what they did release. Both Lee and Grant were very successful so Alfred and Frank probably leaned towards their more commercial sessions to release at the time. Others are a great mystery like Wayne Shorter’s ‘Et Cetera’ or Bobby Hutcherson’s ‘Oblique’. Brilliant sessions. I asked Alfred once about all the unissued material and he didn’t really remember leaving so much good material in the vault. So I started putting these sessions out in the late ‘70s in the US. But the record business was in bad shape at the time and the label lost interest in issuing them. So I talked to King Records in Japan who were distributing Blue Note at the time. They put a lot of them out. Then when Toshiba EMI took over Blue Note we put more out and then started converting everything to CD. I have gotten just about everything out that deserves to be released at least in Japan if not everywhere. In the past few years, Japan has begun to reissue of lot of these and classic Blue Notes on hi-res CDs.

Our favorite recordings on the label belong to what we call the « Dark Jazz » genre, like Duke Pearson’s ‘The Phantom’, Andrew Hill’s ‘Lift With Every Voice’, Bobby Hutcherson’s ‘Oblique’ or Jack Wilson’s ‘Easterly Winds’! These are still largely underrated. Any idea why?
Well, most of the albums that you name are from the late 60’s and early 70’s. This was a bad time for jazz in USA. Underground FM Rock like Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead were attracting the young white audience and the avant-garde was driving away the middle-aged black audience and jazz was left with very little support. These albums were created and issued during that time and were overlooked. I think that is why history has forgotten them.

Pete La Roca’s ‘Basra’ is one of our favorite LPs on the label. Why did Pete release only one LP for Blue Note?
I don’t know. A lot of guys only made one or two albums for a label during that time. And guys like Pete (in demand drummers and bassists) got a lot more work by playing with different groups than trying to lead their own group. Of course, Pete did make another album for Blue Note 30 years later !!!

75 years is quite an achievement! How do you explain the longevity of the label?
I think the longevity of the label is owed to the great music of the classic Blue Note period (1954-67) that Alfred and Frank recorded and that remains vital and alive today and the fact that Bruce Lundvall, myself and Don Was who followed since the 80’s have never tried to duplicate what they did, but we respect it and try to live up to their legacies in our own way.

The Blue Note identity (the artwork, the quality of recordings, …) is part of the label’s mythology. Do you have any type of strategy to keep the myth alive?
Well, we’ve always kept that legacy alive by issuing the classic Blue Note albums in the best possible sound with original packaging and liner notes to keep the spirit of the original Blue Note alive. That identity does not exist for new Blue Note recordings since 1985 because we have so many different producers, engineers, photographers and designers. We have always tried to keep the quality high, but it doesn’t have an identity like the original Blue Note did.

What could eventually endanger the Blue Note brand?
What would endanger Blue Note would be if the kind of person who only cared about music as a commercial commodity instead of an art were to take over the label. Then bizarre projects like Rod Stewart sings Gershwin or Barry Manilow duets with dead people would destroy the integrity of the label and lose the trust of the fan.

Do you think a label like Blue Note could see the light today? If so, which other label could potentially look like Blue Note today?
Yes, I do. But it would have to be an independent label, not part of large corporation. I think in the 70’s ECM in its own musical style created an independent label with a very strong identity. I think Criss Cross in the 80’s till today is doing very much what Blue Note of the 50’s and 60’s did. And newer labels like Palmetto and ACT are recording pure jazz and forging their own identities.

Are you interested in the current jazz scene?
Yes, I don’t have the time to follow it as much as I would like but there are an amazing amount of talent artists on every instrument. I think the fact that people like Herbie Hancock and Terence Blanchard give their time to jazz education has really helped too.

Current Blue Note artists like Gregory Porter or Robert Glasper are very promising. Do you think they will be part of the Blue Note legend one day?
Yes I do. We have been very lucky over the past 30 years to record people like Dianne Reeves, Cassandra Wilson, John Scofield, Greg Osby, Tim Hagans, Joe Lovano, Jason Moran, Ambrose Akinmusire, Robert Glasper and Gregory Porter. They are all original and they are here to stay.

Are you enthusiastic about the return of vinyl records? How do you see the future in that respect?
I don’t think the return of vinyl affects the style or quality of music, but it does make us more conscious of upholding great sound quality when producing a record.

We owe you the re-discovery of the Monk quartet with Coltrane. Do you have many more unreleased tapes? Where do you find them?
Well, they come from different places. That one came from Larry Appelbaum at the Library of Congress. Author Lewis Porter found an ad for that concert in a New York newspaper and kept asking Larry to look for it in the Voice Of America radio tapes. A couple of years later, Larry found it by accident !!!! They called me and we made a deal. This was a major find. I doubt we will ever see anything that significant again. I believe most of the next discoveries will come from INA, the BBC, RAI and other European radio and television companies that taped the great American artists in the 60’s.

What would be the Blue Note release of your dreams?
I don’t know how to answer that. Since 1976, I’ve gotten all the great unissued music released. Since 1985, I’ve gotten all of the classic catalog issued on CD in good sound with bonus tracks. I’ve also been able to produce a lot of wonderful artists like Andrew Hill, McCoy Tyner, Freddie Hubbard, Don Pullen-George Adams, Joe Lovano, Terence Blanchard and more. I think my dreams have come true.