The full moon bracketed by Saturn and Jupiter was not the only awesome sight in B'game last night. One of the coolest dudes in B'game did it again last night. Andrew Speight had his House of Bop swinging in a tribute concert to Cannonball Adderley and Nancy Wilson who recorded a seminal LP together back in 1961. Andrew is "chief cook and bottle washer" at his events--he's promoting them, setting up the sound and video for streaming on his Facebook page, delivering in-depth backgrounds on the songs and artists and.....and playing the alto sax like a pro. He let everyone know that the LP being featured was the first female vocalist fronting a small combo that made it to vinyl. Just awesome to see and there were a couple of B'game restaurant owners in the small audience last night which might lead to some public gigs. One can only hope.
As Andrew noted last night, a great way to build a great jazz combo is to start with the drummer. It's the loudest instrument and if the drummer doesn't like you he can drown you out! We were graced with a true legend on drums last night. As Roy McCurdy's web page notes
McCurdy worked with the Mangione Brothers group (Chuck and Gap Mangione) in the early 60’s and later joined the Art Farmer Jazztet and then went with Sonny Rollins. Following Sonny Rollins he became a full time member of the Cannonball Adderley Quintet from the mid-60’s, traveling internationally with the group, including a particularly successful tour of South America in 1972.
Who better to set the beat for two hours of Cannonball's music? With David Wong as the other half of the rhythm section and Terrell Stafford blowing hard on trumpet, and Matthew Clark on the piano all that was needed was the vocalist who could deliver the Nancy Wilson feel. Tiffany Austin was on it and added the fine feel and tone that was needed. Here's McCurdy and Stafford.
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