This
interesting LP popped up recently on Ebay. Not one I’d ever seen before but a
little Googling and I find Les Strand qualifies as a bona fide Ellingtonian.
A
little information about the organist first, however, from Geoff Alexander’s
history here.
“(Jimmy) Smith
himself, while indicating that he has not been
directly influenced by any
other organ players, does admit to enjoy listening
to only one other, an
obscure organist named Les Strand, who he refers
to as the "Art Tatum of
the organ."
Strand, whose father
spent most of his career as a musician playing in
shows on the theatre circuit
in Chicago, taught himself to play the
Hammond at the age of fourteen. He
began playing in a funeral home before
hitting the lounge circuit, and was
probably the purest bebop organist who
ever played the instrument. His
obscurity results from a combination of
factors: an inappropriate record label
(Fantasy, which had nothing in
their catalogue remotely like Strand's jazz organ,
and which refused to
give much promotion to him), a non-traditional organ (he
recorded mostly
on the Baldwin, which is not a "bluesy" instrument),
and technique, which
was so complex that the basic jazz-blues oriented organ
trio setting would
simply not have worked well with his Tatum-Tristano
influenced style.
Strand rarely traveled out of the Chicago area, and never appeared in
a
large East Coast city. He is rare among jazz organists in that his first
instrument was the organ itself (he started with the Hammond at age 14),
and
his total recorded output consists of three albums on Fantasy, two of
which
feature the Baldwin organ, and a promotional album for Yamaha.
Interestingly,
neither Leonard Feather, who produced his Yamaha record,
nor Chicago jazz
radio programmer Dick Buckley, who wrote the liner notes
for one of his
records, knew Strand's whereabouts, and small wonder: he
retired from active
playing at the young age of 40 to pursue a teaching
career in 1964, has since
retired from teaching, and now lives in Kansas
City.
Strand's version of
"If I Had You" (example number 10 on the cassette) is
a
tour-de-force of dynamics, comping, and just plain magnificent keyboard
technique. The "cool" sound of the trio is a result of the fact that
the
guitarist 'and the drummer were currently then working with accordionist
Art Van Damme's group, and were accustomed to playing in a relatively
quiet
setting (the drummer, in fact, uses brushes throughout the album.)
Although he
preferred the Hammond, Strand's father worked in the Chicago
Baldwin store and was able to
introduce him to the wider dynamic range of
that organ. The Baldwin, however,
did not record as well as was expected,
and therefore he returned to the
Hammond for his final recording on
Fantasy, "Les Strand Plays
Ellington".) The Baldwin does emphasize
Strand's horn-like
quality, and in using the "vibes" setting, actually
evokes the sound
of a guitar more than anything else.”
As
for the Ellington connection, well, Exhibit One: this from Ken Vail’s excellent
Duke’s Diary:
Whether
this Milt Grayson recording was ever released, it is hard to say. I haven’t
been able to find a trace of a commercial release on line.
In
addition to producing Les Strand, the keyboardist – who, in fact, favoured a
Baldwin organ – also played with the Ellington band. A contributor to the
Organissimo jazz discussion forum writes:
"I had the privilege of studying Jazz Organ with him for two
years in Chicago and he personally gave me a few recordings on Cassette Tape,
which I still have and am remastering to CD but probably not for release. He
did have a unique and complex style. I have a copy of that Yamaha recording he
did, which was done after her won the top prize at the world finals of the
Yamaha International Electone Festival. I believe Les was the first american to
win the world title in that competition. At
one point he did several recordings with Duke Ellington when he would come to
the Blue Note Jazz club in Chicago but Les told me that, unfortunately, those
recordings got lost somewhere in the Ellington estate. I don't think they
were ever published but it sure would have been a blast to hear. He was
immensely talented and a great teacher.(My emphasis.)"
I wonder will these Blue Note recordings ever come
to light? Until then, we have this souvenir of Les Strand’s association with
Ellington.
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