The insatiably exploratory clarinetist, saxophonist, composer and educator Jimmy Giuffre was born in Dallas, Tx. on April 26, 1921 — a hundred years ago today. In honor of his centennial, we're devoting this installment of Take Five to his music.
These tracks span more than 40 years of a brilliant and often underappreciated career. Conspicuously absent is "The Train and the River," which memorably opens the Bert Stern film Jazz on a Summer's Day. (That performance warrants its own discussion, which I address in this anniversary essay about the film.) And we haven't included anything from The Jimmy Giuffre 3 & 4: New York Concerts, which Elemental released in 2014 (but which isn't available on any streaming service); order it here.
Woody Herman Orchestra, "Four Brothers"
The Second Herd, which Woody Herman formed in 1947, was also known as the Four Brothers Band — because of the popularity of this tune, composed by Jimmy Giuffre for the orchestra's saxophone section of Zoot Sims, Serge Chaloff, Herbie Steward, and Stan Getz. Based on the changes to the Harry Warren standard "Jeepers Creepers," it's a tune expressly designed to feature the airy, Lester Young-ish style of the section. And for Giuffre, it was an early calling card; he even released an album titled The Four Brothers Sound, featuring his overdubbed tenor, for Atlantic in 1959.
Lighthouse All Stars, "Big Boy"
Howard Rumsey’s Lighthouse All Stars, a defining unit of west coast jazz, had an unlikely hit in "Big Boy," which Giuffre and Shorty Rogers composed as a playful riff on "The Big Head," a popular Coleman Hawkins tune. Why was it unlikely? Because the strong beat and raucous energy of the track defied a west coast vibe. "Never thought we'd live to see the day," wrote a reviewer in DownBeat, "but here are a bunch of ex-Kenton and -Herman guys waving the rhythm-and-blues flag. Jim Giuffre, who wrote 'Four Brothers,' puts on his straight jacquet; rhythm section shuffles, and everybody starts flying home."
Jimmy Giuffre 3, "Western Suite"
The Jimmy Giuffre 3 immortalized in Jazz on a Summer's Day — Giuffre on clarinet and tenor, Bob Brookmeyer on valve trombone, Jim Hall on guitar — also made a landmark album called The Western Suite. (Recorded in 1958, it was released on Atlantic in '60.) The title track, a continuous piece in four movements, captures Giuffre's feel for the American west, his birthright as a native Texan. It's a work of colloquial ambition, as connected to folk music and cool jazz as it is to the pastoral work of Aaron Copland.
Jimmy Giuffre 3, "Threewe"
A separate edition of the Jimmy Giuffre 3, with bassist Steve Swallow and pianist Paul Bley, made history with the 1962 Columbia album Free Fall. Giuffre formed this group after an encounter with Ornette Coleman a few years earlier at the Lenox School of Jazz, drawing inspiration from his liberated relationship to tonality and form. "Threewe" is a composition that Giuffre titled after the collective energy of the trio — an idea well justified by the performance.
Paul Bley, Jimmy Giuffre, Steve Swallow, "Turns"
In 1989, Giuffre, Bley and Swallow reunited for a pair of recordings on the Owl label, titled The Life of a Trio. This version of Giuffre's "Turns," from the first of two nights, suggests the resumption of a conversation: each member of the group is alert to their dynamic together, making micro-adjustments as they go.
