Having only recently realized these discs were issued on CD – but now out of print – I wanted to track them down to hear if they had anything new to say. I had both sets when they were first released, but I remember not playing them very much. At the time, my interest was in Bob James and while the keyboardist/ composer/arranger is all over these records, it just never felt like a Bob James experience to me. Then, that was a bad thing. Today, that might be a good thing.
By 1977, Columbia Records and its affiliates boasted an impressive roster of jazz headliners: from fusion stars like Herbie Hancock, Ramsey Lewis, Freddie Hubbard, Weather Report, John McLaughlin, Tony Williams and Chick Corea’s Return to Forever to such jazz legends as Maynard Ferguson, Stan Getz, Dexter Gordon, Benny Golson and Gerry Mulligan. It was an amazing congregation for any one label, big or small.
Even young up-and-comers like Woody Shaw and Bob James were getting a wider hearing on, perhaps, the world’s most wide-ranging distribution network at the time. This impressive roster is what got Columbia named “Record Label of the Year” in 1978, by the DownBeat critics’ poll, probably to the dismay of listeners worried about the major label’s need to feed its bottom line.
A handful of these guys assembled for a “rip roaring” big-band performance of Columbia’s “top name soloists” in January 1977 at a sales conference, of all things, in Atlanta, Georgia. Apparently, the occasion was such a hit that an album titled The Atlanta Concert was scheduled for an August 1977 release. But that never happened.
Word of the group’s performance made its way across the Atlantic to Claude Nobs (1936-2013), founder and director of the esteemed Montreux Jazz Festival, who expressed interest in having the Columbia players perform – in various units – on July 24, 1977, the closing night of the 25-day festival’s 11th annual outing,.1
Composer and arranger Jay Chattaway (b. 1946) was tasked with arranging and directing the program and the players. Apparently, the acoustic-jazz group V.S.O.P., also on Columbia, was scheduled to play Montreux a few days later.2
After much planning and negotiation, the CBS leaders – who Chattaway insisted would not be called “All Stars,” as that moniker was more befitting smaller labels than a jazz behemoth like Columbia3 – were booked and the date was set.
The band that night in Switzerland included no less than 16 “headliners,” as well as sidemen from Maynard Ferguson’s band at the time, including drummer Peter Erskine, and five brass players from London. Also prominent in the line-up was trombonist Slide Hampton – who was working with both Woody Shaw and Dexter Gordon at the time – handling several arrangements and manning several solos.
The headliners, though, are a heady bunch indeed: they include first-billed Bob James and George Duke on keyboards; Stan Getz, Dexter Gordon and Benny Golson (who, sadly, passed away as this was being written) on tenor sax; Hubert Laws, Bobbi Humphrey and Thijs van Leer on flute; Maynard Ferguson and Woody Shaw (still with Muse at the time) on trumpet; Steve Khan, Janne Schaffer and Eric Gale on guitar; Alphonso Johnson on bass; Billy Cobham on drums; and Ralph MacDonald (who was never a Columbia artist but, rather, on the TK Records subsidiary Marlin) on percussion.
Two beautifully designed4 and meticulously annotated double-disc sets captured roughly half of the evening’s six-hour concert – still a lot of music for eight sides of wax. Montreux Summit Volume 1 was issued in October 1977 and featured only six tracks (two of which are 20-plus minutes) while Montreux Summit Volume 2, issued seven months later, featured yet another seven tracks.
But that’s nothing. Norman Granz’s Pablo label issued no fewer than 15 albums – two of which were eight-disc (!) box sets – in its own “Montreux ’77” series by such straight-ahead jazz legends as Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald, Oscar Peterson, Joe Pass and others.
Granz, of course, pioneered the summit-style concert with the many Jazz at the Philharmonic (JATP) shows he staged in the forties, fifties and early sixties. These were often praised (or criticized) for a variety of leaders, mostly affiliated with Granz’s Verve label, getting together for some heavy-duty blowing that bordered on showboating and cutting contests that showcased friendly fire and, what Maynard Ferguson initially presumed of this particular showdown, as “star wars.”
The whole thing went out of fashion in the mid sixties as jazz sprouted many heads that went in as many different directions. But summit shows made a surprising comeback in the early 70s, when producer Creed Taylor, who headed up jazz’s premier label of the day, gathered his headliners for a series of successful concert performances as the CTI All Stars.
While it’s worth noting that Montreux Summit headliner Stan Getz was himself a former JATP participant, both Montreux contributors Bob James and Hubert Laws were also charter members of the CTI All Stars from 1971 to 1975.
Montreux Summit, however, was something quite a bit different than either JATP or the CTI All Stars. “The [Montreux] concert combined different eras and talents in new ways,” as Bob James rightly said in the notes to the set’s second volume. “It afforded the opportunity for everyone to break out of patterns by playing with new guys for the first time.”
Several pieces were written specifically for the occasion, including Bob James’ surprisingly underwhelming “Montreux Summit” (1); Jay Chattaway’s electrifying finale “Andromeda” (1); the big band fusion of George Duke’s “Be Cool” (2); Bob James and Hubert Laws’ third-streamish “Two-Part Invention” (2); and Thijs van Leer’s positively CTI-worthy adaptation of “Kanon for Flutes” (2). New pieces written for the occasion by Benny Golson, or others, seemed not to make the cut.
A whopping three of the longer jams heard here, Dexter Gordon’s “Fried Bananas” (1) – first recorded in 1969 – Woody Shaw’s “The Moontrane” (2) – which dates back to a 1965 Larry Young record – and “Red Top” (2) – originally associated with Gene Ammons – complement studio takes on Gordon’s Columbia album Sophisticated Giant. That record, waxed one month earlier, also featured Shaw on trumpet as well as the trombone and arrangements of Slide Hampton.
Alphonso Johnson’s “Bahama Mama” and James’s “Night Crawler” are pleasant in their familiarity but hue a bit too close to their original studio recordings to rouse much excitement. But you’ve got to admire Stan Getz, game to play and shredding the hell out of “Night Crawler.” Makes you wish Getz and James made a whole record together.
According to Mort Goode’s notes in Volume 2, several performances had to be cut from the records, including “Laura,” yet another track from Sophisticated Giant; “Gonna Fly Now,” Maynard Ferguson’s Top 40 hit that year; “Hocus Pocus,” the 1973 yodeling hit by Thijs van Leer’s rock group Focus; and Benny Golson’s “Are You Real,” which, like “Blues March,” the saxophonist performed with Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers on that group’s 1959 Blue Note LP.
Each listener will find fault or favor here, depending how their tastes fall. This listener still likes much of the same stuff he did as a 15-year old, including the genuinely thrilling and CTI-esque “Kanon for Flutes” (2 – also a great feature for James on Fender Rhodes), Jay Chattaway’s “Andromeda” (1).5 and George Duke’s Rhodes solo on Steve Khan’s “Rites of Darkness” (2). But nearly fifty years later, I now appreciate Wayne Shorter’s “Infant Eyes,” beautifully finessed by Getz and James, and Dexter Gordon’s “Fried Bananas,” a signature tune that always sounds new and exciting in the master’s hands.
If there’s a problem with Montreux Summit, though, it is, perhaps, too much of a good thing. While the players, presentation and performances are nearly flawless – a feat in itself – the program is a bit incoherent. First, there are simply too many featured players. How ever distinctive three saxophonists, three guitarists and three flautists may be, with that many players, everyone is simply a section mate.
With all these featured soloists, there is a tendency – especially evident on the records – to pack too many solos in to each song. Such a strategy weighs down the first set much more than the second one, as the producers seemed obliged to provide all the players as much solo space on record as is technically possible. The concert was likely better balanced, with more of the smaller units leading up to the big blowouts.
In concert, a stage crammed with stars can be exciting, energetic, even thrilling. On record, you’re likely just waiting to hear from the one or two players that brought you to the party in the first place. It can be a long wait.
“Rarely has a corporate report been so much fun,” enthused Howard Mandel in his four-star DownBeat review of the first volume of Montreux Summit.6 “Seldom has a record label’s roster performed special arrangements at a major jazz fest, fulfilling expectations, satisfying hopes, and leaving an adequate document besides. In the summer of ’77, Columbia got it all together; the music taped during a long Swiss night does CBS Records president Bruce Lundvall’s investment in jazz proud.”
Montreux Summit Volume One seemed to sell moderately well at the time, reaching number 11 on Billboard‘s Jazz chart. While people like me picked up on the second volume, it’s not clear whether that one performed as well. My sense is that it did not.
Columbia, clearly feeling jazzed by the Swiss concert, assembled another all-star group, a (much more manageable) quartet this time, for a brief American tour of its own in the Fall of 1977. The resulting album, Alivemutherforya, was released in early 1978 and credited to what amounted to a “supergroup,” with drummer Billy Cobham, guitarist Steve Khan, bassist Alphonso Johnson and saxophonist Tom Scott (who, mysteriously, was not part of the Montreux program).
The well-received Alivemutherforya was more of a sampler than anything else, but it was a surprisingly better-than-average fusion outing, ironically captured just as fusion itself was completely dying out (Johnson’s “Bahama Mama” makes another appearance here). These guys rode the zeitgeist to smooth jazz or out of the limelight altogether.
Regardless, this disc nicely documents what fusion could be. Or, maybe, all it could be. But you have to wonder what Whistler’s Mother is plugged in to on the record’s cover. Wounded Bird issued Alivemutherforya on CD in 2015.
In 1981, two single-disc reissues of the Montreux music appeared – for some reason – with the “X” in Montreux strangely cropped (for some reason) on both of these single-album issues: Montreux – First Divide featured “Fried Bananas,” “Infant Eyes,” “The Moontrane” and “Red Top” while Montreux – Second Divide featured “Blues March,” “Two-Part Invention” and “Montreux Summit.” Wounded Bird issued the original Montreux Summit discs on CD in 2012.
The lovely “Infant Eyes” was also included as a bonus track on Stan Getz – The Complete Columbia Albums Collection (2011) while “Fried Bananas,” “The Moontrane” and “Red Top” are bonus tracks on Dexter Gordon – The Complete Columbia Records Collection (also 2011). Oddly, though, the Sony box sets from this period devoted to Woody Shaw and George Duke included none of their 1977 Montreux performances.
Endnotes:
- Billboard, June 18, 1977. ↩︎
- At the time of the Montreux event, V.S.O.P., which featured Columbia recording artists Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, Freddie Hubbard and Tony Williams, was in Japan, where the live album Tempest at the Coloseum was recorded the night before the Montreux show on July 23. For the record, the above-referenced Atlanta concert also included Hancock, Hubbard and Williams. ↩︎
- Ironically, the 2012 Wounded Bird CDs do, in fact. credit the Montreux Summit sets to the “CBS Jazz All Stars.” This is likely a nod to the moniker used by Columbia for 1979’s Havana Jam albums, on which many of the same musicians from these Montreux records appear. ↩︎
- The brilliant Paula Scher (b. 1948), then a CBS graphic designer – she famously helmed that generation’s much-loved 1976 Boston cover – obviously and beautifully designed both Montreux Summit sets. But only Volume 2 credits its illustrator. There, it was Seymour Chwast (b. 1931). The cooler watercolor of Volume 1 remains uncredited. A more typical representation of Chwast’s style appears on the Yellow Submarine-ish cover of the 1977 album The Peacocks, by Stan Getz and Jimmy Rowles. ↩︎
- “Andromeda” is a sequel to “Galaxy,” a Jay Chattaway composition written for and performed at the January concert in Atlanta. That performance has never been issued, but a cover of “Galaxy” was featured on a record of the same name issued in 1980 by a group called Riverside Jazz. ↩︎
- DownBeat, May 4, 1978. ↩︎