Savannah College of Art and Design/Courtesy of Savannah Music Festival
by PATRICK JARENWATTANANON, June 06, 2013 8:00 AMWe jazz fans tend to filter through a lot of names. For every Sonny Rollins or Wes Montgomery on the cover of an album, there might be two, three, four, five, eight, 14 more musicians backing him or her. Slowly, we begin to string together the works of these sidemen, too: what they're capable of, with whom they recorded, in what circles they appeared to run. Somewhere, we know this isn't the complete story, but sometimes, it's all we have to start thinking of one.
To evaluate the late bassist Ben Tucker on that criterion would reveal some impressive credits. He played bass in Billy Taylor's trio for years. He's on records by Art Pepper and Warne Marsh made in Southern California. He's on dates led by Gerry Mulligan, Grant Green and Quincy Jones made in New York City. The recording log alone reveals every indication of a first-rate player during a fertile period in music.
Look a little further on the credits and you'll see he was a composer, as well. His blues "Comin' Home Baby" was recorded by a jazz group led by drummer Dave Bailey in October 1961; the next month, Tucker was again present when flutist Herbie Mann recorded it live in concert. Mann's version became a hit, but not the Top 40 success that reluctant vocalist Mel Tormé enjoyed when Tucker worked with Bob Dorough to create a lyric for the tune. Among the hundreds of Tucker's songwriting credits, "Comin' Home Baby" remains his biggest commercial success — it was even recently recorded by Michael Bublé.
Read more: http://www.npr.org/blogs/ablogsupreme/2013/06/06/188967302/ben-tucker-remembering-a-bassist-and-citywide-icon?ft=3&f=126134671&sc=nl&cc=jn-20130609
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