Bud Shank's first leadership session ...

At JazzWax, Bud Shank's first leadership session, "Bud Shank and Three Trombones," a 10-inch album from 1954... https://t.co/aR1RS5pSE1 pic.twitter.com/YVDGSxvHtm

— Marc Myers (@JazzWax) 12 de junho de 2017

Bud Shank, Born 5/27/1926

Bud Shank, Born 5/27/1926, is our Artist of the Week 5/22/17! MORE Jazz Birthdays and #OTD In Jazz DAILY at https://t.co/L7fnyxvTLR pic.twitter.com/AAYHVmH0C2

— Jazz 88.3 San Diego (@Jazz88) 22 de maio de 2017

Bud Shank: Shorty Rogers, 1954

Reprinted from http://jazzwax.com

June 09, 2016

If you're looking for an introduction to West Coast jazz or simply want the pure stuff, Bud Shank's recordings for the Pacific Jazz label in the 1950s are a great place to start. Bud had a sterling, aggressive sound on the alto saxophone, with the feel of a sports car pulling away from the curb. His albums for Pacific Jazz wisely teamed him with top like-minded Los Angeles talent, including Shorty Rogers, Bill Perkins, Bob Cooper, Claude Williamson and others. Yesterday, I spent the day writing while listening to Bud's entire Pacific Jazz output. Each album remains a masterpiece—from a technician's standpoint and from a soul perspective. Bud was always all in—he loved lowering his foot on the proverbial gas pedal—but he also had enormous sensitivity and depth.

The album that stuck in my ear during yesterday's listen was Bud's first leadership date—simply called the Bud Shank Quintet. It featured flugelhornist Shorty Rogers backed by Jimmy Rowles (p) Harry Babasin (b) and Roy Harte (d)—a superb rhythm section. This album was originally recorded for Nocturne as part of its "Jazz in Hollywood" series and reissued later on Pacific Jazz. The enterprising Harte founded both labels as well as Drum City, a leading drum retailer in West Hollywood.

What's fabulous about this album is that all of the songs were composed by Rogers, who had one of the finest lyrical sensibilities of all the West Coast jazz writers-arrangers. We also get to hear Rowles, one of the most elegant and delicate West Coast pianists of the period, and Harte, whose stick and brushwork were terrific. We even get to hear Bud play flute on Lotus Bud. But the real standout on this album was the superb and still underappreciated bassist Harry Babasin. His lines here were meaty, rock-solid confident and smart. So much so that the sound of his bass rises out of the rhythm section to become the third horn. [Photo above of Bud Shank by Roy Harte Jazz Archives/CTSImages]

It's remarkable that 62 years later, this music sounds just as fresh and joyous as it did in 1954. There's no filler. I only wish Bud were still with us so I could call him up to talk about it. For my interviews with Bud, scroll down the right-hand column under JazzWax Interviews for the "Bud Shank" links. [Photo above of Shorty Rogers by Roy Harte Jazz Archives/CTSImages]

JazzWax tracks: You'll find the Bud Shank Quintet playing the compositions of Shorty Rogers as well as three other Bud Shank albums for Pacific Jazz here. If you're feeling flush, spring for the The Pacific Jazz Bud Shank Studio Sessions, a Mosaic box now out of print but available here.

JazzWax clips: Here's Bud Shank and Shorty Rogers on Rogers' ballad Jasmine, which has a These Foolish Things feel...

And here's Just a Few. Dig Bud and Rogers motoring around on this one...

Used with permission by Marc Myers

Bud Shank and the Sax Section

Reprinted from http://jazzman.com
Used with permission by Marc Myers
Whenever a jazz artist is packaged on an album as joining, meeting or leading a "sax section," I'm instantly hooked. In every case, the result is exciting, since no one in his right mind would be paired with a sax section unless the results and collective talent were sterling. Examples of this approach that come to mind include Al Cohn and the Sax Section (1956), Coleman Hawkins Meets the Saxophone Section (1958) and That's Right: Nat Adderley and the Big Sax Section (1960).

Then, of course, there was Supersax, starting in 1972, playing dense-packed arrangements of Charlie Parker solos. I recently discovered another album in this category that, like the other sax summit efforts, is terrific: Bud Shank and the Sax Section (1968).

Using the phrase "the sax section" in an album title carries major connotations and responsibilities. The implications always are that the reeds separately and together are all muscle, that the tracks on the album are shrewdly chosen and that the arrangements are tight and adventurous to the ear. All are certainly the case with this Bud Shank album.

The West Coast band assembled for the Pacific Jazz date featured Bud Shank and Bill Perkins (alto saxes), Bob Hardaway and Bob Cooper (tenor saxes), Jack Nimitz and John Lowe (baritone and bass saxes), Dennis Budimir (guitar), Ray Brown (bass) and Larry Bunker (drums). Bob Florence [pictured] handled the arrangements and conducted the band.

Bud Shank had a split musical personality during the 1960s. On the one hand he could tear your heart out with edgy playing on ballads and up-tempo pieces. But Bud also could lay back and surf melodies beautifully. He recorded this album in the middle of a highly commercial period for Pacific Jazz. At the time he was recording bossa nova albums (Brasil! Brasil! Brasil!) and LPs that tried to capitalize on the surging rock trend (A Spoonful of Jazz and Magical Mystery). Some were more successful than others and all had heart.

Tracks on The Sax Section include Summer Samba, On a Clear Day, the Sidewinder and And I Love Her. As you can see, the material was all over the lot hoping to appeal to everyone. And yet the album works, largely because of Bob Florence's arrangements and the shrewd doubling of the baritone and bass sax parts, which give the charts heft at the bottom.

Florence also had the good sense to widen out the voicings and extend the counterpoint—making the section sound like a full band rather than one instrument. The overall sound remains wonderfully reedy and flighty. Interestingly, Jack Nimitz was the sole member of this sax section who wound up as a member of Supersax.

JazzWax tracks: Unfortunately Bud Shank and the Sax Section album isn't available on CD. Blue Note, which owns the Pacific Jazz catalog, should really consider re-issuing it. In fact, since we're on the subject, a box of Bud's 1960s World Pacific albums is in order. The album is available on eBay and Amazon from independent sellers as a vinyl LP. A special JazzWax thanks David Langner and Wen Mew.

Ex-Centrum Jazz Port Townsend Artistic Director Bud Shank Dies at 82

PORT TOWNSEND -- Bud Shank, former artistic director of Centrum's Jazz Port Townsend program and a renowned alto jazz saxophonist whose career spanned 60 years, has died at his home in Tucson, Ariz.
He was 82.

Cause of death was listed as pulmonary failure.
While Shank had “some ongoing health issues," according to JazzTimes.com, the Web site said a few days before his death last Thursday he had been in San Diego, recording a new album.
Funeral arrangements were pending.
Born May 27, 1926, in Dayton, Ohio, Clifford Everett “Bud" Shank tried his hand at a variety of woodwinds before settling on the saxophone.
He attended college in North Carolina and worked with saxophonist Charlie Barnet before moving to California in the late 1940s, where he played with trumpeter Shorty Rogers and then pianist Stan Kenton.

He was one of the early stars of Kenton's Innovations in Modern Music band and was closely associated with the emergence of swinging “West Coast" jazz in the 1950s.
Working with guitarist Laurindo Almeida, Shank was also one of the first jazz musicians to explore Brazilian music.
In the late 1970s, a revitalized jazz scene saw Shank emerge with a new quartet, LA 4, which included guitarist Laurindo Almeida and bassist Ray Brown.
Always exploring new musical frontiers, Shank also played with India's star sitar-player Ravi Shankar, Japanese kotoist Kimio Eto and London's Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Shank cut a number of albums for the international music label World Pacific from the 1950s to the '70s.

In 2005 he formed the Bud Shank Big Band in Los Angeles.
He was scheduled to headline at the Tucson Jazz Society's spring series of concerts later this month.
He was honored in 2008 by the Tucson group and the Los Angeles Jazz Society with their lifetime achievement awards.
“Shank's cool but always strongly swinging sound has made him one of a handful of saxophone players with an instantly recognizable and always exciting sound," the Tucson Jazz Society said in its award citation.

“Bud Shank has more than earned his status as a legend."
http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/news.php?id=33347