From: smg+@cs.cmu.edu (Stephen Guattery)
Subject: Re: D. Gillespie records
Organization: School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1993 17:18:35 GMT

marvo@cbnewsk.cb.att.com (ronald.f.roberts) writes:
>...Chronologically, the late 1940's recordings with
>Carlie Parker (Bird) represent some samples of the important revolutionary 
>(at that time) bebop that Dizzy and Bird almost singlehandedly created. You
>may notice that in the Savoy recordings, Dizzy even plays the piano on the
>important date when Bird first led a group including Miles Davis.
>

Some additional information on the early (c. 1945) Gillespie-Parker
collaborations:  The ones I like best are the recordings made for Guild
under Gillespie's name.  There are about seven tunes: "Groovin' High",
"Hot House", "Salt Peanuts", "Shaw 'Nuff", "All the Things You Are",
"Dizzy Atmosphere", and "Lover Man" (the last with vocal by Sarah Vaughan).
These used to be available on an LP twofer called "In the Beginning" on one
of the Fantasy labels.  That set also included a bunch of Gillespie big band
recordings from the late '40's.  Most of the contents of that set (19 of 23
items) were issued on a Musicraft CD (under Gillespie's name) entitled "Shaw
'Nuff".  Don't know if either of these are still in print.  Savoy reissued
some (though not all) of the Guild sides on LP in the '50's; maybe Denon
will reissue that LP on CD (maybe they've done it already - what's on the
"Groovin' High" CD Denon's put out?).

Of the Parker material issued by Savoy before the Denon takeover, Gillespie
played only on the late 1945 session that produced "Koko".  He plays very
little trumpet on this session - only the intro and coda to "Koko".  As Ron
notes, he played piano on the rest of the session (with the exception of
"Thrivin' From a Riff" ("Anthropology"), on which Sadik Hakim  played piano).
Someone posted a while ago that this entire session has been reissued on CD
by Denon/Savoy; I don't know the title, though - maybe someone can fill that
in.  Not something to pick up if you're looking for Diz's trumpet playing.

If you're interested in early Gillespie and the development of bebop, there's
a great collection put out by the Smithsonian that covers Gillespie recordings
from about 1940 up to about 1946.  It's called "The Development of an
American Artist" and as far as I know it's only available as a 2-LP set.
Really interesting if you're a bop fan.

Finally, some comments on a couple of the recordings Ron listed from recdb:

>As a leader:
>Parker, Charlie - Charlie Parker On Dial (Stateside Records-Spotlite 1989, CD)
>Parker, Charlie - The Legendary Dial Masters, Vol. 1/2        (Stash 1989, CD)

As is clear if you perused the full recdb listing included in the original
post, these have only one track with Gillespie ("Diggin' Diz" from the first
scheduled Parker/Gillespie Dial session).  The second Dial session (which
Parker missed) is included on "Development of an American Artist".

>Parker, Charlie - C. Parker-D. Gillespie Bebop's Heartbeat    (Savoy 1986, CD)

This went out of print when Denon bought Savoy.  It includes a late 1945
recording session under Slim Gaillard's leadership that included Parker and
Gillespie, and a recording of a 1947 Carnegie Hall concert that "reunited"
Parker and Gillespie.  I like the concert recording a lot.  It's five(?)
bop classics played at incredible tempos, and there is some really nice
playing by Gillespie.  The recording is pretty bad, though.  I'm not sure if
it's in print anywhere.  If it is, check the format.  The Savoy release
included complete recordings of the performances, which were too long to
fit on a standard 78.  The material was originally released on bootleg 78s;
most numbers were issued on two side as Part I and Part II, and parts of
Gillespie's solos were lost in the breaks between the sides.  I've heard of
reissues in this format, which are not very good if you want to hear Gillespie.

					Steve Guattery
					smg@cs.cmu.edu
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