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LES MCCANN Les McCann is probably best known for his collaboration with saxophonist Eddie Harris on the albums Swiss Movement and Second Movement. Though they did play together occasionally in the two decades following their famous 1968 performance at the Montreux Jazz Festival, such performances were still the exception rather than the rule. McCann did well in the 1960s because his gospel-inflected style of piano fit in well with the popular piano groups led by Ahmad Jamal and Ramsey Lewis. In fact, the lead-off tune on the Hyena disc by McCann, Les Is More, the trio workout “Maleah” is obviously quite influenced by Jamal’s recording “Poinciana.” Next up is a 1967 recording from New York’s Village Gate of McCann performing his song “With These Hands.” Dorn leads into the track with a segment from an interview done by Toronto DJ Ted O’Reilly. Then there is an excellent performance of “Samia” which features Eddie Harris. The performance is quite a bit different from the one on Second Movement, and a real find for fans of both musicians. Roberta Flack was very important in producer Joel Dorn’s career—he won two of his four Grammy awards for work he did with the singer. McCann was instrumental in getting Flack signed to Atlantic Records, and here we get to hear a very early performance by the singer, doing the Sinatra classic “All The Way.” The track was recorded in a small club called Mister Henry’s where Roberta performed for many years before her big break. McCann doesn’t even play on this track, but it’s clearly relevant and a serious piece of musical history that needs to be heard. Similarly, the six-or-so minute montage “Les By Night” is the result of Les’ recording of other major jazz artists in some of the best nightspots around. Included are glimpses of saxophonist Stanley Turrentine (with Joe Sample at the piano) cutting loose on some blues, Cannonball Adderley going from a gorgeous rendition of Leonard Bernstein’s “Somewhere” into a raucous “Oh Babe” at Marty’s On the Hill, and singer Carmen McCrae with Ray Brown on bass having a go at “Satin Doll” at Shelley’s Manne Hole. The recording “Little Blue Volkswagon” done at an outdoor concert in Santa Barbara is a major blues performance, and it serves as a reminder that McCann was a seriously entertaining musician who related well to the audience. Further evidence of that is heard on the hilarious monologue “Bird Story.” I don’t want to reveal too much, but let’s just say it involves a pet shop, Charlie Parker reincarnated as a pet bird, and an attempt to catch a cheating woman. If this isn’t one of the funnier jazz-related stories you’ve ever heard, I’d be damn surprised. I wonder if Les every seriously considered doing stand-up work? The track “Clapformation” features Les on Fender Rhodes and also features a very young Gerald Albright on alto sax. It’s a nice piece and a historic recording, because Les’ group with Albright never made a studio recording. In his notes about going through the five or six hundred tapes that McCann had stashed away somewhere, Joel Dorn says: “Oh, and did I mention that Les closes every set, every set, with ‘Compared to What’? After I heard it about a hundred sixty-two times, I was ready to confess to unsolved murders. So, of course, this disc ends with a performance of “Compared to What”. It’s a familiar song to pretty much everyone, but guess what? It still sounds just as funky, just as earthy, just as real as the first time you heard it. Les could perform it endlessly, it seems, with no loss of enthusiasm. And that’s just why Les Is More.
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