Norman Grantz Pioneer of Afro Cuban Jazz - Obituario

Latin Beat Magazine, March, 2002 by Max Salazar

On Thursday, November 22, 2001, jazz impresario Norman Grantz died of cancer in Geneva, Switzerland at age 83. Famed for his Jazz At The Philharmonic concerts of the late '40s and '50s which were heard worldwide, he took jazz musicians out of small clubs and into larger concert halls and theatres and insisted that audiences be seated together regardless of their race. Between 1941-44 he served in the U.S. Army. On July 2, 1944, he produced his first concert at the Los Angeles Philharmonic Auditorium and its financial success secured its continuation and thereafter it was known as JATP (Jazz at the Philharmonic). Grantz produced his own records and there were moments when musicians allegedly didn't know they were being recorded.

Trumpeter Howard McGhee, a jazz star of the '40s, was interviewed by this writer on April 11, 1980 in his NYC apartment. He began his tale with 1945, when he joined the Coleman Hawkins band in Los Angeles. "While with Hawk, Norman Grantz hired the band for a JATP concert. One of the tunes we played was How High the Moon. One day, while walking on a Los Angeles street, I heard it and it sounded like me on trumpet. I knew I didn't record it. I went to the musicians union to see what I could do about it. I was told that as long as he paid me scale I could do nothing. I wasn't satisfied with the $70 he paid me even though it was double the scale. He never told us we would be recorded. I blew on the tunes Perdido, Mordido and Endido. When we finished the JATP tour, Norman told us he had a check for us. He gave me a check for $100, since Perdido was about to be released. Right after Endido was in record stores, I got $100 more. The concert was in September 1947 at NYC's Carnegie Hall. All of those tunes were performed on the same night. We were paid for a concert but didn't know it was also a recording. The musicians were paid the union scale of $40 for the concert and an additional $300 for three recordings which was triple the union's recording scale."

The recordings were released on Grantz's Philo and Asch labels and from 1948 to 1951 on the Mercury label. In 1951 he formed the Clef label and three years later Norgran. Regarding McGhee's allegations, the truth was that Grantz negotiated an agreement with the American Federation of Musicians that allowed him to record his shows despite the fact that recordings could have release delays.

In the fall of 1948, Grantz became the producer and distributor for Mercury Records and the first sessions he produced were the Machito and the Afro Cubans 78 RPMs that were released in 1948 and '49. Grantz signed Machito to a contract after hearing the band at Bop City, then located at 49th Street & Broadway above the Turf Restaurant (next door to Jack Dempsey's famous eatery).

Probably the most significant recording took place on December 20, 1948 at NYC's Reeves Studio when the over six-minute Tanga was split in Parts 1 & 2. Grantz wanted the fiery Tanga for his The Jazz Scene album, 12 tracks on 12-inch 78 RPMs, along with 8x10 photos of the musicians involved. The following month tenor saxophonist Flip Phillips was added and soloed during a 5-minute and six-second version of Tanga, which replaced the 2-part December 20th session. To promote The Jazz Scene, a concert was staged on February 11, 1949 at Carnegie Hall. On the bill was Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, Neal Hefti, Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins, Bud Powell and the Machito Orchestra, which featured Flip Phillips' arousing solo on Tanga.

"We stole the show with Tanga," said a smiling Mario Bauzá years later. Grantz secretly recorded the concert and included the version of Tanga on his album. (In the motion picture "Bugsy" which starred Warren Beatty and was released during the '90s, jazz impresario Bill Graham portrayed Lucky Luciano and is seen dancing to Machito's Tanga, the same Carnegie Hall live version).

The following month, Down Beat magazine published Michael Levin's Diggin' The Discs column at the time a 78-RPM disc sold for eighty cents. "The Jazz Scene, probably the most remarkable record album ever issued, even to its price ($25), is now out, the slightly delayed love child of JATP promoter Norman Grantz. He has talked about, dreamed of and worked on this album for well over 3 years. To my personal knowledge, he has well over $12,000 of his own dough invested in its production. Assuming that all five thousand copies of the limited edition are sold, he can't possibly do more than break even." Along with a photo of Machito and José Mangual was Grantz's notes regarding Tanga: "During the past two years, a new influence along with Bop has come up called Afro Cuban rhythm. Without question, the finest exponent of this type of music is Machito and his band. One of the chief reasons for this is that the band has steadfastly adhered to a policy of playing only what it felt to be a true interpretation of its music in an authentic and faithfulness to true Cuban rhythm. Mario Bauzá in fact directs the band, though led by Machito. Bauzá for many years with Chick Webb and Cab Calloway, is a thoroughly schooled musician with a feel for the Cuban, plus the necessary affinity for modern jazz. The heart of Machito's band is its rhythm section. Here, that wondrous counterpoint between the various rhythm instruments is set up, but the whole meshes together to produce a beat that never stops swinging and being exciting. Tanga is a Cuban tune. This recording initially features the vocal of Machito, then the oriental-like alto of Gene Johnson, and finally the emotional tenor solo by Flip Phillips who was added to the band for this recording. That Afro-Cuban music can incorporate jazz within its framework is amply displayed here. In fact, both profit from the association." (Norman Grantz).