Lars Hoel

39 posts

Producer, Music Inside Out with Gwen Thompkins

Little Richard 1932-2020

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COSIMO MATASSA, Record producer In his studio in 1958 Photo taken 6/11/1958

News of Little Richard’s death at the age of 87 is especially sad news for us here in New Orleans. Although a Georgia native, Richard Penniman recorded many of his most famous hits right here at Cosimo Matassa’s J&M Recording studio.

Songs like “Tutti Frutti,” “Long Tall Sally,” “Lucille,” “Good Golly Miss Molly” and “Keep A Knockin” blew the lid off the Fifties, according to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Little Richard was one of the Hall’s first inductees in 1986.

Rock critic Dave Marsh wrote that Richard’s shouting and singing “paid tribute to the gospel women from whom he snitches at least as many licks as the Beatles ever stole from him.” In 1989 Marsh ranked “Tutti Frutti” number nine on his list of the 1001 greatest singles ever made.

Those early hits are classics to be sure, but for some reason we often return to a duet he did with country singer Tanya Tucker on an obscure MCA compilation from 1994, Rhythm, Country & Blues. Here’s a live performance of that song, Eddie Cochran’s “Somethin’ Else,” at the 1994 CMA Awards:

It’s also worth tracking down this album for its fine version of Allen Toussaint‘s “Southern Nights,” with the maestro himself on piano and vocals, and a buttery smooth Chet Atkins on guitar.

Oh, and did we mention Aaron Neville and Trisha Yearwood singing “I Fall To Pieces” on that same album? Check it!

It’s funny how Little Richard sent us free associating once again. But he did have that effect of taking us out of ourselves. Woooo!

Terence Blanchard Hosts “Up From the Streets”

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Mark your calendar: New Orleans composer and trumpeter Terence Blanchard will be coming to your home in just a few days. No need to clean up the place, however. Blanchard is hosting the award-winning New Orleans documentary, “Up From the Streets.” This “virtual cinema release” will begin streaming on May 14.

Here’s how it works: Tickets to watch the film are $12 each. They’re available from over 75 participating movie theaters in the U.S. Your ticket will be good for seven days, and you’ll have 72 hours to finish the film once you’ve started watching. A list of participating theaters (and virtual tickets) is available online.

The idea, of course, is to support your local independent movie theater while sheltering safely in place. But a portion of the proceeds also goes to the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation’s Music Relief Fund. This initiative supports Louisiana musicians who’ve lost income during the pandemic. So it’s a win-win-win.

Up from the Streets: New Orleans: The City of Music (Trailer)

“Up From the Streets” is both a history and celebration of the music of New Orleans. It premiered last October at the New Orleans Film Festival. The festival jury nominated it for best feature-length Louisiana documentary. Awards at other festivals in Los Angeles, Washington, DC and Houston followed.

Terence Blanchard is on-camera host and narrator. “Up From the Streets” has interviews by Harry Connick Jr., Wynton and Bradford Marsalis, Aaron Neville, Robert Plant, Keith Richards, Sting, Allen Toussaint and Bonnie Raitt among others. Such legends as Louis Armstrong, Fats Domino, Dr. John, The Neville Brothers, and, of course, The Preservation Hall Jazz Band appear in archival and newly filmed performances.

Michael Murphy is the producer and director. His previous New Orleans documentary was 2005’s “Make it Funky.”

Sweet Crude’s New Album

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Good news: Sweet Crude’s newest album just came out: Officiel/Artificiel.

And there’s even more good news: Sam Craft, Alexis Marceaux and Skyler Stroup of Sweet Crude have recovered from coronavirus. The group had just ended a tour through Alabama and Florida when the band members fell ill, according to NOLA.com.

Sweet Crude – Officiel/Artificiel (Visualizer)

To be honest, Officiel/Artificiel has been out since April 24, but we’ve been, shall we say, a bit distracted. Meanwhile Sweet Crude has been busy, giving interviews to Billboard, OffBeat Magazine and our friends at NPR, among others.

Unfortunately, all that activity doesn’t include touring to support the album. Like musicians everywhere, Sweet Crude has had to lean on streaming technology to get the word out. Here’s Alexis and Sam performing the title track of Officiel/Artificiel … unplugged.

As Sam Craft told NPR’s Ailsa Chang, “We understand that there’s a huge community of musicians in New Orleans who are needing to totally reinvent their business. But what we see is that the fact that we’re all in the same boat has led us to supporting each other, in the digital way that we can. We’re used to disasters happening down here — usually of the hurricane variety — but we know the value of reaching out to one another and helping each other is priceless.”

Happy Birthday Duke Ellington

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It’s Duke Ellington’s 121st birthday today, and what better excuse to listen to his New Orleans Suite — which, as it turns out, is 50 years old this month.

George Wein commissioned this composition, released on LP in 1970, for that year’s New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. It won a Grammy the following year for Best Jazz Performance by a Big Band.

The suite includes “portraits” of Sidney Bechet, Mahalia Jackson and Louis Armstrong, along with a lesser known New Orleans artist: Wellman Braud. Braud played upright bass and tuba with Ellington in the 1920s and 30s. Branford Marsalis credits Braud with being one of the first “walking bass” players. And if that’s not enough cred, he’s distantly related to the Marsalis family.

The album contains the final recordings of alto saxophonist Johnny Hodges, who died halfway through its completion. The gently-swinging “Blues for New Orleans” features Hodges’ last recorded solo. (It’s rumored he would have played his rarely-heard soprano saxophone on “Portrait of Sydney Bechet.”)

Three weeks before his death Hodges, along with the rest of Ellington’s orchestra, gave “Blues for New Orleans” its JazzFest premiere on April 25th, 1970 at the Municipal Auditorium.

So, happy birthday Duke Ellington … and happy belated birthday to his New Orleans Suite.

Sylvan Esso – WITH

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It’s been a while since we checked in with our favorite electronic pop duo, Sylvan Esso, to see what they’ve been up to.

Turns out, a lot.

Last year they decided to set out on a limited run of tour dates as a ten-piece band, featuring eight musicians and friends. We were lucky enough to catch the opening concert of the With Tour at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in L.A. and it was wonderful:

If you weren’t able to attend any of the live shows (or if you’d like to re-live them), you’re in luck! A full-length concert film premieres on YouTube this Thursday, April 23rd at 9pm Eastern.

Here’s Amelia and Nick with a preview:

“We knew that in order to put on the best show we possibly could in a few short weeks we had to truly lean on and trust the friends we had asked to become part of our band. The end result – as with so many communal efforts – was much greater than the sum of its parts, in ways we could have never dreamed of. The world has completely shifted in a few months – the idea of togetherness rings in a different way. It was such a special moment that now feels like a signpost of how things were and how they could be again.”

Sylvan Esso hopes that this spirit of togetherness will inspire people to have watch parties to check out the film while maintaining social distancing. They invite anyone interested to head over to their website to sign up. They promise to send “send all the (easy!) details to you on Wednesday.”

We can’t wait!

Stay Away

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We love Randy Newman here in New Orleans. Of course, the songs “Louisiana 1927” and “Dixie Flyer” come to mind immediately.

The first became something of an anthem after Hurricane Katrina. Newman’s “Dixie Flyer” is the autobiographical tale of his childhood commute from L.A. to LA and “the land of dreams.”

Then there’s Newman’s iconic score for “The Princess and the Frog,” the 2009 animated feature set in New Orleans.

So when we learned of a new Randy Newman video — one addressing the Covid-19 pandemic — of course we had to watch:

Proceeds from the video support the Ellis Marsalis Center for Music‘s efforts to broaden opportunities for underserved children and young musicians in New Orleans’ Ninth Ward.

We love you, Randy! But please … stay (six feet) away.

#EDayLive

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For more than three decades, Friday night was Ellis Marsalis night at Snug Harbor Jazz Bistro in New Orleans.

Tonight, in a way, it still is.

In December, 2019, the 85 year old jazz patriarch announced he was stepping away from his weekly commitment, calling it “exhausting.” But Marsalis still planned to appear at the club a couple times a month as a “special guest.”

Ellis Marsalis died on April 1st, 2020 and now Snug Harbor is honoring his memory with a virtual Friday night concert series, starting tonight at 8:00 pm, CDT.

The players include saxophonist Derek Douget, bassist Jason Stewart and trumpeter Ashlin Parker, along with percussionist Jason Marsalis. They’ll all be performing from their respective homes, streaming on the Snug Harbor Facebook page.

Here’s the band to explain:

If, like some of us, you missed the opportunity to hear Ellis Marsalis at Snug … now’s your chance to make up for it by helping some local musicians honor his memory. And don’t forget the virtual tip jar.

What’s on Meschiya’s Playlist?

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This week we’re reconnecting with New Orleans chanteuse Meschiya Lake after a seven year hiatus. Much has happened in that interim, to say the least. She’s a new mother. And she’s got a new album; a collaboration with Danish saxophonist Søren Siegumfeldt.

Of course, like all musicians in New Orleans and elsewhere, Meschiya Lake is idle due to the global pandemic.

So what’s she been listening to?

In my daily rotation learning on guitar is a song called, “Blackbird,” by an Irish artist named Lisa O’Neill, but also is “Dumb Blonde,” by Dolly Parton! Two complete ends of the spectrum. One is like, [sings] really beautiful and minor key and then there is Dolly talking about “you may think I’m a dumb blonde.”

Naturally we wanted to take a closer listen to these two songs. Here’s “Blackbird”:

And here’s the inimitable Dolly Parton, suffering through an intro by the forgettable Bobby Lord on his TV show in 1967:

Five Albums We Love

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Tough times call for time-tested music. Here are five albums we’ve listened to over and over again throughout the years — on vinyl, compact disc, streaming … some even on cassette!

We’re not saying these are the best in whatever musical category they happen to occupy. Nor do we claim each album’s the best offering from that particular artist. “Best” is not a debate we want to get into.

What each album offers is good company. A musical sanctuary for those who just need to make the rest of the world disappear for about 40 minutes or so.

1. Dr. John, Gumbo

Hard to believe this recording’s almost fifty years old! The songs on Gumbo are so different from the pop and jazz of the early 70s they might as well have landed from outer space. They had — and have — an infectious, driving, carefree yet wistful quality that’s a defining characteristic of New Orleans music. And co-produced by Harold Battiste, how could they not?

While Gumbo is available online and on CD it’s worth seeking out a vinyl copy (either the 1972 Atco original or the 1986 Alligator re-issue) in order to read Dr. John’s liner notes, strangely missing from the other formats.

2. Fats Domino, Greatest Hits: Walking To New Orleans

They’re all here: “Blueberry Hill” … “I’m Walkin'” … “Blue Monday” … the songs you need to get you through these hard times. Bonus activity: put “Ain’t That A Shame” on repeat, pick up a saxophone and pretend you’re Herb Hardesty.

3. King Curtis & Champion Jack Dupree, Blues at Montreux

Recorded live at the Montreux Jazz Festival, Montreux, Switzerland on June 17, 1971, but it could’ve been a decade earlier at the Drop on LaSalle. Everybody’s having so much fun here. On “Junker’s Blues” Jack plays fast and loose with the 12-bar format, dropping a measure here and adding one there as the band struggles to keep up. “When it comes to bars,” he says, “the only ones I know about are those you drink in and those in prison cells. I don’t count bars, I play by feeling.”

4. Aaron Neville, My True Story

Produced by Don Was and Keith Richards, with Richards on guitar, this album of doo-wop standards may seem as far removed from New Orleans as you can get. But oh, that voice. That soul, that wellspring of controlled emotion. “These songs helped to mold me into who I am,” says Aaron Neville. “They’re all dear to my heart, and they rode with me, in my bones, through all these years.”

We could listen all day long.

5. Allen Toussaint, American Tunes

I’m not sure, but I’m almost positive, that all music came from New Orleans.
Ernie K-Doe, 1979

We referenced this on a recent blog post featuring Paul Simon’s timely video, “American Tune Til Further Notice.” Now it’s time to play the record in its entirety. While you’re listening you may want to read an insightful revue by another virtuoso New Orleans pianist, Tom McDermott. A fitting testimonial to an astonishing career. Thanks, Mr. Toussaint, for helping us get though this period of isolation and loss with your unyielding optimism and matchless grace.

New Orleans Jazz Patriarch Ellis Marsalis 1934-2020

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“Ellis Marsalis” by gamelaner is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Ellis Marsalis, Jr. has died at the age of 85. His legacy as a performer, teacher and patriarch of one of the great musical families in jazz is immeasurable. Marsalis was a mentor to a Who’s Who of jazz luminaries: Terence Blanchard, Donald Harrison Jr., Harry Connick Jr., Nicholas Payton, Kent Jordan, Marlon Jordan, Victor Goines, and Jon Batiste. Four of his sons have become jazz notables in their own right: Wynton, Branford, Delfeayo and Jason Marsalis.

We have an interview with Marsalis and it’s ready for broadcast and streaming right now. Navigate to the Listen menu and scroll to find Ellis Marsalis Jr.

MIO host Gwen Thompkins talked about Ellis Marsalis with NPR’s Rachel Martin for Morning Edition:

Though mentored many famous names in jazz,, Marsalis saw himself more as a facilitator than an educator:

EM: “…if you can facilitate the student through the material that you use to teach and recommend – ’cause a lot of stuff you recommend are things that you may not have on the spot if we are talking about music. You can tell a student, “Look, what you need to do, you need to go listen to standards.” Now, here is somebody who has been spending all their time trying to play like John Coltrane, so you say, “Hey man, that is okay, but you need to go and check out Sonny Rollins.” Become more like a facilitator.”

Paul, George, Maurice and Oscar

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It’s Paul Whiteman‘s birthday today, and this obscure fact sent us down a virtual rabbit hole of free association…

Once hailed as “The King of Jazz,” Paul Whiteman (1890-1967) had one of the most popular dance bands of the 1920s and 30s in this country. And it was big — at a time when most orchestras topped out at six to ten players, Whiteman’s sometimes boasted as many as 35, including strings. In 1922 he managed 28 bands on the East Coast, earning him over a million dollars. (Fifteen million today, adjusted for inflation.) Not bad for a viola player from Denver.

Today, if Paul Whiteman is remembered at all, it’s for introducing the world to George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue.

Rhapsody in Blue — which Whiteman commissioned — premiered at an afternoon concert on Tuesday, February 12, 1924 in New York City’s Aeolian Hall. Whiteman called his concert “An Experiment in Modern Music.” Rhapsody was second to last on a long and tendentious program. According to Wikipedia, many important and influential musicians of the time were present, including Sergei Rachmaninoff, Igor Stravinsky, Fritz Kreisler, Leopold Stokowski, John Philip Sousa, and Willie “the Lion” Smith. Gershwin himself was the soloist.

In 1984 the late conductor Maurice Peress set out to recreate the entire concert in a recording with pianists Ivan Davis (Rhapsody soloist) and Dick Hyman. It’s a treat to hear the work in its original jazz band orchestration with banjo and saxophones. It’s also worth seeking out the physical CD for the excellent liner notes by Peress.

So many recordings of Rhapsody have been made over the years, but our favorite will always be the one featuring the pianist, celebrity and professional hypochondriac Oscar Levant. A music critic once asked him if Gershwin’s music would still be around in a hundred years. Levant famously replied, “If George is around, it will.”

Sadly, no videos seem to exist of Levant playing Rhapsody. But there is a memorable scene in “An American In Paris” featuring that other Gershwin masterpiece, Concerto in F … and a lot of Oscars:

About that “King of Jazz” title? Some critics have called Whiteman’s ornately orchestrated music “pseudo-jazz,” lacking the improvisational and emotional depth of true jazz. But in his autobiography, Duke Ellington declared, “Paul Whiteman was known as the King of Jazz, and no one as yet has come near carrying that title with more certainty and dignity.”

Well, if the Duke said so, that’s all right with us.

Happy Birthday, Carol Kaye

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In the words of Dr. John, “Carol Kaye is a sweetheart and a kick-a– guitar player as well as a kick-a– bass player!”

You may not recognize the name but you’ve heard her on literally thousands of recordings, TV themes and movie scores. A member of L.A.’s legendary Wrecking Crew, Carol Kaye stood out in that group of virtuoso studio musicians as one of its very few women.

From CarolKaye.com:

“Carol Kaye was born [Ed. note: March 24th, 1935] in Everett, Washington to musician parents, Clyde and Dot Smith, both professionals. She has played and taught guitar professionally since 1949, played bebop jazz guitar in dozens of nightclubs around Los Angeles … accidentally got into studio work late 1957 with the Sam Cooke recordings.

“In 1963 when a Fender bassist didn’t show up for a record date at Capitol Records, she picked up the Fender bass (as it was called then) and augmented her busy schedule playing bass and grew quickly to be the number one call with record companies, movie and TV people, commercials and industrial films.”

So Much Music

The list of Carol Kaye’s credits on electric bass is truly mind-boggling: The Beach Boys … Phil Spector … Quincy Jones … Frank Sinatra (and Nancy Sinatra) … Ray Charles … Sonny and Cher … Diana Ross and the Temptations … as well as New Orleans own Soul Queen, Irma Thomas. And Mahalia Jackson. By her count, over 10,000!

As Taj Mahal said to Carol when they both appeared at Seattle’s Museum of Pop Culture, “Carol Kaye, you are the best!“

Here’s a 2013 interview with Carol Kaye by the Snapshots Music & Arts Foundation:

American Tune Til Further Notice

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The amazing Paul Simon‘s new video is just what we need right now.

This reminds us of Allen Toussaint‘s posthumous album, American Tunes. According to Nonesuch Records, the title song was the last track cut in the final session for the disc.

In 2009, Toussaint gave viewers of Austin City Limits a preview.

Happy Birthday, Marcia Ball

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They say it’s impolite to ask a woman her age, but Marcia Ball’s talent is ageless. She was born in Orange, Texas on March 20 and raised in Vinton (Motto: Gateway to Cajun Country), Louisiana.

Music Inside Out last heard from Marcia Ball on our February 13th program, but a lot has happened in the world since then, to say the least. Here’s what she has to say on the subject: