Killer Joe, arranged by Quincy Jones

On the YouTube Page:

Here is the quintessentially cool arrangement of “Killer Joe” by Quincy Jones. Enjoy my Remix/Remaster of this 1969 jazz classic.

Background information provided by Bruce Scott:
"Killer Joe" was written by the legendary tenor sax, composer and arranger, Benny Golson. The latter and Quincy Jones are very close friends. This classic tune is from the LP entitled "Walking In Space" (A&M/CTI 3023), which was released in stereo on November 19th, 1969. "Killer Joe" was recorded on June 18th, 1969 at the Van Gelder Studios, in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. Recording Engineer: Rudy Van Gelder. Produced by Creed Taylor.

“Walking in Space” is a 1969 studio album by Quincy Jones The album was recorded for A&M and features an iconic photo of Quincy by Pete Turner who made some of the most famous A&M album covers. "Killer Joe" features Ray Brown on bass and Grady Tate on drums, an early example of a strong jazz rhythm section in pop music.

I had the half-speed mastered audiophile pressing of this album. I never cared for its lopsided stereo mix, where most everything was slammed into the right channel, save the reeds and muted trumpets, which were the only thing in the left channel.

In my mix, I kept the drums in the right channel, but the swapped channels of the instruments, putting the horns, woodwinds and guitar on the left channel with the reeds and muted trumpets on the right with the drums, so it’s a much more balanced mix. I panned the female vocalists in the right channel. [It was very boring having them centered]. The bass was originally slightly right justified, so I panned it dead-center for better balance and reduced it by 10%.

It appears to have been recorded on older 1st generation transistorized solid-state equipment due to the very sterile and distorted audio quality. The original bi-polar stereo mix was most likely done on the old 4-track mastering system as well. Having been compressed for LP mastering compromised the dynamics quite a bit. I cleaned it up and expanded the dynamic range to brighten it up and bring it into the new millennium.

Personnel on this recording:
• Quincy Jones - conductor, arranger 
• Freddie Hubbard, Lloyd Michaels, Dick Williams, John Frosk, Marvin Stamm, Snooky Young – trumpets
• Jimmy Cleveland, J. J. Johnson, Alan Raph, Tony Studd, Norman Pride, Kai Winding – trombones
• Joel Kaye, Roland Kirk, Hubert Laws, Jerome Richardson – reeds
• Paul Griffin - piano
• Eric Gale - electric guitar
• Ray Brown - double bass
• Grady Tate – drums
• Bob James - electric piano
• Hubert Laws - flute, tenor sax
• Toots Thielemans - guitar
• Bernard Purdie - drums
• Hilda Harris, Marilyn Jackson & Maretha Stewart - vocals

Technical Information:
I used SpectraLayers PRO-7 to isolate the Vocals, Orchestra, Drums, Bass & Piano into 5 separate tracks. Adobe Audition was used for Dynamic Range recovery, Delay, Reverb, EQ, and final mixdown. NERO 2019 Platinum used to generate the final video.

The Greatest Night in Pop [Media Notes 174]

Ian Leslie writes about The Greatest Night in Pop, a documentary about the making of "We Are The World." The opening paragraphs:

The Netflix documentary, The Greatest Night In Pop, tells the story of the making of We Are The World, the 1985 charity single featuring (almost) everyone in American pop at the time: Michael Jackson, Lionel Richie, Stevie Wonder, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, Diana Ross, Cyndi Lauper, Tina Turner, Billy Joel, Dionne Warwick…the list goes on and on.

The documentary is based on hours of footage from the night they recorded the single, only a few minutes of which was used for the original music video. The Greatest Night In Pop (TGNIP) came out eighteen months ago, and while millions of people have viewed it, I’m constantly surprised to learn that many have not. Everyone should.

If I had to recommend a documentary or just ‘something to watch on TV’ for absolutely anyone - man or woman, old or young, liberal or conservative, highbrow or lowbrow - I’d recommend The Greatest Night In Pop. It may not be the deepest, most profound ninety minutes of TV, but it is irresistibly enjoyable. And actually, like the best pop, it is deep; it just doesn’t pretend to be.

Diversity and roles:

I’ve written before about how diversity needs to be interpreted beyond demographic attributes like race and gender to temperament and personality. The British management researcher Meredith Belbin constructed a famous inventory of behavioural types which together make up a successful team: the Resource Investigator, the Coordinator, the Shaper, the Catalyst, and so on.

TGNIP prompted me to come up with an inventory of my own: the Decider, the Connector, the Conscience, the Old Buck, the Disrupter, the Weirdo, and the Lover.

The players:

• The Decider: Quincy Jones
• The Connector: Lionel Richie
• The Conscience: Bob Geldof
• The Old Buck: Smokey robinson
• The Disrupter: Stevie Wonder
• The Weirdo: Bob Dylan
• The Lover: Diana Ross

H/t Tyler Cowen.

The Greatest Night in Pop [Media Notes 132]

The Greatest Night in Pop (2024) is a documentary about making “We Are the World” in 1985. Harry Belafonte initiated the project in December of 1984 and it was recorded a month later between January 22 and 28 of 1985.

From Brian Tallerico at Roger Ebert:

After that kind-of-generic VH1 intro segment, when everyone gets to the studio, “The Greatest Night in Pop” lives up to its potential. There’s tons of footage from the night and some great trivia, much of it shared by participants like Sheila E., Bruce Springsteen, Huey Lewis, and Smokey Robinson, who reveals how he talked Jackson out of some bad lyric changes because he was one of the people not scared to stand up to the King of Pop. From Richie’s eating habits to Dylan’s apprehension at the vocal range to changing lyrics in the moment, those who love music process docs will be enraptured. Music bio-docs may be running out of steam, but “The Greatest Night in Pop” works by being specific and enlightening.

Richard Roeper, The Chicago Sun-Times:

With Quincy Jones producing and a handwritten sign saying, “CHECK YOUR EGO AT THE DOOR,” the 46-member super-group knocked out the song over the course of eight hours.

It’s great fun to hear Dionne Warwick’s honey-coated voice meshing with Willie Nelson’s raw but still smooth vocals and to see how Wonder used his incredible mimicry skills to show Bob Dylan how Dylan could contribute his lines. [...]

Looking back all these years later, it’s something of a miracle that, in the days before texts and emails, when you had to communicate by fax and messenger and landline phone calls, so many performers who were used to being the biggest star in the room agreed to get together on relatively short notice and figure out a path to record one of the most impactful singles in music history.

Lionel Ritchie and Michael Jackson wrote the tune in record time, but, as I’ve already said, the project was initiated by Harry Belafonte. Thus it was only fitting that in the middle of the recording session Al Jarreau starting singing “Banana Boat Song (Day O),” the 1956 hit that made Belafonte a star. Everyone joined in and sang along with him. For me, that was the hit of the evening, perhaps because I remember Belefonte from my childhood. When it came time for Bob Dylan to sing his solo part, they cleared the studio so he could do it without onlookers. This film has many such details.

Duke and Q

Duke Ellington and Quincy Jones 1965 Los Angeles ... pic.twitter.com/yzqjCKVIKz

— Dan (@dan_bst) March 10, 2022

Will Jacob Collier win the Grammy for Best Album? [Oh those kids]

I surely don’t know. He’s already won four Grammies, all for arranging (Wikipedia).

Here’s what he has to say about the nomination, from his Facebook page:

The last 24 hours have turned my world upside down. To find myself Grammy-nominated for Album Of The Year is nearly impossible to wrap my head around...an unthinkable, unspeakable, epic honour. Three years ago, when I set about dreaming up a self-produced quadruple album, I barely imagined it would be possible to create, let alone that it would carry me into such unfathomable territory as this! To be considered alongside such legendary nominees for this award is a bizarre and tremendous privilege. I am forever grateful to Mahalia Music,Ty Dolla $ign, Daniel Caesar, Jessie Reyez, Kiana Ledé ,T-Pain, Kimbra, Tank and the Bangas, Tori Kelly & Rapsody for bringing such magic to the album... to the wonderful Ben Bloomberg, Emily Lazar, and Chris Allgood for helping me shape it sonically... and to all at the Recording Academy who voted for me. This is going to take some time to fathom... but in the meantime, I’m sending so much love to you all from here in London, and looking forward to wherever the path may lead us.

I’m just barely familiar with his music. I’ve seen perhaps a half-dozen to a dozen of his YouTube clips – he got his start on YouTube in 2012. They’re interesting and impressive, and I’ll be watching more. I note that Herbie "Watermelon Man" Hancock thinks he’s a genius and that Quincy "Thriller" Jones has signed on as his manager. I’ve read, and have heard from a friend, that he gives an impressive live show. No doubt.

Still....

Here’s his most recent video, an arrangement of Mel Tormé’s “The Christmas Song” (“Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire”), a song I know fairly well and like a lot:

If you’re interested in the musical particulars, here’s a transcription by Jason Fisher:

Impressive? Surely. Tremendous knowledge of music, great skill in execution, and mastery of technology. Very pretty. But compelling music? I’m not sure. Do I like it? Yes.

As I said in an email to a friend:

I’ve listened to between a half and a dozen of his videos. Impressive stuff. But they all seem a bit the same. When you throw all that STUFF at a tune, what emerges is mostly the stuff and all the tunes become racks on which to hang the stuff.

But he’s still young. Not even 30. Maybe he’ll pile up more and more stuff and then figure out how to get rid of most of it. Then we’ll see. I figure I’ll keep tabs on him but I’m not going to buy his albums, not yet. I’d like to hear what he can do with a simple blues. And since he’s a vocalist, I want to hear what he can sang, if you get my drift.

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 Collier explains harmony on five levels, from a seven-year old to Herbie Hancock:

Composer David Bruce comments on Collier's microtonal virtuosity:

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An interesting article about his background: “I’m the eldest of three children – Sophie and Ella are my two younger sisters and they are amazing, we sing Bach chorales together as family – it’s just so much fun.”