Jazz at Massey Hall
| Jazz at Massey Hall | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Live album by The Quintet | |
| Released | 1953 |
| Recorded | 15 May 1953 |
| Venue | Massey Hall, Toronto |
| Genre | Jazz |
| Length | 46:54 |
| Label |
Debut/OJC America |
| Producer | Charles Mingus |
| Professional ratings | |
|---|---|
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| Allmusic |  |
| Robert Christgau | A |
| The Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide | |
Jazz at Massey Hall is a live jazz album featuring a performance by "The Quintet" given on 15 May 1953 at Massey Hall in Toronto. The quintet was composed of several leading 'modern' players of the day: Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Bud Powell, Charles Mingus, and Max Roach. It was the only time that the five men recorded together as a unit, and it was the last recorded meeting of Parker and Gillespie.
The first pianist considered by the organizers was Lennie Tristano, but he suggested Powell as a more appropriate match for the other musicians.Oscar Pettiford was considered as an alternative to Mingus.
Parker played a Grafton saxophone on this date; he could not be listed on the original album cover for contractual reasons, so was billed as "Charlie Chan", an allusion to the fictional detective and to Parker's wife Chan.
The original plan was for the Toronto New Jazz Society and the musicians to share the profits from the recording. However, owing to a boxing prize fight between Rocky Marciano and Jersey Joe Walcott taking place simultaneously, the audience was so small that the Society was unable to pay the musicians' fees. The musicians were all given NSF checks, and only Parker was able to actually cash his; Gillespie complained that he did not receive his fee "for years and years".
The record was originally issued on Mingus's label Debut, from a recording made by the Toronto New Jazz Society (Dick Wattam, Alan Scharf, Roger Feather, Boyd Raeburn and Arthur Granatstein). Mingus took the recording to New York where he and Max Roach dubbed in the bass lines, which were under-recorded on most of the tunes, and exchanged Mingus soloing on "All the Things You Are".
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