sunken and haunted image. Even so, his technique was precise, and his playing and singing remained touchingly effective to the end” (Cook & Morton). Original silver gelatin print (234 × 300 mm), verso with Fèvre’s studio wet stamp, identifying note in black marker pen in Fèvre’s hand, initialled by him, and inscribed “Tirage Georges Fèvre”. In excellent condition. ¶ Richard Cook & Brian Morton, The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings , ninth edition, 2008. £1,250 [150381] 3 BASIE, Count. Original poster for Decoration Day Breakfast Dance at Quincy College, Illinois, 1959. Quincy, Illinois: 1959 “in person! count basie and his famous orchestra” Extraordinary survival from a Basie one-nighter at the recently-established Quincy College, the bandleader’s portrait within a starburst framed by his name stenciled onto a background of broad black “brushstrokes”, a very eye-catching piece. Rather less glamorously, but perhaps in keeping with the nature of the gig, reservations were available from Delux Cleaners at 234 N. 10th Street. Basie played a more famous breakfast dance in 1957, for a record convention at the Americana Hotel, Miami. This was taped and released on the Roulette label as Breakfast Dance and Barbecue, which Cook and Morton award three stars, a shade under their top ranking, and describe the band as “having a good time” – it is difficult to imagine the same atmosphere not pertaining at this Illinois gig. Quincy, a bustling transportation hub on the Mississippi, may not have been on the jazz circuit but neither was it a backwater, being for some time the second largest town in the state. The Basie band was riding a new tide of popularity following the release of 1958’s showstopper album The Atomic Mr. Basie. Poster (545 × 337 mm), medium card stock, heading printed in red, Basie’s image and main titling printed in black on a yellow ground. Pin holes at top corners, softening, surface creasing and slight splash marking to top right corner, small puncture through “H” in “His”, timings corrected in pencil, but overall in remarkably bright condition. ¶ Richard Cook & Brian Morton, The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings , ninth edition, 2008. £2,650 [149221]
1
1 ARMSTRONG, Louis. Superb inscribed promotional photograph from Satchmo’s first tour of Europe. London: Ava Studio, 1933 “a unique phenomenon, an electric personality” A debonair and dj-ed Armstrong poses with horn in a Bruno Pollak RP–7 Bauhaus chair. Inscribed “My Best wishes to Sidney H. Matthews from Louis Armstrong 23/3/34”, inked annotation at the top left-hand corner “Taken 1933 – London”. In the summer of 1932, following a marijuana bust in California and ongoing mob-related management problems, Satchmo took himself off to Europe on the SS Majestic. His initial engagement for two weeks at the Palladium with his “New Rhythm Band” – in fact a scratch band thrown together largely from Paris- based Black musicians – met with mixed reactions. On most nights a good proportion of the audience walked out “utterly shocked at the manic display on
2
stage” (Nollen, p. 43), while the jazz proselytising Melody Maker for August 1932 raved “Top F’s bubble about all over the place … he puts enough energy in his half-hour’s performance to last the average man several years. He is, in short, a unique phenomenon, an electric personality – easily the greatest America has sent us so far” (quoted in Collier, p. 255), reports belied by his demure demeanour in the present stylish, restrained and very “modern” image. Original “8 × 10” silver gelatin print (243 × 187 mm), mounted on card. Some oxidation “silvering” in the darker areas, the inscription a little faded but clearly legible, overall good tone and definition, very good. Presented in a black wooden frame with conservation acrylic glazing. ¶ James Lincoln Collier, Louis Armstrong: An American Genius , 1983; Scott Allen Nollen, Louis Armstrong: The Life, Music and Screen Career, 2004. £1,250 [130285] 2 BAKER, Chet – FÈVRE, Bertrand (photo.) “Chet Baker, Ostia, Italie 1987”. Paris: Bertrand Fèvre, 1987
Hauntingly beautiful image of the great trumpeter, captured during a club date just six months before his death. This exemplar, exhibiting a fine depth and gradation of tone, is given added lustre as having been printed by Fèvre’s father Georges (b. 1930), “a master of black and white silver prints” (bertrand- fevre.com), and in this regard is decidedly uncommon and desirable. This superb portrait was captured while Chet was appearing with the Space Jazz Trio at the Corto Maltese club in Ostia, Italy, in November 1987 (a studio album was released in 1988, Chet Baker meets Space Jazz Trio – Little Girl Blue ). Bertrand Fèvre (b. 1957) studied film at the Conservatoire libre du cinéma français in Paris, working initially as assistant on feature films and commercials. He struck up a relationship with the trumpeter in Baker’s last months and his film, Chet’s Romance , won best short at the César Awards in 1988; a book and recorded interview, My Romance with Chet, was published in 2020. Baker was “the archetypal ‘young man with the horn’, brilliant, inward, self-destructive … He developed a sound similar to Miles Davis’s: quiet, restricted in range, and melodic rather than virtuosic … A heroin habit destroyed the film star looks, and replaced them with a
1
3
2
JAZZ
All items are fully described and photographed at peterharrington.co.uk
3
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online