On Record Store Day (April 22), Joe’s Record Paradise Celebrates Baltimore’s Left Bank Jazz Society | Shore Fire Media

Press ReleasesOn Record Store Day (April 22), Joe’s Record Paradise...

27 March, 2023Print

On Record Store Day (April 22), Joe’s Record Paradise Celebrates Baltimore’s Left Bank Jazz Society

Panel Will Feature Left Bank’s John Fowler Recalling Legendary Shows Including Duke Ellington, Lee Morgan, + Sonny Stitt Alongside Joe Lee (Joe’s Record Paradise), Zev Feldman (Jazz Detective) + Katea Stitt (WPFW)

 

Panel Discussion Begins At 2pm, More Details Below

 

Guests Will Be Able To Pick Up Previously Unreleased Left Bank Jazz Society Live Performances By Sonny Stitt, Shirley Scott & Walter Bishop, Jr., Out As Limited Two-LP Sets For Record Store Day Via Jazz Detective and Reel To Real Records
 

 

On Record Store Day (Saturday, April 22), the long-running Silver Spring, MD record store Joe’s Record Paradise invites music fans to join them for a special celebration of Baltimore’s Left Bank Jazz Society. Joe’s Record Paradise will host a panel discussion featuring Left Bank’s own John Fowler, who will share anecdotes from Left Bank Shows starring Lee Morgan, Sonny Stitt, and the great Duke Ellington. One such story: the Duke, on his birthday, arrived solo to a show after his band’s plane was delayed and went on to put on a classic one-man show, walking the audience through a rough history of jazz and his own musical development.

 

Full event details are below.

WHAT:

A celebration and panel discussion about Baltimore’s Left Bank Jazz Society

WHEN:

Saturday, April 22, 2023 (Record Store Day), beginning at 2pm ET

WHO:

Left Bank’s John Fowler, Joe Lee (owner of Joe’s Record Paradise), award-winning archival producer Zev Feldman (of the new Jazz Detective record label), and Katea Stitt (Program Director at WPFW and daughter of jazz musician Sonny Stitt, the subject of an upcoming Jazz Detective release). If you attended Left Bank jazz shows in the past and you want to share your stories, please come on by.

WHERE:

Joe’s Record Paradise (8700 Georgia Ave, Silver Spring, MD 20910)

OTHER INFO:

Food will be available from Anabel’s Mobile Kitchen.

Contact Joe’s Record Paradise at (301) 585-3269 // info@joesrecordparadise.com

 

Baltimore’s Left Bank Jazz Society was a hub for jazz musicians during the era. John Fowler, who worked on Left Bank’s concert promotions from the organization’s inception in 1964, notes the affection the players had for their Baltimore hosts: “After a while, it became the place to play. In the 50 years that we were in existence, no musician ever left Baltimore without their money, which I understand is unheard of. Once word got out that you can go to Baltimore, have a good time, get fed and get free drinks — and you’re going to get your money, it came a flood. Everybody wanted to play.”

The Left Bank Jazz Society is at the center of the latest project from Jazz Detective, the label of Montgomery County resident Zev Feldman (GRAMMY-nominee and Downbeat's “Producer Of The Year”), and Reel to Real Records, the partnership between Feldman and Vancouver-based impresario and musician Cory Weeds: A trio of hard-hitting, previously unissued LP releases by saxophonist Sonny Stitt, organist Shirley Scott, and pianist Walter Bishop Jr. for Record Store Day (April 22, 2023). The collection — spurred by Joe Lee’s introduction of Feldman to John Fowler — deepens Feldman and Weeds’ fruitful excavation of hitherto unheard music from shows mounted at the Left Bank Jazz Society in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s.
 

Sonny Stitt’s Boppin’ at the Bank: Live at the Left Bank

(Jazz Detective / out digitally on April 28)

Recorded on Nov. 11, 1973, at Baltimore’s Famous Ballroom, a regular site of Left Bank’s shows, this superheated gig finds saxophonist Stitt, one of the great hard bop exponents, at his most powerful, backed by an all-star unit of pianist Kenny Barron, bassist Sam Jones, and drummer Louis Hayes. As saxophone giant Charles McPherson put it: “Sonny Stitt scared people. [Drummer] Roy Haynes said that he seemed to be the only guy that Charlie Parker would be nervous around.”

Hear Sonny Stitt’s “A Different Blues”

 

Shirley Scott’s Queen Talk: Live at the Left Bank

(Reel to Real / out digitally on April 28)

So named because of Scott’s sobriquet “the Queen of the Hammond B-3,” this gig showcases the organ originator’s soulful style in a trio format with Left Bank regular George Coleman and drummer Bobby Durham, captured at the Famous Ballroom on Aug. 20, 1972; the gifted jazz vocalist Ernie Andrews sits in on three of the album’s 10 numbers. As the late jazz organ star Joey DeFrancesco said of Scott: “Her legacy is her tremendous contribution to jazz organ — that will live on forever…She has some great records, but live is a whole other thing because the people are so free to go in whatever direction they like. When you have the cast of musicians like this to do it with, the sky is the limit — and it all shows on this recording.”

Hear Shirley Scott’s “Like Someone In Love”

 

Walter Bishop Jr’s Bish at the Bank: Live in Baltimore

(Reel to Real / out digitally on April 28)

This release features hard-swinging bop pianist Bishop with another underestimated player, tenor and soprano saxophonist and flutist Harold Vick, backed by bassist Lou McIntosh and Dick Berk. The selections are drawn from dates at Baltimore’s Madison Club on Aug. 28, 1966, and the Famous Ballroom on Feb. 26, 1967. Says jazz journalist Ted Panken: “As you’ll hear, Bishop, Vick, Mcintosh, and Berk satiate the heightened appetites of their signifying witnesses, serving an eight-tune musical banquet seasoned with just proportions of relentless swing, melodic creation, and harmonic acuity, feeding the fire with Saturday night blues connotations and Sunday morning sermonizing.”

Hear Walter Bishop Jr.'s “Willow Weep For Me”

 

Past titles excavated from the Left Bank Jazz Society’s musical treasure trove include Understanding, an explosive date led by drummer Roy Brooks; The George Coleman Quintet in Baltimore, a tough gig featuring the titular tenor player; and A Soulful Sunday by vocalist Etta Jones with the Cedar Walton Trio. All were released by Reel to Real as Record Store Day titles in 2021, 2020 and 2018 respectively.