In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

189 13 “Le Fôret”—The Legacy of Tadd Dameron Like so much else about his life, only a portion of Tadd Dameron’s work remains known to us today. Over the years, much of his music has been lost. Still, there is reason to hope that, in time, some of it might be recovered. There have been fortuitous recent discoveries, such as “Zakat”—which had not been heard in decades—and“Mary Lou,” which had never been performed. Neither of these works is mentioned in any of the copyright documents. Conversely, there are titles listed in those documents for which we have no music. There can be no doubt that there was much more music that Dameron wrote than we know about, in terms of both arrangements and original compositions . For instance, when interviewed for this book, jazz historian Donald Meade recalled a Dameron tune titled“In Depth,” which he said was a contrafact of “Fine and Dandy.” Unfortunately, there is no trace of it anywhere but in Meade’s memory.1 There are also the arrangements of “How about You” and, coincidentally, “Fine and Dandy,” which Gerald Wilson mentioned to Eddy Determeyer2 in the course of Determeyer’s research into the life and work of Jimmie Lunceford. “How about You” appears to be lost, but“Fine and Dandy,” discussed earlier in this book, can be found at the Smithsonian Institution. In addition, the number of Dameron’s melodies copyrighted by New Era Music would lead us to believe there are probably more of his arrangements for Lunceford that are either lost or yet to be discovered. In 1945 Count Basie recorded an arrangement of a tune titled“San José” for 190 DaMeroNIa V-Disc (see chap. 4). The arranger is not credited. However, the voicings and quotes from other Dameron arrangements, as well as the melodic character of the transitions and other ensembles, give ample reason to believe it is one of his charts. There were other arrangements that Dameron must have made for Basie in the 1940s. In the 1960s, Frank Foster remembers Dameron coming to a Basie rehearsal and running down some charts that Basie, for reasons known only to himself, rejected.3 Add to this the evidence—some but not all of it anecdotal— of arrangements for Pearl Bailey, Brook Benton, Ray Charles, Tommy Dorsey, Ella Fitzgerald, Woody Herman, Illinois Jacquet, Harry James, Stan Kenton, Lucky Millinder, Vido Musso, Boyd Raeburn, Cootie Williams, and others— including lesser-known regional bands—and it becomes quite probable that Tadd Dameron arranged and/or composed perhaps as much as three times the work we have discussed here. However, if it were only the quantity of his work that distinguished Tadd Dameron, this book would not exist. It is his place in the evolution of jazz that is his greatest legacy. Although Dameron has, for the most part, slipped into obscurity, he is one of the key figures in the formation of modern jazz. Along with Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Kenny Clarke, and Thelonious Monk,4 he laid the foundation for jazz in the post–World War II era. Not only was he present at the birth of the bebop movement; he was one of its prime movers. By the time he went to work for Harlan Leonard in the spring of 1940, Dameron was already well into the evolution of the chromatic harmony associated with jazz in the mid-1940s. Not only are there the indications of it in the recorded work from that year; it can also be seen in the unrecorded composition “Conversation .” Further, there are the subtle suggestions of “bebop” harmony in his early work for Jimmie Lunceford, particularly the arrangement of“Bewildered.” Anecdotes from several different people have attested to the strikingly advanced nature of his work in the period before and during the first recording ban. Cleveland saxophonist Andy Anderson recalled that when he first heard Tadd in 1935, he was using chords, progressions, and voicings that the older musicians were not used to hearing. Others have recalled hearing Dameron himself , or his arrangements at performances by various local and regional bands during that time, and realizing later that they were hearing the beginnings of bebop. Wherever the new approach to jazz was taking shape, Tadd Dameron was there. He and Charlie Parker were jamming privately in Kansas City in 1940. We have Kenny Clarke’s recollections of hearing Dameron play chords with flatted fifths and “playing eighth-note sequences in the new...

Share