Creed Taylor month was announced and first held in 1968. For background and press cuttings from that time, see this entry.
There are lots of indications that the music created by the artists of CTI and KUDU is as popular now as Creed could have ever hoped. In the last year, as well as my own #ctproduced Instagram id[1]ctproduced posts avoiding Instagram, three other Instagram accounts have also been setup to post about the productions by Creed and the numerous artists who recorded with him, not least fellow Brit’ Instagram account #thecreedtaylorvinylarchive.
For this years Creed Taylor month, I’m going to start almost at the end. While the music produced by Creed Taylor shows no sign of going away, or waning, I thought I’d post a video of the concert that effectively was the swansong production for CTI. The musicians had changed, by then even the company had changed to CTI JAZZ Online.
The Montreux Jazz Festival, founded in 1967 quickly became Europe’s premier jazz festival, attracting of course legions of US Jazz music stars. The long director of the Festival, Claude Nobs, was ceaseless in both finding, booking and paying for top quality acts. However, there were few acts that would fly in from America, perform at Montreux and return home, it was just too expensive.
And that’s how it was for the CTI All-Stars 2009 concert, not a concert, but a a tour.
CTI All-Star Tour (2009)
The “All-Stars” first performance was in fact the Montreux Festival on July 7th. They went on to perform 7x more concerts all over Europe and Turkey.[2]The Story of the CTI All-Stars Live – Creed Taylor Produced (ctproduced.com)
Interestingly, among the performers for the 2009 All-Stars were both former CTI leaders, Hubert Laws, and Airto Moreira. Also featured are Randy Brecker, who recorded many times as a sideman for Creed, and Flora Purim.
Given the performance was in 2009, it is not without a sense of history that I note the presence of Hubert Laws. The concert was almost 40-years to the day from the time when Laws stepped into the American Sound Studios; Memphis, Tennessee to recorded his album “Crying Song”. It, like the video of this performance wouldn’t be released until the following year.
Just to think, Hubert took a chance and quit the Billy Taylor Orchestra for the David Frost show, to fly down to Memphis as a second call, in place of Stanley Turrentine, who couldn’t make the date for contractual reasons.
Montreux Jazz Festival
The video presented here includes minor edits, a track from the July 14th, 2009 at the Festival de Jazz de San Javier, San Javier, Spain, “Road Song” is included as a bonus, before the credits.
The concert is written up with some great observations and additional information and pictures by producer and jazz historian, Arnaldo Desouterio.[3]Jazz Station – Arnaldo DeSouteiro’s Blog (Jazz, Bossa & Beyond): CTI All-Stars Band 2009 @ Montreux, Part 1 [4]http://jazzstation-oblogdearnaldodesouteiros.blogspot.com/2009/07/cti-all-stars-2009-band-montreux-part-2.html
XII Festival Internacional de Jazz de San Javier
After performing twice in Turkey, flying to Rotterdam for the North Sea Jazz Festival, then down to Tenerife and Las Palmas in the Spanish Canary Islands, the band arrived in San Javier, Spain for a concert on July 14th.
I don’t have the original recording, or any detail on this, but there is a youtube video available.
Internationale Jazzwoche – Burghausen 2010
As I understand, the 2009 concert tour was well received, and had good attendance, with many concerts sold out. That said, for probably both logistical and cost reasons, only one concert was scheduled for 2010, on March 10th. The same base lineup of Hubert laws, Airto, Mark Egan, Russell Malone, Jeff “Tain” Watts, and Neils Lan Doky. Curtis Stigers, Roy Hargrove, Brian Lynch and Bob Malach were added.
As was almost always the case with the CTI All-Star concerts, they were recorded, many also filmed. Although fairly low-res, there is an excellent 2-hour performance video on youtube, which has excellent sound. The first half of the performance is the CTI All-Stars, with the second half turned over to Stigers, with the CTI All-Stars as sidemen. The tracks are excellent, but it’s disappointing to go out on.
And that was it. After 56-years, the curtain came down on original CTI productions and live concerts. I’ve said it before, I don’t know how much it would cost, but I know I don’t have the money, if I did, I’d love to see band back together again. Bob James, Ron Carter, Hubert Laws, Steve Gadd, Airto, George Benson, Deodato, Patti Austin, Flora Purim, David Matthews, Jim Beard, Randy Brecker, John Tropea, John Faddis and some of the other great CTI Contributors.
I wish, go fund me anyone?
For the rest of Creed Taylor month 2021, I’m going to post some shorter, simpler news and favorite albums.
References
Updates:
2nd Sept. 2021 13:30 Added Images from Montreux Keynote magazine