MOSAIC RECORDS BOOKLET

Guitarist and researcher Vincent Pelote, a member of the Institute Of Jazz Studies, gives an in-depth account of Johnny Smith’s life and the prolific 12 years he spent recording for Roost with plenty of quotes and reminiscences from Smith himself.

In the age of microsizing, every Mosaic Records Box Set booklet is still 11 x 11 inches to allow our customers to appreciate all the extras we put into printing them (and for easier reading).

SOUND QUALITY

After a diligent tape search (Roost was not well organized), we finally came up with the original tape masters for all of these sessions. Malcolm Addey skillfully executed the tape transfers, sound restoration, remix (on two of the later sessions) and mastering in 24-bit.

PHOTOGRAPHY

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Johnny Smith
Johnny Smith provided many of the photographs from his personal collection. Others come from Francis Wolff, the Ray Avery archives and the Institute Of Jazz Studies.

SAMPLE RECORDING SESSION

May 1954

Now we come to the first two of several Johnny Smith Quartet sessions. This particular foursome introduces the little-known but very talented Perry Lopez as rhythm guitarist and brings back Arnold Fishkin and Don Lamond. There isn’t much biographical information on Lopez, whose full name was Perfecto Macabata Lopez. He was born and raised in Philadelphia where he began his career playing mandolin. After a stint in the Air Force during World War II, he continued his career playing with groups like the Benny Goodman Octet, the Billy Taylor Quartet, and the Ellis Larkins Trio among others and recording with Goodman and Julius Watkins.

All these quartet (and subsequent trio) performances are less arranged than the quintet items and give us a chance to hear more of Smith’s improvisatory prowess. The intro and melody to Stranger In Paradise are played effortlessly by Smith in chords before he takes off on a single-note romp of a solo. The Gershwin brothers are ably represented with a beautiful ballad reading of Our Love Is Here To Stay and an up-tempo interpretation of ’S Wonderful, with Smith showing he can deliver no matter what the tempo; his solo burns. He quotes Stormy Weather during the trading of fours with Lamond, and Fishkin gets eight bars on which to shine. The guitarist sticks close to the melody for his one-chorus reading of Ellington’s In A Sentimental Mood, using single-notes more than his trademark chords on this lovely melody by the “maestro.” Bob Haggart’s What’s New is given a fine chordal melody treatment by Smith, with Lopez’s chords in accompaniment. Smith has a formidable technique, which he uses sparingly with startling results. Dig his blistering sixteenth-note run at measure 32! The pace picks up with I’ll Remember Apri.. Smith quotes Johnny Mandel’s Hershey Bar (a.k.a. Or Music To That Effect), Night and Day and a little of what sounds like Buttons and Bows during his solo. Fishkin gets to walk a little before Smith returns and takes it out. An interesting out-of-tempo intro by Smith kicks off Ellington’s 1933 composition Sophisticated Lady. There is no intro for Easy To Love as Smith and company launch right into this up-tempo Cole Porter standard. Smith states the melody in chords, switching to single notes for his three-chorus solo. In the fourth chorus he shares fours with Lamond. After another of those well-executed intros by Smith, he gives us a lovely legato chorded melody statement on Autumn In New York. The next title, Walk, Don’t Run!, was a hit record, but not for composer Johnny Smith. It was a 1960s rock group, the Ventures, who got the hit. Smith based the tune on the chords of Softly, As In A Morning Sunrise and originally titled it Opus. Teddy Reig, Smith’s long-time producer (at Roost and later Verve), named it Walk, Don’t Run!. It was a version by Nashville guitarist Chet Atkins that inspired the Ventures to record it. The tune has a very catchy melody, and Smith’s solo is better than anything on that hit version. Fishkin has an eight-bar solo as well. The guitarist’s technique is liberally displayed on this brief reading of Lover Man, while Gershwin’s Someone To Watch Over Me is given a sensitive interpretation. How About You starts out with four measures of Lopez and Fishkin playing a tricky unison figure which they continue when Smith enters with the melody in chords--a nice arranging touch by Smith.