Konitz Meets Mulligan: Lee Konitz and The Gerry Mulligan Quartet

“Gerry Mulligan was also involved in the Birth of the Cool—you had quite a lot of contact with him over your career.

I always thought of him as an ally. He appreciated my playing, and I appreciated his, and especially his writing, very much. I played his arrangements with Claude Thornhill, and Stan  Kenton. The occasions that we had together, they were very fruitful. 

Was he an intuitive player?

Gerry was a great musician, also a great composer and arranger. My favorite playing of his was with the Birth of the Cool. He also recorded a free version of "Lover Man" with me and a trio with Peggy Stern that was very intuitive and really inspired. He was pretty much an intuitive player, but maybe too conscious of making an impression on his audience — and that means functioning other than intuitively.”

- Andy Hamilton, Lee Konitz: Conversations on the Improviser’s Art [2007]

“When the Kenton band was at the Palladium in Los Angeles, Gerry asked me to come and sit in with his quartet at the Haig on our nights off. I loved

the pianoless concept, and I have worked in many similar groups over the years. I had heard stories about Chet not reading, but I was never in a situation to check that out. I had also heard that he didn't know chord changes, but I remember seeing him at a piano, playing changes to tunes, so that wasn't true. On my recordings with the quartet, I actually rejected "Too Marvelous for Words" because it didn't seem to fit into Gerry's context. …  Looking back, Gerry and I didn't play that much together, but he was very encouraging to me in the early days, and I always felt he was an ally. We even got high together for the first time because we had that kind of close relationship.”

- Gordon Jack, Fifties Jazz Talk: An Oral Retrospective [2004]

“While all the other instruments during the great days of bop produced important musicians in addition to the leading representative on the respective horn, the alto saxophone had to wait for the start of the cool era for a considerable figure to emerge: This was Lee Konitz, who came out of the Lennie Tristano school. The abstract, glittering alto lines played by Konitz around the turn of the forties on his own and Lennie Tristano's recordings later became more singable, calmer, and more concrete. Of this change, Lee says that then "I played more than I could hear"... Konitz has absorbed and incorporated into his music many of the jazz elements since then - and some of Coltrane and of free jazz - and yet he has always remained true to himself. He is one of the really great improvisers in jazz.” 

- Joachim Berendt, The Jazz Book [1983] as quoted in Peter Ind, Jazz Visions: Lennie Tristano and His Legacy [2005]

“My [Gerry Mulligan] whole job, because we had left the piano off, was to establish always the sound of the chord progression that was moving through the piece, and to do that with my harmony line in relation to the bass line, which always had to be able to state something basic about the way the rhythm line moved—didn't have to just play roots of the chords that you always had to do on the bottom, but you could move through them in such a way that the implication of the chord was always there. So then, even though it wasn't obvious to the ear and it wasn't spelled out, the impression was there, and what we were doing was giving the impression of chord progression because of the way we were touching on those notes.”

- Gerry Mulligan with Ken Poston, Being Gerry Mulligan: My Life in Music, [2023]

“Most of the more casual generalizations about Lee Konitz - cool, abstract, passionless, untouched by bebop - were last relevant about 40 years ago. A stint in the Stan Kenton band, the musical equivalent of Marine Corps boot camp, toughened up his articulation and led him steadily away from the long, rather diffuse lines of his early years under the influence of Lennie Tristano, towards an altogether more pluralistic and emotionally cadenced approach. Astonishingly, Konitz spent a good many of what should have been his most productive years in relative limbo, teaching when he should have been playing, unrecognized by critics, unsigned by all but small European labels (on which he is, admittedly, prodigal). Despite (or because of) his isolation, Konitz has routinely exposed himself over the years in the most ruthlessly unpredictable musical settings, thriving on any challenge, constantly modifying his direction.” 

- Richard Cook and Brian Morton, The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD, 6th Edition [2002]

“Stimulation of his colleagues by consistent application of his peregrine personality is very likely the most wicked weapon in Gerry Mulligan’s deadly arsenal. He has played probably in front of more groups that lingered on in a recurring state of instant disintegration behind him than any other major Jazzman. Not that Gerry plans it this way, he just seems to have been possessed rather frequently of or by an impish natural talent for annoying others to an extent that is much more often productive than destructive.

How this quality operated in his work with Lee Konitz, I have no way of knowing but I believe after hearing this record, that someone constructed a small conflagration under Lee when he sat in with Gerry’s quartet at The Haig in Los Angeles on the night of January 25, 1953. And since the expert at artistic arson, Gerry Mulligan, was present, I think we may have solved this minor mystery.”

- Daniel Halperin, original liner notes to Lee Konitz Plays With the Gerry Mulligan Quartet [PJM -406, 1957]

I enjoy combing the Jazz literature to glean new perspectives on something I’m writing about for the blog and such is the case with the lead-in quotations to one of my all time favorite recordings Konitz Meets Mulligan: Lee Konitz and The Gerry Mulligan Quartet [Pacific Jazz LP PJM 406 and Capitol CD CDP 7 46847 2].

Although issued in 1957, the recordings were actually made in 1953 and the playing on them by alto saxophonist Lee Konitz, baritone saxophonist Gerry Mulligan and trumpeter Chet Baker should be considered in the context of the relative newness of the “modern” - as distinct from - the Swing Era style of Jazz exhibited by the 12 tracks that make up the album. The version of Modern Jazz practiced by Konitz, Mulligan, Baker and others on the West Coast during the 1950s is often referred to as the “Cool School.”

Given the relative recency of Modern Jazz, a style that evolved largely during and directly after the close of World War II - an approach which relied on improvising on the harmony of a song rather than the previous Swing Era emphasis on the melody - it is amazing how accomplished the playing by the horns is on this recording. Kudos should also be shared with bassist Carson Smith and drummer Larry drummer for their smooth rhythmic backing, where again, a new, somewhat understated style of keeping the beat and insuring the forward motion - the swing - of the music was required.

Young musicians taking on the challenge of the latest Thing has been a part of the Jazz tradition since its inception, but this Modern Jazz stuff was complicated and it is remarkable how consummate the playing and the music is on this album.

“The Gerry Mulligan Quartet with Chet Baker, despite its prolific recorded output and its impact on jazz and the American public, lasted for less than one year. Ensconced as the house hand at The Haig in Los Angeles and able to record at its own discretion for Pacific Jazz (as well as single sessions for two other labels), this revolutionary, pianoless quartet crafted its own repertoire and arrangements and built a solid, prolific legacy.

Midway through its existence, the quartet settled on its finest bassist and drummer, Carson Smith and Larry Bunker respectively. At this junction. Mulligan, who had formed this unit through serendipity, luck and circumstance, sought to expand his musical horizons beyond this foursome, which had been an unexpected and overnight success well beyond the bounds of the usual jazz audience. He assembled and recorded on Capitol Records a tentette that was an outgrowth of the famous Miles Davis Nonet, a group that also recorded for Capitol, and for which Gerry had been a player, composer, arranger and founding member.

Another diversion from the quartet grew out of that group. By January of 1953, when he recorded the tentette. Mulligan felt confident that his quartet was ready to record live at their Los Angeles home The Haig. Dick Bock started bringing down his portable tape recorder to capture the band for possible record releases. One night. Lee Konitz, who was then a member of the confining, pompous, ponderous Stan Kenton Orchestra, came to the club to sit in. Konitz and Mulligan had worked together in 1947 with Claude Thornhill's band and in 1949 and 1950 with Miles Davis’ Birth Of The Cool Nonet. And they would work together again in December of 1957 on a Gerry Mulligan Songbook recording.

The sequence of events in January of 1953 are not clear. The results are that Konitz sat in with the Mulligan quartet at The Haig for a night for six tunes and went into a studio with the quartet for three more tunes and also to the studio at Phil Turetsky's house with Joe Mondragon subbing for Carson Smith for two tunes and an alternate take. Because of liner note information given by producer Dick Bock, it was assumed that these three sessions took place in June of '53. But actually, several of the titles were released months before then. And in June, Konitz was thousands of miles away from Los Angeles earning his living with the Stan Kenton Orchestra.

Regardless of dates, this series of recordings was a major event. Lee Konitz had already become a major voice because of his rigorous training and experience with Lennie Tristano anil because of several triumphant record dates that he had led including a version of George Russell's "Ezz-thetic" with Miles Davis. But on these sessions, Lee Konitz excelled and soared with an inspired fluency and lucidity that had never before been fully realized in his work.

Essentially, the Mulligan quartet with Baker provides with its own very distinctive identity a backdrop that highlights and inspires Konitz as the principal soloist. The Haig recordings start off this Compact Disc collection, and they include an previously unissued version of "Bernie's Tune" which was first discovered by and issued on Mosaic Records in 1983. As one might expect, the repertoire here is a set of standards that any professional musician should know. But what they do with it is something else again. The first two titles “Too Marvelous For Words" and "Lover Man" are especially stunning vehicles for Konitz.

"Almost Like Being In Love'.' Mulligan's "Sextet" and "Broadway" are by the same working quartet and Konitz and were recorded at a professional Los Angeles recording studio, while "I Can't Believe That You're In Love With Me" (another Konitz spectacular) and both takes of "Lady Be Good" were done at Phil Turetsky's homemade studio with Joe Mondragon in place of Carson Smith.

It may have been that after several months with Kenton. that I*e Konitz was starved to play some real creative music or it may be that Mulligan's creative atmosphere and Baker's raw. instinctive talent inspired Konitz to greater heights. Whatever the circumstances or motivations, this is one of the finest bodies of work by Lee Konitz, a consistent and immensely creative jazz artist. It is also a testament to the Mulligan-Baker quartet which was as vital and innovative as any New York band of its time.

Now on CD in complete form for the first time is the full encounter between soloist Lee Konitz and the Gerry Mulligan-Chet Baker Quartet. A rare and special musical occasion indeed.”

— Michael Cuscuna