15/02/2024
🚨 RSD 2024: ART TATUM - NEVER-BEFORE-HEARD AT THE CHICAGO BLUE NOTE JAZZ CLUB IN 1953 on RESONANCE! We’ve been so eager to share this exciting news with you, the first of our two Record Store Day releases is Art Tatum "Jewels In The Treasure Box: The 1953 Chicago Blue Note Jazz Club Recordings" on Resonance Records. This is a previously unissued limited-edition 3-LP (and deluxe 3-CD) collection of recordings from jazz icon and virtuosic pianist, Art Tatum, captured live at the Blue Note jazz club in Chicago in March of 1953 with guitarist Everett Barksdale and bassist Slam Stewart.
"Jewels In The Treasure Box" is available as a limited-edition 3-LP set at participating record stores starting 4/20 as part of Record Store Day! Find stores and more information at recordstoreday.com. The deluxe 3-CD set is available on 4/26 at https://resonancerecords.org/product/art-tatum-jewels-in-the-treasure-box-cd/ and Bandcamp https://arttatumresonance.bandcamp.com/album/jewels-in-the-treasure-box.
These recordings were transferred from the original tape reels and mastered for LP by engineer Matthew Lutthans (who also worked on Resonance's Grammy-nominated 2019 Nat King Cole release "Hittin' the Ramp") at The Mastering Lab. Containing a whopping nearly 3 hours of never-before-heard music captured in an intimate setting at the height of his powers with his longtime trio, the deluxe, limited-edition 180-gram 3-LP gatefold set (and deluxe 3-CD set and digital download) includes rare photos and memorabilia from Herman Leonard, Bob Parent and the Holzfeind family archives (owners of the Blue Note jazz club in Chicago); plus liner notes from Columbia University professor and author, Brent Hayes Edwards; as well as statements from Ahmad Jamal, Sonny Rollins, Monty Alexander, ELEW, Spike Wilner, Johnny O'Neal, Michael Weiss and Terry Gibbs.
Thanks also to Michael Kurtz and Carrie Colliton at Record Store Day for their ongoing support, and our publicist Ann Braithwaite for her tireless PR efforts. The album cover was designed by Burton Yount, and features an iconic photo of Tatum by Herman Leonard.
*** READ THE FULL PRESS RELEASE BELOW ***
RESONANCE RECORDS PROUDLY PRESENTS JEWELS IN THE TREASURE BOX, A THREE-LP SET OF PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED LIVE CLUB PERFORMANCES BY JAZZ PIANO GENIUS ART TATUM, FOR RECORD STORE DAY ON APRIL 20
Dazzling Limited Edition Set Presents Almost Three Hours of the Keyboard Virtuoso in Full Flight with His Trio (Guitarist Everett Barksdale and Bassist Slam Stewart) at Chicago’s Blue Note Jazz Club in August 1953
Deluxe Collection, Due as a Three-CD Set and Digital Download Edition on April 26, Features Detailed Notes by Brent Hayes Edwards and Tatum Tributes and Remembrances by Sonny Rollins, Ahmad Jamal, Terry Gibbs, ELEW and More
Resonance Records, the independent label home of award-winning, previously unreleased jazz recordings, will present Jewels in the Treasure Box, a dazzling three-LP set of newly unearthed, unissued live recordings by the incomparable pianist Art Tatum as a limited-edition Record Store Day release on April 20, 2024. The three-CD version and digital download edition will be released on April 26.
Clocking in at nearly three hours, the collection features 39 unheard performances by Tatum and his trio featuring guitarist Everett Barksdale and bassist Slam Stewart at the Blue Note jazz club at 56 W. Madison Street in the Chicago Loop. The set, recorded by owner Frank Holzfeind during dates at the intimate club on August 16-28, 1953, is being produced with the full cooperation of the Art Tatum Estate and the Holzfeind family.
Tatum and his band are heard in stellar form on these recordings, which are a major addition to the small group of extant live performances by the keyboard maestro, who died in 1956. The pianist, who also plays several audience-requested solos, unleashes every staggering feature of his formidable technique.
The album’s title is drawn from an essay by critic Gary Giddins in his 1998 book Visions of Jazz that describes the master’s keyboard attack: “Those magnificent arpeggios, runs and flurries, those supersonic turnbacks and contrary figures and thumb-driven bass walks…are the nerve center of his art, the jewels in his treasure box.”
Jewels in the Treasure Box is mastered by engineer Matthew Lutthans (who also engineered Resonance’s Grammy-nominated Nat King Cole box Hittin’ the Ramp) and presented in its RSD edition on 180-gram vinyl pressed at the respected audiophile pressing plant Le Vinylist. Both the LP set and subsequent CD release will feature rare photos and memorabilia from Herman Leonard, Bob Parent, and the Holzfeind family; an essay by Columbia University professor and jazz scholar Brent Hayes Edwards; and remembrances and personal reminiscences from Ahmad Jamal, Sonny Rollins, Monty Alexander, ELEW, Spike Wilner, Johnny O’Neal, Michael Weiss, and Terry Gibbs.
Resonance co-president Zev Feldman, the award-winning “Jazz Detective” who produced the Tatum collection, says of this landmark project, “Resonance’s founder and co-president George Klabin and I were elated by the promise of releasing an album of previously unissued Art Tatum material. From the moment we started working together over a decade ago, Tatum was someone who inspired both of us personally and deeply.
“For many years, we’ve each had the feeling that if we could find some unissued Art Tatum recordings, that would be a holy grail for us, the realization of a dream. The reality of these performances far exceeds my expectations. It’s remarkable that these recordings exist at all, but that they are superb is simply thrilling, and we're delighted to have an opportunity to present them to the public for the very first time.”
The late club owner Holzfeind’s children Kathleen Holzfeind Doherty, Tom Holzfeind, and Jean Holzfeind Bystedt say in a statement, “We are excited to be sharing these never-before-heard live Art Tatum recordings from the Blue Note with you and we're grateful to Resonance Records for seeing their value and having the determination to introduce them to audiences old and new. Dad's private reel-to-reel tapes were a proud part of his legacy. With this new collection, the Blue Note legacy lives on!”
Jazz historian Edwards says of the music, “The 39 songs captured here, performed over six sets at the Blue Note in downtown Chicago — a sumptuous nightclub that Duke Ellington used to call the ‘Metropolitan Opera House of Jazz’ — represent by far the largest sampling of the work of the second Tatum trio, and thus an opportunity to revisit the ensemble’s legacy. As such, these sessions are a revelatory addition to the archive of Tatum's final years.”
To a man, Tatum’s musical colleagues offer effusive testimony about the greatness of Tatum and his Chicago Blue Note jazz club recordings.
Ahmad Jamal says, “Art Tatum’s style was like no other. It still cannot be equaled. I know very few people who could imitate Art Tatum. He was unique, a gift from the Creator that we should all always appreciate. Art Tatum influenced all pianists….Exploring his music, studying the man, and getting to know this great gift is something I’m still involved in.”
Saxophone colossus Sonny Rollins says, “Art Tatum has influenced my music a lot. The fact that I've even tried to play as a trio has a lot to do with him, because Art Tatum could cover so much music. That's what I try to do with a drummer, a bass and a saxophone. We want to cover the whole spectrum like Art Tatum does. He inspired me a lot, and listening to him play inspires me a lot. Everything he plays makes me want to see if I can copy it on the saxophone. He’s such a part of everything I'm trying to do and at the highest level, I don't know any musician in the jazz world who doesn't just stop cold when you mention Art Tatum.”
Piano wizard ELEW (Eric Lewis) states, “My foundation is Art Tatum. He takes me right to classical music and my classical training there. When it comes to other styles like, say, the styles of McCoy Tyner or Thelonious Monk for example, all of that gets enhanced through Art Tatum’s work. Max Roach told me that Art Tatum was the paradigm for all those guys. And we know the story of Charlie Parker taking a job washing dishes at a restaurant just so that he could hear Art Tatum play for free.”
Running down the elements of Tatum’s style, Spike Wilner says, “You have his flawless technique, the articulation of the notes. His repertoire was massive, made up of all the great tunes. And he had an arrangement for every single one of those tunes, some kind of iconic arrangement. Some are the most iconic in our canon — ‘Yesterdays,’ for example. Finally, he had an amazing harmonic palette in which he could improvise — the strangeness he could find, that he could clash, play things a half step out of the key or anywhere he wanted. The surprise modulations — everything to keep your ear off balance. This combination of tremendous jazz feel, technique, time and harmonic adventurousness made him probably the greatest jazz musician who ever lived. You'd be hard pressed to say who was greater.”
Johnny O’Neal, who portrayed Tatum in the hit 2004 Ray Charles biopic Ray, recalls, “The first time I heard Art Tatum was when my father, who was also a pianist, played me a record of Tatum playing ‘Tea for Two.’ It was the most unbelievable thing I’d ever heard, still to this day. I don’t think there’s been anyone on any instrument who could match up to Art Tatum’s skills, not just because he was a technical player. He was just so well-rounded as a piano player. He had the deepest harmony you could ever imagine. You can't even duplicate what he played harmonically — in addition to his technique. He's always been my favorite pianist of all time.”
Vibraphonist Terry Gibbs recalls the gunslinging Tatum of nightclub cutting contests: “To me, Art Tatum was the greatest piano player who ever lived. When Teddy Wilson was with Benny Goodman, they used to play wherever they’d play, and then always at an after-hours club. In the after-hours clubs, people would say, ‘Teddy Wilson's coming,’ and any piano player there got scared as heck. Teddy Wilson was that great. But Teddy told me he wouldn’t follow Art Tatum. He said he'd follow every piano player that ever played anywhere, except Art Tatum.”
Some summarize the genius of Art Tatum succinctly. Pianist Michael Weiss says, “On a scale of 1 to 10, Tatum kept the dial on a steady 11.” Pianist Monty Alexander notes, “When Art played, he was like the eighth wonder of the world.”
Was there another like him? In his essay, writer Edwards cites the view of the New Yorker’s great critic Whitney Balliett in American Musicians: “He occupied his own country.”
On The Jewels in the Treasure Box, Art Tatum can be heard all the way live, staking out unexplored territory in the jazz terrain.
Resonance Records is a multi-GRAMMY® Award-winning label (most recently for John Coltrane’s Offering: Live at Temple University for "Best Album Notes") that prides itself in creating beautifully designed, informative packaging to accompany previously unreleased recordings by the jazz icons who grace Resonance's catalog. Headquartered in Beverly Hills, CA, Resonance Records is a division of Rising Jazz Stars, Inc. a California 501(c) (3) non-profit corporation created to discover the next jazz stars and advance the cause of jazz. Current Resonance Artists include Tawanda, Eddie Daniels, Tamir Hendelman, Christian Howes and Donald Vega. www.ResonanceRecords.org
For more information please contact:
Ann Braithwaite / Braithwaite & Katz Communications
ann - at - bkmusicpr.com
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