[Trombone-l] Tommy Turk

[Wessner, John]

I'm not sure that's quite accurate.  Tommy Turk was in Pittsburgh when I was a boy and my father took me to hear him when I was very young - maybe 14 or so.  I followed him until I was out of college and he had moved on to Las Vegas.  He made an LP in the early 80s; my late-sainted wife got me an autographed copy of it.

Tommy had great technique.  This was set off in the early 50s by his choice of Flo Cassenelli as the other horn on tenor.  (He was a more rhythmic honker.)  However, his style was considered "swashbuckling" and hence not really cool enough to qualify as bop.  I'm sure I showed his influence and was also not considered appropriate by the Parker clones I played with in college.  

He made a solo 45-EP while with JATP, but I remember his talking about being cut from a lot of the other stuff.  He is on a number of the Billie Holliday cuts - at least on the credits.

He was always nice to me and talked to me about the dangers of drink and such.
jw

-----Original Message-----
From: trombone-l-bounces at samford.edu [mailto:trombone-l-bounces at samford.edu] On Behalf Of zemry1 at bellsouth.net
Sent: Monday, December 31, 2007 9:21 PM
To: Dave Hanson; trombone-l at samford.edu
Subject: Re: [Trombone-l] Tommy Turk

 Yes!! I bought that cd several years ago based upon the reccomendation of a saxophone friend of mine. He had it on a cassette tape. He was playing be-bop before be-bop was invented!

-------------- Original message from "Dave Hanson" <jazzdude39 at comcast.net>: -------------- 


> I was recently going through my many CD's and ran across one with the little 
> known trombonist Tommy Turk on a Norman Granz, Jazz at the Philharmonic 
> recording. Also at this event was Charlie Parker as I remember but have lost the 
> jeweled box it came in, that lists all the players. 
> 
> This was performed in 1949 long before I heard jazzers like Frank Rosolino and 
> J.J. Johnson. Anyone on this list familiar with Tommy Turk ? 
> 
> Happy New Year all ! 
> 
> Dave Hanson 
> Atlanta 
> _______________________________________________ 
> Trombone-l mailing list 
> Trombone-l at samford.edu 
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