Jack Mcduff, born Eugene McDuffy

Skip the bio; you can read that anywhere. Just a few impressions of the man and his music. Often compared to Jimmy Smith, Jack's playing really had little to do with Jimmy's, other than the basic sound and method. He was not a virtuoso in the classical sense, but his genius was manifested in several ways:

• His arrangements and compositions: Never content to just jam on a standard, Jack always recast a standard with a custom intro, treatment, or arrangement. Refreshingly new-sounding breaks, key changes, and codas were the "standard" for a McDuff presentation of an old pot-boiler. His original compositions were unique, and on a level with much more famous composers such as Duke Ellington and Basie, who was a major influence. Prolific as he was original, the originals number in the hundreds, though this is difficult to document.
• Style: His blues licks sounded kind of standard until you tried to play one of them. They were anything but. Full of curlicues and jump-backs at odd places, they were more expressive, in my opinion, than any of the other jazz organists'. Speed was not his object; beauty, wit, and passion were. Also, he swang in a way that was immediately recognizable. He had his own brand of time, especially in his basslines. Three notes from his left-hand was enough to get you out of your seat and dancing like a fool. This was partly technique: he had a way of allowing a little space between each note that gave the lines life and definition. In the bass, he always played just the right note, and had the ability to vary his basslines much more than his fellow organists. Although he could and did play the widely-copied Smith approach to soloing, Jack was much more into using his right hand has a "Basie-style horn section" than the other organists, adding to his own special brand of excitement.
• Soul: There was never a more bare-naked revelation of feeling at the Hammond than this man's. To one who is open to hearing it, he regularly put his heart on his sleeve for a crowd. Jack had an old blues called "Moody McDuff." The name was apt. His music regularly reflected extreme joy, and if you saw him play it was easy to see: when swinging hard, his head would go back, his eyes would roll, a grin on his face, as his head waggled in time to the music. On the other hand, he could go from this to the sounds of intense pain in a few seconds. Moody, introspective, intelligent, and sad all at the same time. You won't hear this discussed on any jazz documentary, because nobody knows how it's done. A few players just do it, that's all we know.

What follows is a very long Real Audio™ clip, taken from my personal live recordings of Jack, that is two tunes strung together. This clip illustrates everything I have been trying to say about the man and his wonderful playing. Please enjoy them and think of his contributions as you contemplate his talent.

Click here for 21 minutes of Jack McDuff live, in Real Audio™
 
 

Parts of these clips have been featured previously on my site, but for the first time, they are presented complete and unedited.
Recorded in mono at Parnell's Jazz Club, Seattle WA, 1982. Jack McDuff's Leslie 147 bass speaker was ripped; such is life on the road. You can hear a ripping noise on some pedal tones. Just consider it part of his funky tone. No noise reduction is used except on Jack's brief opening comment, which is still very noisy due to the fact that I had to turn it way up just to make it audible. The raw sound file was compressed 2:1 @ -18dB.

Andrew Beals, alto sax
John Hart, guitar
Rudy Petschauer, drums

"Gospelette," which has never appeared on records in its best form, contains three entirely different elements. It is appropriate here, on this sad day, as it begins with Jack saying, "Rest my head down now and cry, y'all." This tune was played immediately upon Jack's hearing that Sonny Stitt had just died (1982). The gospel-ish intro, with its gorgeous chords and thrilling glisses, is just dripping with sadness, introspection, and majesty. The head is a poppish, slightly funkish romp, though in a minor key. The solo sections, on the other hand, are straight-ahead and swinging, and the chord progression for the head is thrown out.

After pausing barely long enough to turn on the vibrato and take a breath, Jack launches into THE definitive version of his old classic, "Another Goodun," many times better than any recorded version. Here you will hear him play a solo improvisation on a blues in the key of G that shows that he could play far more stuff than is commonly thought, including chromatic runs and flights outside of the key center. There is a moment where he simply stops playing with a jerk, then restarts, in tribute to a beautiful waitress who walked in front of him. Hilarious, if you were there. As the band comes in, you can hear the tremendous excitement generated in the crowd.

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