[Dixielandjazz] Pops Foster, Bird, Dizzy and Trane

[David M Richoux]

That is not as much of a stretch as Louis Armstrong's  1970 version of  
Pharoah Sander's  "The Creator Has a Master Plan."

> Late in the Spring of 1970, Bob Thiele (of the Impulse and Flying  
> Dutchman labels) brought Armstrong and an all star group (led by  
> arranger Oliver Nelson)into the studio. The resulting session can  
> charitably be described as wavering back and forth between bizarre  
> and banal. Armstrong works his way through a couple of old-school  
> numbers, and a few very strange attempts at current material like  
> ‘Give Peace a Chance’ and ‘Everybody’s Talkin’, but there’s also one  
> completely unexpected gem. That gem is – not coincidentally –  
> Satchmo’s version of ‘The Creator Has a Master Plan’.
> Leon Thomas and Armstrong split the vocals here, with the first  
> verse provided by the former, and the chorus by the latter, before  
> Leon falls by with the spiritual yodeling and then what you end up  
> with is an odd, and oddly appealing, one time only, intersection of  
> easy listening, avant garde spiritual jazz, flower power and that  
> essence of starshine that Satchmo carried with him from the streets  
> of New Orleans, all over the world and back again to the studio on  
> Wednesday May 27, 1970 where the old, the new and the in-between all  
> sat down and meshed for a few unlikely minutes.
> While there’s none of the earthy, tenor explosions of Sanders, this  
> version does touch on the original in places. Thiele was the  
> producer on both sessions, and in addition to Thomas, the great  
> James Spaulding plays flute on both versions.
(from http://funky16corners.wordpress.com/2009/01/18/louis-armstrong-wleon-thomas-the-creator-has-a-master-plan/ 
  )

David Richoux

On Nov 4, 2009, at 2:51 PM, Robert Ringwald wrote:

> Thanks Steve.
>
> I cannot imagine Foster working with COLTRANE..
>
> --Bob Ringwald
>
>