1/31/2024 0 Comments Leroy anderson jazz pizzicato![]() "Roy accidentally made the place sound really great," recalled Manolides, a hipster raconteur whose stories behind the bar were often as entertaining as the music. The owner created the illusion of a low ceiling by suspending 2-by-12-foot beams, painted flat black, across the room. Airbrushed portraits of jazz musicians that now hang in Dimitriou's Jazz Alley adorned the walls. Seating 125, the club had brick walls, large cushions and Tiffany-style lamps suspended over the tables. (now occupied by the Davidson Galleries). Inspired by the success - and design - of the Portland club, Jazz de Opus, owned by his wife's cousin, he opened his night spot at 313 Occidental Ave. Parnell started the club because he was bored with his job. "He didn't drink and he was not a night sort of guy."Ī restless entrepreneur, Mr. "He wasn't a 'jazz guy,' " said his brother-in-law, Jimmy Manolides, who tended bar at the club and played keyboards with the classic rock band Junior Cadillac. In the '60s and '70s, he worked as a parole officer for King and Snohomish counties.Ī tall, big-chested, imposing man who wore a trim beard and carried himself with the authority of a ship's captain, the former county employee did not fit the stereotype of a jazz-club owner. Parnell, a lifelong jazz fan, saw it coming.īorn in Seattle, he played football at Renton High School and the College of San Mateo, in California, and later earned a master's degree at Central Washington University. The Bicentennial year would mark the beginning of a national jazz renaissance. When Parnell's opened in November 1976, jazz had been on the back burner for nearly a decade. Monty always said, 'In the jazz business, Roy would be the bass player. "It's really precious to have been married to a man like that," said his wife, Sandy, who worked in the club's kitchen. Parnell died Saturday of pneumonia, brought on by the chronic disease scleroderma, from which he had suffered 6-½ years. If you have the red book CD I'd not recommend this disc.That's how jazz fans still lovingly refer to Parnell's, the Pioneer Square jazz club operated by Roy Parnell from 1976 to 1980. Overall it really isn't a huge improvement over the earlier, red book CD.Ī mixed bag, then. The center channel shows its presence in the usual improved soundstage width, something I'm at a loss to explain, and woodwinds have good presence. ![]() ![]() I don't know if the different mics used had anything to do with it or if we are hearing the effects of remastering tweaking (the level of tape hiss on this disc is markedly lower than on the other Mercury SACD's I own a little equalization in the upper midrange/treble perhaps?) or if we are hearing some age-related treble self-erasure in the tapes or if that's simply the way Bob Fine wanted the tapes to sound. The 1964 sessions sound more like a typical, high-quality Mercury: lots of dynamic range, plenty of great hall ambience. The 1956 sessions, which used different mics, are a bit more reverberant and the sense of hall is better with more depth. Image depth isn't that great, either and the whole thing sounds professional but a bit flat and not up the to usual high Mercury standard. The 1958 sessions sound.well, okay but a bit dead with regards to hall sound. The usual Mercury three microphone set up with half-inch, three-track Ampex tape recorders was used for all sessions. The first fourteen tracks were recorded in the Eastman Theater in two sessions, one in March, 1958 and the other in October, 1956 the Watford Town Hall sessions were taped in 1964. The London sessions sound more fun perhaps the London air did something for Fennell or maybe the orchestra just wanted to have a good time. Oh, they are fine and make good background music but to my taste they just aren't quite there, not risky enough. Why? They just don't pack much sparkle or oomph when compared to others mentioned above. Frankly, none of the performances of these pops pieces will replace those on other sources I own by Fiedler and the Boston Pops on RCA or Abravanel on Vanguard, which is a bit surprising given Fennell's famous pops touch.
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