Joe Fiedler's and "Open Sesame" - Fuzzy And Blue (November 12, 2021)

In 2019 trombonist Joe Fiedler released Open Sesame, packed with inventive jazz readings of material drawn from his longstanding “day job” as an EMMY-nominated music director and staff arranger for the famed children’s show Sesame Street. The effort was equally beloved by lay listeners and the jazz world alike. DownBeat praised the music’s “diverse aesthetic,” in which Fiedler blends “elements of funk, rock, free-jazz and New Orleans polyphony into a potent mix that gives depth and texture to the lighthearted compositions.” When Fiedler and the band toured the music, including a stop at Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola with guest luminaries Wynton Marsalis and none other than Elmo himself, the realization set in that the project would be no one-off. “I have these songbooks from the Sesame Street office,” Fiedler says, “and if you whip through the first 30 tunes, absolutely everyone knows them. But there are six or seven thousand songs they’ve done over the past 50 years, with plenty of gold in there to do a second album for sure.”

Fuzzy and Blue, Fiedler’s second volume of Sesame Street songs, shines still more light on the extraordinary wit and melodic gift of the foundational Sesame Street composers Joe Raposo and Jeffrey Moss, among others. The album boasts the same top-tier lineup as Open Sesame, with a couple of twists. Trumpeter Steven Bernstein, who played on only part of Open Sesame, now becomes an integral cog in a nimble three-horn section, expanding and varying the palette and allowing Fiedler to bring his seasoned orchestration skills to the foreground. Reedman Jeff Lederer plays tenor and clarinet and relies more heavily on soprano sax this time out, helping achieve the ideal blend of colors and registers that Fiedler was seeking. Drummer Michael Sarin and bassist Sean Conly keep the rhythms locked and creatively churning, from the Dr. John/Professor Longhair vibe of “Fuzzy and Blue” to the reggae feel of “Elmo’s Song” (by Tony Geiss), to the Hugh Masekela-inspired Afropop of “Ladybug’s Picnic” (originally a peppy country novelty by the late William “Bud” Luckey).

The ensemble also gets a visit from vocal powerhouse Miles Griffith, the very model of a guest on Sesame Street. On the “I Love Trash/C Is for Cookie” melange (a one-two shot of Moss and Raposo), Griffith’s singing is unabashed, larger than life, uproariously funny but insightful and firmly in control. He’s equally compelling in a sociopolitical vein on “I Am Somebody,” in which Fiedler combines an original song with the lyrics of Reverend William Holmes Borders — words recited to powerful effect on Sesame Street in 1972 by Reverend Jesse Jackson. Fiedler felt a need on Fuzzy and Blue to acknowledge social tumult at the close of the Trump presidency and the still-tentative aftermath of the COVID pandemic. “We Are All Earthlings,” a gentle and idyllic Jeffrey Moss folk ballad from 1993, accomplishes this as well, though Fiedler brings a stark added tension with his Stravinsky-esque horn voicings.

Together, Bernstein and Fiedler present a veritable master class in the use of mutes for endless color and timbre subtlety, in the spirit of early jazz. “We’re playing these Harmon mutes with the stems in,” Fiedler says, “which nobody does — that’s from the ’20s.” Bernstein plays his signature slide trumpet on Raposo’s “X Marks the Spot” (the only minor-key song) but otherwise is heard on valve trumpet and flugelhorn, not to mention the lower and darker G trumpet on Raposo’s “I Am Blue.” That song opens with beautiful muted trombone and is distinctly Ellingtonian in orchestration, with horns placed outside their more common registers.

Throughout the album there’s an atmosphere of fun, “a sense of burlesque” as Fiedler put it in the Open Sesame liner notes, that flows from the trombonist’s deep love of Ray Anderson, the Jazz Passengers, Carla Bley and other major influences. Steven Bernstein’s Sexmob is another. The improvisational openness and risk of Fiedler’s trio dates Sacred Chrome Orb, The Crab, I’m In and Joe Fiedler Plays the Music of Albert Mangelsdorff also carry over to this more song-oriented endeavor. Fuzzy and Blue, like its predecessor, is Fiedler’s way of bringing it all together, reminding himself and all of us that inspiration can and does come from everywhere, and that everything is connected.

A native of Pittsburgh, Fiedler is an accomplished jazz improviser and bandleader with sideman credits including Andrew Hill, Charles Tolliver, Satoko Fujii, Eddie Palmieri, Celia Cruz and a host of others. In addition to his trio and other small-group lineups, Fielder leads the low-brass quartet Big Sackbut (three trombones & tuba), which has released the albums Big Sackbut, Sackbut Stomp and Live in Graz. He was nominated for an Emmy Award in the category of Outstanding Music Direction and Composition in a Children’s Series in 2013 and 2016. He plays lead trombone on the 2021 movie soundtrack album for Lin-Manuel Miranda’s In the Heights, contributing horn orchestrations for five major numbers and underscoring cues as well. While playing the In the Heights stage production in 2008 he met chief arranger Bill Sherman, who went on to hire Fiedler for a reboot of The Electric Company and then Sesame Street as well. 

1. ABCDEFGHI

2. Bein' Green

3. Fuzzy and Blue

4. I Am Somebody

5. I Am Blue

6. Elmo's Song

7. I Love Trash

8. Bip Bippadotta Suite

9. Lady Bug's Picnic

10. We Are All Earthlings

11. One of These Things

12. X Marks the Spot

13. Captain Vegetable

Joe Fiedler, trombone

Jeff Lederer, soprano & tenor saxophones, clarinet

Steven Bernstein, trumpet, slide trumpet, flugelhorn, G trumpet

Sean Conly, acoustic and electric bass

Michael Sarin, drums

Special Guest: Miles Griffith, vocals (Tracks 4 & 7)

Recorded at The Bunker Studio Brooklyn May 10-11, 2021

Mixed and mastered by Dave Darlington at Bass Hit Recording

Art: Fran Pontenpié

Photography: Scott Friedlander

PREORDER

Shakers n' Bakers - Heart Love (February 14, 2018)

In 1968, after years of being one of the most charismatic and controversial characters in the free jazz movement of the 1960’s, the saxophonist Albert Ayler made a recording called “New Grass”, comprised of songs that he had created along with his musical and life partner Mary Maria Parks. These new songs spoke with the directness of the language of R n’ B and Soul music and were produced with a slick sound by Bob Thiele for the Impulse label. This music expresses Albert and Mary Maria’s beautiful vision of a world filled with happiness and universal love. While Albert’s own playing on the record shows the same fire and freedom he exhibited throughout his entire recording career, the album was a departure from the less structured sound of his previously recorded music. This music used the familiar forms of popular music forms to express an ecstatic millennial vision of Heaven on Earth. 

Upon it’s release, the album “New Grass” was subjected to great criticism, most pointedly by some of the people who had championed Albert in his early career and raised him up as a hero of the new jazz. In the magazine “Cricket”, Amiri Baraka and his editors accused Albert of being a “sell-out” who had appeased Impulse Records by making an album that was intended to broaden his appeal to a wider audience. Albert made one more album for Impulse, but within 3 years of the release of “New Grass” he was suddenly gone, the victim of a tragic drowning in the East River. 

The album’s utopian vision and millennial fervor resonate deeply and I have felt for a long time that my group Shakers n’ Bakers was the perfect ensemble to re-visit the rarely heard songs on this recording. In addition to these joyful and visionary songs you will hear some traditional Spiritual songs included here that Albert had previously recorded as well. I have made my case for the connections between the “Vision Songs” of the Shaker religious sect and the music of Albert Ayler in the previous two Shakers n’ Bakers recordings - here I focus only on the second part of that equation, although in the opening recitation you will hear a Shaker text that I uncovered in original manuscript form while doing research in 2013 as a NEH “Summer Scholar” at the NY State Archives in Albany. The opening words of this recording have not been uttered since the mid-19th Century and speak to the power of revelation of the divine through human expression that connects the Shakers and Albert. 

1. Message from Mother Ann

2. Everybody's Movin'

3. Oh Love of Life!

4. Deep River

5. Music is the Healing Force of the Universe

6. A Man is Like a Tree

7. Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen

8. New Generation

9. Swing Low Sweet Chariot

10. Goin' Home

11. Heart Love 05:08

Shakers n’ Bakers: 

Mary LaRose / Miles Griffith – vocals 

Jeff Lederer – Tenor Saxophone, flute 

Jamie Saft – piano, organ, Baldwin electric harpsichord 

Chris Lightcap – bass 

Allison Miller – drums 

With: 

Steven Bernstein – trumpet, slide trumpet 

Kirk Knuffke – cornet 

Joe Fiedler – trombone 

Lisa Parrott – baritone saxophone 

Special guest on #7 and #9 

Matt Wilson – drums 

And the “Heart Love Singers”: 

Amy Cervini, Mary LaRose, Melissa Stylliano, Toni Seawright, Chelsea McClauren. 

All arrangements by Jeff Lederer ç ledrose music (bmi) 

Recorded May 1 and 2 at Systems Two, Brooklyn NY 

Engineered by Mike Marciano 

Mixed by Jamie Saft at Potterville International Sound. 

Mastered by Alan Douches at West West Side Sound. 

Shaker “Gift Hearts” created by the women of the Shakers community graciously provided by the Hancock Shaker Village. 

Designed by Guillermo Prado, Eight Point Two studio.