Still Hearing George Shearing

Jazz musicians have their own ways of saying someone has departed this world. They say "Lester left town" or "Max went on the road" or "Al caught the last bus."

On Valentine's Day, George Shearing caught the last bus. For thoughts on George Shearing, we turn to the Old Disc Jockey.

"I first heard Shearing on 'Just Jazz,' a CKCK Regina program led by Jack Pollard and Gren Marsh. It was 1949, and the recording was 'September in the Rain,' by the just formed George Shearing Quintet: Margie Hyams, vibes; Chuck Wayne, guitar; John Levy, bass; the great Denzil DeCosta Best, drums; Shearing, piano. 

"No one had ever heard anything like it. It was a mesmerizing sound, incredibly tight, intense but unhurried, piano, vibes and guitar in unison, the steady pulse of the bass, and the whisper of brushes. It, and the quintet, were an instant hit. (Today's Trivia Question #1: what was on the flip side of that 1949 78?)

"The commercial success of the Shearing sound kept the quintet, with changes in personnel but not instrumentation, going for almost thirty years. Way too long for Shearing, 'The last five years,' he said, 'I played on automatic pilot. I could do the whole show in my sleep.'

"Shearing had much more to do, in different ways. He recorded a series of piano-and-bass duets with Brian Torff, Don Thompson and Neil Swainson. He accompanied a score of singers, including Peggy Lee, Billy Eckstine, Ernestine Anderson, Mel Torme, Teddi King and Carmen Macrae. He recorded a set of songs with Nat Cole. The album was titled 'Nat Sings, Shearing Swings.' I wished they had switched places for the second half, with Nat at the piano and Shearing singing.

"Because Shearing could sing, in a soft, husky voice. Particularly affecting is his recording of 'The Real Thing,' the Gerry Mulligan-Mel Torme song, on one of his albums with Brian Torff.

"And he did other interesting things. He composed settings for a number of Shakespearean verses; he recorded an album of Cole Porter songs with Barry Tuckwell, the Australian French horn virtuoso; he amused himself doing pastiches of classical works and dead-on impressions of other pianists; and he performed on 'Reunion' with Stephane Grappelli, with whom he had played as a teenager in WWII London. (Also in WWII London, he met his first wife, Trixie, in an air raid shelter during the Blitz. He later composed a piece he called 'How's Trix?' He liked to say he had composed three hundred songs, of which two hundred and ninety-nine had gone from relative obscurity to total oblivion. However, he could have lived comfortably forever on the royalties from the other one: 'Lullaby of Birdland.')

"Trivia Question #2: What other instrument did Shearing play?

"He traveled a lot. Some of us remember a high energy evening at Isy's in Vancouver when the quintet was augmented by percussionist Armando Peraza. Diana Krall opened for him at the Orpheum, in a Vancouver Jazz Festival appearance. Don Thompson even persuaded him to go to Powell River for a community music festival. 

"Shearing did reassemble the quintet voicing from time to time. There was a fine run in New York that included Don Thompson, this time on vibes, Neil Swainson on bass, and Reg Shwager on guitar. Plus a drummer whose name I will remember immediately after posting this. And there was one more quintet CD, with a clever cover: five dogs, of different breeds, in a row, with the lead canine--an Irish setter--wearing dark glasses.

"Shearing had a puckish and slightly rude sense of humor, in the English music hall tradition. Introducing a Brian Torff piece called 'High and Inside,' he said, 'The title puzzled me. Because, of course, I am a cricket fan.'

"His great influence, at the beginning, was Teddy Wilson, the pianist long associated with Benny Goodman. In his recording of 'I Can't Get Started,' Shearing sang

'When I first met Benny G.

 He said 'Hi, Teddy' to me.'

"On a long ago late night show, I used a Shearing Quintet recording of 'When Your Lover Has Gone' as a signoff theme. Leaning close to the microphone, I would whisper, in my best teenage baritone, 'Your lover is going now.' 

"And I will always remember going into the Texan Cafe for coffee after signoff, dropping a nickel in the jukebox, and hearing a Shearing trio recording of 'So Rare.'

"George Shearing. We're still hearing George Shearing. We will always be hearing George Shearing."

Answer to Trivia Question #1: "Conception," a Shearing original.

Answer to Trivia Question #2: The accordion.