Tom Dempsey: Saucy

Guitar and Hammond B3 organ: a specific sonic palette
I want every listener to feel great when they listen to music. (Quote Tom Dempsey)
Hans Koert

Tom Dempsey, New York based guitar player, always carries the sound of those Jimmy Smith’s    B3  Hammond ….. I carry it with me everywhere I go .. with or without the guitar …  he says in an interview with Brent at the criticaljazz.com site. That music embodies a level of sophistication, integrity, honesty, humility, positivity, humanity, raw expression and an intent on bringing a good feeling to the world that is palpable.  When I was a kid, he remembers, the first record with a jazz guitar that fascinated me was the 1965 Verve album by the Wynton Kelly trio featuring Wes Montgomery at the guitar ….. This album led me on a musical journey, as Tom describes it at the liner notes, which introduced him to the organ played by Jimmy Smith, playing a duet with Wes Montgomery: The 1966 Verve Dynamic Duo album.  Dempsey says to have been inspired by guitarist like Wes Montgomery and Pat Martino, but also Charlie Christian, Kenny Burrell, Grant Green, Jim Hall, George Benson, Tal Farlow …… and a lot more.

Tom Dempsey (source: tomdempseymusic.com)

Since he moved to New York City, more than 20 years ago, he played with several organ players in clubs like Augie’s  and in several Harlem clubs down town. His latest album is entitled Saucy, wich refers to  …. my days playing regularly in Harlem with one specific organist who almost exclusively played in the key of G.  To this day G is one of my favorite keys on the guitar.

Enjoy this own composition  Saucy, which became the title song of this album,  in a fragment of a concert at the Columbia University, 2012 .

Tom Dempsey is accompanied by Ron Oswanski at the Hammond B3 organ and Alvin Atkinson on drums. Ron Oswanski debuted last summer with his album December’s song.

Tim Ferguson (not on the record)  and Tom Dempsey (source: tomdempseymusic.com)

His album Saucy contains ten tracks, half his own compositions – half standards.  Buddy Montgomery’s Bock to Bock ( Monk and Wes’ younger brother), Lee Morgan’s Ceora and the Simon and Carfunkel hit Bridge Over Troubled Water, which remembers him to the Katrina and Sandy hurricanes. Ceora, which debuted on Lee Morgan’s Blue Note album Cornbread ( September 1965), has always been one of my favorites, he says in the liner notes: The rhythmic background of the sounds of Brazil coupled with the sophisticated rhythms, melodic and harmonic attributes if be-bop and hard bop music make for a very interesting marriage of musical textures.   

(photo courtesy: Hans Koert)

The album ends with Tom Dempsey’s Pat-a-tat-tat, an uptempo composition by Dempsey, written for Pat Martino, a jazz icon he admires … It belongs to my favorites of this album. 

Hans Koert
editor
keepswinging@live.nl

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The Tom Dempsey Trio has that specific sound of the jazz guitar in combination with the groovy sounds of the Hammond B3 organ .... a popular sonic palette.  Tom Dempsey's latest album, entitled Saucy, features Ron Oswanski at the Hammmond B3 organ  and Alvin Atkinson on drums. A great album to find a copy.

 Retrospect
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Ron Oswanski: December's Moon

This is not an organ record (Quote: Neil Tesser)
Ron Oswanski's debut: an entertaining lyrical post-bop album
Hans Koert

Ron Oswanski debut album December’s Moon, is not an organ record …….. Neil Tesser opens its liner notes; a really weird statement, as, when you play the album the opening track, White Meadow, starts with the full sound of a B3 Organ ….. What did Neil wanted to say? Ron Oswanski explains this rather weird statement …..  If you expect to hear the groovy sounds of a Jimmy Smith B3 organ or the groovy rhythms of the so-called Jazz organ trios of the 1960s and 1970s you bought the wrong record …… I’m not a traditional Jimmy Smith style organ player, Ron says: I do play that style, but I’m a big ECM ( = Edition of Contemporary Music ) fan who listened to a lot of Keith Jarrett and Jan Garbarek.  

 

Ron Oswanski (photo courtesy: Ron Oswanski)

Ron Oswanski was born in 1974 in Toledo (Ohio) and started to play the piano as a kid.  He took the accordion to play in his father’s polka band and became fascinated by the B3 organ due to  Bill Heid:  I used to hear Bill playing at Rusty’s all the time. I bought my first organ from him, and he was my major organ influence.
Enjoy this cd's preview:



His first debut on record was with Maynard Ferguson, who invited him early 1990s to play in his band. Working with Maynard was a fantastic experience .. He really encouraged us  to write …. To bring in what you have.  Ron debuted on Maynard Ferguson’s Big Bop Nouveau Concord Jazz album These Cat’s can Swing (1994); his debut album under his own name has been released a few months ago: December’s Moon …..  The reason is very simply …… Ron Oswanski, being a sought after accompanists, has a busy calendar as a session player and sideman and that’s why he’s making this relatively late debut as a leader.

Ron Oswanski (photo courtesy: Ron Oswanski)

The album has a dozen tracks, featuring Ron Oswanski on Hammond B3, but also at the piano  and the accordion. Guitarist John Abercrombie can be heard on five tracks, like the Kenny Wheeler composition Kayak an the great Oswanski title song December Moon. Most of the tracks are Oswanski’s own compositions.

I really liked Solo for Undia, a Tim Ries composition (he plays saxophones in the band), the groovy Ukrania Polka,  played at the accordion and the piano trio version of Fred Hersch Evanessence, which was originally released on Fred Hersch's  1990 Tribute to Bill Evans as well as his Heartsongs, albums released in the previous year.  It’s heart to point to my most favorite track: Is it Evanessence or 80-80-8, an Oswanski original or Kenny Wheeler’s Kayak.  Never mind – A very entertaining record with Ron Oswanski playing the keys ( Hammond B3, piano and accordion)
Find yourself a copy.

Hans Koert
keepswinging@live.nl
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Neil Tesser, who wrote the liner notes for Hammond B3 jazz artist Ron Oswanski, opens with the quote: This is not an organ record ..... a rather weird suggestion, I think, as it is Ron Oswanski's main instrument: that needs some further explanation.  Ron, who's active in jazz since the early 1990s, recently debuted with this album under his own name and shows that he is a great jazz player at the keys .... not only the Hammond B3, but also at the accordion and piano, ............  December's Moon is a very entertaining album and the music, the repertoire learns, that there is more then the funky groovy sounds of the Hammond as we know from the 1960s Hammond Organ trio's of Jimmy Smith and his successors  .... that's why this album is not an ordinary organ record!

 Retrospect
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