Hal was an incredible teacher. At the New School (and probably other places) he used to teach a Rhythm Section workshop that always had lines out the door of people trying to audition for it. So many nuggets of pure gold. A few (of a billion) off the top of my head:
"Swing is about decay as much as it is about attack. You should practice at least four distinct note lengths that you can combine to create different swing feels."
"Actively trying to hear a clave in your head (even in a straight-ahead setting) can make your phrasing way more rhythmically interesting."
"Cannonball and the boys gave me two years to get my blues together. Thank god, cause I would have been fired before then if they hadn't."
There's also the great, semi-famous story — which Hal personally validated — of Hal pushing his Fender Rhodes into the Hudson River sometime in the mid-70's, after deciding he wanted to recommit himself to acoustic piano.
Thanks for sharing your wonderful experiences with Hal Galper, Ethan. My sole in-person encounter with Galper is nowhere near as deep as yours and yet I feel compelled to share it because it left such a strong impression on me.
In 1985 I was 22 and took my girlfriend Julia up to the Blue Ridge Parkway in the '72 Buick Electra 225 I had just inherited from my grandmother. At elevation this autumn day was socked in by fog, so there wasn't a damned thing to see. However the muffler blew on the car so there was plenty to hear and that would be the day's theme. Sound.
That evening we saw Phil Woods with Tom Harrell and Hal Galper (sorry but I can't recall bass or drums) at Rhythm Alley, a tiny club in Chapel Hill, NC. Seeing jazz legends in holes in the wall was not and is not an everyday thing here. The show was amazing.
Afterward Hal hung out and we chatted with him. Wearing a blue Oxford with khakis and Birkenstocks, he was amused when I told him he looked like a preppie from hell. He was warm and patient and seemed genuinely to enjoy interacting with us young people. I didn't know he was an educator but now it makes so much sense. As an educator I feel the same way.
And that's all. That's all. Ask not for whom the bell tolls...
I enjoyed this a lot and I'm eager to listen to some more of Hal's recordings, which I'm not familiar with at all. But anyone in the Ahmad Jamal vibe is worth checking out, for me.
Interesting side note though - I was surprised, almost shocked, to see the name Steve Ellington, which I hadn't thought about in years. I saw him play, and played a few gigs with him (I was a bassist then) in Montgomery, Alabama in the late '90s. Also interesting that you refer to him as "mysterious". Among the younger players in that scene, of which I was one, all we knew about him was that he had played with some names, but the only recording I remember finding with him on it was that Dave Holland album. I never spoke to him to ask for more info or stories, or looked much further into it, to be honest, and I moved to New York soon after.
I never met Hal, and don’t know his actual work, outside of the Konitz record which I don’t love. But! I love these anecdotes, and for me they are very moving, because his videos and books changed my thinking, playing, and teaching dramatically. I struggled for years to get better with improvisation and a few hours of studying his lessons turned my musical life around.
There are two long and excellent oral history interviews from Cadence magazine circa 2007 which I believe are on the Galper website. The first one mostly about his time in Boston was extremely useful to me when I was writing my yet to be published biography of Tony Williams. Hal Galper himself was also extremely generous with his time in providing me with additional information. Sam Rivers’ A New Conception with Galper on piano is, in my view, a significant recording.
In a blindfold test I might hear some connections between the NEW CONCEPTION Galper and the 1970s quintet Galper, but I don't think I'd connect them with the Concord Jazz-era Galper or the Phil Woods Galper.
Ethan, do you hear a through-line, something fundamental across the years?
A New Conception: while comping, HG is very 60s Blue Note (RVG’s production contributes of course). But when he solos he sounds more distinctive - in the middle of the album there are three standards and HG sounds a bit like Verve-era Bill Evans but with more “id” (he’s less controlled in an exciting way).
1970s leader albums: very much in a Tyner bag, which sounds great behind the Breckers.
HG replaces Mike Melillo in Phil Woods band (1980-1990): these records were all over jazz radio in my teens. I sampled a 1980 session (the Birds of a Feather bonus material in the PW Mosaic set) and the Tyner-isms are stripped away, but the rhythmic drive from the 1970s is largely maintained. (With Sam Rivers HG was very rhythmically elastic.)
But interestingly in 1990 (All Bird’s Children) he goes pentatonic when the tune calls for it (Hal Crook’s “Ixtlan”) but his attack sounds nothing like Tyner.
Then in the 2010s on his own leader dates it’s all pulled together: you still hear the influences but it’s completely integrated.
I’m not a pianist but to my ears it sounds like the touch changes a lot over the years, but in ways that serve the band. The moments I love best are when he plays a crazy elastic embellishment often side-slipped (like a trail of sparks across the sky) and sticks the landing (he often ends a solo this way). You hear that from 1966 through to 2016.
I listened much more while assembling this week's radio show. I didn't discern a through-line. But I've come to think that the stylistic shifts were contextual, which is to say: if you have a band with the Brecker Brothers, are you going to play like Bill Evans? No, you're going to play like McCoy Tyner. Does that sound right with Phil Woods? No, maybe Tommy Flanagan. You need to make a trio work and you've just been playing the whole range of tunes with Woods: from the 1930s to Oliver Nelson and Eddie Harris: you take that repertoire and you dip into the Ahmad Jamal bag.
In the early 2000s Hal put together a band inspired by Hermeto Pascoal. Jo Lowry and I were the singers and John Ellis played sax. Jo and I wrote lyrics to some of Hal’s tunes.
These are most if not all of the Phil Woods albums with the three G's rhythm section. Some are quartet, others quintet w/Tom Harrell, others with different guests, or a larger band. Thanks for inspiring me to compile this list, I wasn't aware of some of these before!
Live from New York (1982)
At the Vanguard (1982) (both these first two albums recorded on consecutive nights)
Thank you for this tribute to Hal Galper. I have a few of his albums and downloaded a few more. 1977's "Now Hear This" with Terumasa is pretty damn good.
It's interesting where your column leads. Listened to Conception with Sam Rivers and then ended up buying four late-period Sam Rivers albums. Inspiration and Culmination, and then Purple Violets and Violet Violets. Great stuff.
I took a few zoom lessons with Hal around the time of his " Forward Motion " book. He was very nice and quite helpful but he insisted on playing not his piano but a fucking melodica! I imagine he had only a desktop computer and wasn't going to make accommodations for anyone.
At one point I mentioned that I had just seen Konitz with Broadbent and he said " he could have called me."
There exists a trio lp recorded in Australia that's really remarkable.
I do remember thinking that he was committing career suicide when I read his " Open letter to the Jazz Business " that was published in Downbeat way back. I think he accomplished his goal with that as he disappeared from sight for a number of years. I think he found teaching rewarding.
After he retired he was interested in playing again and we talked about possible venues in Ct but he said he'd tried booking and they were uninterested which I don't understand. He finally had a regular gig near his place for a number of years and he seemed happy with that.
I remember him telling me that Getz didn't know the changes but not in a negative way. I think, like Pres, he didn't want to know as it would be an unnecessary distraction.
I had the good fortune of hearing (and recording) Hal in the most intimate setting, a 60-70 seat club in Toronto, Cafe des Copains, in March of 1990. He was there for a couple of weeks, playing solo piano and I had never heard him that way, only with other musicians. 'Twas a real revelation -- the tunes, tempos, the range. And he was a good talker/teacher/storyteller, a good hang...
Hal had never recorded solo, so the taping I did for my radio station were of interest to him, so I gave them to him. Perhaps they became an "audition" for the later Concord solo release he made.
(He made a deal with an Italian label for release: "Hal Galper at Cafe des Copains" Philology W 35.2)
I remember that club fondly. I lived in Chicago, but was in Toronto for a meeting with a client about a sound system design, and when I learned that Barry Harris was there, settled in for the night. It was nice getting to know a local with conversations between sets.
It was a great spot, relaxed and unpretentious, with the piano in effect in the middle of the room. Kind of 'music in the round'. Small enough that the instrument (and it was 95% solo piano) was in the middle of the room, with the artist within reach. No amplifying, just a talk mic.
It hadn't been much of a music spot before new management was convinced by John Norris (of coda magazine and Sackville Records) to try jazz. The first artist was Ralph Sutton, followed on over the next few years by such as Ray Bryant, Jay McShann, Junior Mance, Dick Hyman, Barry Harris (glad you liked it!), Dick Wellstood, Judy Carmichael and on and on. And I got to record them all for broadcast while they were there, pumping up the audience.
Of course the landlord noted the success, and demanded a rent increase, so when the lease ended on a Wednesday night, overnight the operation was moved to another spot run by the same man (Montreal Bistro). Art Hodes played Wednesday at the Cafe des Copains and continued on Thursday at the Montreal Bistro. And the music played on...
thanks for recording all that music for posterity. I have heard a few good solo recitals from Cafe Des Copains, including Stanley Cowell, Ronnie Mathews, and Art Hodes. If I could clone myself I would survey them all (and also survey the Maybeck Hall series).
Great post, thanks for sharing all the personal encounters!
Cool to see the mention of Steve Ellington; the Sam Rivers album, Dimensions & Extensions, was an early influence for me, and Ellington plays beautifully in a distinctive style on that one. I need to hear his later playing with Galper; thanks for calling those out.
Speaking of Galper, his Rhodes work on Cannonball's live-in-the-studio album Inside Straight was also big with me and my neophyte jazz buddies in high school. Still a very fun listen.
This is definitely one of your most interesting memorial pieces. I’ve always agreed with Shostakovich that you learn the most hearing musicians talk about the musicians who matter to them. But I must also accuse you of burying the lede in our friendship - dude, you’re a drummer?!?!? As if we didn’t have enough to talk about already! 😉😄😎
Hal was an incredible teacher. At the New School (and probably other places) he used to teach a Rhythm Section workshop that always had lines out the door of people trying to audition for it. So many nuggets of pure gold. A few (of a billion) off the top of my head:
"Swing is about decay as much as it is about attack. You should practice at least four distinct note lengths that you can combine to create different swing feels."
"Actively trying to hear a clave in your head (even in a straight-ahead setting) can make your phrasing way more rhythmically interesting."
"Cannonball and the boys gave me two years to get my blues together. Thank god, cause I would have been fired before then if they hadn't."
There's also the great, semi-famous story — which Hal personally validated — of Hal pushing his Fender Rhodes into the Hudson River sometime in the mid-70's, after deciding he wanted to recommit himself to acoustic piano.
great stories!
Thanks for sharing your wonderful experiences with Hal Galper, Ethan. My sole in-person encounter with Galper is nowhere near as deep as yours and yet I feel compelled to share it because it left such a strong impression on me.
In 1985 I was 22 and took my girlfriend Julia up to the Blue Ridge Parkway in the '72 Buick Electra 225 I had just inherited from my grandmother. At elevation this autumn day was socked in by fog, so there wasn't a damned thing to see. However the muffler blew on the car so there was plenty to hear and that would be the day's theme. Sound.
That evening we saw Phil Woods with Tom Harrell and Hal Galper (sorry but I can't recall bass or drums) at Rhythm Alley, a tiny club in Chapel Hill, NC. Seeing jazz legends in holes in the wall was not and is not an everyday thing here. The show was amazing.
Afterward Hal hung out and we chatted with him. Wearing a blue Oxford with khakis and Birkenstocks, he was amused when I told him he looked like a preppie from hell. He was warm and patient and seemed genuinely to enjoy interacting with us young people. I didn't know he was an educator but now it makes so much sense. As an educator I feel the same way.
And that's all. That's all. Ask not for whom the bell tolls...
I enjoyed this a lot and I'm eager to listen to some more of Hal's recordings, which I'm not familiar with at all. But anyone in the Ahmad Jamal vibe is worth checking out, for me.
Interesting side note though - I was surprised, almost shocked, to see the name Steve Ellington, which I hadn't thought about in years. I saw him play, and played a few gigs with him (I was a bassist then) in Montgomery, Alabama in the late '90s. Also interesting that you refer to him as "mysterious". Among the younger players in that scene, of which I was one, all we knew about him was that he had played with some names, but the only recording I remember finding with him on it was that Dave Holland album. I never spoke to him to ask for more info or stories, or looked much further into it, to be honest, and I moved to New York soon after.
I hadn't thought about any of that in many years.
I never met Hal, and don’t know his actual work, outside of the Konitz record which I don’t love. But! I love these anecdotes, and for me they are very moving, because his videos and books changed my thinking, playing, and teaching dramatically. I struggled for years to get better with improvisation and a few hours of studying his lessons turned my musical life around.
Nice to hear!
There are two long and excellent oral history interviews from Cadence magazine circa 2007 which I believe are on the Galper website. The first one mostly about his time in Boston was extremely useful to me when I was writing my yet to be published biography of Tony Williams. Hal Galper himself was also extremely generous with his time in providing me with additional information. Sam Rivers’ A New Conception with Galper on piano is, in my view, a significant recording.
I agree about A NEW CONCEPTION
Looking forward to the Tony Williams book! Right on!
Windows (1975) is a wonderful duo album with Lee Konitz!
I admit to mixed feelings about Hal on WINDOWS but Konitz himself is unbelievable on that record. Peak '70s Lee to be sure.
In a blindfold test I might hear some connections between the NEW CONCEPTION Galper and the 1970s quintet Galper, but I don't think I'd connect them with the Concord Jazz-era Galper or the Phil Woods Galper.
Ethan, do you hear a through-line, something fundamental across the years?
This is a great question, but I don’t have a very good answer. Someone who knew his work better should weigh in…
I’ve done a quick survey today:
A New Conception: while comping, HG is very 60s Blue Note (RVG’s production contributes of course). But when he solos he sounds more distinctive - in the middle of the album there are three standards and HG sounds a bit like Verve-era Bill Evans but with more “id” (he’s less controlled in an exciting way).
1970s leader albums: very much in a Tyner bag, which sounds great behind the Breckers.
HG replaces Mike Melillo in Phil Woods band (1980-1990): these records were all over jazz radio in my teens. I sampled a 1980 session (the Birds of a Feather bonus material in the PW Mosaic set) and the Tyner-isms are stripped away, but the rhythmic drive from the 1970s is largely maintained. (With Sam Rivers HG was very rhythmically elastic.)
But interestingly in 1990 (All Bird’s Children) he goes pentatonic when the tune calls for it (Hal Crook’s “Ixtlan”) but his attack sounds nothing like Tyner.
Then in the 2010s on his own leader dates it’s all pulled together: you still hear the influences but it’s completely integrated.
I’m not a pianist but to my ears it sounds like the touch changes a lot over the years, but in ways that serve the band. The moments I love best are when he plays a crazy elastic embellishment often side-slipped (like a trail of sparks across the sky) and sticks the landing (he often ends a solo this way). You hear that from 1966 through to 2016.
Thanks for such a detailed comment!!!
I listened much more while assembling this week's radio show. I didn't discern a through-line. But I've come to think that the stylistic shifts were contextual, which is to say: if you have a band with the Brecker Brothers, are you going to play like Bill Evans? No, you're going to play like McCoy Tyner. Does that sound right with Phil Woods? No, maybe Tommy Flanagan. You need to make a trio work and you've just been playing the whole range of tunes with Woods: from the 1930s to Oliver Nelson and Eddie Harris: you take that repertoire and you dip into the Ahmad Jamal bag.
https://wfmu.org/playlists/shows/154520
In the early 2000s Hal put together a band inspired by Hermeto Pascoal. Jo Lowry and I were the singers and John Ellis played sax. Jo and I wrote lyrics to some of Hal’s tunes.
That Phil Woods rhythm section of the “three G’s” (Galper/Steve Gilmore/Bill Goodwin) was by itself one of the great trios.
What is a good place to start with the Phil Woods / Hal Galper albums ? Phil Woods was very prolific in the 80s!
These are most if not all of the Phil Woods albums with the three G's rhythm section. Some are quartet, others quintet w/Tom Harrell, others with different guests, or a larger band. Thanks for inspiring me to compile this list, I wasn't aware of some of these before!
Live from New York (1982)
At the Vanguard (1982) (both these first two albums recorded on consecutive nights)
Integrity (1984)
Piper at the Gates of Dawn (1984)
Phil Woods Quintet Heaven (1984)
Gratitude (1986)
Dizzy Gillespie Meets Phils Woods Quintet (1986)
Bob Stew (1987)
Bouquet 1987)
Phil Woods Little Big Band: Evolution (1988)
Phil Woods Quintet + 1: Flash (1989)
Thank you for this tribute to Hal Galper. I have a few of his albums and downloaded a few more. 1977's "Now Hear This" with Terumasa is pretty damn good.
Relatively rare Tony Williams appearance
It's interesting where your column leads. Listened to Conception with Sam Rivers and then ended up buying four late-period Sam Rivers albums. Inspiration and Culmination, and then Purple Violets and Violet Violets. Great stuff.
Fabulous
Caught 4 sets of Hal with Cannon in the mid 70s. That band could "do it all" !!
Wish I could have seen that band
I took a few zoom lessons with Hal around the time of his " Forward Motion " book. He was very nice and quite helpful but he insisted on playing not his piano but a fucking melodica! I imagine he had only a desktop computer and wasn't going to make accommodations for anyone.
At one point I mentioned that I had just seen Konitz with Broadbent and he said " he could have called me."
There exists a trio lp recorded in Australia that's really remarkable.
I do remember thinking that he was committing career suicide when I read his " Open letter to the Jazz Business " that was published in Downbeat way back. I think he accomplished his goal with that as he disappeared from sight for a number of years. I think he found teaching rewarding.
After he retired he was interested in playing again and we talked about possible venues in Ct but he said he'd tried booking and they were uninterested which I don't understand. He finally had a regular gig near his place for a number of years and he seemed happy with that.
I remember him telling me that Getz didn't know the changes but not in a negative way. I think, like Pres, he didn't want to know as it would be an unnecessary distraction.
Thanks for comments. Is the Australian LP “Naturally?”
I remember Mulligan saying that Chet damn sure understood, but didn't know what to call it.
I had the good fortune of hearing (and recording) Hal in the most intimate setting, a 60-70 seat club in Toronto, Cafe des Copains, in March of 1990. He was there for a couple of weeks, playing solo piano and I had never heard him that way, only with other musicians. 'Twas a real revelation -- the tunes, tempos, the range. And he was a good talker/teacher/storyteller, a good hang...
Hal had never recorded solo, so the taping I did for my radio station were of interest to him, so I gave them to him. Perhaps they became an "audition" for the later Concord solo release he made.
(He made a deal with an Italian label for release: "Hal Galper at Cafe des Copains" Philology W 35.2)
amazing story, thanks!
I remember that club fondly. I lived in Chicago, but was in Toronto for a meeting with a client about a sound system design, and when I learned that Barry Harris was there, settled in for the night. It was nice getting to know a local with conversations between sets.
It was a great spot, relaxed and unpretentious, with the piano in effect in the middle of the room. Kind of 'music in the round'. Small enough that the instrument (and it was 95% solo piano) was in the middle of the room, with the artist within reach. No amplifying, just a talk mic.
It hadn't been much of a music spot before new management was convinced by John Norris (of coda magazine and Sackville Records) to try jazz. The first artist was Ralph Sutton, followed on over the next few years by such as Ray Bryant, Jay McShann, Junior Mance, Dick Hyman, Barry Harris (glad you liked it!), Dick Wellstood, Judy Carmichael and on and on. And I got to record them all for broadcast while they were there, pumping up the audience.
Of course the landlord noted the success, and demanded a rent increase, so when the lease ended on a Wednesday night, overnight the operation was moved to another spot run by the same man (Montreal Bistro). Art Hodes played Wednesday at the Cafe des Copains and continued on Thursday at the Montreal Bistro. And the music played on...
thanks for recording all that music for posterity. I have heard a few good solo recitals from Cafe Des Copains, including Stanley Cowell, Ronnie Mathews, and Art Hodes. If I could clone myself I would survey them all (and also survey the Maybeck Hall series).
Glad you liked them...there are those and scores more, sitting on tapes somewhere, most of them digitally recorded at the Cafe, and the Bistro.
a worthy project to take on for the right team…
Great post, thanks for sharing all the personal encounters!
Cool to see the mention of Steve Ellington; the Sam Rivers album, Dimensions & Extensions, was an early influence for me, and Ellington plays beautifully in a distinctive style on that one. I need to hear his later playing with Galper; thanks for calling those out.
Speaking of Galper, his Rhodes work on Cannonball's live-in-the-studio album Inside Straight was also big with me and my neophyte jazz buddies in high school. Still a very fun listen.
great!
This is definitely one of your most interesting memorial pieces. I’ve always agreed with Shostakovich that you learn the most hearing musicians talk about the musicians who matter to them. But I must also accuse you of burying the lede in our friendship - dude, you’re a drummer?!?!? As if we didn’t have enough to talk about already! 😉😄😎
Well I hit drums and cymbals for a while there. I also played bass and tenor sax in the school bands. None of that at a high level.
Thanks for this, Hal was a really good teacher with great insight into what works and what doesn't - not that I always agreed.
btw: you mention Jamey Aebersold, it's his birthday today (20th July) - somebody should do a deep interview with him.
Wow. Jamey is 86 today.
Still gigging!