Symphony Orchestras
After Marian McPartland became disenchanted with noisy, smoky nightclubs, concerts seemed the way to a quiet audience and classical music seemed the key to concerts (Campbell, 1981: 34). She was encouraged by fellow pianist George Shearing, who had mastered works by Bach and Mozart, to branch out into playing with symphony orchestras. Assisted by coach Ada Kopetz-Korf from the Manhattan School of Music, Marian first mastered the Grieg 'Concerto In A Minor', claiming it to be 'less dangerous than the Mozart concerto, and not in many pianists' repertoires' (Press Release, 1978).
Marian gave the Grieg a trial run at the Hotel Carlyle, with Ada Kopetz-Korf playing the orchestra part, and she broke in the concerto with a second piano player at Bates College in Maine soon after. This was followed by a free concert at the Chicago Public Library (Idaszak, 1978). The Chicago program, opposite the City Symphony Orchestra directed by Leon Stein, was another warmup to her debut concert. Two other tryouts of the Grieg took place in February 1978, at Potsdam University, Potsdam, and at Bowling Green University, Ohio, with their symphony orchestras. On April 1, 1978, Marian took to the concert stage with the Rochester Symphony Orchestra, launching a new career as a concerto pianist.
On May 5, 1979, Marian McPartland performed the Grieg with the Somerset County College Community Orchestra in New Jersey (Nutile, 1979). In a 1980 interview, Marian referred to performances of the Concerto with the Memphis and Chicago Civic Symphonies. As well, the Buffalo Philharmonic and an appearance with the Minneapolis Symphony were lined up. The Minneapolis performance took place on June 10, 1980.
Later, Marian McPartland worked up an interpretive rendition of George Gershwin's 'Rhapsody In Blue' and found that piece even more challenging that the Grieg in places. Having recorded a low-key album of Leonard Bernstein's compositions for Bainbridge Records in the early 1960s, Marian commissioned orchestral arrangements of a medley of Bernstein's 'West Side Story' score. Adding to this repertoire, she acquired orchestrations of Gershwin and Ellington medleys, which she performed in a pair of concerts with the Wilkes Barre and Scranton Symphony Orchestras in 1981. From esteemed British composer and arranger, Robert Farnon, she also commissioned arrangements of her own compositions.
In a 1982 program with the New Amsterdam Symphony Orchestra at Alice Tully Hall at the Lincoln Center, Marian McPartland performed Gershwin's 'Cuban Overture', 'An American In Paris' and 'Rhapsody In Blue' as well as lush arrangements of her own compositions. Marian has performed solo or with her trio over the years with the Monmouth Symphony, the Chicago Civic Symphony, the Greenwich Symphony, the Merrick Symphony, the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, the Marin County Symphony, the Orlando Symphony, the South Bend Symphony, the Chautauqua Symphony, the Miami Symphony, the Minnesota Orchestra, the Memphis Symphony, the Rochester Philharmonic, the Milwaukee Symphony, the Minnesota Orchestra, the Wilkes Barre and Scranton Symphony Orchestra, the New Orleans Symphony, the Buffalo Symphony, the Grand Rapids Symphony, the Oakland Symphony, the Florida West Coast Symphony and the Sacramento Symphony (Press Release, 1982). Marian McPartland also performed her orchestral program with the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra in Edmonton, Canada, and with the New York Pops Orchestra under the direction of Skitch Henderson.
Back when she left the Guildhall School Of Music, young Margaret Turner had made a pledge to her parents that she would perform in public as a classical pianist. Without forsaking the jazz scene for symphonic sounds, she fulfilled this promise, and broadened her horizons, when she performed with the London Symphony Orchestra. She was billed as Marian McPartland at the Albert Hall, under the baton of jazz musician and conductor John Dankworth.
Marian remembered fondly, 'My whole family came, and I think they decided I was doing something respectable after all' (The Note, 1993: 10). One evening at The Carlyle, Marian McPartland defined her approach to classical music:
Classical music is like a piece of string. And jazz is like an equal length bit of elastic. Both measure about the same dimension, but [in jazz] there's more give, shimmering and slithering around in the bit of elastic (Storck, 1981: B1).
Exposure For Women In Jazz
During the 1970s, Marian McPartland had assembled a group of female musicians for the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) jazz series At The Top. She had also recorded these female jazz musicians on her Halcyon Records label, and was gathering material for a book about the contributions of women musicians to American jazz. This encylopedia did not eventuate, but some of Marian McPartland's writings on jazz and jazzwomen over the years were compiled into another book, All In Good Time (McPartland, 1987). In 2003, the book was updated and expanded and published by The University Of Illinois Press as Marian McPartland’s Jazz World: All In Good Time.
As a high profile woman musician, it was natural that the inaugural Kansas City Women's Jazz Festival in 1978 would headline Marian McPartland and her fellow jazz pianist, Mary Lou Williams. Any Festival supported by two such highly successful jazz women was bound to highlight the contribution of female instrumentalists to jazz, and the need for women musicians to receive more exposure on stage, in the media, and through their recordings.
The 1980s would herald the release of several books documenting the lives of women in jazz - Antoinette Handy's Black Women In American Bands And Orchestras; Sally Placksin's Jazzwomen: Their Words, Lives And Music; Mary Unterbrink's Jazzwomen At The Keyboard; and Linda Dahl's Stormy Weather: The Music And Lives Of A Century Of Jazzwomen. These groundbreaking studies were long overdue, and foregrounded the stories of many jazzwomen formerly unrecognized.
1980
On February 6, 1980, Marian McPartland appeared in concert at Mercer County Community College, as part of the Cultural Events series (Princeton Spectrum, February 6, 1980). She opened at the Café Carlyle for a season running from August 30 to September 20, 1980. In the celebrated chic of the Carlyle, 'Marian McPartland's music mesmerises her fans into reverential silence, ranging from John Coltrane, Hoagy Carmichael, Harold Arlen, Duke Ellington, Stephen Sondheim to the Beatles' (Corry, 1980).
Alec Wilder died on Christmas Eve 1980, and on December 29, 1980, WXXI-TV Rochester rebroadcast a 1975 documentary on his life, featuring a lengthy conversation between Wilder and Marian McPartland, moderated by Tom Hampson (Rochester Democrat And Chronicle, December 28, 1980). This would be the first of many tributes and concerts commemorating his life and his music.
In another 1980 interview, Marian McPartland articulated her thoughts on improvisation, the process that remained a mystery to Wilder as long as he lived:
Jazz is improvisation of a theme, and I consider myself a jazz musician. I enjoy changing songs around - the tempo, the phrasing, any part of it really. I live dangerously - in a musical sense. It's worth making an occasional mistake, otherwise it's all so repetitive. If you keep playing the same thing every night it's no longer improvisation, it's a piece'. She also revealed that she had just played on a PBS pilot tentatively named In The Key Of Jazz (McPartland to Chemerka, 1980).
Also in 1980, after conducting much research, Marian McPartland wrote a feature article about an extraordinary all-girl band, The International Sweethearts Of Rhythm, formed in 1938 at Piney Woods Country Life School near Jackson, Mississippi. The band achieved great success, including European concerts and stayed together until 1948.
Marian's article shone the spotlight on this group of musical women who had been lost in obscurity since their show business lives came to an end, and led to them being flown in from various part of the country to appear at the Kansas City Women's Festival in 1980. Earlier recordings of the Sweethearts were released as a result, and a documentary film was shown in theaters all over the country (McPartland, 1980).
1981
In February, with Jimmy McPartland and a stellar line-up, Marian performed at the Boston Globe Jazz Festival in the Berklee Performance Center. Interviewed beforehand, she spoke of her pride in securing the right to release, through her record company Halcyon Records, sides she recorded with the late singer Teddi King for the Lincoln Center Library. In so doing, she would support the Lupus Foundation.
Marian also performed at Rick's Café Americain in Chicago, her program ranging from Bix Beiderbecke's 'In A Mist' to John Coltrane's 'Giant Steps'. While in Chicago, she was interviewed for Contemporary Keyboard as the fifth and final pianist in a twelve-week jazz piano festival that had also included Earl Hines, Bill Evans, George Shearing and Oscar Peterson (De Muth, 1981).
Interviewed before a March solo performance at Upsala College, Newark, NJ, Marian McPartland indicated that she would be guest artist with the Monmouth Symphony at the Monmouth Arts Centre in Red Bank, playing the Grieg 'Concerto In A Minor', and a Gershwin medley. She was also optimistic about Piano Jazz being picked up for a third season:
The series was not funded by federal monies, thank God, and Exxon seems interested in underwriting it again. Besides, there are so many players we haven’t had on yet – Herbie Hancock, Earl Hines, Jimmy Rowles, Ray Bryant – that I just have to do another series (Kanzler, 1981).
Much publicity surrounded the first annual competition for jazz pianists residing in Florida, Georgia and Alabama as part of the 20th anniversary of the April River City Arts Festival in Jacksonville. At this Festival, Marian McPartland performed a solo concert in the Civic Auditorium Little Theatre. In a review of this performance, Marian was described as:
A one-woman band as she demonstrated a jazz musician's artistry. The evening went on, through the tricky rhythms and difficult dynamics of Chick Corea's 'Matrix', the late Alec Wilder's 'I'll Be Around', Marian McPartland's own 'Ambiance', with its parallel chord progressions and scales (Crosby, 1981: D9).
She also served on the panel of judges, alongside her colleague Dr. Billy Taylor. As a judge, she indicated she would be 'looking for a good rhythmic approach, originality of ideas, a high quality of improvisation and a degree of technical proficiency' (Strickland, 1981).
In February 1981, a concert program produced by Milford Fargo was presented in Howard Hanson Hall at Eastman College of Music, Rochester. The night was billed as 'A Musical Tribute To Alec Wilder', who had passed the year before. It was a warm, intimate program, with remarks from Eastman Director Robert Freeman, and recorded performances by Marian McPartland, Jackie Cain and Roy Kral, and numerous Eastman musicians who knew Wilder. The selections varied from popular songs to excerpts from Wilder operas and stage productions to instrumental solo and chamber pieces (Stone, 1981).
In April 1981, another concert entitled 'Remembering Alec Wilder' was presented by pianists Marian McPartland and Loonis McGlohon, along with vocalist Marlene VerPlanck. In June 1981, Marian indicated that she had been filling in for Jack O'Brian as the Voice Of Broadway, and would participate in an All-Women Jam at Carnegie Hall on June 4, as part of the KOOL Jazz Festival.
The night was a tribute to Jon Saunders, critic and photographer. Other performers were pianist Dorothy Donegan, trombonist Melba Liston, bassist Lucille Dixon, and saxophonist Jean Fineberg. Whitney Balliett questioned the need for an all-women event:
All-female jazz events are voluntary acts of segregation and seeming admissions that only through numbers can women equal men in jazz. But women have long been equal to men in jazz. Men have dominated its instrumental side, but women have dominated its vocal side. [Most] of the evening was a kind of jam session, with Marian McPartland or Dorothy Donegan on piano, Mary Osborne on guitar, Jean Fineberg on tenor saxophone, Lucille Dixon on bass, and Barbara Merjan on drums (Balliett, 2000: 591).
Reviews of this concert, 'Women Blow Their Own Horns', appeared in Billboard and Variety magazines. Billboard reported the concert as a 'new addition to the Festival line-up':
'Women Blow Their Own Horns' packed the hall on this rainy Fourth of July. Much of the program ran at the same mid-level intensity that afflicts many Festival performances, with the result that the crowd-pleasing finale came as a startling revelation. Jazz can be exciting, whether it is made by men or women, or both. But why wait until the end of the show? Still, there was much good music to be heard.
After an uneven first half spotlighting the Willene Barton Quintet, Melba Liston and Company, pianist Dorothy Donegan, and an account of female jazz and its legacy rendered by local TV personality, Melba Tolliver, the program sharpened its bite with a satisfying group jam.
Mary Osborne set the tone with her breezy guitar style and was joined by Lucille Dixon on bass and Marian McPartland on piano. Representing a younger generation of musicians were Barbara Merjan on drums and Jean Fineberg, whose potent sax and flute solos met deservedly with some of the evening's biggest applause. The group functioned particularly well as a unit, handling classic material like 'Now's The Time' and 'Autumn Leaves' with polish and poise.
The program needed added spice though and Dorothy Donegan delivered it. In a solo setting or in the group jam for the closing number, her raucous and extroverted approach scored a hit (Riedinger, 1981).
Variety, reviewing the KOOL Jazz Festival event, wrote:
The 'Women Blow Their Own Horns' concert was characterized by emcee Melba Tolliver as a 'tribute to our jazz foremothers,' but the emphasis was upon current musicians. The evening belonged to Dorothy Donegan, who wowed the Carnegie Hall crowd with a virtuoso display of solo piano, ranging non-stop through standards such as 'Tea For Two', 'Once In A Lifetime', and even 'Flight Of The Bumblebee'. Donegan returned later to climax the concert with electrifying barrelhouse and stride piano, soloing during a jam session in which her combination of piano attack and outrageous body language stole the show from even such engaging performers as guest artists Dizzy Gillespie and Clark Terry.
Other highlights included moving tributes to the late Mary Lou Williams by pianist Marian McPartland and guitar-vocalist Mary Osborne, Jean Fineburg's excellent modern solo work on tenor sax and flute, interesting arrangements by trombonist Melba Liston, leading her mixed (male and female) septet, and Willene Barton's gut-bucket tenor sax leading her quintet (Variety, July 8, 1981).
On July 31, 1981, Marian McPartland and singer Susannah McCorkle appeared with the Eastman School of Music Arrangers' 'Holiday' Orchestra in 'A Tribute To Alec Wilder'. Marian McPartland continued to bring her polished blend of elegant jazz to The Carlyle, in a season lasting July through September with Steve LaSpina on bass and Charles Braugham on drums.
A review of this performance by John S. Wilson described Marian as 'a moving force in breaking new ground in jazz' and as 'a very astute pioneer. When she does something new, something different, she makes sure it does not seem too different.' On this occasion she introduced an Ornette Coleman tune to her audience in a program that included compositions of Michel Legrand, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Chick Corea, Cole Porter and one of her own compositions (Wilson, 1981).
On August 17, on what would have been Bill Evans' 52nd birthday, Marian McPartland devoted an entire evening at The Carlyle playing the music of this influential pianist after his untimely death. Along with such classic Evans pieces as 'Waltz For Debby', 'Very Early' and 'Turn Out The Stars', she also played tunes written in honor of Evans by pianists George Shearing and Barbara Carroll (The New York Times, August 17, 1981).
On her last night for the 1981 season at the Carlyle, Marian's husband Jimmy, with the golden cornet he inherited from Bix Beiderbecke and mellophone player Don Elliott came by to play music with her, and freedom of expression and love for the music were paramount (Storck, 1981: BI).
Another tribute occurred in memory of singer Teddi King when Marian McPartland performed with singer Susannah McCorkle at the Lincoln Center Library performing tunes associated with Miss King (Shepard, 1981).
1982
Back in the 1960s, Marian McPartland had recorded an album of Leonard Bernstein's show tunes Marian McPartland Plays Music Of Leonard Bernstein. In 1982, she returned to the Carlyle with a birthday tribute to Leonard Bernstein with bassist Steve LaSpina. According to The New York Times review, 'the two musicians created gossamer musical textures of surpassing delicacy' (Holden, 1982).
Even though Marian McPartland built her New York reputation during long engagements at jazz clubs like the Hickory House in the 1950s, in the 1980s she could be found in the more intimate settings of the Café Carlyle, Michael's Pub, and The Cookery, the latter in company with a double bass player, as no amplification was permitted.
A further tribute concert was given in honor of Alec Wilder at Carnegie Hall on July 26, 1982. It was entitled 'Friends Of Alec Wilder', as part of the KOOL Jazz Festival. Whitney Balliett, writing from his own perspective, opined that Wilder 'would not have been altogether displeased by the concert. He always knew that beauty is rare and that praise well given is even rarer'. He continued, going into fine detail about repertoire and performers:
[M]any things would have pleased him: the amount and variety of his music that was performed (about two dozen songs, including 'Baggage Room Blues', 'A Long Night', 'Who Can I Turn To?', 'Lovers And Losers', 'Mimosa And Me' and 'Blackberry Winter'; two woodwind-octet numbers; the third and fourth movements of Suite No. 1 for Horn, Tuba, and Piano; all of the Jazz Suite for Four Horns, and all of the Suite for Baritone Sax, Horn, and Wind Quintet, written for Gerry Mulligan); the complex, tough chords that Marian McPartland used at the beginning of her solo on 'Jazz Waltz For A Friend', written for her; the adept octet performances.of 'Such A Tender Night' and 'Kindergarten Flower Pageant; the quality and strength of Mabel Mercer's voice on 'Did You Ever Cross Over To Sneden's?'; the snap that Gunther Schuller, conducting, got out of the horns in the 'Jazz Suite For Four Horns'; Jackie Cain's straight, sad 'Remember My Child'; Stan Getz's reverential, equally mournful 'Where Do You Go (When It Starts To Rain)?'; and the stately readings, one muted and one open-horn, by the trumpeter Joe Wilder of 'Trouble Is A Man' and 'Blackberry Winter'. Most of all he would have relished the fact that the concert belonged as much to its performers as to him (Balliett, 2000: 622-623).
On August 25, 1982, the tribute to Alec Wilder was broadcast again on WXXI-TV, and aired as a simulcast. The program included commentary by Marian McPartland, Louis Ouzer's photographs of Wilder, and performances from the annual Eastman Arrangers' 'Holiday' Concert which featured Marian McPartland and vocalist Susannah McCorkle performing Wilder pieces.
1983
In 1983, Marian McPartland continued the cabaret theme at Michael's Pub for a four-week run with a tribute to the most jazz-oriented Broadway composer, Harold Arlen, accompanied by bassist Brian Torff. According to The New York Times:
Arlen's bluesy tunes gave the pianist the opportunity to create strong melodic lines, interesting modulations and chord voicings, and the bassist to answer with accompanying figures. Mr. Torff has been leading his own duo for the past year, and in his return to a subordinate role with Miss McPartland, his playing shows the results of the confidence and initiative he has developed as a leader (Wilson, 1983).
On August 12, Marian McPartland performed a concert engagement at Wolf Trap Theater's Meadows Center in Washington, D.C. (Unterbrink, 1983: 37).
1984
1984 saw the return of Marian McPartland to the jazz club scene. With a trio consisting of Gary Mazzaroppi on bass and Todd Strait on drums, Marian McPartland presented her Harold Arlen tribute in the fully-fledged jazz surroundings of Fat Tuesdays in 1984, playing a six-night engagement. 'It has been more than a decade since she has played at a basic, hardcore jazz club. Instead she has usually been heard in the cabaret atmospheres of Michael's Pub, the Café Carlyle, and the now-departed Cookery' (Wilson, 1984).
Since Marian McPartland left traditional jazz behind to enter the world of contemporary jazz which, at the time, was bebop, she has consistently had exceptional bassists and drummers working with her. According to critic John S. Wilson, 'her current bassist is one of her best, Gary Mazzaroppi, and her drummer, Todd Strait, making his New York debut is following in the footsteps of one of Mrs. McPartland's most celebrated drummers, Joe Morello, who came to her 30 years ago on the recommendation of the guitarist, Sal Salvador, who has also sent Mr. Strait to her' (Wilson, 1984).
The avant-garde concerts produced by Verna Gillis during the five years of the KOOL Jazz Festival up to 1984 were moved from Irving Plaza to St. Peter's Lutheran Church. Marian McPartland, however, was scheduled to open the KOOL Jazz Festival's one-hour solo piano concerts in Carnegie Recital Hall. Whitney Balliett gave an overview of her program:
Her program included Duke Ellington's tricky, funny 'Clothed Woman', a blues, a John Coltrane number, Johnny Mandel's fine 'Emily', her own 'Ambiance', Alec Wilder's 'I'll Be Around', 'I Hear A Rhapsody', Ahmad Jamal's pretty 'Without You', Bob Haggart's elegant blues 'My Inspiration', Cole Porter's 'From This Moment On', and 'Royal Garden Blues'.
But almost every selection was submerged in thick chords and deep bass figures - these last resembling Dave McKenna's left-hand drone. Whenever a single-note melodic line came into view, it would be caught from behind by a chordal wave. Presenting jazz pianists alone, as pure and elevated as it may seem, rarely works. Without rhythmic support and guidance, they tend to turn into rhapsodists (Balliett, 2000: 667).
Without doubt, Marian McPartland, given the freedom of a solo setting, tends towards a rhapsodic style, particularly in her free-flowing introductions to pieces.
1985
In February 1985, at Weill Recital Hall in Carnegie Hall, yet another tribute concert to Alec Wilder, 'The First Annual Birthday Concert', was held, with Manny Albam conducting the Friends Of Alec Wilder Orchestra. On May 31, 1985, Marian McPartland gave her symphony repertoire an outing at a gala concert in celebration of the 10th anniversary of the New Amsterdam Symphony Orchestra Season in the Alice Tully Hall in the Lincoln Center. She performed Gershwin's 'Cuban Overture', 'An American In Paris', and 'Rhapsody In Blue', as well as arrangements of her own compositions.
She continued to be a sought-after performer at festivals, such as the Nice Jazz Festival in France and the KOOL Jazz Festival in New York, where she opened the piano series again with her artistic hallmarks 'an expressive serenity and a classical sense of how the elements of jazz pianism ought to be balanced' (Holden, 1985).
This concert in the Carnegie Hall Recital Hall, later renamed the Weill Recital Hall, was significant for the way in which Marian McPartland created an exceptional mixture of musical moods with fastidious technique and a feeling for all the styles of jazz she had assimilated across the decades.
What was also interesting was the way in which Marian McPartland involved the audience. She has always chosen from a broad repertoire, even sometimes asking the audience for requests and combining them in medleys. Marian's motto may well be to be entertaining as well as musically valid. Comments overheard by this researcher at her concerts indicate how enthusiastically audiences react to her variety and versatility.
In an All-American program with the Greenwich Symphony in Connecticut the same year, Marian McPartland played works by Gershwin and Ellington billed as a 'Salute to the State of Liberty'. This was the Greenwich's Symphony's first 'pop' concert involving a jazz musician performing popular music with a symphony orchestra (Tynes, 1985: 11).
1986
1986 was significant in that Marian McPartland's radio program Piano Jazz branched out into presenting guest artists other than pianists. In 1985, during the sixth season of the show, Marian McPartland had presented Dizzy Gillespie, who played piano as well as trumpet. This was followed by pianist/singer Cleo Brown, whom Marian had located living in obscurity in Denver, Colorado. Other guests in the same series were pianists who also sang - Blossom Dearie, Shirley Horn and Carmen McRae. Piano Jazz had subtly expanded in 1985, and on May 8, 1986, singer Sarah Vaughan was acknowledged as the first guest invited to the program as a singer, despite the fact that she also played piano early in her career.
Marian McPartland was quoted as saying, 'It's still Piano Jazz and we have a lot of instrumentalists who are not pianists, but there's enough piano because I'm there. Nobody seems to mind. In fact, we got a lot of compliments on the show we did with Rosemary Clooney. People seemed to love that. And I'm happy that we had Joe Williams. That was a great show also' (Baldwin Revue, 1999: 10). Later, in an interview for JazzTimes, singer Joe Williams summed up the essence of Marian McPartland's pianism, 'Marian is piano.harmonics, and colors' (Zych, 1997: 35).
In February 1986, in the Weill Recital Hall, the Friends Of Alec Wilder performed at the 'Second Annual Birthday Concert' in his honor, with Marian McPartland featured among other interpreters of the Wilder legacy.
1987
Two major career highlights of 1987 were, first, the release on Concord Jazz Inc of the music of Duke Ellington's alter ego Billy Strayhorn, Marian McPartland: Plays The Music Of Billy Strayhorn, and, second, the publication of selected jazz writings in the Oxford University Press edition of Marian McPartland's book All in Good Time. This edition has now been expanded into the Illinois Edition, Marian McPartland's Jazz World: All In Good Time (McPartland, 2003).
A major feature interview by British jazz critic Steve Voce took place during the Grande Parade De Jazz, held in Nice each July. Voce had sought out Marian McPartland during previous Nice appearances in 1985 and 1986, and Marian had reminisced about cycling along the promenade with her husband Jimmy in 1946 when they visited Nice with a USO unit. Marian spoke at length about the leading her different trios, and about the dynamics of the variety of guests on her radio show Piano Jazz (Voce, 1987: 6-9).
Also in February 1987, an '80th Birthday Tribute To Alec Wilder' (Part V: The Composer And The Man) was presented by the Friends of Alec Wilder at the Weill Recital Hall in Carnegie Hall with Marian McPartland, Jackie Cain, Roy Kral and others, including some Wilderian bubble-blowing on stage (Stone, 1987).
In June 1987, Marian McPartland travelled to England to promote All In Good Time and to make a symphony recording with conductor/jazz saxophonist/arranger John Dankworth. In August 1987, Marian McPartland was featured in a tribute to great women of jazz at the Lincoln Center's inaugural Jazz Festival (Carnegie Hall News, December 13, 1988).
1988
Early in 1988, Marian McPartland performed at Carnegie Hall with Walt Levinsky and the Great American Swing Band. This band, led by Walt Levinsky, made its debut in 1987 at Michael's Pub and the members were all alumni of Benny Goodman's famed orchestra.
During another visit to England in June 1988, Marian visited her sister, Joyce. During her stay, she appeared in concert with vocalist Cleo Laine and saxophonist John Dankworth, with Alan Ganley on drums and Alec Dankworth on bass.
In a solo concert at Weill Recital Hall as part of the first New York International Festival of the Arts and the JVC Jazz Festival in July 1988, Marian drew upon a semiformal lyrical style as well as up-tempo swing. One reviewer compared her musical sensibility to that of Alec Wilder. 'Like Mr. Wilder, Miss McPartland is a musician who does not find jazz incompatible with semiclassical instrumental music of a wistful impressionistic sort' (Holden, 1988).
Also in 1988, Marian McPartland shared a piano bench with pianist Joanne Brackeen, headlining a 'Women In Jazz' program in Piedmont Park in Atlanta. They performed solo and duet format, and also conducted a lecture/demonstration at Agnes Scott College. Interviewed for the The Atlanta Journal, Marian spoke of her collaborator as being 'very provocative, rather far out and definitely interesting' and one of her favorite guests on Piano Jazz, celebrating its tenth anniversary in 1988. 'This instinct to share the spotlight is all too rare among musicians. But second nature to a skilled radio interviewer' (Emerson, 1988: 9M).
[Author's note: Marian McPartland wrote the liner notes to Brackeen's 1975 recording Six Ate, on Candid Productions.]
In November 1988, the Marian McPartland Trio performed in Kilbourn Hall as part of a concert series. With support from bassist Gary Mazzaroppi and drummer Todd Strait, Marian ranged through a varied program including 'A Flower Is A Lonesome Thing' with 'Debussy-ish overtones', according to the reviewer. The Times-Union review found Marian's playing a thing of wonder but found bassist Mazzaroppi 'just a hairsbreadth too loud, and incessantly - and distressingly - sharp' and Strait was 'too timid, contenting himself with absent-minded cymbal brushings' (Cantrell, 1988).
1989
On January 13, 1989, Marian McPartland appeared again with the New York Pops under the baton of Founder and Director Skitch Henderson. This concert marked the New York Pops' sixth year of concerts at Carnegie Hall. Along with Marian, guest performers included Walt Levinsky and the Great American Swing Band. Promotional material stated:
British-born Marian McPartland's performances at the piano and her personal style of jazz have won her acclaim as an important figure in jazz today. She is a regular guest at major jazz festivals worldwide and was a featured guest in a tribute to the great women of jazz at Lincoln Center's first jazz festival in August 1987. In addition, Ms. McPartland has been the recipient of the Duke Ellington Fellowship medal from Yale University, the Armstrong Award for Piano Jazz, and the PBS Award for Piano Jazz. In April 1988, her Peabody award-winning radio show began its ninth season for National Public Radio (Carnegie Hall News, December 13, 1988).
At the close of the 1980s, Marian McPartland was being described as a Renaissance woman of jazz, having 'played sterling jazz piano for decades, hosted a nation-wide radio show, run her own record label, educated public school kids about the music, served on arts councils, composed songs, and written fondly of her jazz peers, heroes and heroines for music magazines' (Gewertz, 1987).
Yet another activity for Marian McPartland is her membership of the board of the American Guild of Authors and Composers, the watchdog for the collection of musicians' royalties. Along with Carmen McRae, she also served as a moderator for the series 'Women In Jazz' on Cable Television.
References
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Unknown author (1981) 'Concert Reviews, KOOL Jazz Festival', Variety, July 8
Wilson, J. S. (1981) 'Cabaret: Marian McPartland', The New York Times, July 7
Smith, C. (1981) 'You'll Hear The "Correct" Way With Wilder's Music In This Concert', Rochester Times Union, July 30
Unknown author (1981) 'Salute To A Jazzman', The New York Times, August 17
Shepard, R. F. (1981) 'Tribute', The New York Times, October 15
Holden, S. (1982) 'Piano: Miss McPartland', The New York Times, August 27
Wilson, J. S. (1983) 'Jazz Piano: Miss McPartland', The New York Times, May 12
Unterbrink, M. (1983) 'Marian McPartland: Crusader For School Jazz', Music Educators Journal, September, pp. 36-37
Wilson, J. S. (1984) 'Critics Choices - Jazz', The New York Times, October 28
Wilson, J. S. (1984) 'Cabaret: McPartland', The New York Times, November 1
Holden, S. (1985) 'Marian McPartland On Piano', The New York Times, June 23
Gourse, L. (1995) Madame Jazz: Contemporary Women Instrumentalists, New York: Oxford University Press
Tynes, H. (1985) '"First Lady Of Jazz" Prefers To Improvise', Gannett Westchester Newspapers, June 14, p. 11
Unknown author (1999) 'Marian McPartland: In Love With Jazz', Baldwin Revue, vol. 2, no. 3, Fall, pp. 8-10
Zych, D. (1997) 'Marian McPartland: True Devotion', JazzTimes, vol. 27, no. 8, October, pp. 31-37
Voce, S. (1987) 'Marian McPartland', Jazz Journal International, vol. 40, no. 3, March, pp. 6-9
Stone, D. (1987) 'Blowing Bubbles At Carnegie', Rochester Democrat And Chronicle, March 8
Press Release (1988) Carnegie Hall News, December 13
Holden, S. (1988) 'A Jazz Recital With A Touch Of Semiclassical', The New York Times, July 2
Emerson, B. (1988) 'Marian McPartland Shares A Piano Bench', The Atlanta Journal, September 11, pp. 1M, 9M
Cantrell, S. (1988) 'McPartland Brings Fresh Jazz To Kilbourn', Times Union, November 9
Gewertz, D. (1987) 'Music's Renaissance Lady Keeps Breaking New Ground', Unknown source
