Shelly Manne & His Men Play Checkmate

In a documentary film about food supplies to be consumed in time of war, stored in underground bunkers, I used a solo of drummer Shelly Manne for a sequence of never ending rows of shiny tins with biscuits and corned beef. The solo was from the Contemporary Lp "Shelly Manne & His Men Play Checkmate". My colleagues complimented me on the excellent choice of music and the mixing engineer asked me where I got that superb recording from.

Well, I had bought the Checkmate Lp in a sale in a department store. After coming home and playing it, I became an avid lover of West Coast Jazz instantly. The adaptation of the score of John Williams - who in those days was called Johnny Williams and was writing a lot of music for television before he became the prolific John Williams of the big screen - was played with suspense and a sort of coolness by Shelly Manne (drums), Conte Candoli (trumpet), Richie Kamuca (tenor), Russ Freeman (piano) and on bass Chuck Berghofer, the youngest of them all.

Extraordinary Sound

The sound of the Lp was indeed superb, realistic and full of detail and I realised that I had stumbled upon a treasure, a product in the category "State of the Art" - even if in those days this term was not commonly used.
Technician Howard Holzer and producer-owner of Contemporary Records, Lester Koening, were the creators of this recording art on Contemporary C3599 the issue I had bought. What I sensed was that technical knowledge, artistic feeling, empathy with the music and the musicians, and a very musical ear, were assisted by the valve circuits in microphones, mixers and amplifiers, by the specially designed cutting lathe and cutting head, and finally by the quality of the pressings. We are talking 1962.

The Drummer

Although my respect was for producer Koenig, it was Shelly Manne who became, at least to me, a sort of trademark. His name on the label was the quality stamp. Sure there were the other artists, and more good drummers among them. But Manne with his controlled and refined style which is completely the opposite of, say, Gene Kupra's, appeared to be the bonding factor of 'music making without egos fighting to get the upper lead' (which by the way can be fun too!).

At The Manne Hole

Now more Contemporary artists were on my list to be investigated: Curtis Counce, Hampton Hawes, Art Pepper, Cecil Taylor, Barney Kessel, Chet Baker, André Previn, Phineas Newborn, Ray Brown. This led to my second best buy, this time the 2 Lp set "Shelly Manne and his Men at The Manne Hole" (S7593/4) which is another striking Koenig account, again with Howard Holzer responsible for the sound recording, and again with Shelly Manne, Conte Candoli, Richie Kamuca, Russ Freeman, and Chuck Berghofer.

Reference Recording

Contemporary records do have a high content of natureleness. Like Mercury Living Presence, Contemporary served as an example and inspiration to other labels in the 1970s like Sheffield Lab, Eastwind, Concord Jazz, Proprius and also Three Blind Mice, I dare say. Even today many a Contemporary record can be qualified as being a true reference.

Technical Data

Many record companies do print technical data on the back of their covers just to impress the buyer. Often these data are accompanied by an advertising slogan. The technical data mentioned on the back of Checkmate were there for advertising purposes, no doubt, but the mention of these data was really meaningful and justified and surely Lester Koenig wanted the buyer to know that his recordings were among the best a fan can get. I had taken the wide frequency band of 30 to 20.000 Hz. and the tangeable mid band for granted until l noticed that the cover of the stereo version - which I bought later - mentioned 15.000 cycles as upper limit. That stereo issue sounded rather thin. I realised that the cutting head was not yet able to engrave the same dynamics stereophonically. Many early stereo cuttings of Blue Note, Riverside, Pacific, London (English Decca) and Philips Hi-Fi Stereo cuttings have this slender sound.

Instrumental Realism

Making a live recordings in a club is something completely different from making a studio recording where producer and recording engineer can have full control over acoustics, the positions of the players, the sound can be tested and microphone placement can be meticulously adjusted, and if the musicians do not have the right spirit they can be asked to come back some other day. Not so when an actual performance is to be recorded in Shelly's club in Hollywood. Then and there one must make shift with what one has. From the recording it is clear that there is no luxurious grand piano but a simple upright piano. And an upright has a distinctive sound because the attack of the felt hammer moves the string with force towards the soundboard first. The reflection which is picked up by the microphone is primarily out of phase.

In and Out of Phase

In recordings of a grand piano microphones are positioned above the strings. There the felt hammer strikes from underneath and the mike picks up the sound which is for the most part in phase. The intensity of the reflected sound is less and of course is out of phase with a minute time delay.

In an upright piano the sound board is in a vertical position and the space between the strings and the soundboard is rather limited. Now the felt hammer strikes in the direction of the soundboard and the initial vibration is out of phase relativ to the microphones, does not matter if these are positioned above the piano or in front when the lid is taken of.

Shelly Manne & His Men at The Manne-Hole features a 'primitiv' upright piano. Primitiv, but at the same time determining the atmosphere in the club. On top of that one can hear that during a few passages and solos the level of one of the microphones is adjusted to bring out the piano or another instrument better. That too tells the listener that this is a live recording. Despite these circomstances, S7593/4 became one of my treasured Contemporary albums too, because the recording gives a strong sense of 'being there'.

Recordings

Checkmate and Shelly Manne & His Men at The Manne-Hole on S7593/4 - with classics like ‘Softly as in a morning sunrise’, ‘Love for sale’, ‘On green Dolphin Street’, ‘What’s new?’ and Cole Porters melancholical 'Ev’ry time we say good-bye’ all embedded in the live atmosphere - have always been my favorites. But there are more titles on the shelves: Phineas Newborn; The Two and The Three; Swingin Sounds; the 4 Black Hawk sessions with that trotting Whisper Not and Step Lightly; and even a very young Pepe Romero playing Flamenco Guitar is among my Contemporaries. No matter what, there is always this "natural sound", notwithstanding the fact that Lester Koenig and his technicians used multi miking. There are no problems with phase noticeable.

Lester Koenig

Lester Koenig may have founded Contemporary Records in 1951. Both in the Schwann Long Playing Record Catalog and The Long Player, the Contemporary label is first listed in the fall of 1953 with Howard Rumsey's Light House All-Stars on three ten inch records with reference C2501, 2506, 2510. And there is Shelly Manne and His Men on C 2503, 2511, 2516, and 2518, available as a four ten inch set. But soon Koenig switched to the 12" format in the 3500 series: "The Three" & "The Two" (Shelly Manne with Shorty Rogers and Jimmy Giuffre, and pianist Russ Freeman (Contemporary C3584). Koenig's early recordings were made in cooperation with 'European Records' from France - maybe because of the contacts Koenig had with film people from abroad.
In 1956 when tape recorder, the cutting lathe and matrix production had reached a higher level, Lester Koenig produced his first stereo recordings.

In the nineteen forties Lester Koenig was a writer for documentaries (Thunderbolt, The Memphis Belle) and later he was an associate-producer with Paramount Pictures. IMdB mentions The Heiress (1949), Detective Story (1951) and Carrie (1952), although Art Pepper in his biography mentions also Roman Holiday (1953).
After World War Two had ended the Soviet Union was no longer a partner to confer with, naturely, but became the new enemy in the political doctrine. It meant that The Cold War had started. Now anyone with more or less liberal ideas was suspected of having communist sympathies. Josef McCarthy, a Senator from Wisconsin who himself had served in World War Two, made a speech about how the Democratic administration had been infiltrated by communist subversives. From 1950 on not only government and its institutions, but also the media were being scrutinized. People who had suspicions about the liberal views of colleagues were urged to report this. Also the film industry was X-rayed for alleged subversive characters. Several writers, directors and producers were no longer employed. People were summoned to testify at the hearings organized by McCarthy and his Committee.

Character

In his autiobiography "A Straight Life" (originally published by Schirmer Books, New York, 1979), Art Pepper writes about how Lester Koenig became a producer of records:

Art Pepper also remembers that Lester Koenig was like a father to him and many times helped him to make a start for "a straight life" again and again by giving him the chance to make recordings and help him clean up his financial situation.

Senator Richard Nixon of California took part in the hunt with heart and soul and insinuated that Democratic presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson had ties with the communists. The hunting reached a pinnacle when Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were tried and were executed. (See for more info Spartacus Educational). Eventueally McCarthy's Committee was more and more criticized and McCarthy himself became unbelievable and died a mad man.

John Koenig

In Art's biography Lester's son, John Koenig, says about his father:

Although Les was a man who had an ear for new ideas, even if they were not executed well, he always was the man with taste and the technique had to serve.

Hampton Hawes

Pianist Hampton Hawes also wrote down his esteem for Lester Koenig. Hawes had made a 45 rpm single for Discovery in 1952 with Shelly Manne, and he cut a ten inch for Vantage Records in 1955. That was it. But Shelly Manne took him one day to Lester Koenig's office. Hampton Hawes in his biography "Rise Up Off Me" (written with Don Asher, Thunder's Mouth Press, New York, 1972):

Valve Condenser Microphone AKG C 12

The AKG C-12 is a smooth sounding microphone and has the character which is so typical of good, vintage condensor microphones. The character is completely different from dynamic microphones which are so en vogue these days in the pop music business. It is clear that the equipment used in those days by Lester Koenig, Howard Holzer, Roy Dunann, Val Valentin, John Palladino, was of a different nature if compared to transistors and opamps and one bit converters of today. The equipment matched the mikes to bring about the best characteristic and dynamics. The C-12 has a very individual signature which is easily recognized. For example in André Previn West Side Story disc (S7572), or Phineas Newborn's A World of Piano (S7600 - Old Jazz Classics Records reissue OJC 175).

When Cecil Taylor was recorded in New York City at Nola's Penthouse Sound Recording Studios by Tommy Nola and Lewis Merritt, no microphone type and other equipment is mentioned. Except that the cover shows an upright piano which is evident when listening to the disk.

When Contemporary records were remasterd and issued as Old Jazz Classics (OJC) they show that the tapes were replayed by using modern tape recorders for play back and that the music may have been re-recorded on another modern tape machine and that this recording served as the new master from which the OJC lacquer was cut. OJCs bear the character of transistors and have more straight dynamics, specifically in the high frequencies. Fortunately there is always some of the original sound character coming throug, unmistakingly Contemporay and unmistakingly the C-12 microphone for which AKG has designed a more modern version, the C12VR.

This page is an adaptatrion of an article first published in 1995 of which an edited version also appeared in Analog Aktuell, the magazine of the Analog Audio Association, Germany.

Page first published on the web in June 2010.

YouTube: Checkmate