‘Ben Webster & Associates’: Ben Webster’s Star-Studded Swing Session
The tenor saxophonist’s 1959 outing for Verve Records featured jazz giants Coleman Hawkins and Roy Eldridge.
In 1959, Ben Webster traveled to New York for a recording session under the supervision of jazz impresario Norman Granz. The day before going to the studio, he bumped into Budd Johnson, an old friend and fellow saxophonist, at Beefsteak Charlie’s, an off-Broadway bar and grill. Webster explained that tenor saxophone pioneer Coleman Hawkins was booked for the session before asking Johnson if he might be free as well. Out of that chance meeting, Ben Webster & Associates was born, a glorious jazz summit celebrating the music of the swing era.
Webster was born in 1909, and began his professional music career with the piano. “The first time I ever heard Ben he was playing piano at a silent movie theater in Amarillo, around 1928,” Johnson once told jazz writer Leonard Feather. When the movie ended, Webster and Johnson started talking. “He said he’d like to learn saxophone,” remembered Johnson, who agreed to give Webster some lessons. “I taught him scales and fingering,” he revealed. Eight months later, the pair’s paths crossed again. “I ran into Ben and he had my old job with (jazz drummer) Eugene Coy’s band,” recalled a flabbergasted Johnson. “That’s how fast he learned.”
Order Ben Webster And Associates on vinyl now.
Webster’s natural affinity with the tenor saxophone meant that despite being a newcomer to the instrument, he wasn’t short of work. In the early 30s, he got a gig playing in Kansas City with Bennie Moten, whose group featured a rising piano star called Count Basie. Later in that decade, he joined the ranks of several well-known ensembles, including those led by Benny Carter (a saxophonist who, along with Coleman Hawkins, was a major influence on Webster’s sound and style), Cab Calloway, and Fletcher Henderson. In 1940, Webster joined Duke Ellington’s orchestra, though because his relationship with the suave jazz aristocrat was a fractious one, he left after three years.
In the 1950s, Webster came into his own as a solo artist. By then, the big bands had largely gone, swept away by bebop, a small-group jazz revolution. But Webster stood firm in the face of the bebop tsunami, making records that stayed true to his swing and blues roots. His career took off spectacularly when he joined jazz impresario Norman Granz’s Verve label in 1956. Three years later, Granz put Webster in the studio with the saxophonist’s idol, which produced Coleman Hawkins Encounters Ben Webster. Its success led Webster to reunite with Hawkins on Ben Webster & Associates, cut later the same year.
Joining Webster, Hawkins, and Johnson at the session was another jazz luminary: The formidable trumpeter Roy Eldridge, whose dazzling style bridged the swing and bebop eras. Supporting the four horn players was a formidable rhythm section comprising guitarist Les Spann, pianist Jimmy Jones, bassist Ray Brown, and the former Basie band drummer Jo Jones.
Beginning with an epic 20-minute version of Duke Ellington’s “In A Mellow Tone,” a softly-simmering late-night groove, Webster and friends shifted into top gear on the full-throttle swingers “De-Dar” and “Young Bean.” Webster’s was the only horn featured on a gorgeous cover of the 1940s Sinatra ballad “Time After Time,” defined by his saxophone’s languorous, lower-register breathiness. The album closed with “Budd Johnson,” a slow blues Webster named after his friend who taught him the saxophone.
Despite its non-descript title – which sounds a bit like the name of a law firm – Ben Webster & Associates is brimming with exciting musical interactions. By sharing the spotlight with his chief influence (Hawkins) and his first and only saxophone teacher (Johnson), Webster showed a generosity of spirit that overcame his competitive impulses. It resulted in a high-quality collaboration that stands as one of his finest artistic endeavors of the 1950s.
