Standards Scrutiny: A Night In Tunisia

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One of my favorite jazz standards is definitely Gillespie's bouncy Night in Tunisia, and I'm always kinda excited when I'm about to hear a new version, particularly so as I've yet to really stumble into a take I haven't liked.

What are peoples favorite takes on it?
I'm listening to Sonny Rollins' A Night At The Village Vanguard for the first time now, and it has a couple of very cool sax-trio takes on the song, and they really get the ol' happy-centres chugging.
My current fave, however, is probably Dexter Gordon on Our Man In Paris, as it's just one looong, beautiful ride through the song; god that man had tone and an amazingly melodic style of improvisation. Love the way he ends it too.
Incidentally, a more easternish take on the song was what got me into Yusef Lateef; unfortunately I only heard it through an MP3, so I have no idea what recording it came from - very different from the usual bop-takes that go around though.

Sadly I've only heard one Parker/Gillespie take on the tune so far, and the recording dampens some of the impact for me (the recording being the one on the complete Massey Hall concert compilation)
I bought that fairly recently though, so it'll definitely get plenty of time to grow. Plus, it's cool to have the sax and trumpet interaction going, rather than one player alternating both parts.

― Øystein (Øystein), Monday, 14 February 2005 21:55 (twenty-one years ago)

My current fave, however, is probably Dexter Gordon on Our Man In Paris
That's a good one! There is another good version with the exact same group, I think, minus Dexter Gordon, on a Bud Powell album called Round About Midnight At The Blue Note. Great drum intro by Kenny Clarke.

― Ken L (Ken L), Monday, 14 February 2005 22:19 (twenty-one years ago)

Second or third the version on Our Man In Paris (w/ Bud Powell on piano!) See also the version on Art Blakey Quintet Live at Birdland -Vol One w/ Clifford Brown Lou Donaldson and Horace Silver.

― lovebug starski (lovebug starski), Monday, 14 February 2005 22:37 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm partial to the later Blakey version w/Lee Morgan, Wayne Shorter et al.

― Jordan (Jordan), Monday, 14 February 2005 22:42 (twenty-one years ago)

I love the interlude with the big-band style hits.

― Jordan (Jordan), Monday, 14 February 2005 22:45 (twenty-one years ago)

yes the ultimate version is on the album A Night In Tunisia by Art Blakey.

― Riot Gear! (Gear!), Monday, 14 February 2005 22:46 (twenty-one years ago)

Btw this is a great idea for a continuing series of threads.

― Jordan (Jordan), Monday, 14 February 2005 22:47 (twenty-one years ago)

Oh yeah, I think that Art Blakey album (the earliest of the two by that title) is being reissued as a RVG any day now, too. Definitely going to pick it up when I have the chance.

― Øystein (Øystein), Monday, 14 February 2005 22:50 (twenty-one years ago)

Second or third the version on Our Man In Paris (w/ Bud Powell on piano!)
Mention should also be made of the great Pierre Michelot on bass.

― Ken L (Ken L), Monday, 14 February 2005 22:51 (twenty-one years ago)

I sincerely think one of my favorite renditions was the clarinetist in the subway a few weeks ago, accompanied by a guy drumming on a bucket.

― jaymc (jaymc), Monday, 14 February 2005 23:00 (twenty-one years ago)

Live at Birdland was 50's, and I've never liked it as much as everyone else seems to because of the crap sound. The rhythm section is hardly distinguishable, though there are some nice Clifford Brown solos. A Night in Tunisia is 1960.

― Jordan (Jordan), Monday, 14 February 2005 23:07 (twenty-one years ago)

I have a Frank Morgan version of it which is pretty good, but it seems to me that Ron Carter, of all people, is not playing the bassline exactly right for some reason, which has always irked me.

― Ken L (Ken L), Monday, 14 February 2005 23:09 (twenty-one years ago)

There's a great version of this by Chaka Khan.

― mike t-diva (mike t-diva), Monday, 14 February 2005 23:14 (twenty-one years ago)

I vote for the Art Blakey version as well. This is one of my favorite jazz standards.

― RS £aRue (rockist_scientist), Tuesday, 15 February 2005 00:51 (twenty-one years ago)

xpost yeah, Chaka Khan! And they sample whole solos by Bird and Diz both, don't they? At least one--and it works, even w) 80s devices, or so it seemed at the time.Haven't heard it in a while. Anybody know about the rest of her album? Jordan, my local jazz station has been playing tracks both vols. of A NIGHT AT BIRDLAND lately, and I dunno whether these are recently re-mastered or what, but sound pretty awesome. On the radio, anyway.

― don, Tuesday, 15 February 2005 03:04 (twenty-one years ago)

I love this song so much, especially as performed by Charlie Parker. However, another version to check out is the one by THE VENTURES.

― Pleasant Plains /// (Pleasant Plains ///), Tuesday, 15 February 2005 04:03 (twenty-one years ago)

Gang Starr sample this to beautiful effect on "Words I Manifest"...

― Pete Scholtes, Tuesday, 15 February 2005 19:13 (twenty-one years ago)

Another real highlight was hearing Ella Fitzgerald sing this song. For some silly reason I steered clear of vocal jazz for a good while, but it was made extra fun when I did explore it, as I knew so many of the songs through instrumental takes. A Night In Tunisia is -really- cool to hear sung, it's not a melody that I would've thought could sound good when sung, so that made it all the cooler to hear it.

Hrmm, mentioning Ella makes it tempting to start a similar thread about Mack The Knife.

― Øystein (Øystein), Saturday, 19 February 2005 12:40 (twenty-one years ago)

Bud Powell all de way.

― edd s hurt (ddduncan), Sunday, 20 February 2005 23:17 (twenty-one years ago)

Another vote for that epic Art Blakey version with the multiple false endings. Of the Parker/Gillespie versions I've heard, I like the Massey Hall better than the 1947 Carnegie Hall version (first one I ever heard), with everything but the horns & drums inaudible, so it's kinda hard to tell when the song itself begins.

― Myonga Von Bontee (Myonga Von Bontee), Sunday, 20 February 2005 23:50 (twenty-one years ago)

BTW, I had no idea that Ella Fitzgerald recorded this, let alone Chaka Khan! Were there actual lyrics written, or just scatting, or what?

― Myonga Von Bontee (Myonga Von Bontee), Sunday, 20 February 2005 23:53 (twenty-one years ago)

Ella does it on the Clap hands here comes Charlie album.
Found the lyrics she used (and wrote?) with a wee bit of assistance from ol Oogleg:

The moon is the same moon above you
Aglow with it’s cool evening light
But shining at night, in tunisia
Never does it shine so bright

The stars are aglow in the heavens
But only the wise understand
That shining at night in tunisia
They guide you through the desert sand

Words fail, to tell a tale
Too exotic to be told
Each night’s a deeper night
In a world, ages old

The cares of the day seem to vanish
The ending of day brings release
Each wonderful night in tunisia
Where the nights are filled with peace

(bridge)
(scat)

{repeat all twice}
(scat)
Each wonderful night in tunisia

― Øystein (Øystein), Monday, 21 February 2005 00:40 (twenty-one years ago)

six months pass...

Still Bud Powell.

― k/l (Ken L), Sunday, 4 September 2005 10:14 (twenty years ago)

two years pass...

Weren't there some more threads of this ilk?

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Friday, 6 June 2008 19:31 (seventeen years ago)

I know in my mind I started a few, including one for "Willow Weep For Me" and the one I just started for "In A Mellow Tone."

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Friday, 6 June 2008 19:32 (seventeen years ago)

I'm partial to the later Blakey version w/Lee Morgan, Wayne Shorter et al.

i have a great one w/dizzy's big band, and lee morgan as the trumpet soloist. at the beginning, dizzy announces, "and now i'd like to play one of my latest compositions...in fact, one of my *only* compositions."

― Dominique, Friday, 6 June 2008 20:00 (seventeen years ago)

i think i started imaginary ones for "summertime" and "all the things you are".

"willow weep for me" would be good, i love that tune but haven't heard too many versions.

― Jordan, Friday, 6 June 2008 20:07 (seventeen years ago)

James Brown's "Willow Weep For Me" is off the hook.

― dad a, Friday, 6 June 2008 20:10 (seventeen years ago)

The two versions I know pretty well are the one by Dexter Gordon off Our Man In Paris, this album being mentioned in the first post of this thread, with a great sax and drum breakdown/intro, and one by Sarah Vaughan with your former teacher Richard Davis on bass, in which she knocks over her music stand and can't read the lyrics at one point.

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Friday, 6 June 2008 20:12 (seventeen years ago)

I started reading that Wilfrid Sheed book The House That George Built last weekend, and he talks about how Gershwin took Ann Ronell her under his wing and encouraged her and fought for her and she wrote that great song. I just looked it up on Wikipedia and they say people suspect that Gershwin wrote it himself and gave it to his girlfriend as a gift!

I think the JB version might be on youtube.

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Friday, 6 June 2008 20:16 (seventeen years ago)

huh, didn't know about the JB version. sounds pretty cool from the clip i found on amazong.

― Jordan, Friday, 6 June 2008 20:16 (seventeen years ago)

http://www.amazon.com/Gettin-Down-James-Brown/dp/B000A32KM8/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1212783304&sr=8-1

― Jordan, Friday, 6 June 2008 20:18 (seventeen years ago)

Don't know if that is on youtube after all, but his excellent version of "Sunny" sure is
(xp)
which is apparently the first track on that album.

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Friday, 6 June 2008 20:20 (seventeen years ago)

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