Monday, July 16, 2018

Image and sound: Webster Hall, 1956

One satisfaction of researching jazz photography—for it is a lot of fun—is the rare occasion when the images can be married to sounds. The book The Sound I Saw (Phaidon Press, 2011) by Roy DeCarava (1919-2009) includes a beautiful collection of black and white images, many of jazz musicians, with no credit whatsoever. Checking faces, names and discographies like this one, there are two photographs which can be pinned down, taken at the magnificent Webster Hall, RCA's regular studio in NYC at the time. These:
Tony Scott and orchestra, Webster Hall, NYC,
Friday, December 14, 1956
Left to right: Frank Foster, Danny Bank (with back to the camera), Frank Wess, Sahib Shihab,
Gigi Gryce, Tony Scott; same date and location.