Jimmy Raney - May 24, 1989 - WFPL Radio - Louisville, Kentucky

[enalnitram]

Hi forum,

Today is the 35th anniversary of the day my mind was blown and my life changed completely!

I grew up in Louisville, Kentucky. I knew who Jimmy Raney was in 1989, because I had met him. I attended the University of Louisville for two years, and I took group lessons from him for a semester, a few years before, when I was 18 years old. To me, at that time, music meant Led Zep, Beatles, etc ... but my musical appreciation was beginning to quickly exponentially expand. I had just started playing classical guitar, and was beginning to fall in love with harmony. I no longer saw music as just a beat or a style. I was beginning to appreciate music beyond genre, and to see that it could be timeless.

The lessons with Raney came about, because I was auditing classical guitar lessons in the music building, while being an information science major. The director of jazz studies stopped me in the lobby and told me that I might want to sign up for this. This was two years before the broadcast, around January of 1987. I didn't know who Jimmy Raney was at that time. I was barely aware of jazz at all. But I could sense the importance of the opportunity in his voice and I signed up.

Lessons with Jimmy were just about the best thing I could have ever hoped for at that time in my life, because he was just so warm and human. But Jimmy was losing his hearing, and he soon stopped teaching and playing after this. The lessons only lasted a few months. He introduced me to a few tunes and some chords. He played back what I just tried to improvise but made it better -- an invaluable experience. He explained why Ravel, Bartok, Stravinsky were so cool. He used to hang out with Charlie Parker in NYC, and had dozens of stories. But then it was over. I so wish I could do that over now!

I had heard Jimmy was a great guitarist and that he was important, and I believed it. But at that time, I had never actually seen a Jimmy Raney record or LP. I didn't have any. I didn't even know anyone that had any. I had just heard him play with me!

Fast forward to 5/24/1989. I'm at home (my parent's house) and I hear there's going to be a long radio broadcast where Jimmy is featured. So I got together some blank cassettes, and recorded the whole thing.

The broadcast lasted 5 hours, and these tapes became my whole musical world, for quite a while. It was a chronological survey of his career with interviews and music. It was like a lightning bolt to my soul, I was just so in love with electric guitar, jazz, Raney's inventiveness and freedom, his phrasing, and sophisticated sense of fun.

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When the pandemic happened in 2020, and there was not much else to do, I uncovered the tapes from 1989 and digitized them. I went through discogs and used their images. I have cds and lps of most of Raney's output, so I used superior audio, along with the interview portions of the cassettes. I uploaded all 5 hours to my youtube account.

But since 2020, 3 of those 5 youtube videos have been taken down. I uploaded part 1 to vimeo. I didn't realize at the time that vimeo has a limit. So, parts 2 and 3 are currently without a home. I guess I could put them in a google drive account, but it would be great to put them somewhere, where people could discover them and experience the whole program, to learn about Jimmy, hear his story and hear all the tracks in chronological order.

Jimmy is my favorite guitarist, I love him dearly, and I made these videos to share his music and playing with the world. If anyone has ideas about where to go with these, I will appreciate it. I suppose I could ask Jon Raney if he would want to host them on his site. I will do that. But I wanted to mark the occasion with a post. Hope you enjoy!

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VIDEO

Part 1


Part 4

Part 5

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AUDIO

Google Drive folder, 5 parts mp3s

PART ONE

00:00 Introduction
00:54 Body and Soul (1954)
04:32 The End of a Love Affair (1975)
08:41 Chasin' the Bird (1980)
16:00 Interview
20:16 Pardon My Bop
22:57 As I Live and Bop
26:03 Interlude in Bebop
28:58 Diaper Pin
31:44 Interview
35:00 Parker 51
41:06 Rubber Neck
45:31 Yesterdays
48:29 Budo
53:37 Announcements

PART TWO

00:00 Interview
04:53 Puby La Keg
09:54 Everything I've Got
15:30 Just One of Those Things
18:47 Interview
23:01 Motion
28:20 Lee
32:39 Signal
38:19 Round About Midnight
43:38 Interview
48:15 Isn't It Romantic?
52:21 How Long Has This Been Going On?

PART THREE

00:00 Nobody Else But Me
04:57 Too Late Now
09:14 The Flag Is Up
13:25 Interview
18:31 American Tempo (Edmond Hall)
20:52 Slowly (Jazz Goes to the Movies)
24:49 Hello to the Season (Gary McFarland Sextet)
31:49 Nature Boy (Teddy Charles Tentet)
38:11 Raney Day (Brookmeyer/Hall/Raney)
43:35 Interview
47:21 A Primera Vez
51:38 Move It
56:00 All Across the City

PART FOUR

00:00 How About You?
03:51 Interview
10:07 Bernie's Tune
16:25 Interview
24:06 Darn That Dream
29:01 Anthropology
33:04 Watch What Happens
36:41 Groovin' High
44:25 Interview
51:15 Out Of Nowhere
57:42 Freedom Jazz Dance

PART FIVE

00:00:00 Dolphin Dance (Herbie Hancock)
00:07:26 Interview
00:12:55 Samba Teekens
00:19:02 Oleo
00:23:21 Interview
00:28:35 Chewish Chive and English Brick
00:33:20 Out of the Past
00:40:20 Ovals
00:46:43 Interview
00:51:46 Stella By Starlight (Victor Young)
01:00:00 Interview

[wintermoon]

Oh, hope it stays up, I'm gonna dig into this when I get some time.
I've been back on a JR kick again lately, just reminded me again of what a monster player he was, not that I really needed reminding, truly one of the all time greats. I still don't think he get the props he deserves. I've got most of his available output, even the obscure stuff but always a treat to hear something new. thanks for posting!

[nyc chaz]

Thanks for posting this.I downloaded all 3 parts and look forward to the other two if possible.Raney definitely deserves a lot more love than he gets.

[mr. beaumont]

Oh wow...I need to clear some time and listen to ALL of this...thank you so much for sharing.

[jameslovestal]

Going to make the time to listen to this since Jimmy Raney is one of my favorites.

Thanks for posting!

[sgosnell]

Perhaps you could upload to YouTube Music. The video wouldn't seem to be that important, considering it was a radio broadcast. You can make the playlist unlisted, which means only users with the URL can listen, then share that URL. That would seem to avoid the problem with YouTube, but I'm far from an expert on YouTube stuff.

[JazzPadd]

Thank you so much for your passionate dedication and for sharing your treasure with us.

That’s what JGO is all about!

[Mick Wright]

Many thanks for posting these, enalnitram. Please do let us know when you find a new home for parts 2 & 3 of your tapes.

Here's one of my favourite recordings of Jimmy Raney, with Tal Farlow, playing 'How Deep is the Ocean' and 'Out of Nowhere' at Tal's home in the early 1960s:

All the best
Mick W

[ScottM]

Thanks for posting this! Jimmy is my favorite, as well. I was fortunate enough to go to the Bellarmine College jazz guitar clinic a couple times in the early 90's. Jimmy was a clinician both years. As he was getting ready to start a session, I went up to ask him about something in his handouts from a previous session. He said, "here, play these chords." I grabbed my guitar and sat beside him comping for him. One of the most surreal moments I'll ever experience.

[wintermoon]

Many thanks for posting these, enalnitram. Please do let us know when you find a new home for parts 2 & 3 of your tapes.

Here's one of my favourite recordings of Jimmy Raney, with Tal Farlow, playing 'How Deep is the Ocean' and 'Out of Nowhere' at Tal's home in the early 1960s:

All the best
Mick W

Where in the world did that come from?
(besides Tals house)

[Mick Wright]

Where in the world did that come from?

Hi wintermoon,

there are three Jimmy Raney & Tal Farlow duets on the cd that's included with the 2014 illustrated biography of Tal Farlow, Un Accord Parfait, a Life in Jazz Guitar, written by Jean-Luc Katchoura and Michele Hyk-Farlow (French and English text, €69.00) published by Paris Jazz Corner:

TAL FARLOW - Un accord parfait - A life in Jazz Guitar - Tal Farlow | Paris Jazz Corner

[sgosnell]

Another possibility for sharing these tracks is to put them in a cloud storage account. Anyone can get free storage on Dropbox, Google Drive, Box, et al, and all it takes is an email address. Google will give anyone any number of free email addresses. I have several, mostly from when I was using them for hinky websites. It's easy enough to share individual files on any of these platforms. I like Dropbox, but I have accounts on all three of these services, plus more, just to wear belts, suspenders, and safety belts, for data I absolutely don't want to lose. If it's sensitive I encrypt it before uploading, but for music that wouldn't be necessary.

[enalnitram]

First post has been edited to add a google drive link to a folder with the full audio: 5 mp3s, one hour each!

[sgosnell]

Downloaded, it will obviously take a few hours to listen to all of it. I appreciate your making this possible. Thank you.

I have the files in my Google Drive, in case something goes wrong. I won't post a link unless it becomes necessary for some reason, but there is a backup in place.