First Look ’25: The Vanguard Tapes (short)

This film couldn’t be made in the same way today. That is because the venerable Village Vanguard jazz club no longer has a kitchen—at least not one that requires a paid dish-washer. However, from 1991 to 1995, filmmaker Bill Morrison washed dishes in the Vanguard kitchen. Evidently, even back then the kitchen-area was a hang-space for musicians between sets and their guests. Morrison quickly realized he should film some of their candid banter. Jazz fans finally get to hear some of the comradery in the short film (possibly an excerpt of a longer future project) The Vanguard Tapes, which screens today as part of First Look 2025.

Jazz fans will immediately understand the appeal of this film when they hear the two most prominent voices are alto-sax player Lou Donaldson and pianist Harold Mabern. They were both amazing musicians and wonderful showmen, who routinely cracked up both their audiences and sidemen in between numbers. Whether it is Donaldson talking about playing his numbers and betting on horses, or Mabern recapping his favorite soap opera, you can understand why Morrison felt compelled to record these slices of the behind-the-scenes jazz life.

Logically, there are also very serious discussions of music. Trumpeter Danny Moore pulls no punches with his critical appraisals of Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock. (It should be noted, this was the early 1990s. By the late 1990s, Shorter was enjoying a career renaissance returning to the acoustic hardbop he played before his Weather Report years.)

The Village Vanguard at Lincoln Triangle

“After seventy-two years you’d better have a reputation for something,” Lorraine Gordon said of her club, the Village Vanguard, at the Lincoln Triangle B&N last night. The event was an interview and Q&A with Gordon moderated by Dan Morgenstern to promote her recent memoir Alive at the Village Vanguard (review here).

Gordon’s late husband Max opened the Vanguard in early 1935 and it has been in its present location since December of that year. Lorrraine Gordon took over the club’s management after his death, beginning with a stand by the Tommy Flanagan Trio on May 23, 1989. However, Gordon had always had a passion for jazz, and some of her fondest remembrances in her book and at B&N last night were of the great trumpeter Jabbo Smith.

As a substantial value-added bonus pianist Cedar Walton, a Vanguard regular fresh off a plane from Japan, also played solo, warming up the audience before Gordon came out with “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and playing a half hour set afterwards that started with “Sweet Lorraine.”

Unfortunately, the Q&A session demonstrated the perils of audience participation. One rather upset woman felt the need to defend Benny Goodman’s honor based on her misreading of Alive. Gordon assured her: “I was madly in love with him.” Another audience member actually interrupted her mid-anecdote so he could ask a question before he had to leave. Could we show a little etiquette, please? Of course, Gordon dealt with him easily—she has been running a night club for eighteen years, and it is a great place to hear jazz. The acoustics are perfect and the vibe is legit.

It was impressive for a book event. (Believe me, I’ve been to plenty.) Look for a B&N event with Larry Coryell from the same publisher sometime in September.