Gene Ammons
tenor saxophone
Chicago tenor saxophonist with a big sound who, when Barry was very young, always let him sit in, even making Junior Mance get up from the piano for him.
- mentions
- 1
- recordings
- 1
- Barry speaking
- 0
What Barry says
Ammons always let Barry sit in with him. When Barry was very young, Ammons would make Junior Mance get up so that Barry could play. Barry always loved to see him come to town, because he was one player Barry could really sit in with.
Asked whether Charlie Parker had a big sound, Barry recalls Bird playing from the back of a room, and says Ammons did the same: he would stand at the back of a club while players such as Frank Foster were at the microphone, and he too had a great big sound.
In the oral history, after saying how beautiful it was to sit in with Charlie Parker, Barry says he felt the same with a ‘Gene Harris’ who let him sit in all the time. Given what he tells Panken, this is probably Ammons, though the transcript gives Harris.
Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶209Barry Harris on WKCR-FM ¶202
Asked about Dexter Gordon and Ben Webster, whose playing he finds different from Bird’s, Barry groups Coleman Hawkins with Webster, gives Dexter a notch of his own, and adds that Wardell Gray, Gene Ammons and Yusef Lateef could all play too.
In his own words
He always let me sit in with him. When I was very young, he used to make Junior Mance get up and let me sit in with him.
I always loved to see him come to town, because he was one cat really I could sit in with.
Gene Ammons used to do that, too. He’d stand in the back of the Club Valley…
There were, we had Wardell Gray, we had Gene Ammons, we had Yusef Lateef, all these guys, these cats, they played too.
Every mention
1 moments in the recordings, 0 of them Barry speaking. Each says who is talking.
Barry Harris Spanish TV
- 14:31
Someone else
Spanish TV narrator (‘Jean Hammons’): Ammons often invited 15-year-old Barry to play; calls him Barry’s first hero and teacher.
In the interviews and notes
Barry tells Ted Panken that Ammons, like Bird, would play from the back of a club and had a huge sound. He always let Barry sit in, and when Barry was very young he made Junior Mance give up the piano for him.
Asked how Charlie Parker affected his life, Barry speaks of the few times he sat in with Bird and says he felt the same beauty with a ‘Gene Harris’ who let him sit in all the time, most likely Ammons.
Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶208Barry Harris, Smithsonian Jazz Oral History Program ¶209
Sorting out the tenor players with Aaron Graves, Barry groups Coleman Hawkins and Ben Webster together, puts Dexter Gordon on a notch of his own, and adds that Wardell Gray, Gene Ammons and Yusef Lateef played too.
Leroy Williams, Barry’s drummer, recalls that when he grew up in Chicago, Gene Ammons and other slightly older players were around, the players he looked up to; he thinks that is why he and Barry come from the same place.
Ted Panken (interviewer); Tommy Flanagan, Tommy Flanagan ¶103Ted Panken (interviewer); Tommy Flanagan, Tommy Flanagan ¶105