Coleman Hawkins At Birmingham Town Hall

Writing about tenor saxophonist Johnny Lippiett got me thinking about other tenor players, especially Coleman Hawkins, who effectively introduced the instrument to jazz, turning it into the pre-eminent and perhaps most expressive instrument of the music.

Those thoughts also reminded me I was lucky enough to hear Hawkins play at Birmingham Town Hall in the 1960s, in fact not long before he died in May 1969. It was one of the most moving experiences of my life.

The concert in question was one of those Jazz At The Philharmonic things that were, thankfully, all the rage in the 1950s and 1960s, managing to bring together some of the greatest American players of the preceding 40 years or so; players who very quickly turned the events into brilliant three hour jam sessions.

If memory serves me correctly the line-up back in 1969 included Louis Bellson drums, Buck Clayton trumpet, and Teddy Wilson piano, oh, and Vic Dickenson trombone. There was another sax player who might have been Zoot Sims, but I'm not sure.

It was a great concert, although Hawkins didn't appear until the last ten minutes, but when he did ( he was helped on by another musician who placed him against the curve of the piano) his somewhat battered sax suspended from his neck, the spotlight narrowed, Hawkins looked-up to his audience and, smiling, counted Wilson in to the introduction of his signature tune, Body and Soul, the recording of which, some thirty years earlier had turned Hawkins into a legend. And when he placed his gold-plated Selmer tenor sax between his lips I don't think anyone was prepared for what they were about to hear.

Like most Hawkins fans I was familiar with the Johnny Green song and was quite prepared to hear something of a pastiche. No way. Hawkins (although not well, and sporting a large beard that was a contradiction of his usual sartorial elegance) created a totally new composition that built in effortless upward layers of sound that came out of that well travelled horn with an exquisite fullness that belied the man's obvious fragility; and it was a fullness that overflowed with emotion - as if he knew he was nearing his end - that by the time Teddy Wilson gently played the last feathery chord, that went deliciously hand-in-hand with Hawkins' last breathy kiss of the reed, I was in tears, and knew I'd heard something quite unique from a master artist of unrivalled brilliance who, like Armstrong, changed the way we listen to music.