Treasures From The Vault - Live At The Penthouse In Seattle

Nearly four years ago, I did a roundup of new vinyl releases made from rediscovered recordings of performances by the likes of Thelonious Monk, John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Wes Montgomery, Dexter Gordon, Woody Shaw, and others.  Many of these lost treasures were live recordings made for broadcast on radio and TV in Europe.  Once they were aired, they were filed away in the vaults of TV France or Radio Denmark or wherever, and gathered dust for the next 50 or 60 years.

Of course, this isn't a new phenomenon.  But the financial rewards of marketing deluxe, limited-edition vinyl to high-end collectors has turned the steady trickle of "newly-discovered" releases into a deluge.  More and more producers and independent labels are combing the archives of broadcasters in Europe, Japan, and the U.S., unearthing forgotten performances on a nearly daily basis.  More and more recordings made by jazz club owners or enthusiastic amateur tapers are also turning up.  And, not surprisingly, the major record labels are getting in on the act by going through their vaults to find unused tracks or entire sessions they can market as "never-before-released" recordings.  Overall, this is fantastic news for jazz lovers.  More Bill Evans?  You betcha.  More John Coltrane?  Yes, please.

The biggest problem now is deciding which of the flood of newly-discovered gems is worth buying.  The fact is that some unreleased sessions are unreleased for a reason -- they just aren't very good.  Even great performers can have a bad day.  Other recordings might be great performances that are not well recorded or have other flaws.  While the recordings still might be worth releasing for historical reasons, I'm not likely to ever listen to them.  I find it really pays to read the reviews and listen to samples before buying.

Of course, the "newly discovered" trend isn't limited to jazz.  Recent reissues by the Beatles, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, The Beach Boys, Led Zeppelin, the Rolling Stones, and many, many others include previously unreleased session tracks, alternate takes, and newly-discovered recordings from live shows, sometimes amounting to multiple discs.

Bob Dylan's Bootleg Series Vol. 12 Deluxe Edition (left) from 2015 has six CDs with more than 100 outtakes from the Blonde On Blonde sessions.  It's fascinating stuff, but you have to ask yourself: How often am I going listen to the 17 different takes of "Like A Rolling Stone?"  In my case, maybe once.  Which is why I generally don't buy the multi-disc deluxe sets and just stick with the remastered original material.  And sometimes, I don't even bother with that if I'm happy with my copy of the original release.

On the other hand, a newly-discovered live set that was professionally recorded and captures a major artist in excellent form is almost always worth having.  In that regard, one of the best of the "newly-discovered" series is the collection of recordings being released under the title "Live At The Penthouse."  (Top photo group)

The entrance to the Penthouse in Seattle

The Penthouse was a Seattle jazz club opened in 1962 by Charlie Puzzo in the city's Pioneer Square district.  For the next six years (the club closed in 1968), The Penthouse was one of the hottest jazz venues on the west coast.  Along with such historic spots as The Nighthawk in San Francisco, Shelly's Manne-Hole in Los Angeles, and The Lighthouse in Hermosa Beach, CA, The Penthouse was a "must" stop for touring jazz performers.   

While it's not unusual for jazz clubs to host live recordings (there must be at least a dozen different "Live at the Village Vanguard" releases alone), what sets the Penthouse apart is that the club installed a dedicated line to Seattle radio station KING-FM.  Every Thursday night, KING broadcast a 30-minute live set from the Penthouse.  The shows were hosted by producer and radio personality Jim Wilke.  In the liner notes to the "Live At The Penthouse" series, Wilke describes the setup he used -- four stage microphones fed into a small mixer that he tweaked on the fly while seated at a small table near the club's stage.  The mixer's output provided the live feed to the radio station.  He says that the dedicated phone line to the station was "broadcast quality."  I'm not sure exactly what that means, but the sound of the mono recordings is very good, with punchy bass, good overall balance, and a lively presence which was aided by the sound bouncing off a brick wall behind the bandstand (visible on the cover of The Three Sounds album at top).  Based on the recordings released to date, the Penthouse audiences were amazingly well behaved, as there is almost no background noise other than polite applause.  In all, Wilke hosted more than 200 live shows, all of which survive as "air check" copies of the live feed made on the station's 1/4" Ampex reel-to-reel recorder.

Part of the tape collection from Live At The Penthouse

There is a brief but very well done documentary about the history of The Penthouse, narrated by Charlie Puzzo's son, Charlie Puzzo Jr., and featuring invaluable input from Jim Wilke.  Puzzo Jr. shares the history of the club through family photos,  while Wilke talks about his experience recording the concerts and shows the treasure trove of tapes from the live broadcasts.   

While Wilke is talking, the camera pans the shelves of the Live At The Penthouse tape archive (screen grab above).  The names of the performers on the boxes offer some tantalizing possibilities for upcoming releases, including Bill Evans, Ray Charles, Charlie Byrd, Jimmy Smith, Donald Byrd, Cal Tjader, Jack McDuff, Charles Lloyd, Art Blakey, John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie, and Gerry Mulligan, among many others.  Crikey!  The collection seems to include just about every major jazz artist of the time.  

While highlighting the six (now eight) "Live At The Penthouse" releases made to date, Puzzo Jr. says that they plan to put out one or two new recordings per year going forward.  (At that rate, you can collect the entire set in 100 years or so.  Personally, I hope they speed things up a bit.)  You can check out the film here.  

The first of the "Live At The Penthouse" releases was The Three Sounds Groovin' Hard, put out on the Resonance Records label in 2016 (all cover photos at top).  That was followed by Wynton Kelly Trio, Wes Montgomery Smokin' In Seattle in 2017; Cannonball Adderley – Swingin' In Seattle in 2018; Johnny Griffin, Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis – Ow! in 2019; and then two CD-only releases: 2020's The Jack Wilson Quartet Featuring Roy Ayers - Call Me; and Bola Sete - Samba In Seattle in 2021.

Emerald City Nights volumes one and two, released in 2022.

Which brings us to the most recent releases in the series, a pair of double albums featuring pianist Ahmad Jamal called Emerald City Nights (above).  Together, the albums comprise a four-disc compilation taken from different performances during a period of slightly more than three years.  The first release is subtitled Live At The Penthouse 1963-64, while the second is Live At The Penthouse 1965-66.  Both albums are produced by Zev Feldman and are the first two releases on his brand new (and aptly named) Jazz Detective label.  

[Brief aside: Feldman is the most active and most successful of the many producers working to uncover and release forgotten jazz performances.  He has been involved with all the Live At The Penthouse releases to date, and seems to have had a hand in nearly every significant discovery of a long-lost or unknown jazz recording in the past decade.  He has produced dozens of releases for a variety of labels, including Resonance Records, Elemental Records, Reel To Real, Tompkins Square, Sam Records, Real Gone Music, Verve, and Blue Note Records.]

Back to Ahmad Jamal.  According to Wilke, he recorded "more than a dozen" live dates by Jamal's trio at The Penthouse.  The Emerald City Nights discs include tracks from seven different sets, played by four different trio line-ups (either Jamil Nasser or Richard Evans on bass, and either Chuck Lampkin, Vernel Fournier, or Frank Grant on drums).  As with the earlier releases in the series, the mono sound is clear, balanced, and conveys the excitement and feel of a great live space.  

The two Jamal releases were mastered by Bernie Grundman from "audio transferred from the original tape reels," and pressed by Optimal in Germany.  Both sets (and indeed all the Live At The Penthouse releases) are highly recommended.  The packaging is first-rate:  The vinyl is 180 grams and dead quiet, and each release includes a beautiful, glossy booklet containing photos, extensive liner notes, and insightful interviews.  The LP jackets have a hand-written, limited-edition serial number on the back.

Indeed, the only real drawback to the Live At The Penthouse series is that they are all limited-edition pressings of 1,000 to 5,000 copies.  As a result, most of them are sold out and difficult to come by.  The  Ahmad Jamal releases came out on November 25, 2022 as part of Record Store Day's Black Friday event.  By the time I noticed their release, about two weeks later, both volumes were already sold out.  Luckily, I was able to snag new copies from a seller on Discogs with only a slight markup.  Now, after only a couple more weeks, mint copies are going for a minimum of $50 each.  And that will probably seem like a bargain in a couple of years, as near mint copies of Wes Montgomery's 2017 Smokin' At The Penthouse are selling for $150, if you can find one.

[Brief rant:  I understand the appeal of limited-edition LP pressings.  Labels don't always know how well an album is going to sell, and no one wants to have thousands of unsold copies.  More importantly, a limited-edition pressing creates a sense of urgency and a fear of missing out which encourages collectors and music lovers to rush out and buy a copy before they are all gone.  Fair enough as a marketing ploy, but what a limited-edition release mostly does is drive up the price.  Rapacious resellers snap up multiple copies and immediately advertise them for sale at marked-up prices.  Of course, neither the label, nor the artist, nor the record store owner sees any of that extra profit.  So, note to artists and labels: By all means release a limited, numbered edition of your LP on splatter vinyl.  But if it sells out in about 10 minutes, then for Pete's sake press another batch (a plain black, non-numbered edition), and sell more albums!  It's a win win for you and your fans, and it helps screw over the resellers.  Which actually makes it a win win win.  End of rant.] 

If you've been snoozing on the Live At The Penthouse series, I urge you get busy and track down copies of the two recent releases by Ahmad Jamal while they're still relatively easy to find.  With a little luck, you might also score some of the previous releases in the series at prices that don't break the bank.  (Of course, you could always get the CDs, but only if things are utterly hopeless.  And for heaven's sake don't tell anyone.)

As I was researching this piece, I started to wonder if some of the recordings in the Penthouse archive weren't already available, at least in bootleg form.  Surely someone in Seattle had taped the radio shows off the air and posted the music somewhere?  After nosing around the internet, the only other Penthouse live broadcast I could find is a Bill Evans trio set from May 12, 1966.  It is available as a bootleg CD on the EU-based Jazz Do It label, and can also be heard on YouTube here.  Evans is in good form on the six-song set which includes "How My Heart Sings," "Who Can I Turn To" and "Round Midnight."  He is accompanied by Eddie Gomez on bass and Jack Hunt on drums.  It would make a perfect follow-up to the Jamal trio recordings (hint, hint).

Astute readers may be wondering about the much-ballyhooed 2021 release of a "newly discovered" live version of John Coltrane's A Love Supreme recorded at the Penthouse in October, 1965.  The set came out on the Impulse! label and is titled John Coltrane - A Love Supreme: Live In Seattle.  That set was indeed recorded at the Penthouse -- but not by KING-FM.  It was captured on a reel-to-reel deck by Coltrane's good friend and musician, Joe Brazil.  [Though long-rumored to exist, the tape was lost for more than 50 years until it turned up in Brazil's effects following his death in 2008.]  In addition, there is another Impulse! release which was recorded during Coltrane's same ten-day residency at the Penthouse in 1965, a double album called Live in Seattle which was released in 1971.  While both of these sets may also exist in the Live At The Penthouse collection, the Impulse! albums were separate recordings.

Enjoy the music!