By David "Chet" Williamson Sneade
In his 18
years at Long View Farm recording studios in North Brookfield , MA
Between
the years of 1973 and 1991, he hosted such seminal artists and acts as
Aerosmith, the J. Geils Band, Arlo Guthrie, The Rolling Stones, Stevie Wonder,
numerous jazz fusion artists, and a cast of thousands more.
For the
past seven years, Markle has been painstakingly preserving these recordings,
rescuing them from oxidation in hopes of maintaining the integrity of their
original quality. If you missed them the first time around, in the vinyl format
maybe, he has recently reissued the material on his web site,
www.studiowner.com. Once there, click on “Media Library,” enter your
email address, log in and enjoy the music.
 |
| Gil Markle at the board |
In
addition to the stars, Markle also captured hundreds of local and regional
bands that also worked at Long View during his tenure. Among the jazz sides in
the collection is a never-before-released 1980 session led by Howie
Jefferson, which is quite possibly the last recording of the
saxophonist. He died the following year.
The date
featured Jefferson on tenor with pianist Jeff
Lass, guitarist Jay Conte, bassist Paul Sokolow (overdubs) and
drummer Grover Mooney. Bassist Bob Conte played bass during the
original recording but his performance had to be scrapped after it was
discovered that his track was damaged.
 |
| Jeff Lass |
Lass has since gone on to
make a name for himself nationally in the film industry, scoring for such films
as Dick Tracy, Iron Jawed Angels and The Killing Zone. The New York-based
Sokolow has appeared in a variety of settings, including with Leni Stern, Dar
Williams and Herbie Mann. Grover Mooney is no stranger to local audiences
having performed in the city numerous times with Rebecca Parris. Bob Conte is
still active throughout Worcester County
The song
list is basically standards and blues, including “Green Dolphin Street,” “I’ll
Remember April,” “My Baby Just Cares for Me,” “One Note Samba,” “Secret Love,”
“Summertime,” “There Will Never Be Another You,” and untitled blues and another
untitled jam. They are listed on the Studiowner Media Library as “J. B.
Railstop,” named after the Spencer restaurant, where Carmella’s on Rte. 9 sits
today. It was then owned by the Conte brothers.
Markle
says he was a big fan of Jefferson and a regular at the restaurant. “I had eyes
for one of the young waitresses,” he says laughing. “So I found myself going
there to get a bit closer to her, which never occurred. The residuals involved
Howie Jefferson.”
Markle
was uniquely qualified for such recordings. His father was an audio engineer
for NBC and his mother was the big band singer, Connie Gates.
The Media Library is actually a page on Markle’s web site, which is virtually
an interactive memoir titled, Diary of a
Studio Owner.
 |
| Markle's mom, Connie Gates |
Today, Markle is the owner of Passports Educational
Travel, which sponsors the overseas travel for several thousand American
students each year. He no longer has any involvement with the recording studio.
As a fan of
Jefferson , Markle arranged the session in
1980 on his time and his dime. “I invited them back there for the hell of it,”
he says. “I wanted Jefferson to meet Jeff Lass, the piano player, knowing they were playing the
same material. They just sat down together and played, basically with no rehearsal.
It was all one session.”
 |
| Connie Gates sings Worcester songwriter Harry Tobias |
Markle
recalls how Jefferson liked to set up in front of a
microphone. “He put one of our condenser mikes into the horn of his saxophone.
He said he liked to record that way. It rattled. Instead, we positioned him
between two very expensive Neumann condenser microphones.”
When
asked why the bass was replaced, he says, “I forget what the reason was. It was
technically defective. Wouldn’t work. So it was a couple of weeks later that we
replaced the bass using Sokolow -- one of Jeff Lass’ -- guys. Bob Conte may not
even know about it, and it may not be apparent to him when he listens to it.
Sokolow pretty much emulated his performance.”
 |
| Studio owner, Markle |
The Media
Library offers both audio and video files of exceptionally high quality. They
can be played in real time (streamed) using Flash technology, encoded at
uncommonly high bit-rates. Another exceptional feature about the site is that
the archival files may be downloaded for personal (only) use, in iPod-ready
format.
The
amazing thing about the Jefferson material is that it was never mixed. “They were what we
called board mixes,” he says. “I did it on the spot in order to check out the
integrity of the Sokolow bass overdubs. I made a straight copy without any EQ,
without any volume moves in order to focus the attention on the artist doing
the solo. Just a flat, straight-across, board mix. It was a seven-and-a-half
ips copy of that board mix that was recoveredquite by accident from a mis-labeled packing case, 25 years later,
unplayed.”
 |
| Engineer, Jesse Henderson |
Markle
reports that the original 24-track tape may still exist at Long View Farm. “It
should still be there, and someone competent should mix it. I’d love to do it.
The fact is, that 24-track tape belongs to Howie Jefferson’s estate. I
basically gifted the entire project to him. I’d involve myself with the mix
project in a heartbeat. Maybe the studio will ask
me to do so.”
me to do so.”
 |
| Markle on the road |
After the
session ended, Howie wrote Markle a letter of thanks that he (Markle) still has
in his possession. “It’s a wonderful letter. I saw it just a month ago. It’s in
one of our red Pendaflex files in the basement. He raves on and on about the
experience and thanks me for having done it for them,” Markle says.
He also
reports that he had used Jefferson on other dates as well. Howie can be heard
on Markle productions including three tunes sung by Joanne Barnard, “Carnival,” “Brahms
Lullaby” and “Second Time Around,” all in the Studiowner Media Library.
 |
| Joanne Barnard-List |
Continuing
to read from his notes, Markle says, “Howie Jefferson was a consummate
gentleman — no indication of any illness. His wife [actually girlfriend at the
time, Joyce Burrell] however was always and painstakingly deferential to him.”
“Now that
I think back on it,” Markle says. “She knew something that we didn’t, and was obviously
taking care of him.”
Though
some of his parts may have ended up on the cutting room floor, bassist Bob
Conte fondly remembers Jefferson and the session.
“Gil used
to come into the restaurant a lot,” he says. “He used to like listening to the
music. He had also heard of Howie Jefferson. So he set up this session at Long
View for Howie with brother Jay and myself and a drummer from Boston, who did a
lot of work around town, Grover Mooney. He was a little bit high the day we
recorded that.”
 |
| Louis Armstrong and friends backstage at the Worcester Memorial Auditorium (Howie at far left). |
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| Soft Winds |
Now in
his 70s and active, Conte lives in the Stiles Reservoir area of Spencer. His
real surname is Contestabile. Before Jay died 12 years ago, the Conte Brothers
worked together for more than 40 years. In the early 1950s they replaced the
famous Soft Winds that featured Herb Ellis, Lou Carter and Johnny Frigo at the
Darbury Room in Boston.
In the mid-’50s they worked at the Maridor in
Framingham and in the ’60s at the Sea & Surf. A list of those who sat in
with the rhythm mates include such jazz stars as Errol Garner, Zoot Sims, Bobby
Brookmeyer, Slam Stewart and Dave Bailey. In the two decades that they were
active in Rte. 9 East clubs, young players such as Chick Corea, Steve Kuhn,
Akira Tana and John Abercrombie had joined the brothers.  |
| Young pianist Steve Kuhn |
Jay’s
daughter is in the business. She is the jazz singer, Zephryn,
who works in the Arizona area. When asked how he hooked up with Jefferson,
Bob says, “My brother and I were playing a duo thing at Spencer Seafood. It was
Saturdays. One night Howie came in with Bill Fanning, a piano player. Howie was
digging all the stuff my brother was doing. On the break, he says, ‘Yeah, I
heard of you guys.’ My brother says, ‘Howie Jefferson. Yeah, I heard of you all
these years.’ He heard of us but never heard us.
 |
| Zephryn Conte |
“So he
and my brother struck up a warm relationship. He started going to my brother’s
house with records. Then he started bringing his horn and sitting in down
there.
"Before you know it, we were in the process of opening the restaurant out there. He used to come out all the time. He’s the one that suggested having jazz on Sundays.”
"Before you know it, we were in the process of opening the restaurant out there. He used to come out all the time. He’s the one that suggested having jazz on Sundays.”
J. B.
(Jay and Bob) Railstop was owned by the Conte brothers. “We were there for four
years,” Bob says. “We used to play nightly. We were there all day and we would
play at night. Sunday was the jazz thing. We had various musicians — guys that
we knew from Boston that would come in and sit in and play.
 |
| Bobby Sherwood |
“One
night this fellow came in and said, ‘I heard that you had jazz on Sundays. He
was kind of bent-over, a skinny looking guy. He says, ‘My name is Bobby Sherwood. That name might not mean
anything to you, but this guy had a band in the ’30s. He did this thing called,
‘Elks Parade,’ it was a famous song. He was married to Judy Garland’s sister,
Dorothy Gumm.”
Sherwood,
who was also a guitarist who replaced Eddie Lang in Bing Crosby’s band, was
living in Auburn at the time of his illness. “He was staying with this woman.
He was going to the Dana Farber Cancer place to get treatment,” Conte says.
Conte
says playing and having guests sit-in was the best part of owning the
restaurant. “The rest of it was a lot of headache,” he says. “See what happened
was my brother got sick while we were there. He had congestive heart failure.
He wound up in the hospital. Then I was running the place with my sister in-law
and my wife. We were working our heads off. Eventually we sold the place.”
 |
| Stones taking the Long View |
Conte
says he certainly knew of Long View before recording the session.“They
used to get a lot of big names up there recording,” he says. “They’d stay over.
They had the facilities. Gil had the Rolling Stones up there recording and they
all came down to hear us play one night. I never got into rock stuff but they
were all there sitting in the bar drinking. What’s his name, Keith Richards? He
was diggin’ Jay’s playing.”
When
asked if he recalled the Long View session with Jefferson, Conte says “I have a
rough copy. It was all done in one session, everything was impromtu. We
recorded in the house. Howie played very nicely. I enjoyed his work. Gil Markle
enjoyed it too because he got it all on tape, smilin’ all the time. Jeff Lass
was the piano player that Gil brought in. Excellent piano player. He was
leaving to go to California right after that session.
“I
actually didn’t know Howie was sick. He was going with Joyce. She used to come
out with him all the time. She called me and said, ‘Howie is real sick. He’s
got cancer.’
“A
strange thing happened. My sister-in law had to rush my brother to the hospital
one night. He couldn’t breathe. She took him to City Hospital. Howie was there
at the same time. They were both being treated at the same time.”
 |
| Howie, Just a Closer Walk With Thee |
Jay
recovered. (He died of a heart attack in 1995. He was 68.) Howie did not, dying
after being hospitalized in June of 1981. He was 67. “Howie was a real
gentleman, a very nice person,” Bob says. “My brother was really sad about the
whole thing.”
This
piece was first published on July 25, 2007.
Note: This
is a work in progress. Comments, corrections, and suggestions are always
welcome at: walnutharmonicas@gmail.com. Also see: www.worcestersongs.blogspot.com Thank you.
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