Orcar Pettiford—”Blues In The Closet” (1958)

“Blues In The Closet” is a 1953 composition by Oklahoman Oscar Pettiford (1922-1960). It was originally titled “Collard Greens And Black Eyed Peas.” Oscar Pettiford is one of the most recorded jazz bass players, who is also considered as one of the pioneers of the cello as an instrument in jazz. Pettiford, who is often overlooked when it comes to mentioning giant jazz players, specialized in intricate solo work and was credited with a “wide knowledge of both jazz and classical music and an outstanding sense of rhythm.”

The Oscar Pettiford Quintet: bassist Oscar Pettiford is accompanied by Austrian jazz tenor saxophonist Hans Koller, Hungarian guitarist Attila Zoller and American drummer Jimmy Pratt -- and not Kenny Clarke as it says on YouTube! “Blues In The Closet” was recorded in Vienna, Austria on January 10, 1959, for the Ariola EP “Mr. Pettiford’s Convalescence.” Pettiford and Zoller were both injured in a car accident during the previous Christmas season, while enroute to Vienna, and this a the first recording after their convalescence. In 1959 this record won the Jazzstudio SFB award of Radio Free Berlin.

Oscar Pettiford was born on an Indian reservation in Okmulgee. His mother played the piano and his father led a 10-piece family band in which the young Oscar initially was a vocalist. By age 10, the boy started to play the piano and four years later he was the bass player of the family orchestra which toured the Midwest with great success.

Oscar was influenced by Jimmy Blanton and Milt Hinton, and when Oscar wanted to quit bass playing and work in a steady job, it was Hinton who convinced him to stick to the bass. Within a few months Pettiford was discovered by Charlie Barnett and he was invited to join the saxophonist’s band.

By 1943 Oscar had joined the jazz scene in New York, including playing with Roy Eldridge at the Onyx Club. Pianist Billy Taylor recalled that “OP [as his friends called him] had the strength and the rhythmic capacity to do things that were on the same level as Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker.” In 1944 Pettiford joined Billy Eckstine and in 1945 he moved to Boyd Raeburn’s band. That same year Oscar joined Duke Ellington and his Orchestra with whom he stayed for three years.

In 1949, while with the Woody Herman band, a hand injury in a friendly baseball game prompted Pettiford to switch from the bass to the cello, which brought a mellow sound to jazz. Pettiford even paid a tribute to the smaller instrument which helped made him famous by naming his son Cello, and his twin daughters Celeste and Cellina.

In 1950 “OP” was part of the Louis Bellson-Charlie Shavers Combo and between 1951 and 1952 Pettiford took his own group to Korea and Japan. During the Fifties Oscar Pettiford spent most of his time freelancing in New York, and in 1958 he came to Europe with the Carnegie Hall Jazz Band. After the tour Pettiford remained on the continent and made Europe his home, with Denmark as his base. He died in that country’s capital Copenhagen at the young age of 37, from a virus closely related to polio.