You think you have to start planning for Christmas early–Strawberry Theatre Workshop‘s Greg Carter was kicking around holiday-themed ideas back in June. The advance planning has paid off with a benefit performance by the Jose Gonzales Trio of the music from A Charlie Brown Christmas. The Peanuts-flavored magic happens at the Erickson Theatre Off Broadway on Monday, December 5, at 7:30p. (tickets: $15).
Depending on how you feel about that trademark “alien visitors” line delivery you get on Peanuts specials, you may be happy to hear this particular evening is about the jazz music, rather than kid chorale. The trio was kind enough to post some samples from rehearsal: “Christmas Time Is Here” and “O Tannenbaum,” to get you into the spirit.
It’s music to remember childhood, with its heartaches and growing pains, by. I had a chance to talk a little with Gonzales about the enduring appeal of Vince Guaraldi‘s composition, which has to be notable in part for being Christmas music that’s not all that cheerful (the uptempo “Linus and Lucy” that everyone knows wasn’t written for holiday special), but like Charles Shulz’s kids, full of bittersweetness. The CBS executives of 1965 did not like jazz in their Peanuts, but Lee Mendelson, who had picked Guaraldi to soundtrack an unaired documentary on Shulz, stuck to his arranger.
Jose Gonzales
Vince Guaraldi played piano and Hammond organ with his trio, with drummer Jerry Granelli, and Fred Marshall on double bass. They were a West Coast jazz group from San Francisco, not Mendelson’s first choice, but when he heard their hit “Cast Your Fate to the Wind” on the radio, he was hooked.
Gonzales listed a few influences you can hear in Guaraldi’s piano: Satie, Ravel. As a performer, “he’s in that Bill Evans tradition,” he said, which Nat Hentoff agrees with in his appreciation of Guaraldi:
I had seen that total immersion before, and often, in a pianist of a different temperament, Bill Evans. His head coming very close to touching the piano keys, Bill Evans eventually was the piano. Bill, however, became an icon. But Vince Guaraldi, who died of a heart attack in 1976 at 47 between sets during a gig, has not become a legend.
It’s not that Guaraldi didn’t do well–look at his discography–but with the benefit of hindsight, we’re all CBS executives. Of course, Gonzales also says there’s a story about Guaraldi flashing a knife as a warning to chatterers during his performance–”he had a bit of a temper”–so that immersion made its own demands.
Gonzales and his trio can be seen and heard all around Seattle on jazz missions that don’t feature Snoopy dances. You can hear them at the Sip wine bars (both Seattle and Issaquah) on Thursdays. First Saturdays of the month, they play at Madrona’s St. Clouds restaurant; on second Saturdays, Serafina on Eastlake. Further afield, they’re at the Scotch and Vine in Des Moines every other Friday. Keep up with them on Facebook to hear about all their shows.
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