Sax Man Teddy Edwards’ Sputtering Jazz Career Gains Momentum Again

For decades, the career of tenor saxophonist Teddy Edwards was almost like a rehearsal: a fit of stops and starts.

Edwards--who has long been a major, though somewhat unheralded, voice of the Los Angeles jazz community--might make an album for a jazz specialty label, and it would only do so-so, and he wouldn’t tour in support of it. Or he would make one of his occasional trips to Europe to perform, only to return to Los Angeles and find just sporadic work.

Two years ago, however, his fortunes shifted when Tom Waits, a singer, songwriter, pianist and actor, contacted Paris-based producer Jean Philippe Allard, who oversees many of the jazz releases for Polygram Records, of which Antilles is now a subsidiary.

Waits, who records for Antilles as well, recommended that Allard record Edwards, who had been an off-and-on musical compatriot since the early ‘80s, when they performed together at the Troubadour in West Hollywood.

“I don’t know that Teddy’s ever gotten the kind of recognition he’s due for all the contributions he’s made, but I sure love him and enjoy working with him,” said Waits, who utilized Edwards’ tenor sax to play behind Crystal Gayle’s vocals on the soundtrack of Francis Ford Coppola’s “One From the Heart,” for which Waits served as musical director.

Allard agreed that Edwards was long overdue for a major label release--his last U.S. album was issued in 1976 on the small Xanadu jazz line. Allard contacted the saxophonist, who could hardly believe his ears.

“When I heard about the album, I said ‘Beautiful,’ ” recalled Edwards, who plays Saturday at the Jazz Bakery in Culver City. “Jean Philippe gave me a great deal, including a large royalty percentage, payment of all fees for recording, plus money in front for making the record. I told him, ‘You make me feel like I am somebody,’ and he said, ‘Well, you are.’ ”

That first album, “Mississippi Lad,” features Edwards’ nimble-fingered, soaked-in-blues horn work and his happy-sad, wailing sound on a variety of straight-ahead originals. He is helped out by a backing crew that includes lesser-known Angeleno players such as pianist Art Hillery and trombonist Jimmy Cleveland, both aces.

Waits also makes a cameo, performing two tunes--”Little Man” and “I’m Not Your Fool Anymore”--in his trademark sandpapery but multicolored voice. “Little Man,” which is about a father talking to his son, “took on a new meaning for me after I had kids, and I told Teddy I’d love to do it,” Waits said.

“Mississippi Lad,” which was released in January, has sold only modestly. Still, it has enabled Edwards to expand his performance schedule, appearing in U.S. and European venues that were new to him. These included the lounge of the luxurious Meridien Hotel and the 1,500-seat Chatellet Theatre, both in Paris.

And as far as the horn man is concerned, things are getting even better. Two weeks ago, the Los Angeles Jazz Society announced it will honor him with its 1992 “Lifetime Achievement Award.” And Monday and Tuesday, he fulfilled a longtime dream when he took his 17-piece Brasstring ensemble into recording studios in Hollywood.

The Brasstring, which was once 33 pieces strong when the saxophonist-composer debuted it in 1977 at the Wilshire Ebell Theatre in Los Angeles, will perform more Edwards originals composed for five brass instruments, five strings, harp, rhythm section, saxophone and vocals. The band includes such notables as trumpeter Oscar Brashear, violinist Michael White and pianist Hillery. Lisa Nobumoto is the vocalist.

“I have the brass for excitement, the strings for beauty, and I’m in the middle,” Edwards said. “It’s another means of expression for me.”

As a warm-up to the recording session, the group made an afternoon appearance last Sunday at the Catalina Bar & Grill in Hollywood. According to the club’s owner, Catalina Popescu, “The strings sounded wonderful, and Teddy, as usual, was great.”

Edwards, a native of Jackson, Miss., who has lived in Los Angeles since 1945, was a professional musician by the time he was a teen-ager, playing with the late rhythm and blues bandleader Paul Gayten.

The saxophonist began his recording career in Los Angeles, making a number of sessions as a sideman. One of the first of these was “Up in Dodo’s Room,” with his longtime associate, the trumpet great Howard McGhee, for Ross Russell’s acclaimed Dial Records. (Edwards and McGhee later recorded “Together Again,” an LP for Contemporary Records, in the mid-’70s.)

On another Dial date in 1948, where Edwards and Dexter Gordon were featured on the now classic tenor sax battle fittingly dubbed “The Duel,” Edwards made his debut as a leader.

He said the track, called “Blues in Teddy’s Flat,” “sold more than anything on Dial,” a label that also recorded Gordon, Charlie Parker, Wardell Gray and others. “And it’s still selling on a Spotlite reissue out of England,” he added.

Edwards said his financial rewards for the sales of “Blues in Teddy’s Flat” have been typical of his track record with almost every label before his association with Antilles. “I made $41.25 for the date the day I recorded it, and I haven’t seen another quarter since,” he said matter-of-factly and without bitterness.

Through the years, Edwards has had numerous high points in a rocky road of a career. He has made more than a dozen albums under his own name and has recorded on a hundred others by stellar artists such as Sarah Vaughan, King Pleasure, Benny Goodman, Gerald Wilson, Max Roach and Clifford Brown.

Despite only modest recognition for his efforts and equally moderate financial rewards, at least until recently, Edwards has always maintained a smile in the face of adversity. “I’m a fatalist,” he said. “This is what it is. I can’t get mad. I don’t. I keep on steppin’. My thing is all over the world. Nobody can stop that.”