Neal Hefti - The Basie Years

The Basie Years

In 1950, Hefti started arranging for Count Basie and what became known as "The New Testament" band. According to Hefti in a Billboard interview, Basie wanted to develop a stage band that could appear on The Ed Sullivan Show. Although the New Testament band never became a show band in that sense, it was much more of an ensemble band than Basie's previous orchestras. Hefti's tight, well-crafted arrangements resulted in a new band identity that was maintained for more than twenty years. In his autobiography, Count Basie recalls their first meeting and the first compositions that Hefti provided the new band:

Neal came by, and we had a talk, and he said he'd just like to put something in the book. Then he came back with "Little Pony" and then "Sure Thing," "Why Not?" and "Fawncy Meeting You," and we ran them down, and that's how we got married.

Hefti's compositions and arrangements featured and recorded by the orchestra established the distinctive, tighter, modern sound of the later Basie. His work was popular with both the band and with audiences. Basie said, "There is something of his on each one of those first albums of that new band."

One of the new Basie band's most popular records was titled "Basie" and subtitled "E=MC²=Count Basie Orchestra+Neal Hefti Arrangements," now more commonly referred to as Atomic Basie, an album featuring eleven songs composed and arranged by Hefti, including the now-standard ballad "Lil' Darlin" and "Splanky." Also on the album were "The Kid from Red Bank" featuring a gloriously sparse piano solo that was Basie's hallmark, and other songs that quickly became Basie favorites, such as "Flight of the Foo Birds" with Eddie Lockjaw Davis' flying tenor solo, "Fantail" with Frank Wess's soaring alto solo, and the masterpiece ensemble lines of "Teddy the Toad". These pieces are evidence of both Hefti's masterful hand, and the strong ensemble that Count Basie had put together.

During the Fifties, Hefti didn't get as much respect as a musician and band leader as he did as composer and arranger. In a 1955 interview, Miles Davis said "if it weren't for Neal Hefti, the Basie band wouldn't sound as good as it does. But Neal's band can't play those same arrangements nearly as well." This disparity is not so much a reflection of Hefti's ability (or lack thereof) as a musician, as it is a reflection of his focus as a writer. In the liner notes to Atomic Basie, critic Barry Ulanov says:

In a presentation of the Count Basie band notable of its justness, for its attention to all the rich instrumental talent and all the high good taste of this band — in this presentation, not the least of the achievements is the evenness of the manuscript. Neal Hefti has matched — figure for figure, note for note-blower — his talent to the Basie band's, and it comes out, as it should, Basie.

Much the same way that the influential Duke Ellington matched his scores to the unique abilities of his performers, Hefti was able to take advantage of the same kind of 'fine-tuning' to bring out the best of the talents of the Basie band. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that when the same charts are played by a different band, even the composer's own, that the result is not as strong.

As composer, Hefti garnered many accolades. In addition to Ulanov's praise, Hefti won two Grammy awards for his composition work on Atomic Basie including "Li'l Darlin," "Splanky," and "Teddy the Toad." The success of the album had Basie and Hefti in the studio six months later making another album. This second album was also very successful for Basie. Basie recalled:

That is the one that came out under the title of "Basie Plays Hefti". All the tunes were very musical. That's the way Neal's things were, and those guys in that band always had something to put with whatever you laid in front of them.

Hefti's influence on the Basie sound was so successful, his writing for the band so strong, that Basie used his arranging talents even when recording standard jazz tunes with the likes of Frank Sinatra. Basie said,

So we went on out to Los Angeles and did ten tunes in two four-hour sessions . All of those tunes were standards, which I'm pretty sure he had recorded before (and had hits on). But this time they had been arranged by Neal Hefti with our instrumentation and voicing in mind.

Again, by matching the individual parts of the arrangements to the unique abilities of Basie's band, Hefti was able to highlight the best of their talents, and make the most of the ensemble.

Overall, Basie was very impressed with Hefti's charts, but was perhaps too proud to admit the extent of his influence:

I think Neal did a lot of marvelous things for us, because even though what he did was a different thing and not quite the style but sort of a different sound, I think it was quite musical.