A few
years ago I blogged about my favourite saxophonist: Shafi Hadi. The first five
paragraphs of this post are lifted directly from that original piece with one
or two minor amendments and edits. The rest is an update, what I’ve since
discovered about this shadowy genius:
One of
the great unsung heroes of the alto and tenor saxophones was a man named Curtis
Porter. He’s probably better known as Shafi Hadi, perhaps having changed his
name on religious grounds during the late 1950s.But even as Shafi Hadi, few
will have encountered him because he appears to have enjoyed no more than the
metaphorical 15 minutes of fame. By the middle 60s, he seems to have dropped
into semi-obscurity.
I first
heard him in about 1962 or 1963 when Mingus and his Tijuana Moods album erupted
into my hitherto cloistered British-trad-jazz-revival consciousness. Suddenly I
was listening to a sax player capable, in my opinion, of trouncing the great
Bird himself.
His
tone was cut of the best diamond, sharp yet plaintiff, stuffed full of 100
carat emotion and bluesy fire. Solos were considered and intelligent, delivered
with exacting precision. Phrasing and intonation were often laconic; he
eschewed the fusillades of notes. For him, his jazz was not about increasing
the numbers of notes per second by running frenetically up and down the chords,
but was more to do with turning short sentences and phrases into pithy sayings
of expressive substance. Pauses were as significant as the notes themselves;
somehow he stitched silence with sound to produce solos of the utmost beauty.
Little
is known about him. He started playing in various R&B bands (before R&B
become a corrupted concept) and I know for a while he was associated with Hank
Mobley, recording on at least one album with him. His first recording venture
with Mingus was “The Clown” in early 1957 (about 6 months after becoming a jazz
player at the age of 26) and he was involved with the great bassist on at least
seven albums until middle 1959.
During
1958 he collaborated with John Cassavetes on the sound track for the producer’s
film “Shadows” in which Mingus was also involved. Cassavetes acted out the
roles as Hadi improvised accompanying music. Cassavetes wrote: “It was
terrific. He played the story of his life to music.” The actor also records
that Hadi was married, was large in stature as well as creativity, and stood
physically tall. Nat Hentoff in the liner notes for “The Clown” writes that
Hadi had said after the recording: “I think more jazz groups should tell
stories like Mingus does, instead of just playing notes and techniques.”
Update:
A
rumour went around that he’d died of a heroin overdose in the early 70s, but a
Wiki entry suggests he was still around on the music scene in 1975, and in 1977
he was reported to have collaborated with Mary Lou Williamson on her
composition “Shafi” although typically the source is vague about the extent of
his contribution. A couple of years later he was said to have worked in some
way with Sue Mingus (Charles’ widow) to provide original scores of her late
husband’s music.
In
coda, I can’t help be struck by the similarity in tone and phrasing between
Shafi and another brilliant alto sax player, Jackie McClean, especially on
Mingus’ “Blues n Roots” album. Mingus was never a composer to look backwards;
he always edged forward, so I’m surprised he employed a sideman sounding so
much like an earlier one. Perhaps I’m wrong on this; I’m not technically minded
with music. I’d be interested to hear expert views, and to know whether anyone
has more information on what happened to such a skilled and gifted jazz
musician.
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