Tribute by Adam Michlin

Tribute by Victor Morosco

Tribute by Albert Hunt

Vincent J. Abato - January 21, 1919 - January 31, 2008
by Adam Michlin
First published in: The Clarinet, Volume 35, Number 3, June 2008

Vincent J. Abato, Vincent James Abato, Vincent Joseph Abato, James Abato, Jimmy Abato. The number of variations are almost as endless as the career of a man who achieved rare success in not one, not two, but three different genres of music on two families of instruments.

Ask a clarinetist who Vincent J. Abato was and they will certainly mention his many years playing bass clarinet with the New York Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. They might mention his long career teaching clarinet and saxophone at the Juilliard School of Music. Those really in the know will possibly mention his staggering rendition, on clarinet, of the third movement of Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto, with clarinet choir accompaniment by a Who’s Who of 1960s orchestral and studio clarinet players including Bernard Portnoy, Herb Blayman, Charles Russo, Joe Allard, Al Gallodoro, and Al Klink. Perhaps some might even mention his more famous students such as Eddie Daniels, Phil Woods, Ron Odrich, and my own teacher who first introduced me to Mr. Abato, Victor Morosco.

Ask a classical saxophonist and they will surely tell you of his groundbreaking recordings of the Jacques Ibert Concertino da Camera and Alexander Glazunov’s Concerto for Saxophone.  They might know him as the man who was the first and last (with a long interlude taught by Joe Allard) classical saxophone professor at Julliard. Many will talk about his breathtaking work as saxophonist with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in such operas as Porgy and Bess and Lulu. Those really in the know might mention his world premiere recording of the Paul Creston Saxophone Sonata, with the composer himself at the piano or his world premiere performance, at age 24, of Creston’s Concerto for Saxophone with the New York Philharmonic. The Creston Concerto performance is particularly interesting; it was performed while Mr. Abato was serving as the Philharmonic’s bass clarinetist. In his own words, the saxophone was, at the time, just something he kept in his locker for dance band gigs.

Ask a jazz scholar or a big band fanatic and they will likely respond, “Oh, you mean Jimmy Abato?” and tell you that until his passing he was one of the last people still alive who had once played with the Glenn Miller Band, followed by a clarification of with the namesake of the band.  They might tell of his stint with the Claude Thornhill band. Some scholars may even mention his brief appearance as alto saxophone soloist on the top 40 popular charts.

I was privileged to know Vincent J. Abato during the last years of his life. Jimmy, as his many friends called him, and I spent many hours discussing everything from those who influenced him (Jascha Heifetz and Tommy Dorsey), his favorite conductors (Arturo Toscanini and James Levine), and all the many famous people he came in contact with throughout his vast career. As just one example, he would tell the story of playing bass clarinet in Strauss’ Don Quixote during the famous Leonard Bernstein episode where Bernstein had to step in at the last minute as conductor of the New York Philharmonic for the then ailing Bruno Walter.

The tendency is often to overly romanticize those who have passed on, but it is not exaggerating to say that Vincent Abato was a man who would give the shirt off his back for his friends. Mention your friendship with Vincent Abato to anyone who knew him as a friend, and you are immediately treated like family. At the same time, it is important to know that he was always a man who said exactly what he thought. He was honest to perhaps a fault with the highest standard of music; these characteristics tended to put off people just as often as it attracted them. He was a man who was great at what he did, but at the same time a man who might be called narrow. It is tempting, though, to wonder if it is possible for anyone to achieve even some of the heights he reached without some set of critics crying narrow.

Sitting and talking with him late in his life, you might hear him say that his biggest regret was dropping out of school during the Great Depression so he could perform on clarinet to help his family pay the bills. You would certainly be regaled with stories about just about everyone in the music world. On one day, he might tell you the story of sitting at lunch with Daniel Bonade (who played second clarinet to Mr. Abato’s first on the Firestone Radio Hour), when Mr. Bonade was approached by Benny Goodman for lessons (Mr. Bonade said no.). On another day, he might tell the story of giving a young upstart clarinetist his first job in New York at the request of Mr. Bonade. A young upstart clarinetist named Robert Marcellus. Your next conversation might be about recording with the likes of Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, and Sarah Vaughan (“Always first alto!”, he would say). He might tell you the story of Charlie Parker observing one of his lessons. You would always walk away with an immeasurable feeling of knowing all of these people, who are themselves so often deified, as real human beings.

Of all the stories he would tell, there was one that perhaps best captures the range of the man known as Vincent J. Abato. I often asked Mr. Abato about innate talent versus training, and one day he told me a story about a clarinet student auditioning at Juilliard. The student played his audition for the panel (which included such players as Daniel Bonade, Augustin Duques, and, of course, Mr. Abato) and each of the judges wrote down whether they would accept the player or not. Each paper was examined, and in the end, all the votes were no... all except for Mr. Abato’s.

The head of the panel asked Mr. Abato why he voted to accept this student whom everyone else had rejected. Mr. Abato responded that this student had more talent than anyone in the room (and this was quite a room full of talent!), and he would prove it if they would bring the student back in. They brought the student back in and Mr. Abato had him go through a few basic tests, involving singing and reproducing pitches played at the piano. Afterwards, the head of the panel agreed to accept the student if Mr. Abato was willing to take him on. Mr. Abato agreed, and the student was accepted. The name of this clarinet player who, I should add, has graciously allowed me to share this story, is Phil Woods.

Here is the end of the story in Phil Woods’ own words, perhaps made clearer to all by Mr. Abato’s at the time secret wish to have been able to graduate himself:

“I missed my final exam because I was working at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, very close to Juilliard physically, but light years away philosophically. I had taken a leave of absence to do a tour with Charlie Barnet's great band, and my exam coincided with our Apollo sojourn. Unfortunately, due to my youthful stupidity, my clarinet was stolen on the day of the exam. I went to the school to tell Mr. Abato what happened and asked if I could re-schedule at a later date. He went ballistic and called me some very bad names. I never took the exam and regret not getting my diploma, but things happen. Never saw Mr. Abato again but I had some great lessons. I got a kick out of some friends telling me that whenever my name was mentioned he would say, ‘Phil Woods? Taught the kid everything he knows!’ Maybe Jimmy - maybe! A difficult man sometimes but he was a very important man in my formative years.”

Ask me who Vincent J. Abato was, and I will tell you he was perhaps one of my closest friends in the world, someone I will always consider to be family, and someone who will continually guide me in my life and career. And, for the record, he asked me to ensure that his name is forever more recorded as Vincent Joseph Abato, even though, as if he wanted to remain an enigma even in his own passing, there are references in his own hand writing to Vincent James Abato.

Thank you Jimmy. You made the world a better place through your music. You made the world a better place by being you.

Vincent J. Abato
January 21,1919 - January 31, 2008
by Victor Morosco

 
The “J” in Vincent J. Abato has caused some interesting conversation through the years, but it is of little consequence in comparison to the legacy he left to the world in the art of saxophone performance. Amongst his peers in New York he was simply know as “Jimmy”. To the uninitiated, sometimes “Abato” would have to be included. To me he was always Mr. Abato or “professor”. I was working with him in New York when I was in my late 50’s when he said to me, “Victor, You can call me “Jimmy”, especially when we work together.” “O.K. Mr. Abato” I answered. We laughed all the way up the street. I started studying with Mr. Abato when I was 12 years old. I was his only child student and I never really got comfortable with calling him “Jimmy” until January 29th 2008.

It sometimes seemed to me that he lived two musical lives. He is probably most renowned for his classical saxophone recordings in the late ‘40’s of the Concertino da Camera of Jacques Ibert and the Concerto for Saxophone and String Orchestra of Alexander Glazounov, recorded on one of the earliest LP recordings of any genre. To put this a bit more in perspective; Marcel Mule was at the height of his career and had recorded the Ibert on breakable 78s not much before this. Dr. Eugene Rousseau, Jean-Marie Londeix and I were in elementary or high school and recovering from WW II. The balanced action Selmer saxophone was new and very difficult to acquire, and the Mark VI had not been developed.

Prior to these recordings, at 24 years of age, as a member of the New York Philharmonic clarinet section he was asked to learn and perform the world premier of the “Concerto for Saxophone and Orchestra” by Paul Creston who had recently won the Prix de Rome for composition. The orchestra manager had heard Mr. Abato practicing the saxophone one afternoon (“I was looking for a reed for a record date”) he told me years later, and when the orchestra was having trouble locating the soloist they were interested in during World War II, the manager suggested they try Abato. Later in his career he recorded the Sonata with Paul Creston performing at the piano.
Until that point in time Mr. Abato only played the saxophone on commercial dates and dance bands such as Glenn Miller and Claude Thornhill. He always considered himself a clarinetist first and foremost. “I played the saxophone only to enhance my income. I became a saxophone soloist by accident” he said to me.  Please remember in the 1940’s the symphony was a season of 26 weeks or so and he had two children to support. As he was pretty much self taught on the clarinet, except for some early lessons from his older brother, he taught himself the saxophone and the Concerto by applying what he learned as a clarinetist and by observing other great musicians.

My lessons on vibrato, for instance, were “to make the vibrato with the lower jaw and listen to great string players.” That was it! Of course I had the benefit of listening to his recordings until I wore out several copies. He was melodically influenced by Tommy Dorsey and was enamored of his smoothness and therefore developed and insisted on absolute smoothness of fingers as well as timbre in going from note to note on any instrument. One was never to slap a key. When he played it was if his fingers caressed the keys. This method was also a foundation of the teachings of the master clarinetist and teacher, Daniel Bonade. Technically he was greatly influenced by the precision, rhythm and flair of Jascha Heifetz. He felt he learned from great conductors. Arturo Toscanini and James Levine were among his favorites.

His career as a soloist was greatly enhanced by the emergence of the concept of “clinicians”. The late Vito Pascucci became the president of the Leblanc instrument company, which was somewhat new to the United States, and engaged Mr. Abato to perform on these instruments professionally and at various universities and conferences in order to give these instruments credibility. Mr. Abato was a flamboyant, energetic man of strong opinions and little formal education, due to having to go to work as a youngster to help support his family, which helped make his music very exciting but could also step on some toes. Perhaps never having gone through an educational system, as we know it, made it a bit difficult to understand what others may experience in a traditional educational system. I was fortunately also a recipient of his great generosity and magnanimity in wanting to help others. As a teenager and while at Juilliard I was allowed to accompany him to recording sessions, rehearsals and concerts where I could listen to some of the greatest instrumentalists in the world apply their talents. He would have me sit next to him when it was appropriate and observe the music and hear and “feel” the others around him. Friday afternoons, when there were no classes or performances at Juilliard, I would take the subway to CBS studios in New York and sit through and observe rehearsals for the “Carnation Hour,” a weekly, live radio show on Sunday mornings. It was a master class every week for me. When he played a solo it was a lesson in phrasing, imagination and beauty every time. Which was basically his method of teaching. Every time he played for me as a youngster, I learned and was inspired. He would often take me to dinner afterwards and enchant me with stories of situations with great artists and performers.

Many years later after Mr.Abato had retired from the Metropolitan Opera, and I had returned to New York, I was waiting to have dinner with Mr. Abato between performances while he was rehearsing a “pops” concert with the Skitch Henderson Orchestra in Carnegie Hall. It was not too interesting until the orchestra started to play a standard ballad, which was an alto saxophone feature accompanied by the orchestra. I was a pretty seasoned performer in my late 50’s at the time. I sat in the hall and listened and was absolutely mesmerized by his beautiful interpretation and performance and tears poured from my eyes as I realized my youthful admiration was not misplaced.
He disliked the altissimo register. His solo repertoire, other than the well-known standard pieces, was a bit suspect. But in his hands the saxophone and the music he performed were transformed into something exquisitely beautiful. He was “one of a kind” and I am glad I could witness it “up close and personal”

Only a researched biography could fully tell the story of this unique artist who with no schooling to speak of played in the New York Philharmonic at age 21, then was a first call for many studio orchestras and on ABC staff for many years, and ended his career with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in his late 60s where he played clarinet, bass clarinet and memorable performances as a saxophonist in the operas Lulu, The Rise and Fall of Mahagonny, Porgy and Bess, and Billy Budd.

According to my friend and former student Adam Michlin, in his article in the Clarinet Journal, “he asked me to ensure that his name is forever more recorded as Vincent Joseph Abato, even though, as if he wanted to remain an enigma even in his own passing, there are references in his own hand writing to Vincent James Abato.

With great admiration,
Victor Morosco

Vincent J. Abato
by Albert Hunt

I am extremely grateful for the lessons I took with Jimmy Abato.  He was truly an artist.  Whether on clarinet or saxophone, every time he played, it was an inspiration.  He always played all  the notes, rhythms, articulations and dynamics with a great sound, AND he every time he played a phrase, it was new and different from the time before.

When I took my first lesson with Mr. Abato, I was quite proud of myself because I had a full scholarship to study with him as a doctoral student at Juilliard.  I was ready to dazzle him with my technique and artistic phrasing.  Mr. Abato asked me to play a scale.  I did, and he told me to play it legato (slurring).  I did, and he told me that it sounded like I was tonguing.  He insisted on legato--complete connections between notes.  He said, "Son, you can't play like that now.  You're in college."  We spent the next 50 minutes working on slurring a C major scale.  It was the beginning of a new level of technical understanding for me. Over the next two years, as I strove to meet Mr. Abato's ever increasing demands for technical and musical excellence, I grew to understand and appreciate what an incredible artist he was.  I will always be thankful for the opportunity to study with Jimmy Abato.