Born: December 16, 1953 Primary Instrument: Clarinet
Allan Vache’ ��” Clarinetist Born December 16, 1953
Allan Vache was graduated from Roosevelt Elementary School, Rahway Junior High School, and Rahway High School, Rahway, New Jersey 1959-1971. He also attended Jersey City State College, Jersey City, New Jersey 1971-1975. At this time he studied with David Dworkin of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, and independently with famed jazz artist Kenny Davern. From 1972-1975 Allan also performed many professional engagements with such jazz greats as Bobby Hackett, Wild Bill Davison, Pee Wee Erwin, Gene Krupa, Dick Hyman, Max Kaminsky, Clark Terry, Dick Wellstood, Ed Hubble, Cliff Leeman, Bob Haggart, Jack Lesberg, and many others. He also made numerous appearances with his brother, famed jazz cornetist Warren Vache, Jr. From 1974-1975 Allan appeared in the Broadway musical “Doctor Jazz” at the Winter Garden theater, starring Bobby Van and Lola Falana. He performed with a band that appeared onstage, and Luther Henderson and Dick Hyman wrote instrumental arrangements. In late 1975 Allan joined “The Jim Cullum Jazz Band” of San Antonio, Texas, formerly “The Happy Jazz Band.” He traveled extensively with this band to Europe, Australia, and Mexico, as well as to many concert and festival appearances throughout the U.S. He has recorded nine albums and compact discs with this band, including the only jazz CD of the entire score of Gershwin’s “Porgy and Bess,” released on CBS Masterworks records. Concerts of “Porgy & Bess,” many featuring opera great William Warfield as narrator, were performed by Vache and the band throughout the Western hemisphere, including The Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., and “The Cervantino Arts Festival” in Mexico City, for the U.S. State Department. Allan has appeared in several “World Series of Jazz” concerts in San Antonio. These concerts featured the “Cullum” band alongside such jazz luminaries as Benny Goodman, Pete Fountain, Joe Venuti, Teddy Wilson, Scott Hamilton, Bob Wilber, and many others. Allan appeared with Jim Cullum at Carnegie Hall at the “Tribute to Turk Murphy” concert in January 1987. He has also performed with Culllum on the CBS Morning News, and PBS television show “Austin City Limits.” He also performed on NPR’s “A Prairie Home Companion” with Garrison Keillor, and was a regular performer on PRI’s “Riverwalk ��” Live from the Landing,” from 1987-1992. This program aired on over 200 public radio stations in the U.S. and abroad. Many of these shows are still rebroadcast today. In the summer of 1992 Allan left San Antonio to pursue a free lance career. Since that time he has appeared as a solo performer at several jazz festivals and parties around the country and abroad. He has appeared with pop performers Bonnie Rait and Leon Redbone and can be heard on the soundtrack of the 1998 film “The Newton Boys”. In 1993 he moved to Orlando, Florida to perform at various Orlando attractions including Walt Disney World and Church Street Station. Vache has numerous recordings to his credit, several under his own name, for various labels. These include Audiophile, Jazzology, Arbors, and Nagel-Heyer, of Hamburg, Germany. Vache has presently recorded twelve CDs for this label, six of these as the leader. His latest CD’s are “Ballads, Burners & Blues”, released in March of 2004, which includes his wife, Vanessa Vache’, on clarinet, as a special guest, and “With Benny in Mind”, a tribute to Benny Goodman, released in April of 2007. Both for the Arbors label. Having toured in Germany, Austria, England, Scotland, Ireland, Italy, Poland, Switzerland, France, and Israel, Allan continues to work as a freelance artist in the Orlando area as well as appearing at many concerts and festivals in the U.S. and around the world.
o The key member of the group was Allan Vaché, a clarinetist whose solos were strong and full bodied, sometimes suggesting the overwhelming intensity of Sidney Bechet. This became most apparent when Mr. Vaché gave the ensembles a colorful lift as he soared above the other horns. Mr. Cullum, a cornetist and Mike Pitsley, a trombonist, contributed to the strength of a very positive front line, which was backed by a rhythm section that managed to blend the chunky sturdiness of the 1920's rhythms with the smoother flow of the Swing Era.
For bright, swinging clarinet of the classic school there is much to choose from right now; Davern's new Breezin' Along, Harry Skoler's Reflections On The Art Of Swing and this delightful sextet from Allan Vache, Swing And Other Things. Vache is the proprietor of a big, rich, round tone across all registers and swings with a fierce, caution-to-the-wind abandon. At fast tempos on “June Night”, “Limehouse Blues”, “Hi Ya Sophia” and others, the pull between the creative freedom and ensemble exactness generates a powerful and fascinating tension and cohesion. On the one duet (”He Loves And She Loves”) he and pianist Johnny Varro strike up the kind of rarefied elegance Benny Goodman and Jimmy Rowles used to get.
Small group swing is a devilishly precision mechanism governed by strict balances and formalities that the listener is reminded of only when they are jarred out of position. Such music offers no camouflage in which to cover errors and suffers fakers without mercy. Vache's associates here are about as good as they come and fuse into a wonderfully cohesive ensemble. The clarinetist's brother, cornetist Warren, cameos on a bright “Cheek To Cheek” at the end. --John McDonough
Allan Vaché Swing and Other Things ARBORS ARCD 19171 (67:37) The “swing” of the title is palpable throughout this album, especially “Limehouse Blues”, “Cheek to Cheek” and Benny Goodman's “Rachel's Dream”. On these and the other selections Clarinetist Vaché captivates you with his propulsive phrasing, harmonic momentum and Artie Shaw-like high notes. This is swing in the Goodman tradition. (The comparison is aided by John Cocuzzi's Hampton-ish vibes.
The rhythm section -- guitarist Bucky Pizzarelli, pianist Johnny Varro, bassist Frank Tate and drummer Ed Metz, Jr. -- prjects a loose, effortless bouyancy. Pizzarelli's chorded solos are smooth and warm on “Nancy (With the Laughing Face)” and “You Turned the Tables on Me.” Varro takes several fluid Teddy Wilson-ish solos throughout the album. Cornetist Warren Vaché , Jr. the leader's brother, joins the group on “Cheek to Cheek”, a hard-swinging romp that you don't want to end.
--Owen Cordle
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