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Leon Mitchison – saxophone, vocals
Issac Banks – trumpet
Gerald Grey – tenor saxophone
Carlos Tillman – baritone saxophone
Alva Nelson – organ
Gerald Calhoun – bass
Earl Spiller – guitar
Craig Green – drums
unknown percussion
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Discography | Personnel
| Photos
also see: Leon Mitchison
12" on Soul-Cal Records
Leon Mitchison, the Houston-based saxophonist,
band-leader, ex-principal and founder of the revered Michitone
record label, arguably represents the missing link between
Kashmere High School bandleader Conrad O. Johnson’s
expert jazz education and his Stage Band’s early ’70s,
unbridled funk. In the ten years during which Kashmere
produced their eleven sought-after records on Johnson’s
imprint, Kram, the band won 42 of the 46 competitions they
entered. Though Johnson has argued that “the records
are just a facsimile” of the band’s on-stage presence,
a quick listen to the band’s signature, the Johnson-penned
“Kashmere,” recorded in 1973, presents a strong
argument of the band’s inimitability. Its perfectly
tuned, blaring brass section and proficient sax solos aside,
“Kashmere” showcased one of the band’s strongest
suits: The Nut, Bolt and Screw rhythm section. Craig Green’s
tightly syncopated breakbeats, Gerald Calhoun’s staccato
bass lines and Earl Spiller’s jazzy but 100%-Texan guitar
phrases created the funky base upon which the Kashmere
Stage Band’s winning formula was built.
This formula owes thanks, in part, to Mitchison’s
nurturing. And his rarely heard “Street Scene”
is proof.
While attending graduate school in the mid
’60s, Mitchison was accepted as bandleader at Isaac
Elementary, a school in the area of Houston’s Fifth
Ward known as Kashmere Gardens. It was during his time at
Isaac that Mitchison instructed Gerald Calhoun and Earl Spiller,
among other students who would go on to join the Kashmere
Stage Band. “Gerald Calhoun played sax at first,”
the multi-talented Mitchison remembers. “I’m the
one who influenced him to play the bass – he saw me
playing the bass.” These rising stars, alongside Green
and Nelson, would go on to become the basis for Mitchison’s
Eastex Freeway Band, named after the roadway (now known as
Highway 59) that cut across the Fifth Ward, near the Brewster
Street address that Mitchison called home.
Mitchitone, Mitchison’s most active imprint,
may have been founded concurrently with another, Dialee, as
he released a version of his song “Big Nickle”
on both labels. The same matrix number was attached to each.
There’s not a single cover version to be found on any
of the early Mitchitone releases. “I always wanted to
do originals, I didn’t want to copy,” Mitchison
now states. “We tried to put out instrumentals that
people could possibly want to relate by.”
Of the many 500-piece runs that Mitchison ordered
from his local pressing plant, one in particular has withstood
the test of time to become a deep funk classic. “Street
Scene,” recorded and released in 1974 with the Eastex
Freeway Band, is a Kool and the Gang-influenced funk gem featuring
vocals about escaping the harshness of life on the streets
rapped by Mitchison. “Since I’m a sax player and
not a vocalist, I rapped,” Mitchison states. “I
was rapping way before (today’s) rapping, and I was
trying to get a message across in a positive way.” For
their part, the Kashmere Stage Band’s rhythm section
holds the track together from Spiller’s wah-wah intro
through Green and Calhoun’s steady groove to the dramatic
unison climax. “Those guys was a gift from God,”
Mitchison compliments. “Especially Gerald, he was in
another zone. Nobody could ever really duplicate Gerald Calhoun.”
The same year that “Street Scene”
was released, Johnson released The Kashmere Stage Band
Plays Originals, the Kram album that contains his masterpiece
tune “Kashmere.” Green, Nelson, Calhoun and Spiller
soon graduated, but Mitchison continued to use them as his
band throughout the ’70s, recording obscure, but extremely
tight, funk songs such as “Whatcha Need” and the
funkiest version of “I’ll Take You There”
this writer has ever heard. And the formula that the Eastex
Freeway / Nut, Bolt and Screw rhythm section developed simultaneously
with Mitchison and Johnson would go on to influence Kashmere’s
mid-’70s musical trajectory. Out of Gas (But Still
Burning), arguably Kashmere’s
funkiest album, followed their departure, with the young rhythm
section Cold Fire picking up the reins, saluting them with
the superb “$$ Kash Register $$,” released on
45 and LP.
On this 12-inch EP, the original version of
“Street Scene” is paired with unreleased versions
of the song taken from 1/4-inch two-track mixes that Mitchison
maintained for thirty years in his Houston garage. The alternate
vocal features a performance by Delia Stafford. The instrumental
version features a more prominent role by the track’s
percussionist – here, his conga-line introduces the
song. “(Now) they’re talking about remixes,”
Mitchison laughs, “I always did have the instrumentals
and the (other) versions!”
Egon
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