I'm going to review records in my collection, and you'll be able to decide if they're worthy of your collection. These records are what I consider "must haves" for any jazz aficionado, and would be found in their collections. I wont review any record that's not on CD, nor will I review any record if the CD is markedly inferior. Fortunately, I only found 1 case where the CD was markedly inferior to the record.
Our first album is "Moanin" by Art Blakey and The Jazz Messengers. We have Lee Morgan , trumpet; Benney Golson, tenor sax; Bobby Timmons, piano; Jymie merrit, bass; Art Blakey, drums.
The title tune "Moanin" is by Bobby Timmons, it conveys the emotion of the title like no other tune I've ever heard, even better than any words could ever convey. This music pictures a person whose down to his last nickel, and all he can do is "moan".
"Along Came Betty" is a tune by Benny Golson, it reminds me of a Betty I once knew. She was gorgeous with a jazzy personality, and she moved smooth and easy, just like this tune. Somebody find me a time machine! Maybe you knew a Betty.
While the rest of the music is just fine, those are my favorite tunes. Why don't you share your, "must have" jazz albums with us.
Miles Davis -- COLLECTORS' ITEMS with / Sonny Rollins, Charlie Parker, Walter Bishop, Tommy Flanagan, Percy Heath, Paul Chambers, Philly Jo Jones, Arthur Taylor.
Consiste of two recordings sessions, 1953 and 1956.
Notes: Excellent write up of each song. Bird plays Tenor under the name of "Charlie Chan". Only time Bird and Rollins recorded together. On the extremely moving seven minute "Round Midnight," Rollins has the opening and closing bridges, credited in the original notes to Parker.
The info on some Jazz recordings is as strange as that on most Blues recordings.
Will start the new year with a post of another fine, but now quite obscured player of the bop era,whose album I’ve just managed to get. Its been said that his career has been cut short due to personal issues.
Nice booklet, with a few great photos. Recorded 1955-56.
Notes: "For the greatest in big band music, start here! April in Paris is the high water mark for Count Basie's legendary orchestra and includes the most famous version of the title song, a performance that was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. Above all, this recording embodies the best of what a highly synchronized big band at the top of its game can do---inspire dance, swing, and repeated listening."
I assume this was back when the Grammy awards meant something.
frogman Thanks for the response on the question of "mindless riffing". I was busy celebrating the new year and had not the time to answer.
i assume "mindless riffing" can also be associated with "improvisation" if one does not, for want of choice, or cannot, for want of talent, stick to the guidelines you mentioned in your lengthy and helpful summary.
Since the passing of Coltrane most Jazz critics (yuk), and I have read this in too many articles to count, name Sonny Rollins as the "greatest living improvisor". Here is just one example:
In one sense the history of the last thirty years in jazz might be written in terms of the length of the solos that its horn players have been able to sustain. Certainly one contribution of bebop was that its best players (but only its best) could undertake longer improvisations which offered a flow of musical ideas without falling into honking or growling banalities. I do not mean that the younger players of the forties were either the first or the only jazz musicians to be able to do this, only that for some of them a sustained solo was a primary concern. However, a great deal of extended soloing in jazz has had the air of an endurance feat—a player tries to keep going with as little repetition as possible. But when the ideas are original and are imaginatively handled, such playing can have virtues of its own. However, a hornman’s best solos are apt to be continuously developing linear inventions. Sonny Rollins has recorded long solos which, in quality and approach, go beyond good soloist’s form and amount almost to sustained orchestrations.
Excerpt of an article written From Martin Williams, The Jazz Tradition (Oxford University Press, 1983) pp. 183-93.
Mary_jo, I don't live in the past, I just have memories of the past; Rok lives in the past.
I think he knew something like this would raise me from the dead. That war was fought for a reason, the only reason for this perpetual war now is to enrich the war machine, and they keep going back to that time in order to justify it.
While the "macaroni brains" dwell on the past, the Military industrial complex sucks up tax dollars like a vacuum cleaner, and if there is anything left it goes to the corporations, leaving nothing for the citizens.
I worked with Larry Rice in St. Louis to help the homeless in the 80's, I know something about homelessness; what's happening today is totally absurd; this has never happened before in my life time. Macaroni brained people blame it on the homeless for being homeless. Let me tell you; if me, you or anybody else were made homeless, it wouldn't take long for us to have very serious mental problems and self medicate. So when you see a homeless person talking to himself; just think, that person could be you if the fickle finger of fate deemed it to happen.
I can't rest because I know the reasons why so many people are homeless; the primary reasons go back about 20 years.
Rok, for most of your life, you didn't even have to make a dental appointment, much less pay for a dentist; an appointment was already made, and all you had to do was take off work and go.
what's happening today is totally absurd; this has never happened before in my life time.
Read your Bible. There were the poor and homeless when The Lord walked the earth.
So when you see a homeless person talking to himself; just think, that person could be you if the fickle finger of fate deemed it to happen.
Wrong answer / conclusion. We all make choices, take different paths in life. When we are young, we have parents to make the choices for us. Some folks have no parents, 'teenage mamas' don't count, some folks take what seems to be the easy paths in life, not realizing, those are dead ends and that nothing worthwhile is easy.
Stay tuned, the coming generation of homeless will dwarf the current group. We are teaching them to be homeless and poor as we speak.
The Government, your favorite folks, has found out the following:
1) If you finish high school 2) have no children out of wedlock 3) have no children at all before age 20 4) do not use drugs then, YOU WILL NOT BE POOR. Not a very high bar at all.
I must add, they ASSUME everyone wants to work. That is a hell of a assumption.
Rok, for most of your life, you didn't even have to make a dental appointment, much less pay for a dentist; an appointment was already made, and all you had to do was take off work and go.
Which has what to do with what? Btw, when I was going to the dentist for 'free', my salary was 64 dollars per month.
You all should have learned long ago - with Rok, stick to music and don't get into politics and sociology. Doing so accomplishes nothing - all you get is the "bad personal choices" dogma.
Stereophile featured one of my favorite albums this month; as a matter of fact I had it in my collection ages ago. My favorite tune on the LP was "The Outlaw". That was made for the movie of the same name starring "Jane Russell" which was most "Risque" for it's time. Here it is;
Horace Silver -- SERENADE TO A SOUL SISTER featuring: Stanley Turrentine
Excellent notes. Recorded in two sessions, with two different groups in 1968. These 3 tunes are with Turrentine on Tenor.
Silver gives his "personal guide lines to musical composition." He also lists his "personal Do Nots of musical composition." "I personally do not believe in politics, hatred, or anger in my musical composition."
The year being 1968, I can see why he felt the need to say this.
Possibly the angriest band in the world at The Open Door, Greenwich Village (1953) - Charles Mingus (double bass), Thelonious Monk (piano), Roy Haynes (drums) and Charlie Parker (alto saxophone)
Out of the very many jazz musicians I can think of, none are as consistently good over all these years as "Horace Silver"; evidently, he had the right philosophy for a Jazz musician.
Alex, I'm just getting around to responding to your "Dodo Marmarosa" submission. It was very informative and I liked his music; I found it nostalgic and easy to listen to, will get more of him.
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