jeffcrom

Anthony Braxton - Trio (Victoriaville) 2007 (Victo). With Halvorson and Bynum - and Braxton's interactive laptop, which effectively becomes the fourth member of the "trio."

Janacek - Sinfonietta (Ozawa/Chicago SO). A 45 RPM vinyl Angel "Sonic Series" release. Stirring performance and really fabulous sonics.

Over the past week, I've listened to the complete Karajan/Berlin "1963" Beethoven symphony cycle, in a random order of my own. Really beautiful music making, for the most part. Yeah, the 6th is kind of perfunctory, but I still enjoyed the gorgeous sound of the Berliners.

Eric Dolphy - The Illinois Concert (BN). So grateful that this performance was preserved. This time around, I was impressed at how mature and responsive to the music 22-year-old Herbie Hancock was.

Thank you, gentlemen. I'm proud of this one. Cover design by Grammy winner Susan Archie, who is my neighbor. And if you've never heard of any of my duet partners, at least Google Stuart Gerber. One of my favorite blues lines about a wrong-doing woman: "She's got a man on her man and a kid man on her kid."

Jelly Roll Morton - The Complete Library of Congress Recordings (Rounder). Disc 6 - with such wonders as "Freakish," "The Georgia Skin Game," "New Orleans Blues," "The Spanish Tinge," "Michigan Water Blues," etc.

John Clark - Sonus Inenarrabilis (Mulatta). Found this by chance tonight. Fascinating jazz/new music/third stream/funk compositions performed by a nine-piece band (horn, clarinet, bassoon, string trio, and rhythm section). On first listen, I'm loving this.

Dixieland Way Down Yonder in New Orleans (GHB). One of my favorite New Orleans trad albums of the 1950s, found at the late, lamented Magic Bus record store on Conti Street in the Quarter. One side is trombonist Jack Delaney's band, with young Pete Fountain on clarinet; the band on the flip features Lee Collins, recorded during what I believe was his last trip back to his hometown in 1953. This was originally issued on Southland as a 10" LP; when Jazzology bought Southland, they reissued a bunch of 10" LPs as 12-inchers, without any additional tracks. So there are only twelve minutes of music on each side. No matter - I still love this one.

Art Pepper Plays Shorty Rogers & Others (Pacific Jazz). A 1978 release which issues a couple of 1956-57 dates in at least somewhat less garbled fashion that earlier issues.

Beethoven - Symphony #7 (Karajan/Berlin, from the 1963 box) Two British Quintets (Ramon Kireilis, clarinet/Lamont String Quartet). A really nice Spectrum LP with the Arthur Bliss and Samuel Coleridge-Taylor clarinet quintets. Couldn't find a picture. Horn Quartets: An Omnibus (Concert-Disc LP). Quartets by Alexander Mitushin, Nicolas Tcherepnine, and Paul Hindemith, along with arrangements of folk songs and Bach, played by hornists from Chicago and Minnesota.

Ha! I can't help repeating one of my jazz-obsessed-teenager-interacting-with-a-parent stories, although I know I've told it here before. I was 15 or 16, and had just found the Bird and Diz Verve LP, on which Norman Granz hired Buddy Rich to play drums. I was spinning it in the living room when my sweet mom walked through, carrying a basket of laundry. She stopped, listened for half a minute, and said, "That drummer doesn't really fit with the rest of the musicians, does he?" Now playing: Tom McDermott and Connie Jones - Creole Nocturne (Arbors). RIP, Mr. Jones.

New Orleans cornetist Connie Jones died last night (February 13, 2019) at the age of 84. He was a "musician's musician" - barely known to the general public, but held in high esteem by his fellow Crescent City players. As Tom Piazza said in the notes for the album I will be recommending below, "All the serious traditional players of New Orleans show a special respect for Jones; something shifts in their tone when his name comes up in conversation." He's probably best known for his stints in a latter-day version of The Dukes of Dixieland and with Pete Fountain. I saw him a couple of times with Fountain, and always enjoy the recordings he appears on. I particularly recommend the 2007 duo recording with pianist Tom McDermott, Creole Nocturne, on the Arbors label. RIP, Mr. Jones. https://www.wwoz.org/blog/487471 https://www.amazon.com/Creole-Nocturne-McDermott-Connie-Jones/dp/B01MEGJ6R7

Henry Threadgill - Song Out of My Trees, from the Black Saint box set.

I listened to the Victor album again tonight with Davern's assessment in mind, and I'm just not hearing what he's talking about. Davern is a generation younger than Fazola, so that may influence his opinion. I certainly don't hear the kind of harmonic sophistication Coleman Hawkins or Roy Eldridge had, but I also don't hear any harmonic waywardness or hesitation. Fazola obviously understands chord structures, and even introduces a few (not many) chord extensions/alterations. He is, at least on these eight sides, about as sophisticated harmonically (or a little more so) as you would expect from a New Orleans musician born in 1912. To clarify, I didn't post this to be argumentative, but to satisfy my curiosity about Davern's opinion.

Tonight's shellac: George Gershwin with Paul Whiteman and his Concert Orchestra - Rhapsody in Blue (Victor). Since this piece was premiered 95 years ago today, I pulled out my copy of the second recording, from 1927. I have a later pressing, from the early 1940s. Lennie Tristano - Wow/Crosscurrent (Capitol) Lennie Tristano - Sax of a Kind/Marionette (Capitol) Lennie Tristano - Yestersdays/Intuition (Capitol) Lee Konitz - Yesterdays/Duet for Saxophone and Guitar (Prestige). It was Chuck Nessa who tipped me off that the 78 issue of "Yesterdays" was different from the LP/CD take, and had never been reissued. But it still took me a couple of years to track down a copy. The 78 take was probably issued in error, since there is no trumpet present, but Miles Davis's name is on the label. Charlie Parker - Dewey Square/This is Always (Dial) Charlie Parker - Bongo Bop/Embraceable You (Dial) Charlie Parker - Bird of Paradise/Dexterity (Dial). I stopped in at a suburban Atlanta record store today and picked up a couple of LPs. In addition, they had exactly three 78s - but they were three E- to E Charlie Parker Dials. They sound really good. Takes one and two of "Embraceable You" were both issued on Dial 1024, and I crossed my fingers before playing that disc, hoping that it had take one. It does, and I'm delighted to have one of my favorite recordings of all time in its original format. And when I spun the last Bird record, I experienced a feeling I've had in the past when I hear a longtime favorite recording on 78 for the first time. Hearing these two tunes as the two sides of a record - not as part of a 20-minute sequence of tracks on an LP side, or part of an hour-long program on a CD - is a very different listening experience. As many times as I've heard "Dexterity" since I was 16 or 17, today it jumped out at me as a masterpiece, and reminded me what a great band the 1947 Charlie Parker Quintet was: every element was in balance, and everyone knew his role and executed it perfectly.

Jackie McLean - 'Bout Soul (BN Conn)

Irving Fazola - New Orleans Jazz (RCA Victor). A four-record album recently found "in the wild." This is a 1946 set of tunes associated with the Original Dixieland Jazz Band, but it's no re-creation. Fazola's wonderful playing is beyond anything the OJDB was capable of. His is my favorite clarinet sound ever - classical, jazz, or other.

I have the other issued Ayler recordings from late July in France - the Nuits De La Fondation Maeght material and the additional tracks on the Holy Ghost box set - and I like those very much. Based on one listen, Live on the Riviera is not nearly as good as the others. Ayler seems pretty reined in. Maybe it's because Call Cobbs had not yet arrived, and/or that there is more emphasis on Mary Maria Parks' recitations and singing. In any case, this is some of the least compelling Ayler I've ever heard. Of course, since it's Albert Ayler, I will certainly give it a few more listens; maybe it will grow on me.

Not at all - I think everyone who has heard that one gets it. It's in that body of recordings that have so many layers that you continually find new things in them; they reveal new aspects during each listen. King Oliver's Creole Jazz band records, Gil Evans' Ampex album, and the best Ives recordings are like that.

Olympia Brass Band - The Great Olympia Band book CD (Jazzology). A really excellent set recorded in London in 1968 and originally issued in the UK on 77 Records. Serge Chaloff / Boots Mussilli - Serge and Boots, from the Chaloff Mosaic box set. Albert Ayler - Live on the Riviera (ESP). First spin - I just became aware of this release a few days ago. Or rather, I just became aware that it did not duplicate material I already had, as I had thought.

Very cool!

Jazz For a Sunday Afternoon, Volume 4 (Solid State). Joe Farrell, Marvin Stamm, Garnett Brown, and the amazing rhythm section of Chick Corea, Richard Davis, and Elvin Jones. Edmond Hall - Rumpus on Rampart Street (Rae-Cox mono)

I would agree with that assessment.

Errol Parker Tentet (Sahara)

What's New!!! Sonny Stitt Plays the Varitone (Roulette mono). The price was right - free. And Stitt burns here. But he burns on the crude 1960s electronically enhanced saxophone. On the other hand, there are some nice cameos by J.J. Johnson, Mike Mainieri, Joe Wilder, etc. Verdict: I keep it for now, but it will not survive the Great Album Purge when I move across the country in seven or eight years.