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Nate Dorward

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Everything posted by Nate Dorward

  1. Just got it--spinning it now. Spotted a few familiar faces already. Sounds nice!
  2. Just a quick note to say that I finally got the discs this Monday--will try to give them a spin soon.
  3. Pretty stunning! I played recorder for years, though I stuck to Telemann & Bach..... no Coltrane!
  4. That's very sad to hear. A fascinating, underrated pianist.
  5. Just curious: what makes one commonplace phrase acceptable & another not? Why these phrases rather than others? (Take a look at the Language Log site for similar queries about why certain usages get condemned arbitrarily by self-appointed usage "experts".) There are particular turns of phrase & words I avoid, but in general it seems to me the real problem is people who write without thinking or listening, & simply excising some cliche'd phrases isn't really going to address this problem. (One can write terribly while using entirely original turns of phrase, & write very well using no words out of the ordinary.) If someone wants to recommend a disc I'd rather they simply say "Recommended." rather than trying to work out some tortuous evasion of the word.
  6. The best! I thought this was overrated though there were some classic sequences. Guy It's a great film if you forget about the first half hour or so, which is VERY slow in setting up the basic premise. What is an action film exactly? I'm seeing lots of things listed in this thread which I'd classify as "thriller", "suspense", "adventure", "heist film", "western" &c, rather than action film per se (which, to my way of thinking, needs to make a specific point of stressing kinetic, highly visual forms of violence & thrills). Rififi is a great film, but it's not an action film at all--it's about tension, not release.
  7. Thanks for the comments--I'll see about getting hold of Letzbor. Aside from issues of interpretation (& tone in the case of Holloway), I simply think I'd like to hear the pieces with a fuller & more varied accompaniment. I don't really buy Manze's insistence on avoiding extra instruments in the name of textual or historical accuracy. Only other person I've heard play this material is Barry Guy's wife, the violinist Maya Homburger--the solo "Passacaglia" is included on their album Dakryon. Haven't relistened to it lately but I remember it as being more leisurely & pure-soundish than Manze's more sharp-focus version.
  8. Biber's mystery/rosary sonatas cropped up on the Vandermark thread because I picked up on clem's passing reference to John Holloway's recordings. Anyway, the version I have is the Andrew Manze set; Larry recommended Gunar Letzbor over either of them, whom I'd not come across before. Anyway, thought I'd start this thread, in part because I was curious about the differences between these versions--any thoughts? Manze in his liners is pretty skeptical of recordings that emphasize the sonatas as "program music" or as numerological exercises. His version also largely avoids extra instruments--it's just violin + keyboard. & any thoughts on Biber's other works (for chamber instrumentation or the choral works)?
  9. Hm, lots of names to me that are just names.... Though, yes, Polar Bear is overrated, judging by the one disc I've heard (courtesy of Mwanji Ezana) & Jason Yarde is excellent, judging by a concert I caught some years back (a freeish blow led by Louis Moholo-Moholo). Is the Wellins/Tracey disc a duet, or with a rhythm section? I love Stan but my impression of his son's drumming was none too positive, so I tend to stay clear of his recent work....
  10. Some linguists weighing in (follow the link too): Rock syncopation: stress shifts or polyrhythms? & a related post.
  11. I was recently sent a CD by a 9-year-old in Israel named Ariel (is he linked to above? I'm at work & can't surf that site). Includes a curious version of "Giant Steps" (where his solo is mostly one note!). Despite that, clearly he's got some serious chops & imagination for a 9-yr-old.....!
  12. Whenever I feel bad about writing a pan, I only have to use google for a little relief: I have NEVER encountered a CD yet, no matter how bad, that hasn't attracted a few glowing writeups. Especially on AAJ, where they cluster as thickly as grapes.
  13. As long as there's jazz feeling there I'm happy!--as my reviewing (I hope) shows I try to have an ear to just about any of jazz's various tributaries....
  14. Oh god, Daniel Smith--I was sent one of his discs for review, & it went into my special folder for unintentionally funny discs. (I toss out most bad CDs, but sometimes one feels like hanging on to the memorably awful ones.) One of the worst albums I've ever heard, in any genre. I hope Paul Hanson's NOTHING like Smith.
  15. Hm, wonder if the duos with Poole were recorded.... I gather Poole did record most of his performances.
  16. Didn't catch the show, but anyway, nice to hear he's been featured. A great drummer...! -- My favourite work of his may still be that sequence of discs with Yosuke Yamashita..... -- Has he recorded much as a leader? The only disc of his I have is that one with Sonny Sharrock & John Stubblefield.
  17. Yes, you can get it through the Foghorn site; probably DMG or Cadence could get it for you in the States, too--both of them have stocked previous Foghorn titles. It's a really nice label--I've liked nearly everything I've heard on it (the only disc I'd say give a pass on is the Matthew Bourne solo piano disc--weird, good in spots, but terribly uneven & it requires a strong tolerance for bathroom humour). Aside from this disc, the three albums by Bruise are excellent--the newest one, We Packed Are Bags, was one of the best things I heard in 2007. The quartet album with Jeb Bishop is worth getting hold of, too.
  18. Speaking of which, the only Pepper footage that seems to be on YouTube is this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koNqHz4-WG8...feature=related I take it this is from his troubled mid-1960s phase where he was tackling Coltrane head-on..... I really don't like it at all but it's still fascinating.
  19. Thanks for that posting of the Pepper videos--jesus, I've got to get that album (the only one from that period of Pepper's I'm missing, I think). Not sure I'm hearing "planes" there, exactly! but know what you mean about the contrast with Desmond. Oddly enough, listening to "I Surrender Dear" in this version, more uptempo than the ones I've usually heard (e.g. Monk's), it makes me think Art's moving it in the direction of a Cole Porter tune--that kind of use of chromatics & unexpectedly wide intervals to give it a kind of elegant but urgent drama & melancholy. (Maybe it's the tail-end of the A section, which in Pepper's phrasing sounds like "I Get a Kick Out of You" that's contributing to this sense.) Sorry, but Brubeck's solos on both those tracks just make me go Agh!
  20. OK: thought I'd ask the wiser folks here about an odd problem I've experienced playing DVDs of music concerts & the like (but not DVDs of feature films). I get a lot of crackly distortion (peaking?), usually on the lead horn mostly. Any possible explanation for this? The DVDs I've had trouble with include: all the Delmark DVDs I've encountered--the Deep Blue Organ Trio, Chicago Underground Trio, Khail el'Zabar & the Ritual Trio the Arbuckle short on Dave Douglas's Keystone the recent Jazz Icons Chet Baker DVD On the other hand, I've had no trouble with the Misha Mengelberg documentary on Data. The DVD player is a relatively inexpensive model (NOVA brand). The TV is an elderly Sony (once top-of-the-line), about 15-20 years old.
  21. Nate Dorward

    Dave Easley

    Thanks for that! Though I think he's, as they say, "too much" (in a literal sense). Pity that the poor guitarist is off-camera!
  22. Been listening to this one a lot lately, in part because I've been writing a formal review for Coda, but mostly just because it's a great new release. It's on the small label Foghorn, which is run by the saxophonist Tony Bevan; the trio is Murray, Bevan & John Edwards. They did an album a few years back, Home Cooking in the UK, which was OK but had some prolonged dead spots. This one is one of those free jazz albums where some unhappy circumstances lent a nice bit of pissed-offness & intensity to the gig. (The short story: the trio was booked into a nice arts centre to play a gig in Newcastle. Turned out they were double-booked; so they were forced to relocate to the nearby Newcastle Working Men's Club, with a very rowdy audience of locals who mostly had never heard free jazz before. & Murray was given a very shoddy drumkit to play.) Anyway, listening to it was for me a nice lesson in how loose & raw a drummer can get & yet still keep the time flowing & turning. (There are free passages, but also a waltz & a loose 5/4 rock/funk groove.) & as folks here who've seen my past reviews will know, I think Bevan is one of the real unsung heroes of the UK jazz scene--a great gift for melody & an acute rhythmic sense. Pungent work from Edwards, another player whom I always seek out. Anyway, a great free blowing session; the local audience sounds like they were won over after a few minutes, & the trio actually get a pretty warm reception.
  23. In related news, there's a new (prev. unreleased) Brotherhood of Breath CD due out from Cuneiform shortly, Eclipse at Dawn. It's a live 1971 performance.
  24. Truthfully, though it's easy to compile lists of silly goofs from reviews, everyone has off-days.... most of my jazz books have accumulated annotations of mistakes I've spotted, & I know that I've certainly committed the odd screwup to print or the web.
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