Jump to content

Paul Bley


Daniel A

Recommended Posts

  • 3 months later...
  • Replies 211
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

  • 1 month later...
8 hours ago, Late said:

LTI4NzAuanBlZw.jpeg
I love this album. But did it inadvertently set the mold for all future ECM piano trios?

My favourite Bley. I don't hear it's influence so strongly across other ECM piano trios, and I have a good few of them. 

I'd say Jan Johanson had a bigger influence.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 hours ago, Chuck Nessa said:

Sorry if I asked this 7 pages back, have any members had personal interchange with Paul? He was a fascinating character.

Paul and I were friendly acquaintances, he used to call me 3 or 4 times a year to talk. I loved the guy; he was a bit of a know-it-all, but he really did know it all. I've read both bios. I was most impressed by the fact that at certain key points of his career he took the path least likely to lead to work and money, but succeeded each time. He also told me some funny stories about working with Hawk and Rollins, that Sonny was very consciously trying to lose Hawkins, who asked Bley, on occasion, to cue him in for his solo.

Edited by AllenLowe
Link to comment
Share on other sites

7 minutes ago, JSngry said:

How are those?

Can't say.

The Meehan is on my "to read" list but I can't find a copy. Autographed copy @$100 offered on Improvising Artists website, but I suspect the page/site is not active.

I considered the Cappeletti, but it's really short and got a couple of s**t reviews on Amazon (a "Euro academic" tag discouraged me), so I decided not to spend $.

Edited by T.D.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I read the autobiography and the Meehan book many years ago, and I remember the Meehan book seemed to repeat some parts of the autobiography.  But if you are a fan of Bley, go ahead and read the Meehan book  I have not read the Cappelleti book, but I will if I find it in a library.  I would pay no attention to "s**t reviews on Amazon".

Link to comment
Share on other sites

28 minutes ago, gvopedz said:

I read the autobiography and the Meehan book many years ago, and I remember the Meehan book seemed to repeat some parts of the autobiography.  But if you are a fan of Bley, go ahead and read the Meehan book  I have not read the Cappelleti book, but I will if I find it in a library.  I would pay no attention to "s**t reviews on Amazon".

Agree with the underlined. I searched interlibrary loan in vain for the Cappelletti book, but there are other jazz books I'd prefer to purchase. I don't pay much attention to Amazon reviews, but have limited appetite for "Euro academic" material.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 hours ago, Chuck Nessa said:

Sorry if I asked this 7 pages back, have any members had personal interchange with Paul? He was a fascinating character.

No, I wish I had. Saw him perform but never got the chance to talk to him.

In the last 15 years I've really come around on the electronic stuff. Had it before just for "completism" but now I quite like it. Sometimes you have to grow into something that was done several years before you were born.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 minutes ago, clifford_thornton said:

No, I wish I had. Saw him perform but never got the chance to talk to him.

In the last 15 years I've really come around on the electronic stuff. Had it before just for "completism" but now I quite like it. Sometimes you have to grow into something that was done several years before you were born.

I also just came into an appreciation of this stuff in the last year. Maybe came from taking a very dedicated deep dive into his 60s acoustic music in a way that I never had before.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 minutes ago, AllenLowe said:

His widow Carol has called me a few times for some remastering advice for his old label (was it Improvising Artists?). She lives up in Cherry Valley New York near the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Yes, the label is Improvising Artists.

Mentioned above in thread that I ordered the autobiography Stopping Time through interlibrary loan, and the copy I got (only one available) came from the Cherry Valley Library. Found that surprising (it's a really small town) until I finished the book (C. V. was mentioned).

I wondered whether any of the family still lived there. I visited C. V. a couple of times years ago, but had no idea of the Bley connection.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

20 hours ago, Chuck Nessa said:

Sorry if I asked this 7 pages back, have any members had personal interchange with Paul? He was a fascinating character.

My wife and I were at Birdland years back listening to the Paul Bley Trio with Gary Peacock and Paul Motian. We were sitting at a table to the side of the piano with Frank Kimbrough who was a friend of ours and Bley as well. Paul cut an imposing figure on stage, I did not appreciate how tall he was until seeing him live, and he also sat on top of a thick yellow pages book to boost his stature as well.

Right as the first song begins, Bley is clearly in discomfort. He repeatedly clears his throat. This persists until the next song when it is obvious that he is feeling parched and reaches down to my petite wife sitting closest to him and asks for water. My wife is intimidated by his presence and horrified that she had already taken a sip of water. She looks at Frank and asks "What do I do?". Frank, who is always the coolest cat in the room, simply responds in his typical matter-of-fact manner, "Hey, if he wants your water, give him you water". 

I will always remember the terrified look on my wife's face as she hands him her glass. Both because of his imposing presence and her reluctance to give him a glass that she had already had been drinking from.

Funny moment for me.

LWayne

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think there's a lot more to Johansson than the somewhat sombre album of Swedish traditional songs that is the main reason he's still remembered in Sweden. He did work for orchestras and larger bands, wrote film music and so on. Whether that is ECM-ish or not I'll leave to others, but I didn't think so.

 

Edited by Daniel A
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.

×
×
  • Create New...