Sad news about Frank Morgan

[mikeweil]

i also what are his earliest known recordings? beside the GNP frank morgan album. hey, i should go play that.....

The session on the 'Wardell Gray Memorial Album' (Prestige) must be one of his earliest. A very good one too !

The "Teddy Charles West Coasters" session for Prestige in L.A. on February 20, 1953 was Frank Morgan's (and Sonny Clark's) firsdt studio session.

[JohnJ]

Nice article from the NYT.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/06/arts/music/michael-connelly-wants-to-make-a-film-about-frank-morgan.html

[robertoart]

“I’m a disciple of Raymond Chandler, who said in his essays that there’s a quality of redemption in anything that can be called art,” Mr. Connelly said last week.

Can't say that I totally agree with this redemption stuff. Redemption is far from a given characteristic of any form of art. Although it is especially beloved of those that need to project a melancholic narrative trope in order to 'identify' with the art. Redemption is too associated with guilt, and suggests that 'art' is the product of some kind of 'immanent failure' - that can be transcended by the 'beauty' of the art. In regard to Jazz at least, it strikes me as very much a White way of looking at things, and a typical Existentialist one, overlooking the collective pain of social and economic hardship - and how a music helped transcend and alleviate that - by instead placing the spotlight back on a Romantic interpretation of an individuals particular situation. Once again, no morally wrong act took place on the part of the 'Jazz' culture - therefore no redemption was possible (or needed).

I mean whose achieving the redemption anyway. Morgan - for living through a vile 'social reality' - and succumbing to the endemic 'social disease' of drugs to escape that - and crime to survive. Or Mr Connelly, for recognising humanity (and a sympathetic mise en scene) in Morgan's music - and being diverted from the shite popular culture around him.

Edited June 7, 2012 by freelancer

[AllenLowe]

"Redemption is too associated with guilt, and suggests that 'art' is the product of some kind of 'immanent failure' - that can be transcended by the 'beauty' of the art. In regard to Jazz at least, it strikes me as very much a White way of looking at things, and a typical Existentialist one, overlooking the collective pain of social and economic hardship - and how a music helped transcend and alleviate that "

sounds pretty much the same to me -

[robertoart]

"Redemption is too associated with guilt, and suggests that 'art' is the product of some kind of 'immanent failure' - that can be transcended by the 'beauty' of the art. In regard to Jazz at least, it strikes me as very much a White way of looking at things, and a typical Existentialist one, overlooking the collective pain of social and economic hardship - and how a music helped transcend and alleviate that "

sounds pretty much the same to me -

No transcendence is not redemption. And transcendence is not born out of guilt. Connelly chooses to quote Chandler's very proscriptive statement that redemption is an identifiable characteristic of art. This is then applied to Be-bop and Morgan by context. Be-bop as a Black cultural and social art is transcendent on almost every level. Black people in America had to find ways to transcend American life. Emotionally, socially and intellectually. They had nothing (as a community and a culture) to redeem themselves for. Or would you argue that Be-bop was not exclusively 'culturally owned' by the Black American world and therefore Morgan's life and music should be seen more exclusively through a personal journey of pure addiction/crime and then redemption through musical talent. I don't think this is an entirely appropriate or respectful position. Hence my complaint about a Black Jazz musician being framed through a 'redemptive' lens. It distorts the retrospective perception. It may be appropriate for Chet Baker and Art Pepper (who also had a similar 'redemptive' quality to his story), but not so much for a Black subject of that era.