Art Pepper

[Aggie87]

who's to say that all of these players don't have a unique style of their own.

I don't think anybody's saying that.

[BruceM]

Coltrane influence????

The only thing that came out of Art Pepper's horn was his own experiences.

Well, Art disagrees with you, but what does he know about that...

The suggestion was that Pepper became a lesser musician because he listened to Coltrane. I don't hear that, but maybe you do?

[wordsandsounds]

Coltrane influence????

The only thing that came out of Art Pepper's horn was his own experiences.

Well, Art disagrees with you, but what does he know about that...

The suggestion was that Pepper became a lesser musician because he listened to Coltrane. I don't hear that, but maybe you do?

He's mentioned himself that he became somewhat of an acolyte and had to distance himself. But he integrated it fully. I don't see this as a point to dismiss his work at the time. I think it's beautiful to hear a musician constantly moving and evolving...

[Nate Dorward]

Re: The Way It Was--Actually none of the outtakes from the various other sessions are on the OJCs in my collection--were they included at a later date? In any case, it's great music, both the Side A session with Marsh & the Side B of outtakes (I remember the fast "The Man I Love" as particularly strong).

[king ubu]

I just ordered The Way It Was and Smack Up - the two missing Contemporary discs (from the first Contemporary period, that is - not sure there really was y second one or were those just a few of the comeback albums and then some live stuff? Or are those on Galaxy? Anyway, it all used to be Fantasy/OJCCDs, so I didn't look that closely).

Nate: some of the alternates and additional tracks were added to the actual albums - "Intensity" has two bonus titles that are also on "The Way It Was", I think (but it's been a week since I checked - I have the LoneHill "Freewheelin'" twofer which has the date with Marsh but none of the alternates from that one, and some of the alternates from the other dates have not been added to the respective CD reissues, so I did order it anyway, even more so as Lonehill is not my favourite way to have the music...)

About the Coltrane influence, the one thing which I really did find a bit of a bad recording is the Jazz Casual show - there, as far as I can hear it, Pepper is in the midst of a struggle, torn between himself and Coltrane. Generally I'm in the camp that prefers late Pepper - the Galaxy box is fantastic to my ears, and the Vanguard box is almost up there! I found my way to Pepper via early recordings (the three Blue Note CDs now in a Mosaic Select, then the old LP Pepper Mosaic, the Tampas on VSOP and OJC...), then I got the Galaxy box and was really blown away. Only after that I went on to explore the late 50s albums on Contemporary that most seem to consider the best bunch of his career. I agree they're all very good ("Intensity" is beyond very good, that's the favourite of the bunch, for me). But the raw emotion in his later recordings is what wins me over. It starts in "Living Legend" and "The Trip", I think the two later Contemporary albums that I'm aware of. And then it goes all the way through the Galaxy albums and the later live releases, too.

The Hollywood sessions box is a notch below, I think, though there are of course many glorious moments on it and it's absolutely woth having (as is everything he ever recorded, in my opinion - he's among my favourite musicians, that's for sure)!

PS: why the hell were the piano trio tracks left off the Pepper/Sims Fantasy/Pablo live CD? There was more than enough space, and the liners mention what the trio played... and how the hell could a couple of trio tracks by Victor Feldman, Ray Brown and Billy Higgins do any harm?!?

[Nate Dorward]

My copy of Intensity only has one bonus track, the blues "Five Points". Maybe there's a difference between North American & European issues of the CD?

[Clunky]

, then I got the Galaxy box and was really blown away.

I've really struggled to enjoy the Galaxy box. I got it ultra cheap from 2001 and perhaps as a result have never warmed to it as whole. Perhaps too much of good thing. Late Pepper's wretched intensity can be hard to endure over each of the set's long CDs. Love 50s Contemporary /Omega Tape Pepper, particularly the session with Carl Perkins.

[Kyo]

Coltrane influence????

The only thing that came out of Art Pepper's horn was his own experiences.

Well, Art disagrees with you, but what does he know about that...

The suggestion was that Pepper became a lesser musician because he listened to Coltrane. I don't hear that, but maybe you do?

Now why would I think that your suggestion was that there was no "Coltrane influence????"

at all since "The only thing that came out of Art Pepper's horn was his own experiences"?

[danasgoodstuff]

Part of Peppers experience was having younger black guys in prison tell him he wasn't hip any more and that Coltrane was what was hip now - his reaction to that (both positive and negative) came out his horn...

[BillF]

My copy of Intensity only has one bonus track, the blues "Five Points". Maybe there's a difference between North American & European issues of the CD?

"Five Points" is the only bonus track on my OJC Intensity, manufactured in Germany.

Edited March 7, 2008 by BillF

[Larry Kart]

Yes, but I feel the Trane influence diminished his talents.

I agree and this is why (further explanation at the end, if it's necessary):

Excerpts from Terry Martin's great two-part essay about Pepper, from Jazz Monthly, Feb. and March 1964 (previously posted on a Paul Desmond thread):

"The white aesthetic of self-exploration dominates, but here is no self-indulgence ... each nuance of feeling is tested for strength; sometimes it gives and both listener and player feel the pain, and against this the sheer pleasure of blowing.... 'I Surrrender Dear' is not the brilliant 'Old Croix' but a deeper exploration: the inevitability of the restless theme statement rises in a reiterated and modulated motive variant that merges with the final theme paraphrase, which in turn is decorated with a brief recapitulation of this shape. The movement passes naturally to the beautifully spaced break that sets his solo lines stalking freely over the harmonies. There are marvelous ascensions from a crushed lower register and countless rhythmic shifts, suspensions, reiterations. Indeed expressive formations abound in the solo (each has the solidity of a theme), and one wonders how he has been thought to be merely another altoist....

"'Besame Mucho," alto all the way, is for me possibly the greatest solo he has ever recorded; although I often turn to it for pure enjoyment I nevertheless end by being moved by its fusion of invention, elan, and passion. It is full of mastery -- the staggering doubletime near the end of the even meter section; passion -- the gleaming tone and lyrical paraphrase; and tragic insight, the whole nervous fabric pierced with desire for a transcendent serenity, ascensions that soar above the kaleidoscopic rhythms and spaces of his underworld, analogous to the bold and equally tragic gestures on 'Parker's Mood,' 'Billie's Bounce, ' and 'Chi Chi,' reflecting back to 'West End, 'Potato Head' and beyond; almost 'style beyond style.'"

And this from earlier on in the essay:

'[M]elodic fragments dealt out with a sharp sense of time require reassembly if a coherent expressive end is to be served. Again Pepper seems to delved back into the middle era [i.e. the Swing era] independent of Parker; despite the fragmentation there is a constant sense of formal resolution, a tendency to symmetry... It should be stressed that total asymmetry is not essential to the modern style, but its imprint must remain. Pepper in his own way attempts to regain a classical order from the chaos revealed by the bop greats... It seems that his stint with Benny Carter may have been critical in molding his sense of form, since Carter is a master of construction.... Certainly [Pepper] relies strongly on similarities of melodic shapes, these stemming from the choice and direction of intervals, not from resemblances of melody as such.... The altoist builds not on the original melodic figure laid down at the beginning of the solo but on its shape; thus the melodies developed later need have no close relation to the germ cell in melodic terms. Here is a reason for the absence [in Pepper] of note distortions which are often used, e.g. by Parker and Rollins, to create the required ambiguity. The shapes themselves must be kept clean and unambiguous if they are to form the main constructive element; the ambiguity undeniably present springs from Pepper's individual use of rests. Carter's melodic figures, which are placed symmetrically, result in symmetry. Pepper ... places his asymmetrically and thus only tends toward overall symmetry. This is one source of his lyrical tension.

"Pepper has never sought beautiful melodies for their own sake.... Rather his melody is completely absorbed in the expressive fabric of the music.... Rarely does he strive for a melodic paraphrase of the theme, being generally more interested in the emotive possibilities of interlocking fragments arising from germ cells of the theme and the effect of altered dynamics. Melody suffers change under constant redistribution of the pattern of rests; in this respect we may note the the mastery of Monk, another who is more concerned in reading meaning into the melody rather than extending further the melodic limits during his improvisations...."

Me again. Not to be tedious, but note in particular these passages about the pre-Trane-affected Pepper: "...despite the fragmentation there is a constant sense of formal resolution, a tendency to symmetry.... Here is a reason for the absence [in Pepper] of note distortions which are often used, e.g. by Parker and Rollins, to create the required ambiguity. The shapes themselves must be kept clean and unambiguous if they are to form the main constructive element; the ambiguity undeniably present springs from Pepper's individual use of rests. Carter's melodic figures, which are placed symmetrically, result in symmetry. Pepper ... places his asymmetrically and thus only tends toward overall symmetry. This is one source of his lyrical tension...."

Hearing Trane as Pepper did meant that he changed a whole lot of the above, in ways that I'm sure don't need to be spelled out. Not that he couldn't/shouldn't have changed, but the results IMO often didn't work that well. The air of Sturm und Drang felt somewhat external emotionally and arguably was somewhat external to the actual inner musical workings of Art's music even then, though of course the frequent air of Sturm und Drang in Trane's music was clearly inseparable from its inner musical principles. Finally, there are fair number of later Pepper recordings where he pretty much returns to and recaptures (though not at all in a revivalistic manner) the sorts of things that Terry talks about above.

[danasgoodstuff]

I think Pepper's best music was post-Village Vanguard after he'd worked through the 'Trane thing and was able to use it and everything from before...and it's not like he played clean and pure like Lee Konitz before his Iron City sabatical, he was always a very intense player and there's lots to dig from all periods.

[Chuck Nessa]

Yes, but I feel the Trane influence diminished his talents.

sounds like you're saying something negative about trane....................

How the hell could you get this impression?

[mrjazzman]

Don't have the time or inclination to elaborate other than to say he'd developed a wonderful identity 25 years before the Coltrane influence and he lost much of the influence later. I really enjoy the Vanguard recordings...

Ah, here we have the crux of the matter! I understand how the earliest days of the Coltrane influence messed w/Pepper, but - eventually he integrated it. Chuck says he "lost much of" it, which may or may not be another way of saying the same thing, but I don't think that Pepper of the mid-70s and beyond (which includes the Vanguard material) was what it was if he hadn't gone through Trane the way he did. In other words, if Pepper had never heard Trane, I don't think that he would have evolved to the point to where he played like he did by the time of those recordings.

No matter, count me as part of the minority (here, anyway) which prefers later Pepper. Similarly, I prefer later Mobley. In both cases, the later work ain't as "pretty" as the earlier, but there's an...immediacy, a feeling that there's no longer a layer of "music" between the music and the emotion, if that makes any sense. Which is not to say that that earlier layer was superfluous, or shallow, or anything like that. Far from it. Just that it seems like in the later work, it was no longer needed, that both players might have felt put upon, perhaps even belabored, to go back and play with that vibe again.

As always, mileages can and will vary.

as usual, you said it better than I could.........

[mrjazzman]

Yes, but I feel the Trane influence diminished his talents.

sounds like you're saying something negative about trane....................

How the hell could you get this impression?

when you don't elaborate, how the hell could I NOT get that impression.........

[Chuck Nessa]

Yes, but I feel the Trane influence diminished his talents.

sounds like you're saying something negative about trane....................

How the hell could you get this impression?

when you don't elaborate, how the hell could I NOT get that impression.........

Don't have a clue. You must have a problem.

Where is my negative mention of John Coltrane?

[Larry Kart]

Yes, but I feel the Trane influence diminished his talents.

sounds like you're saying something negative about trane....................

How the hell could you get this impression?

when you don't elaborate, how the hell could I NOT get that impression.........

By reading more carefully or thinking more clearly? If, say, Peewee Russell had been influenced by Trane and the resulting mix didn't quite work, to point that out wouldn't reflect negatively on Coltrane but merely indicate that Peewee's pre-existing virtues were not that compatible with Coltrane's. That's all that was meant. BTW, I did know a marvelous Peewee Russell-steeped clarinetist, the recently deceased Frank Chace, who also greatly admired Coltrane and beautifully integrated some aspects of Trane into his own highly individual style.

[mrjazzman]

Coltrane influence????

The only thing that came out of Art Pepper's horn was his own experiences. I was lucky enough to see im live late in his career and he played a 20 minute blues that was the most emotionally devasting thing I have heard in 40 years of listening to music.

I recommend you listen to a recording that was issued as "Blues for The Fisherman" if you are lucky enough to find a copy.

is that the name of a cut on the album or the name of the album?

[mrjazzman]

Yes, but I feel the Trane influence diminished his talents.

sounds like you're saying something negative about trane....................

How the hell could you get this impression?

when you don't elaborate, how the hell could I NOT get that impression.........

By reading more carefully or thinking more clearly? If, say, Peewee Russell had been influenced by Trane and the resulting mix didn't quite work, to point that out wouldn't reflect negatively on Coltrane but merely indicate that Peewee's pre-existing virtues were not that compatible with Coltrane's. That's all that was meant. BTW, I did know a marvelous Peewee Russell-steeped clarinetist, the recently deceased Frank Chace, who also greatly admired Coltrane and beautifully integrated some aspects of Trane into his own highly individual style.

then say he tried to play like trane and it didn't work out, and we all know what IMPRESSIONS are, right?

[JSngry]

A melody from Ravel over the changes to "So What"?

[Chas]

Coltrane influence????

The only thing that came out of Art Pepper's horn was his own experiences. I was lucky enough to see im live late in his career and he played a 20 minute blues that was the most emotionally devasting thing I have heard in 40 years of listening to music.

I recommend you listen to a recording that was issued as "Blues for The Fisherman" if you are lucky enough to find a copy.

is that the name of a cut on the album or the name of the album?

It's the title of an album under Bulgarian pianist Milcho Leviev's name . It was recorded at Ronnie Scott's in 1980 . It was out on a Japanese CD , but hard to find .

[Chuck Nessa]

Yes, but I feel the Trane influence diminished his talents.

sounds like you're saying something negative about trane....................

How the hell could you get this impression?

when you don't elaborate, how the hell could I NOT get that impression.........

Don't have a clue. You must have a problem.

Where is my negative mention of John Coltrane?

If I'd said beef ruin the taste of cherries, would you say I was dissing cherries or beef? Something else is going on in your head,

[Chuck Nessa]

It's the title of an album under Bulgarian pianist Milcho Leviev's name . It was recorded at Ronnie Scott's in 1980 . It was out on a Japanese CD , but hard to find .

Well before the Japanese cd it was a Mole Jazz lp. Had it a long time ago.

[mrjazzman]

Coltrane influence????

The only thing that came out of Art Pepper's horn was his own experiences. I was lucky enough to see im live late in his career and he played a 20 minute blues that was the most emotionally devasting thing I have heard in 40 years of listening to music.

I recommend you listen to a recording that was issued as "Blues for The Fisherman" if you are lucky enough to find a copy.

just checked amg, that set was under the leadership of Milcho Leviev on the Mole label........

[Larry Kart]

A melody from Ravel over the changes to "So What"?

Don't forget Morton Gould:

http://www.marklevine.com/saywhat2.html