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Mats Gustafsson's vinyl collection!


David Ayers

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On 2/4/2017 at 3:06 AM, Big Beat Steve said:

I think what Dmitry was aiming at is whether the free jazz players really have gone where they are now because they have exhausted every "conventional"  possibility of their instrument and of the music and now have gone beyond the "conventional" contents of the music onto a "higher" (in the sense of "superior") level of the muisc that - according to diehards of free/avantgarde jazz - is the only way to go and to progress because everything else is just old hat and worn out. If this was so then any of the top free saxophonists would have to be able to play, say, ANY Hodges, Prez, Bird, Rollins, (yes, eben Bostic and his often.-acknowledged technical mastery of the instrument) etc. forwards and backwards and inside out and will just not remain there because he has played everything there. Or isn't it rather so that they have gone out on a DIFFERENT branch that is just that - different. But definitely not "superior" or "higher" in an evolutionary sense of the word. Which is fine and perfectly legitimate to do for those who prefer to go into that direction (preferences differ ...) and occupy their own niche there, but of course invalidates that oft-held notion of free or avantgarde being "superior". It's just different sides of a multi-faceted coin. And one is as valid as the other. In EVERY stylistic direction. ;)

But this is getting us off course. I for one find rather more interest in what Mats Gustafsson said in his interview about the closeness (in HIS understanding) of free jazz and certain old-school honkers on the one hand and punk and their 2-chord structure on the other. Normally he ought to have come under heavy fire by avantgarde jazz "traditionalists" for that. ;)

yeah, Mats can do whatever he wants in my opinion. Not all of it do I like but I do respect it & him. I don't think that a Hegelian progressivism towards free music is necessarily realistic, because many of the progenitors of "free jazz" came up in parallel to a lot of post-bop musicians. For example, Bill Dixon was only eight years Dizzy's junior and was five years older than Ornette. I think it is indeed a different branch of the same tree but the latter certainly includes Bostic and Jeep, and I know that Mats internalizes everything he hears whether or not it's beyond obvious from phrase arc to phrase arc.

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On 2/3/2017 at 3:24 PM, clifford_thornton said:

yeah, have you listened to much of his music?

Of course he can carry a tune. But the point of his music is not whether he can or can't play melody in the traditional sense. 

I mean, you don't have to like it to agree that it's music and that he's setting out to do what he wants to do.

Are you positive on that? I've played some of it on youtube, and I'm not so sure. Honestly. And I do agree, it's music.

This is music too. I could actually sit through a good hour of it.

 

Edited by Dmitry
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Whenever somebody asks if somebody can "carry a tune" or some such, it's more than fair to ask the if they would be able to recognized it if said tune was in fact carried.

A lot of times, people complaining about faulty output are really suffering from limited input mechanisms.

Besides, why are "tunes" supposed to be "carried"? Or "bars" supposed to be "raised"? That's, like, a labor/management metaphor.

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2 hours ago, JSngry said:

Whenever somebody asks if somebody can "carry a tune" or some such, it's more than fair to ask the if they would be able to recognized it if said tune was in fact carried.

A lot of times, people complaining about faulty output are really suffering from limited input mechanisms.

:tup

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1 hour ago, corto maltese said:

Wonderful pictures!

The number of records is really not important, but Mats' collection (strictly vinyl) is extraordinarily deep in non-mainstream jazz and "off-the-beaten-track" music. 

Agreed. The depth of his tastes is impressive, particularly since he really goes out of his way to obtain what he really is after.

OTOH the notion of "mainstream" or "non-mainstream" is a very relative one these days, it seems. In my collection the Louis Jordan LPs, for example, outnumber the John Coltrane LPs by about 10 to 1, and the Stan Kenton vs Trane ratio might even be some 15 or 20 to 1. So by the standards of a lot of THIS forum's "typical" ("mainstream"? ^_^) jazz record collections, mine might look like a decidedly non-mainstream one. Luckily tastes and priorities differ so there's room and space for everyone when it comes to browsing the record racks and sales lists.  :lol:

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Your Trane/Kenton ratio should be at least 25/1.

Your Trane/Louis Jordan ratio should be at least 15/1.

Your Ellington/Kenton ratio should be at least 50/1.

These are only suggested ratios; sometimes variances are permitted  with the prior consent of the committee  on  jazz ratios..

 

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1 hour ago, kh1958 said:

Your Trane/Kenton ratio should be at least 25/1.

Your Trane/Louis Jordan ratio should be at least 15/1.

Your Ellington/Kenton ratio should be at least 50/1.

These are only suggested ratios; sometimes variances are permitted  with the prior consent of the committee  on  jazz ratios..

 

:lol:

The committee is still out (and won't be let back in) ... :P

P.S: My Ellington/Kenton ratio is almost 2/1. That sounds a bit better, at least as far as Ellington is concerned? :D

Edited by Big Beat Steve
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35 minutes ago, Big Beat Steve said:

:lol:

The committee is still out (and won't be let back in) ... :P

P.S: My Elltington/Kenton ratio is almost 2/1. That sounds a bit better, at least as far as Ellington is concerned? :D

Yes, as long as that particular ratio is greater  than 1/1, I can testify in support of your sanity in a court of law.

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I can see buying a lot of Stan Kenton records. One never knows what one will end up with. Then again, blessing/curse/etc. Either way, I don't know if "sanity" should even be a baseline expectation, you go looking for "sanity" here, there's no fun to be had. You go looking for a never-ending failed quest for sanity, hey, there's no boundaries, and I'd be a liar if I said that isn't fun sometimes. Not always, but just...set reality-based expectations and watch from afar. Good times.

 

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On 2/4/2017 at 7:27 AM, JSngry said:

the people I run into who are less likely to dig a Little Richard record are the "formal jazz" 

The thing is, though...it's all good, really. Or at least it all CAN be good. Should be good.

there are plenty of discriminating non-jazz listeners who realize that little richard is a waste of space.

listen to the beach boys for a few days. then you can come back and tell us about how 'it's all good'.

 

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See? There we go ...

Tastes differ and the lines very often are not even drawn betwen the Beach Boys and Little Richard.

By the same yardstick that you hint at one might say '"Albert Ayler is a waste of space. Listen to some Billie Holiday for a few days, then you can come back and tell us about how "its all good". 

The "discriminating" criteria that you suppose there are just are NOT there. There is no universal, overriding truth in these fields of music.

 

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Totally. I've become far less doctrinaire in my listening as I've aged, and I think part of that is due to this message board... which I hope would find a lot of commonality with Mats' varied collection (I'm told by a shopowner who knows him that it is close to 15,000 pieces) if not his own playing.

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