Clifford Brown/Max Roach Live at the Beehive

[.:.impossible]

Seems that this should start a decent discussion. I took small part in a conversation the other night with Alvin Fielder and William Parker after their mind-numbing set at the ICA in Boston. William Parker mentioned a recording of the Clifford Brown/Max Roach band from the Beehive that they both got excited about, saying the musicians were moving so fast that they (Parker, Fielder) considered it free. Now this was mentioned in a conversation about the history of bebop. Brownie only came up after mentioning so-and-so whom Fielder credited for inspiring Fats Navarro who, in turn, inspired Clifford Brown. I assume 'creative hyperbole' may, in certain ways, apply, but I also feel that they were directly linking the music that they were exploring that night to what Brown and Roach were blazing fifty years back.

Here is a copy/paste from another thread regarding this. Is this recording a legitimate release, or is it a bootleg? I'd like to hear this very much!

****************

Impossible: He and William Parker were talking about a Clifford Brown/Max Roach recording from the Beehive that was so fast they considered it free. Is anyone familiar? I will post a new thread for this I guess.

Pete C: Sounds like creative hyperbole to me. I don't remember anything qualitatively different when I heard those recordings from other performances by the group.

Larry Kart: They must be thinking of the "Cherokee" on "Live at the Beehive." I do hear something close to a qualitative difference between this performance and any other Brown-Roach uptempo performance of "Cherokee" (or anything else) I know -- it's so damn fast and Clifford and Max are so united/inspired--and I can see where it would make sense to think if it as "free." That is, while what Clifford and Max are playing sounds co-ordinated, esp. rhythmically, one gets the feeling that in practical terms that's because they're both in their topmost conceivable/executable gears, and those gears happen to coincide. Whatever, it's amazing, extreme music. FWIW, there's a piece about the "Live at the Beehive" set in my forthcoming book "Jazz In search ofd Itself" (Yale U. Press, fall 2004).

Edited April 18, 2004 by .:.impossible

[JSngry]

It was a 2Lp set from Max's private tapes that was released on Columbia back in the 70s, when Max had a leasing/distribution deal w/them (similar to the ones that he's had at Elektra/Musician & Blue Note, Bruce Lundvall being the common denominator there). Since the ownership of the tapes remained in Max's hands, when the deal ended, the full rights reverted back to him, and this set has not made it to CD.

Look for it - the sound is "rough" but in no way unlistenable. The music is...incredible.

[brownie]

96 minutes of outstanding music crammed on two LPs. Yes, the sound is rough but who cares? This should be reissued prompto. Clifford Brown is unbelievable on that one. And the set is a rare chance to hear Nicky Hill. Plus Sonny Rollins!

Maybe Max Roach has even more from that evening that could not be included in the set?

[king ubu]

Gotta listen to it again, a smokin' live recording! I wish there was more Brown/Roach live stuff around!

ubu

[Larry Kart]

What the hell -- here's that piece about the "Live at the Beehive" set that I wrote back in 1979 for the Chicago Tribune. It ends a bit abruptly because originally it segued into a section of roughly equal length about Roscoe Mitchell's "L-R-G." Now surgically separated from the "Beehive" section, that will be in the book too.

Live at the Beehive is one of jazz’s delayed explosions. Recorded at a South Side Chicago club on November 7, 1955, the group heard here was co-led by Clifford Brown, the young trumpet master who would die in an auto accident the following year, and Max Roach, the dominant percussionist of the bebop era. Also present were bassist George Morrow, tenorman Sonny Rollins (who would soon leave town as a member of the band), and three Chicagoans--tenorman Nicky Hill, guitarist Leo Blevins, and pianist Billy Wallace. The wide-open jam session that took place that night was captured by Roach on a home tape machine, and until now, the music has been heard only by the people who were at the Beehive and by a few of the drummer’s friends. Deeply wounded by Brown’s death, Roach long found himself unable to contemplate the music that reminded him of his loss, and the mediocre sound quality of the tape seemed to preclude commercial release. But Roach finally gave in to those who told him that the Beehive session had to be heard. And it turns out that the refurbished tape is more than listenable; anyone familiar with these musicians will be able to fill in the missing elements in the aural landscape.

Compared with Live at the Beehive, even the best of the Brown-Roach combo’s studio work sounds restrained. Immediately striking is the change one hears in Brown’s playing. In a tragically brief career that ended when he was only twenty-five, Brown became known for his mellow, butter-smooth tone and his ability to construct seemingly endless lyrical lines. And yet, as lovely as it was, his music at times seemed limited by its loveliness, which could became sweet and cute. But the Clifford Brown heard on Live at the Beehive is virtually another man, a savagely adventurous virtuoso who repeatedly rises into the trumpet’s topmost register to create patterns that seem to have been etched in space by a needle-sharp flame. Brown excels on every one of the album’s five tracks, but he surpasses himself on a twenty-minute version of "Cherokee." The tune, traditionally used to separate the men from the boys, is taken at a lightning tempo, which forces Brown’s lyricism to the point of no return. Eventually, he finds himself stabbing out phrases whose content would be purely rhythmic if it were not for the way his sense of tone and attack makes each note of the design vibrate with melodic meaning.

It is Roach who spurs Brown to these dangerous heights, and in the process, the drummer surpasses himself, too. Neither before nor since has he played with such abandon, and often it sounds as though two or three drummers must be at work. This multiple-player effect comes, in part, from the way Roach has tuned his drum kit. Several years before the Beehive session, he began to adjust his instruments to precise pitches. As a result Roach’s playing became filled with tympani-like effects, as though he were trying to make the drums into a melodic voice. During that same period, though, a certain sobriety crept into his work, perhaps because Roach had to exert conscious control over his new resources. But at the Beehive session, all the wraps were off. Roach’s explosive solo on "Cherokee" is the most startling display on the album, but in no way does he slight his role as an accompanist. Brown’s solos are inseparable from Roach’s support, and the drummer creates inventive patterns behind every player at every tempo from the mercurial "Cherokee" on down to the medium groove of "Walkin’."

Although the album includes skillful playing from Blevins and Wallace, the other major point of interest is the contrast between Sonny Rollins and Nicky Hill. Rollins, who was just about to establish himself as the dominant tenorman in jazz, is in generally fine form. But Hill, who precedes Rollins on ‘I’ll Remember April" and follows him on "Walkin’," more than holds his own. An eccentrically individualistic player who died in 1965, Hill was a master of oblique construction; and his solos are surprisingly prophetic of developments to come. Particularly on "Walkin’," he ends phrases by extending a note until its harmonic meaning becomes more and more ambiguous, an insistence on the purely linear that foreshadows early Ornette Coleman.

[brownie]

Thanks, Larry, for printing this. I'm reading it while listening to this glorious music!

[Harmon]

You can find the Beehive session on CD on Vol.10-11 of "Brownie's Eyes"

of Philology (W 10011, W1012).

Jürgen

[couw]

thanks for posting that Larry. Now you really got me interested in this. ..

(BTW: there's a typo in the second paragraph where "became" should read "become")

[.:.impossible]

Thank you Larry. Jürgen, do you know where I can find these Philology CDs? Thanks everyone!

[Claude]

More on the Brownie/Philology CDs here:

http://www.organissimo.org/forum/index.php?showtopic=4981

[Harmon]

.:.impossible Posted on Apr 18 2004, 08:13 PM

Thank you Larry. Jürgen, do you know where I can find these Philology CDs? Thanks everyone!

I bought them directly from from Paolo Piangiarelli of Philology:

http://www.philologyjazz.it

Jürgen