Michael Fitzgerald

Oh, James Taylor - easy one. This is one of my least favorite PMG records. It's rather bland - The Bat and Barcarolle and Au Lait particularly. They just seem to keep on going without saying much. Eighteen is a rocker, Offramp is an Ornettish thing, and Are You Going With Me is kind of the centerpiece with the introduction of the Synclavier stuff. James is the most typical PMG thing on the record, a nice tune, but kind of out of place by this time. A billion times better in my estimation, is the stuff from this tour, issued on Travels. It integrates the Synclavier into the group sound, there's a balance with the old and new sound of the group and you get more prominent Nana. Mike

Yes, Allen - Sonny *is* playing the game. I am reminded of the film Saxophone Colossus. At one point the holy trinity of Giddins, Gitler, and Davis talk about St. Rollins and the point is made, "now that he and Lucille are producing the records themsevles, the records *are* getting better" - as if the producers (does this specifically mean Orrin Keepnews?) had been the culprits. But the self-produced records weren't any better, were they? The only one I really went for was "G-Man" because of that film. And I can't imagine that Milestone is going to argue with Sonny Rollins at this point - what he puts out is the result of his decisions. Milestone isn't a major label like Sony or BMG. Mike

There is a book in the works that will deal with the history of jazz in Europe. It is being written by numerous authorities. This was reported to me by Francesco Martinelli when he gave a presentation on European jazz 1970-2000 a few months ago. Don't know about the language(s). Mike

Not Debut, Fantasy - LaPorta had several albums for them in 1956-57. Mike

Man, Billy Mitchell is just a punk with none of the charisma of Phil or Grant. And hey, what about Sam and Peggy or Jamie? Yes, EastEnders hits in 2 hours here. Mike

Chip Stern has put together a website - still under construction - the current centerpieces are LONG interviews with Elvin Jones and Eddie Kramer and a big piece on Johnny Smith. There are more things planned and I think this website will be a great contribution. http://www.chipstern.com/chip_sound.htm Mike

Oh man, this is just the North Indian stuff. You need to get vol. 4, the South Indian version - Vina Beat. Mike

I got the new album last week and have listened a few times. I like it better than what I remember from the live show. I think it's notable that this record contains passages that are the most "plain jazz" of anything ever put out by the PMG. In the past, it seems such things were reserved for Metheny solo albums. One of these passages has an incredible guitar solo that seems to be just a little faster, just a little cleaner, just a little more together than what's gone before. Still would be nice to have some track points. Mike

Discussion on this was continued here: http://www.organissimo.org/forum/index.php...6420&hl=metheny Mike

They did THEIR part - but maybe YOU didn't live up to your assigned role of dummy. Guess you got to keep on practicing..... Mike

At least the other kind of ass kicking didn't cost two-fifty......... Mike

I don't care one whit whether it's a staple of high school marching bands. So's that godawful "Y'all ready for this" piece of crap. That "all the cool kids are doing it" doesn't make it right, and this trend ought to be changed. This is a school, an educational institution. The English classes should be reading great literature and the musical groups should be playing great repertoire. You really don't want to get me started on the subject of marching band. Mike

As a music educator, I have serious issues with any school music program that can't get their act together to give a single performance - why are they trying to learn the songs from last year? Are the goddamn three notes of Louie, Louie really all that difficult? I mean, if they couldn't afford any printed music and learned of the performance that morning, it would take 10 minutes to come up with a head arrangement of Louie, Louie that would suffice. Now, there is pretty much no merit in any school music program including Louie, Louie in the first place. It isn't aesthetically appropriate for the ensemble; it is basically devoid of musical value; and when one considers all the other possibilities, that's one lame decision on somebody's part. So I guess what I'm saying is I agree with the school board's decision, but not with their reasoning. They should have just said it was on the basis of the music, not the lyrics. Mike

My favorite exchange on the subject: Q: "I'd like to direct this question to messrs. Lennon and McCartney. In a recent article, 'Time' magazine put down Pop music. And they referred to 'Day Tripper' as being about a prostitute..." PAUL: (nodding jokingly) "Oh yeah." Q: "...and 'Norwegian Wood' as being about a lesbian." PAUL: (nodding) "Oh yeah." Q: "I just wanted to know what your intent was when you wrote it, and what your feeling is about the 'Time' magazine criticism of the music that is being written today." PAUL: "We were just trying to write songs about prostitutes and lesbians, that's all." Mike

And he took Hubbard out on the road with him for several months in 1959. While in Chicago, Freddie had his ass kicked by Ira Sullivan. Here's some of the trumpeters who worked with Rollins over the course of the 1950s and 1960s: Sonny also used Byrd on live gigs in 1957. Thad Jones was involved in a couple of recording sessions in 1964, some issued, some not. The mysterious Reshid Kmal Ali made the Japanese tour in 1963. Charles Tolliver played with SR at the Vanguard in early 1966. There are more. But none seemed to really fit, I guess. Mike

Not necessarily - there are many instances where personnel listed elsewhere (on the album itself, for example) that were omitted by Ruppli. Lord obviously borrowed from Ruppli in this case. Mike

I approach attending weekly engagements with the assumption that the music on an *evening* will not change much from day to day. However, I do expect that if I stay for two sets, I will hear different tunes in each. Generally this works. So, when I go to hear a big band like Maria Schneider's, I know that if I stay for both sets, I'll hear pretty much all the repertoire the band is planning to share with the audience over the course of the week. And if I came back the next night, I'd hear the exact same tunes, maybe in the same sequence, maybe not. A group structured like that, promoting a new album needs that kind of reliability. When I heard a straight week (something like fifteen sets) of Tony Scott & Buddy DeFranco, there were a number of givens, but there were also some wild cards, plus there were different guests each night. Another variable is whether it's a longstanding working band. That kind of group can have more flexibility. I do think the new piano player would be a factor. I have seen Lou Donaldson several times with different groups (sometimes with Herman Foster, sometimes with Lonnie Smith) and haven't noticed the rerun syndrome. But I think those were all concert- or festival-type presentations, not club gigs with multiple shows. Mike

It's a small step from that to genital. And from there to con-genital. Mike

An important difference between soprano and bass clarinet is that the bass clarinet has keys (like a saxophone) that cover the holes. On the soprano clarinet, there are no keys for the primary fingers and the fingers themselves have to cover the holes. I agree with Allen about the air requirements. Mike

Read here: http://users.bestweb.net/~msnyder/clarinet/clar1945.htm Mike

The Hungarian stuff I know involves classical composers (not anonymous - Kodaly, Bartok, for example) borrowing from anonymous folk music. Just because Vaughan Williams used English folk songs as source material doesn't make his English Folk Song Suite something other than classical music. Popularity has absolutely nothing to do with popular music. Just because only one person bought the last album by some garage band doesn't mean the music is all of sudden folk music or classical music. It's popular music that doesn't have popularity. Just because Andreas Bocelli made the top ten in England doesn't make it popular music. But I really don't want to get into this. I've discussed it extensively elsewhere. As for "because it grooved like a mother, had compositions like no other, and because (and pardon the beggin' o' the question) he is one bad-ass brother" - all those things are fine and dandy. But they don't define genius. Because you say he's a genius doesn't make it so. So all those folks are mislabeled? Stevie Wonder is the ONLY genius out there? Mike

So are the authors and/or publishers going to offer a stipend for doing their research, fact-checking, editing, and proofreading for them? Mike

Kind of scary to know that there are folks reading this thread who are expert in hacking the photos on every website associated with Crouch...... http://patriot.net/~crouch/stanley.html Mike

The River still has some worthwhile stuff - I could probably pull a single album of that. But there's nothing on the level of Born To Run and Wild & Innocent. And the single album I make wouldn't be very well programmed. Too much of this stuff doesn't flow together. First album is somewhat half-baked, hit or miss but still one of the top three. The second album is ambitious, but misses the mark a few times. But the looseness of the stuff is beautiful. David Sancious is extremely important to the sound. Drummer Vini Lopez had a great feel. From what I can tell, Boom Carter was a good one too. Weinberg was no problem in the early days. The live performances of early 1975 are fantastic, particularly because of the presence of Suki Lahav in the band. The way Springsteen used dynamics and dramatic storytelling within the context of a super tight, hard-rocking band is one of his greatest achievements. There are some pieces that weren't on the records that are further evidence of this period - live tunes never done in the studio, and the tune Fever, which I think ended up on that recent boxed set. Born To Run is the masterpiece. Production, songwriting, orchestration, performance, the programming of the tracks, all fully realized. If only there were more like it. Or if someone would build on what this album showed was possible. Darkness On The Edge of Town is where things started to decline - listen to the drums. The snare drum backbeat has become overexaggerated and the music isn't subtle. I guess it's great for stadiums. (There are no redeeming qualities to Born In The USA, the epitome of mind-numbing repetitive boredom. Boom THWACK Boom THWACK!) The live shows of 1978 are still worth hearing - just for the incredible energy those guys could put out over the course of three hours. Mike

Maybe various things that John Abercrombie has done? (with Jan Hammer at first and most often Dan Wall) Mike