Gheorghe

well the Bird film really disappointed me.

"To Bird with Love" is not really a "written book", it´s a deluxe collection of photos, letters, contracts, etc., and it was done as a co-production of Chan and Francis Paudras. PW as a successor to Bird? Not really. A good player, yes, but not more. The next genius musician who played a saxophone was Trane.

Yes, the "Love is a Dangerous Necessity".....it starts with that "a capella horn arrangement", very similar to the movie score "Music for Todo Modo", which Mingus composed and recorded 6 years later (on the album Cumbia&Jazz Fusion). So I think this was an idea he worked out later, like many stuff the Mingus composed. Well, it´s cut off when it starts to become a slow blues. Peggy´s Blue Skylight " is really nice, "Reincarnation of a Lovebird" also. I also like the "I left my heart in SanFrancisco", though it´s more fun that vintage Mingus......

A long time ago, I bought a quite obscure Mingus LP with that 1970 group, it was misdated as "1969" but must be 1970, Rotterdam or Amsterdam I don´t remember. Nothing special about it, the bass is practicalle unheard. Yes, the tunes were "Orange was the Colour of her Dress", "OP OP", and "The Man that never sleeps". I still have it, but I don´t think I´ll listen to it soon. If you like Mingus´ 1970 recordings, better get the "America" dates (late 1970 for french label America), originally issued as "Blue Bird" and "Pyticantropus Erectus". Anyway, that´s a really tired Mingus, sure there are great moments, but it would be years later, that Mingus really was back.

The Bird-Kaminsky encounter I got on record, is from March 4 1949 CBS Adventures in Jazz, TV broadcast, NY 1949, the other trumpet player is Miles, Others involved on those 4 tracks are Kai Winding, Max Roach, Ann Baker ( voc on "I got a kick out of you) etc .....

I know that photo from Francis Paudras´ book "To Bird with Love". Really, some broadcast of Bird together with Max Kaminsky from around that time exists.

I think it has a lot to do with the producer or the label. How much they are working on an artist. McCoy Tyner is a good example. It´s also the times that changed. See, the late 60´s and the 70´s were a period of transition. Producers were tired of doing quartet/quintet albums only. Look at the BlueNote catalog, they started make larger groups, augmented by studio musicians. Mingus: When he got that heavy contract with Atlantic, after doing "Changes One/Two", they got tired of recording his working group and started with larger settings, adding electric guitars etc. .

Sure he must have been a great musician. But I must admit, I didn´t really get into his stuff. It was with the Mel Lewis Big Band, after Thad Jones had left. See, I heard the Thad Jones-Mel Lewis band and it really knocked me out. But then after Thad had left, with Bob Brookmeyer composing and arranging, it somehow disappointed me. Maybe it was cool for others, I don´t want to put him down just because I didn´t like it.

Well, Eric Dolphy has a special meaning to me. See, when I was still a kid and didn´t know much about jazz, I somehow got "The Great Concert of Charles Mingus, Paris 1964". That special album, and the stuff that Dolphy plays on it, opened me up. Then I didn´t even have a Parker LP, I had heard only that Bird´s a legend, you know? So, when I heard that "Pakeriana" with Dolphy´s alto solo I thought well I haven´t heard Bird yet, but if Dolphy can do such fantastic things, Bird must be my next choice. So I got to Bird through Dolphy. Needless to say I still had to learn to understand Dolphys musical concept, but it also helped me to dig a little more into the NewThing, to make me ready for Ornette, Don Cherry etc. . The first album of Dolphy under his own name, which I got was the "Berlin Concerts 1961".

Thank you all so much !

Thank you all !

Needless to say that I am a big fan of Bud. Carl Smith wrote a wonderful book about all of Bud´s recordings. I got almost everything Bud recorded, so it was a fantastic experience to read his book. I also like the way how he described Bud´s later work.

Great, I must get that. Didn´t know about "Wounded Bird" until I purchased Dexter´s Great Encounters as CD re-issue. The lable was Wounded Bird.

about playing Mingus´compositions: When I was young and a part time musician, we did "Cumbia & Jazz Fusion" for a while. Was quite an interesting experience with all those different mood´s in it, the first part with that call and response figure and the ostinato bass, the straight ahead part, the earthy two beat section in D flat with the vocals "who says Mama´s lil Baby likes Shortnin´Bread ? " and the fade out. Still remember it very well, even if this was a long time ago. We did it at clubs and people liked it.

Finally some answers that refer more to the music. I got the Spotlite LP as well as a CD that´s more a sampler and got some of the stuff with Maggie and Brew. I really like all of the stuff. And Bird on those 3 tracks on side 2. The arrangement of How High the Moon is also very interesting, very boppish. Well, about the European part of our education......, I heard about people downplaying the importance of rhythm, but I suppose that´s not a jazz audience. I don´t listen to anything else than jazz or afro-american music, so I don´t know how a non-jazz listener feels about it.

I don´t know what you call "vulgar latin" or " f....great". In my answer 2 days ago I tried to describe the music I heard on it. In my opion it´s a great album, like Kenny Dorhams Afro Cuban on BlueNote some years later.

Pharoah Sanders: "Life at the East"

I also love that Afro Cuban recordings of Maggie. My first encounter with it was the Spotlite LP "Afro Cubop". Those are really groovy live recordings with the Machito Band starring Howard McGhee and Brew Moore. "Maggies Blues" is great, dig all the high notes Maggie plays, and how he quotes "Move". The longest track is about 8 minutes and has some exchanges of ideas between Maggie and Machito´s trumpet player Mario Bauza. And dig Brew Moore: He was a guy who was deeply influenced by Lester Young, but could play anything, that afro cuban stuff and all that ultra fast bop stuff with the fastest company (Bird, Miles, Fats), without loosing his Lestorian sound and phrasing. On the second side of that album I mentioned, there´s some rare Bird with afro cuban surroundings. The sound quality is not so great, but it´s really a fun listenig to it. Much better than the better known "South of the Border" things Bird did for Verve......

Can no one recommend an album? I also like the album "Miles Davis at Stadthalle 1973", recorded in my hometown Vienna. Even if the sound quality is not the best , it´s very good music from a very interesting period. It got live versions of the tunes he had recorded recently (Calypso Frelimo and Ife). I was only a kid then, but I loved the music, so I got that album just as a memory of the "good days" when we could see all those living legends "live". I remember, that even my mother liked Liebman´s flute playing on "Ife". And, dont forget "Dark Magus" from 1974.

Too bad Joe Henderson died too early. He was one of my favourites. I saw him live on several occasions in the late 70´s. Mostly with Joanne Brackeen on piano, dont remember the bassist and the drummer, but he was fantastic. I still listen to his records almost every week. Didn´t know it would have been his 75th Birthday, but on the same evening I listened to his "Inner Urge". I´d say that´s telepathy

In my opinion, Dave Liebman was the best reed player that Miles had during his electric period from 1970-1975. I love what he did during those 1973/74 dates. And dig his flute on "Ife", which Miles played almost at every concert. Later I heard him in mainstream setting in the late seventies in my hometown Vienna at Jazzland. One of the greatest club experiences of my life. And I must say, his "Drum Ode" and "Lookout Farm" are the only ECM recordings that I like. I bought "Drum Ode" the next day after I saw Dave life. He signed it for me.

I must admit, that my first larger knowledge about Hampton Hawes also came from reading his autobio "Raise Up Above Me". I don´t have very much recordings from him. I like especially his playing on some Wardell Gray live stuff from about 1952. Really nice and long solos.

[quote name='MarkR' I remember Dave Holland talking about his time with Miles. He was getting over-elaborate and virtuosic with lots of high register playing one night, and in between sets Miles simply said: "Hey, Dave, you play the bass". Oh, that´s a really interesting aspect. I got a record of the Miles Band from 1969 at Blue Coronet and realized that Dave plays very much in the high register, about the whole set. Until now I had thought it was Miles´ idea to leave the bottom out of the whole stuff. That was Miles, telling his musicians things like "leave the chords out, don´t play so many notes, etc.". So I thought that was just Miles´ advice to try something new, to leave the low register out so it might be an open thing.... So, maybe I was wrong and it was Dave´s kind of aproach and Miles tried to talk him out of it...

I remember after it came out it was available as VHS video. Too bad I didn´t buy it then. Couldn´t find a DVD. The only Ornette Coleman "Movie" I have is a DVD with the Trio from 1966 (with David Izenzon and Charles Moffett) That would be great, but the film is quite silly, very few music, just hipsters dancing around and scenes of the musician carrying their instruments to the airport or so....I had hoped they taped a performance. But I remember well the recordings from Caravan of Dreams. The string thing "Time design Prime design" and "Opening at Caravan of Dreams". I love every aspect of Ornette´s music, from the beginning to the really exiting performances of "Prime Time". And I love the way he composes and writes for strings.

Well, a question of taste. I couldn´t imagine music without the bass. The bass is the bottom of the whole thing. I started listenig to jazz because I fell in love with that sound Paul Chambers had on the records I´d buy then (Davis etc.). No bass, no jazz....at least to me. About Jimmy Garrison: You will be astonished but I like most what he did on those two records he made with Ornette in 1968. About his solo work: I agree with some of you, that at a certain point there is not very much variation in it, but that´s what it was supposed to be, a more meditative kind of music. Anyway, some bassists they great as long as they walk on or stay at the bottom, but when they start soloing, they start to practice. Take as an example the last Mingus Date "Me Myself an Eye" and "Something like a Bird". Eddie Gomez and Jiri Mraz just get lost, only high notes, each of them sounding the same way, sounds like exercises. I heard Mingus was very unpleasant about it. But not only because he was not able to play any more, but because of the way it came out. You can tell a story on the bass, not just pickin only the high notes and faster and faster..... they both sound great in the ensemble, but forget them when they start soloing on that record.....