mikeweil

First of all, let me apologize for being sooo late with this. Life has played its tricky game over the last two weeks, including a saddening loss in the family involving travelling all over the country, several days of overdue work around the house that had to be done a week earlier than planned, trouble with some credit card hoax, and my wife insisting we spend the last days of her vacation together in the spa - I had to admit she was right and we really needed and deserved it. And when I finally found the time to sit down and write this two days ago, my browser crashed and all I had written was lost ..... I kindly ask for your understanding and trust that the music will yield enough interest, especially as I could include a brand new reissue of the same group. When I asked to be put on the list some months ago, Ahmad Jamal's Chamber Music of the New Jazz was my choice - no hesitation. I like this kind of piano/guitar/bass trio a lot more than those piano wizardry outlets Art Tatum or Oscar Peterson led, or the Nat King Cole way with a concept more on the entertainment side of things. Jamal, Ray Crawford (a very underrated original guitarist, IMHO) and Israel Crosby present the high point in integrated trio playing with a perfect balance of arrangement and improvisation, great interplay and boundless creativity in developping new approaches to old or odd tunes. The influence on Miles Davis is commonly acknowledged, he covered more than half of the tunes on those Jamal LPs, culminating in Gil Evans' transcription of Jamal's comping on New Rumba as a horn section backdrop for Miles' solo on the Carnegie Hall concert version. I don not want to recapitulate all discographical details, just let me remind you that this was originally on the small Parrot label: and later sold to Chess and reissued on the Argo label, which has the cover we all know, reissued in the Universal LPR series last year. The story about the album and this early part of Jamal's career is excellently documented on a website about the Parrot and Blue Lake labels - have a new look, as this was updated in January 2005 with plenty of new knowledge about recording sessions and unissued material - too bad Universal didn't even attempt to include any of this in their reissue. As Columbia/Legacy just issued their CD The Legendary Okeh and Epic Recordings which includes all but one track the same trio (except for bassist Eddie Calhoun on 8 tracks) recorded for these labels in between the Parrot sessions, I suggest to include them in this discussion: The one track missing (Slaughter on 10th Avenue) was included on the earlier CD Poinciana: Besides that, there was a French reissue of all tracks on two separate CDs; all the music sums up to 82 minutes - the Legacy producers obviously wanted to avoid a double CD just for one track. This is among my desert island music and is a landmark recording - the Argo LP took on almost mythological dimensions for me after reading about it in Joachim Berendt's jazz book thirty years ago - because it was nowhere to be found. A visit to a Paris second hand store (Crocodisc) several years later remedied that situation, except that it was a badly warped copy of a later Chess reissue with lots of reverb added. I transferred it to a cassette I still use in the car, and gave the LP to a friend with a more forgiving turntable ..... So what's you opinion/experience with these, my friends? (Again, my apologies for being so late ... .)

Risking a ban?

There are a few bass clarinet tracks spread over his three Verve LPs recorded between the Riversides and the Atlantics. A good cross section is the Verve Jazz Masters 56 dedicated to Mann. The one live album of the three (Flautista, which has one with bcl) was reissued with two bonus tracks in the Verve By Request series - be aware it is a Latin Jazz album. IIRC he abandoned the instrument when he started recording for Atlantic, and only took up the tenor for one LP in the mid-1960's.

The complete Ervin "Books" would be fine ... Don Patterson with Sonny Stitt Patterson Trios (just organ, guitar and drums) Complete Latin Jazz Quintet I'd buy the Hawes as a two-CD set any day! Any live or studio sets spread over several LPs would be welcome.

Forgot I have an LP search list on my hard drive: Ahead A-33750 Lewis, John Mirjana Asha One McNeil, Lloyd Asha Asha Two McNeil, Lloyd Tanner Suite Bald Eagle BELP 181 Fame, Georgie & Annie Ross In Hogland Baobab No.2 McNeil, Lloyd Tori Beppo B-509 Gillespie, Dizzy Reunion Big Band Live 1969 Blue Note LWB-1033 Silver, Horace Silver 'n' Strings Play Music Of The Spheres Blue Thumb BTS 37 Gasca, Luis For Those Who Chant Chiaroscuro CR 162 Hyman, Dick & Ruby Braff Fats Waller's Heavenly Jive Chiaroscuro CR 189 Mason, James Rhythm of Life Chiaroscuro CR 2037 Harris, Eddie Exploration Columbia KC 32150 Arnold, Horacee Tribe Columbia PC 33534 Lewis, John P.O.V. Finite FIN 1976-2 Chambers, Joe New World Flying Fish FF-380 Foday Musa Suso Mansa Bendung FMP SAJ-51 Jali Nyama Suso Kora Impulse #29069 Sims, Zoot Plays Four Altos Impulse AS-9192 Montgomery, Buddy This Rather Than That Impulse AS-9198 MacKay, Dave & Vicky Hamilton Rainbow Inner City IC-1036 Jefferson, Eddie The Main Man Jazz Circle JC01 Cobb, Arnett Jumpin' The Blues Jazzland JLP 61 Ashby, Dorothy Labor #7006 or 8 Steffens, Walter Ecstasy Landmark LLP-502 Lateef, Yusef In Nigeria Liberty UA LBJ-60060 Young Men From Memphis Down Home Runion Mainstream MRL 346 Coles, Johnny Katumbo (Dance) Muse MR 5052 Hayes, Louis Breath of Life Nemperor Bolden, Walter Open Sky #3126 Hibbler, Al & Hank Jones For Sentimental Reasons Pacific Jazz P-20155 Watts, Ernie Planet Love Pacific Jazz Fischer, Clare So Danco Samba Prestige P-7486 Kloss, Eric Grits & Gravy Prestige Patterson, Don Mellow Soul Savoy SJL-3301 Ellis, Pee Wee Home In The Country Solid State SS-18065 Wali & The Afro-Caravan Home Lost And Found

There are two available, but without Tjader. I'd rather see them do proper reissues, as the old LPs are rather short and compiled long after the original 78 issues - you never get a complete session on one LP. I'd have to buy a third LP to get me the one missing track with Tjader, but I'm not a completist any more. I'm not a fan of these issues or LPRs - they spare the label the effort to get it straight, discographically. Session info on the LPs is missing or incorrect or incomplete.

Had no idea he was Czech ..... quite a story how he got out back then!

This begins to remind me of the foolish debate about the Milt Jackson - John Lewis pairing in the MJQ ...... in the end, we're not a bit wiser, and it all remains a matter of taste and choice on the sides of both the muscicians and the fans.

Thanks for posting this, Bertrand - my thoughts exactly!

Now that had some unidentified person playing the son clavé pattern on the original Prestige recording ..... Several tunes would work extremely well with a "tresillo" bass pattern instead of 4/4 walking, just as many Morton or Joplin tunes (tresillo is notes on 1, 2+, 4 - the first half of the clave and the basis of many Cuban style bass patterns, or tumbaos.as they are called). Try Blue Monk with it - works surprisingly well!

Same with sex ..... it's a saddening moment when there is no more to be found. Now why do newly discovered Trane or Bird recordings make us all flip?

There is another Bethlehem album That Bop Thing with Sahib Shihab, Duke Jordan, Percy Heath, and Philly Joe Jones that is very nice. There is a record of the big band he led in 1966 that finally made it to LP on the British Hep label in 1977, very nice, too. And then there are the beautifully recorded Contemporary LPs he made, available on OJC CDs. I sold many an LP over the years, but I wouldn't part with these. A very underrated player, IMHO.

..... and that is exactly what made Steve Lacy such a master at interpreting Monk: he recognized the specifics of each Monk tune.

Interesting - I was thinking of Ornette, too, as another example of a composer where running the changes won't do very much. You have to understand the melody as an expression of a distinctive musical character - each of their tunes has a specific mood and color, timbre, feel, not just melody or rhythm. It's an entity on its own, a musical individual, so to speak, and has to be treated on its own individual terms.

I love Rouse, too, but I can see what those who criticize him want to say: There is a certain sameness in his playing. He's original, I could probably tell him from any other tenor player, but I couldn't tell any differences between his solos on different tracks ....

I'm not such a great fan of his playing, but I wish him all the best and that he will get what he needs in due time. May you keep swingin', Mr. Brecker!

Having found the two MGM LPs of George Shearing with 95% of his recordings with Cal Tjader, I still want them on CD - they sound great, but of course these half-century old LPs have some surface noise. There are several very nice tracks on them - same probably goes for other Shearing MGM material.

As long as I get enough sleep she doesn't mind and appreciates the contacts and all. But she won't take the toilet seat up - nor do I as I do the housecleaning most of the time. You guys all wear gas masks when you pee?

Maybe they will sound better - he can try and improve his own intentionally inferior sound ..... but we get the umpteenth issue of readily available material.

You pointed out something here, SS - the rhythm! Monk's rhythmic phrasing is very peculiar - and very precise! That's also an important part of his very personal way of approaching standards. Trying to play the tunes exactly as he phrased them rhythmically helps a lot, is my experience. There are no random patterns in his rhythms.

The September issue of Jazz Times has just arrived here and features reviews of the whole package. Mostly favourable. Only complaint is that the Jamal has one track missing, "Slaughter on 10th Avenue". Seems they wanted to avoid making it a double, as was the case with the Woody Shaw.

..... I'd say I sell my Bother Ray CDS on eBay to (probably partially) finance the new box.

Sigh .... I'll wait and see if Zweitausendeins offers this. I have all the previous Atlantic CDs, the Birth of Soul box, the live CD, the jazz CD, the Bags double, and the Fathead .... but the unissued stuff and the DVD looks very tempting, and I prefer the chronological order over all the sessions in the set here .....

As percussionist, I approach them by playing along the melody and the structure. I wouldn't approach them on the basis of chord changes if I played a different instrument - I once saw a facsimile of a Monk sheet, and there were no chord symbols at all. I'd say the harmony was evident to him, and the melody and form were more important. Noodling over changes won't work with his music. I love 'em all, but as far as ballads are concerned I prefer the less often played titles.