MomsMobley

i recall this as the ultimate schizo Pharoah-- a side forgettably pleasant, b side perhaps his single greatest blowout, back when such meant a lot. and the context...

Chuck Carter-- Vinny Golia whips out the big one at 22:30-- doesn't assay mere "ferocity" because he can do dozens of other things well also

my only criticism is the fade outs http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKy6dUPsFQY

The DG Messiaen box on that list is an excellent deal; not every performance is the 'best' or only one you'd want but that's because Ollie's achievement so capacious. Includes texts and translations, unlike some of these other coffins.

I don't disagree with this description of the Mozart but I do view it as an indictment: Mozart was the supreme opera composer of his and every age (equalled, never surpassed); it's ludicrous to pretend the same or very similar musical rhetoric (for lack of better term here) is absent from the piano concertos and yet-- YET... even allowing Perahia's pianism, the conducting there is unaccetably restrained and po' faced. The fact that Murray hasn't pursued conducting is to his credit-- it was clearly not his forte but meanwhile, there it is (even if perhaps ghosted by the ECO), boxed and pedestaled... Now, I'm not going to argue a general case for Decca-era (London in US) Andras Schiff, he shares many of Perahaia's weaknesses-- but 1) Murray's best-- later-- Bach is better than Schiff's and 2) Schiff has a GREAT conductor and a GREAT orchestra on his Mozart piano concertos. I can't imagine that, were each equally accessible, ANYONE, movement for movement, would prefer Perahia to Schiff. BOTH usually underplay Mozart but Sandor Vegh is exponentially more sensitive and wide ranging conductor than Perahia/ECO. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAHaw-oTywA Ubu, Bilson/Gardiner is kinda interesting but Gardiner is too straitlaced, what works for drilling Handel choristers (so to speak) doesn't often work elsewhere and though he has made some decent opera & orchestral recordings... his Bach (first go round), Monteverdi, Mozart and Beethoven aren't among them. (Purcell aye, Handel sometimes, Schumann, mostly yes (he was getting better.)) Robert Levin w/ Chrisopher Hogwood is MUCH better, Levin improv caprice sparking usefully against Hogwood, who's peppy like a tickled scrotum. Best "neutral" Mozart integrale btw is Christian Zacharias on MD&G though the EMI set is also pretty good, occasionally let down with heavy orchestra. Buchbinder is OK, he-- unlike Perahia he does understand/feel the rhetoric-- but he's a bit ponderous at times also. rambunctious Viviana Sofronitsky rules the period roost esp. since Levin/Hogwood is incomplete ('mature', we don't need the kid stuff again) and Ronald Brautigan problematic (his solo Beethoven series on BIS is excellent howev), tho' I definitely wouldn't mind hearing Arthur Schoonderwoerd take 'em on. Here's Artie doing KV 281-- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zppndT_IcEo Mozart is too great to accept less than the complete expression of his genius.

I'm not suggesting anyone shouldn't enjoy what they enjoy but Perahia has had 40 years of ubiquitous (by classical standards) marketing behind him and given that, his achievement, and his intredpidness, is pretty lacking. Again, a handful of better records, NONE of which include those drearily conducted, politely played Mozart concertos (and Mozart should never be dreary or merely polite)... Big box syndrome only reinforces a corporate hegemony that never should have been so blithely accepted in the first place. (Exept that promo copies, advertising, PR firms easily win out.) Compare the relevant Murray to Zoltan Kocsis (except Murray never recorded Kurtag, nor anyone later than Bartok?) Kocsis Schubert D. 960-- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBWzC-qsPtM Kocsis Rachmaninoff sonata #2-- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlQwBHKVros etc etc Kocsis was on Philips for a while but except for a narrow window of Bartok, you'd hardly know it in the States, many of his releases "Special Import" only. His collected Debussy box on Philips is fantastic btw. http://www.amazon.com/Debussy-Piano-Music-Zoltán-Kocsis/dp/B000VG9GSA

And you're missing almost nothing except sweet oxygen so breathe deep and get better. (Columbia-era) Bernstein Mahler destroys Zinman on every possible level (largely mediocre SACD is still mediocre) at the same price, just be glad we're past the insipd "Prince" Charles' watercolors-era which caused Bernstein CD collectors no small amount of grief in the 1990s/early '00s. http://www.amazon.com/Mahler-Complete-Symphonies-Gustav/dp/B005SJIP1E http://www.amazon.com/Mahler-Complete-Symphonies-Carnegie-Presents/dp/B001TIQT98 Also, the for small handful of very good recordings Perahia has made, there are dozens of dull, precious, misguidedly "limpid" ones, why bother when Murray's repertoire is almost uniformly standard & alternatives are many? Yves Nat coffret >>>>>>> http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ses-Enregistrements-1930-1956-Yves-Nat/dp/B000BS6Y74 it appears out of print at present but when the Marcelle Meyer coffret comes back, as it likely will, don't hestitate. http://www.amazon.fr/Marcelle-Meyer-enregistrements-1925-Coffret/dp/B000KRMWLS https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikY_4koQrKg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-r6GzEsmbFM

exactly, that's why I threw out the Philly stuff. if this clown wasn't entirely fronting, picking up some $$$ and another NYRB byline, he could actually do something useful and place the concert in context of Coltrane's bio, Coltrane as southern born, northern raised U.S. Navy veteran whose intense tutelage, intense exploration beyond that, a unique assimilation of virtuosic chops & methodical, radical examination of what "jazz" music can be qua structure (including some notable compositions of his own) & sound... returns to Philadelphia, Temple University, one of the public universities of Pennsylvania in heart of black & blackening north Philly etc... There's ** A LOT ** to explore there even w/o foreshadowing imminent death. What was Coltrane trying to communicate & to whom? Returning to Philly is different than another night at the Vanguard is different than Tokyo etc. If Dyer researches, thinks about these things & still comes out unmoved or even antagonistic, alright, FINE-- anyone can disagree-- but... in arrogance & ignorance both he's done none of that, nor, plainly, is he even capable of simple taxonomic description, thus the weak attempts at diversion, conflation of all those albums you cite above & more. Be hilarious-- & telling-- if NYRB had done a double review; assign it to Dyer and, say, Greg Tate or John Szwed, who was in Philly then or shortly would be, and see what happens. And if they assigned or accepted the pitch from Dyer knowing his ah, "peculiar" limitations as listener/HACK, the question becomes WHY? Just play the song, John, don't get 'uppity' like some of these other...

Bogdan, let's take it from top then. Music maestro, please! Offering: Live at Temple University offers further evidence of the catastrophe of the last phase of John Coltrane’s work. no comment. “Last” rather than “late” because he became ill and died too suddenly (on July 17, 1967), too early, to have properly entered a late period. He was forty. In any other field of activity that would be a desperately short life. Only in jazz could it be considered broadly in line with actuarial norms. Henry Purcell (1659-1695)-- age 36 Giovanni Pergolesi (1710-1736)-- age 26 Wolfgang Mozart (1756-1791)-- age 35 Franz Schubert (1797-1828)-- age 31 Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847)-- age 38 Chopin (1810-1849)-- age 39 George Gershwin (1898-1937)-- age 38 etc etc i'll stop before World War II but hello, compare like to like, or would bringing musicians of similar historical stature into the conversation further reveal the author's idiocy rather than faux 'authority'? "Actuarial" is bullshit diversion, like he's about to offer a deeply researched socio-aesthetic discourse... right. I'm not suggesting there isn't AMPLE room for aesthetic criticism of Coltrane-- if someone wants to go that route, hey, the narrow road is open-- but Dyer is an arrogant simp.

Mods Squad, I'm OK with changing subject line to more clearly place blame where its deserved: * insipid NYRB critic Geoff Dyer * idiotic and/or wholly-- but 'innocently'-- clueless New York Review Book editor(s) Q: I wonder how many times, if any, Geoff has been to Philadelphia & what he did if was there. One can, if they wish, make a musicological argument without knowing the Schuykill from the Delaware but that's not what this fucking simp is playing at here-- at all. also, for Sunday morning--

LK, esteemed commenter, in theory, it shouldn't have anything to do with; in this instance, his thuggish drivel exacerbated by cultural ignorance/arrogance-- take your pick or choose both. didn't mean to imply there weren't excellent white critics & historians of myriad nationalities! (i'll leave NYRB's less-than-spectacular roster of black writers-- on any subjects-- for another discussion tho' that too is suggestive of how an editor would assign &/or accept this drivel.)

so now ya'll know http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/gallery/2014/oct/04/catastrophic-coltrane/ i just noticed from the comments i'm late but since i imagine i'm not alone in usually ignoring this idiocy... i do "love" that this turd throws "Adorno" into the mix; like that "helped" Schoenberg any either!

J. yes, stick to repertoire that grabs you & furrow from there. I drift in & out of older musics myself; there was a time in mid-90s however I went ALL medieval, renaissance & baroque, thought I shoulld work on 'fundamentals' or whatever, thankfully it was time when 'early music' ensembles were really starting to cook, throwing off romantic accretions & timid scholarship, sometimes dubious chops of '60s through '80s... there are some awful American & English early music groups, for example, that would scare anyone off even Bach, let alone Handel or Rameau... which shit is often virtuosic in the bebop sense so if you can't gimme at least that... thankfully tho', and Petibon's great hair is part of it, there are goodly # of musicians, instrumentalists & singers, who have the chops & gumption to make things as exciting, fresh as they were always intended to be. The French know how to dance too.

Christine Schaefer preceding & complementary to Petibon-- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfdP4II20Cg earlier rep with good band, she's esp. excellent in Handel here & elsewhere-- check out her Rameau also--

Memphis Slim, Blue Memphis

...because I witnessed an example of that, Sonny going in between the time so much that the end result was "like" levitating in time, like you started out in one place, then went up into the air and then came back down to earth in the spot where you were supposed to be, but...how did you get there, it was not a linear path, it was like...I don't know, levitation is the best word I can think of for it. And because I was kind of like, WHOA, WTF was THAT????? I started looking around, and I saw Cranshaw just kind of shake his head, shift his body, and get back to normal, like, ok, yeah, he just did that to us, and I look around at the people in the seats, and many of them are doing the same thing, perhaps consciously, perhaps not, who knows, but yeah, Sonny can indeed "do some things". Also, fwiw, this was done on one of those "funk" type tunes, not on a standard, so the myth that Sonny didn't really have his heart into any of "that" stuff...that's not the right argument to have, I'd say. In the last year or two there was a good long interview with Clifton Anderson on WKCR... And we can nearly all say we don't listen for the trombone solos but obviously Clifron knows a thing or three about Sonny and is himself a fine musician... Worth looking for in the underground. re: OP, he may not be among the top 50 most interesting jazz pianists but he performed certain functions very well; Hersch, at best, is a footnote and Jarrett, both in both gospel ostinato and inane 'standards' blather is insufferable. I used to tolerate the idea that his banal success lets ECM do this/that more interesting, vastly more worthy but...

frankie newton at the onyx club woody herman in disco order

Carl & Dennis & ....

true, and of course Bird, Gene Ammons etc are & always will still be awesome; if there are folks who can achieve even significant % of their brilliance/sound/technique... But I keep thinking of the big bands, and arrangers*, composers and the capable musicians who are not heard at what could be better/best.. Not to quash anyone's enthusiasm (really) but when a guy like Tony Malably is touted as some great 'risk taker'... Or that ** anyone ** ever got laid inviting someone to listen to their "Sun Bear Concerts" box... true, it mght as well be useful for fucking something but... *Ralph Burns -->

Excellent to hear! Once you get into it you can really understand the fascination the form/sounds can have for composer, musician, listener... akin to Ellington or Sun Ra. And sure, there's a lot of lesser or merely well crafted classical compositions-- & performers-- also, but all in all, the potential-- and frequently enough-- the payoff is fantastic. to conflate threads, it's much to Braxton's credit what he's going for with the operas as works of musical theater, combining, in theory, some of the best qualities of classical composition, jazz improv, dance etc. Except at the very very highest levels of restructuralist etc like Sonny, playing changes on standards doesn't cut it, nor does whatever variety of erstwhile 'free' blowing, bracing as certain moments can be. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOaiD7DHO2o http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIoHngLypJQ