Larry Kart

That was me who said that, bouncing off of Jim's comment that soloing for Desmond was like heroin for some other guys. What I meant, in line with other things I'd already said or would later say on this thread (and remember I like Desmond) is that his playing seems to me to be extremely self-contained, even on its own terms -- that, in particular, his obviously very clever harmonic sense never seems to interact with (but instead to be wholly at the service of) his desire to (pardon the phrase in this context) extend his melodic lines. Likewise, he'll seldom do anything rhythmically (though he's agile there too) that might disrupt the steady melodic flow. Given all that, what I was thinking then was: An erotic act without a partner. And, yes, I know that in "real" life Desmond was quite the lothario.

You know, I can't say anymore about the balancing out but I do know what you mean now. I guess I would say that for me the moment-to-moment "presentness" of those two Pepper solos remains that way; and they were recorded 51 or 52 years ago. Also, I don't get the feeling that what Pepper was working with there was anything that he had more in his back pocket than, as T. Martin said, Bird had in his back pocket when he made "Parker's Mood" or Armstrong in his when he made "Potato Head Blues." Compared to Pepper's other best work of the period, these two tracks from the Tampa album (plus "Pepper Pot" from there) are a peak of freshly reached ripeness.

Just to be sure I'm following you, you mean "anything that he didn't already know he could work with," right?

Excerpts about those two Art Pepper pieces from Terry Martin's great two-part essay about Pepper, from Jazz Monthly, Feb. and March 1964: "The white aesthetic of self-exploration dominates, but here is no self-indulgence ... each nuance of feeling is tested for strength; sometimes it gives and both listener and player feel the pain, and against this the sheer pleasure of blowing.... 'I Surrrender Dear' is not the brilliant 'Old Croix' but a deeper exploration: the inevitability of the restless theme statement rises in a reiterated and modulated motive variant that merges with the final theme paraphrase, which in turn is decorated with a brief recapitulation of this shape. The movement passes naturally to the beautifully spaced break that sets his solo lines stalking freely over the harmonies. There are marvelous ascensions from a crushed lower register and countless rhythmic shifts, suspensions, reiterations. Indeed expressive formations abound in the solo (each has the solidity of a theme), and one wonders how he has been thought to be merely another altoist.... "'Besame Mucho," alto all the way, is for me possibly the greatest solo he has ever recorded; although I often turn to it for pure enjoyment I nevertheless end by being moved by its fusion of invention, elan, and passion. It is full of mastery -- the staggering doubletime near the end of the even meter section; passion -- the gleaming tone and lyrical paraphrase; and tragic insight, the whole nervous fabric pierced with desire for a transcendent serenity, ascensions that soar above the kaleidoscopic rhythms and spaces of his underworld, analogous to the bold and equally tragic gestures on 'Parker's Mood,' 'Billie's Bounce, ' and 'Chi Chi,' reflecting back to 'West End, 'Potato Head' and beyond; almost 'style beyond style.'" And this from earlier on in the essay: '[M]elodic fragments dealt out with a sharp sense of time require reassembly if a coherent expressive end is to be served. Again Pepper seems to delved back into the middle era [i.e. the Swing era] independent of Parker; despite the fragmentation there is a constant sense of formal resolution, a tendency to symmetry... It should be stressed that total asymmetry is not essential to the modern style, but its imprint must remain. Pepper in his own way attempts to regain a classical order from the chaos revealed by the bop greats... It seems that his stint with Benny Carter may have been critical in molding his sense of form, since Carter is a master of construction.... Certainly [Pepper] relies strongly on similarities of melodic shapes, these stemming from the choice and direction of intervals, not from resemblances of melody as such.... The altoist builds not on the original melodic figure laid down at the beginning of the solo but on its shape; thus the melodies developed later need have no close relation to the germ cell in melodic terms. Here is a reason for the absence [in Pepper] of note distortions which are often used, e.g. by Parker and Rollins, to create the required ambiguity. The shapes themselves must be kept clean and unambiguous if they are to form the main constructive element; the ambiguity undeniably present springs from Pepper's individual use of rests. Carter's melodic figures, which are placed symmetrically, result in symmetry. Pepper ... places his asymmetrically and thus only tends toward overall symmetry. This is one source of his lyrical tension. "Pepper has never sought beautiful melodies for their own sake.... Rather his melody is completely absorbed in the expressive fabric of the music.... Rarely does he strive for a melodic paraphrase of the theme, being generally more interested in the emotive possibilities of interlocking fragments arising from germ cells of the theme and the effect of altered dynamics. Melody suffers change under constant redistribution of the pattern of rests; in this respect we may note the the mastery of Monk, another who is more concerned in reading meaning into the melddy rather than extending further the melodic limits during his improvisations...." About my "planes" notion -- this from Martin's essay is what I had in mind: "[Pepper] relies strongly on similarities of melodic shapes, these stemming from the choice and direction of intervals." My emphasis.

OK -- this "Take the A Train" from the same concert makes it even clearer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJixf0j_myw And I've also found the perfect contrasts, Art Pepper's sublime (at times arguably even tragic) "Besame Mucho" and "I Surrender Dear": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yC2T1Yu9InQ...feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yyt6fm7OZh4...feature=related You see what I mean by "planes"? Art's playing here is about establishing them, pushing against them, and moving through them (with a certain joy and at a certain cost -- these being inseparable).

Or to put it another way, it's kind of (pardon) masturbatory.

Hmm -- maybe we're on similar wavelengths here.

This by way of Doug Ramsey's site (Doug being Desmond's biographer): http://www.dailymotion.com:80/relevance/se...roma-1959_music Normally, I like Desmond a good deal (with some passing but hard to formulate reservations at times), and have problems with Brubeck in the realms of rhythm and his moments of IMO pomposity. Here, as Ramsey says http://www.artsjournal.com/rifftides/ praising Desmond's solo, it's interesting to see how the typically very self-critical Desmond indicates at the end of his turn that he thought it was special, but while enjoying it myself, I also felt that more so, or more clearly so, in this case than in many other instances (though perhaps it's a basic Desmond trait), he somehow remains on one plane -- in particular, that his harmonic inventiveness is always in service to his melodic sense, never the other way around, or even, so to speak, in dialogue. Well, perhaps that's badly put or just wrong -- whatever, I can't shake the sense that Desmond almost literally remains on a single plane, perhaps akin to an angled pane of glass above or below which one can't or shouldn't move, a la Ben Hogan's famous conception of the proper swing plane in golf. As for Brubeck here, that's some pretty hip un-hip playing, if you know what I mean. That is, I can see as much as I ever have been able to, why he would want to do it this way.

Quotes collected by the late (d. 2005) British trumpeter Ron Simmonds: "Why are you leaving? You can run out of bands, you know." Ted Heath (to me) "I don't know, I haven't tried today." Maynard Ferguson, when asked how high he could play "Dinner is served." Phil Seamen, drummer, after hitting the gong in West Side Story "No! No! No! You have to feel it. Feel it!" Joachim Heider, Pop arranger, Berlin "When I play this music I feel nothing." Åke Persson, trombone player "How does this number go?" Jack Parnell, bandleader. "For you -- one, two, three, four." Tom McQuater, trumpet player (McQuater died a few days ago at age 93) For more, go here: http://www.jazzprofessional.com/humour/famous_quotes_1.htm

Puts a different light on that story about Oscar mooning either the Herman or Kenton band bus as Oscar, Brown, and Ellis drove past on the way to next gig on the tour.

To respond to the original question: Breathing in and breathing out.

Just ordered the Juilliard Debussy-Ravel and the Berg Lyric Suite on Testament. In for a penny... Mark's "The balance of individualism and ensemble is a truly American approach, and in many ways analogous to a jazz band" is what I was thinking below the level of actual consciousness. Also, as in much jazz, the ability to hear (or to think you can detect) the people behind the parts that make up the whole can be moving in itself at times. I'm thinking again of the slow movement of the Debussy, where Hillyer's smoldering lines, which are so present-tense in feel that it's almost like they're being improvised, seem to inspire the other players to respond in kind. It's like you're hearing them think "Oh, there goes Rafe again -- let's climb on board."

Found a clean-enough copy (mono) of this old LP, which I used to have, at a used-book store today. Brought it home not sure what to expect after a gap of some 45 years, and holy s---! I don't care for much of what I've heard by later editions of the Juilliard, but this is some fantastic playing. In particular, one always hears (allowing of course for what Debussy and Ravel wrote/had in mind) all the parts as parts and as a whole. Well, I'm not putting that quite right; rather (perhaps) it's the weighting of parts within the whole, the minute/precise but never finicky gradations of dynamics and rhythmic flow. And contrary to the Juilliard's rep in some quarters, there's plenty, plenty soul -- violist Raphael Hillyer in the slow movement of the Debussy, for example; and violinists Robert Mann and Isidore Cohen, and cellist Claus Adam respond in kind. I see that these performances are available as a pricey import on Testament, with the Webern Five Movements and Six Bagatelles added. Another Testament has their Berg Lyric Suite (which I also used to own and have fond memories of -- why does one get rid of such things or let them slip away?), plus quartets by Elliott Carter and William Schuman. Beware, though, of the Juilliard's Debussy/Ravel remake for Sony. Actually, I haven't heard that recording, but other recordings by that later Juilliard lineup (actually, there was more one later lineup) haven't worked for me. In particular, first violinist Mann got more and more wiry -- in the Juilliard's Sony Late Beethoven set (I think I heard the earlier of two such sets Sony sets, preceded no doubt by one for RCA), it sounds at times like Mann's playing chalk on a blackboard. Also, I suspect that the departure of cellist Adam was a key loss, both as a player and as part of the group's "How should we play his?" colloquy. Adam (who joined in 1955 and left in '74) was a composer himself, a student of Stefan Wolpe. Here's the Juilliard lineup over the years: First violin 1946 　Robert Mann 1997　 Joel Smirnoff Second violin 1946　 Robert Korff 1958　 Isidore Cohen 1966　 Earl Carlyss 1986 　Joel Smirnoff 1997　 Ronald Copes Viola 1946　 Raphael Hillyer 1969　 Samuel Rhodes Violoncello 1946 　Arthur Winograd 1955 　Claus Adam 1974 　Joel Krosnick

Are you kidding? I read many opinion pieces and new stories that tore the s--- out of Clemens after his press conference and further stuff from his camp (the news stories implicitly doubtful, the opinion pieces explicitly doubtful or worse), plus I heard lots of stuff on sports talk radio in the same vein (obviously, I'm wasting my life). Yes, I read some stuff that gave or tried to give Clemens a pass, but my honest impression was that it was at least 60-40 Roger is lying, maybe more than that.

Don't know for sure, but I would guess some form of cancer. Anita said in an email to me last night that it (whatever "it" is) was discovered as the result of bouts of severe back pain, but her tone indicated that the back pain was a symptom and what was causing it was not in that league at all. I get the feeling that time is of the essence, which suggests an expensive surgical option, If so, I suppose that's goodish news because there's a lot of stuff they can't operate on.

If perchance I'm guessing right about what Chuck had in mind, finding recordings that have the very elusive right spirit is crucial, and Leibowitz (best known for his advocacy of Schoenberg, Webern et al.) had a terrific feel for Offenbach. I have these two recordings on LP (plus some others by him, I believe) and can vouch for them as performances, though I can't vouch for the CD transfers: http://www.amazon.com/Offenbach-belle-Hélè...9543&sr=1-1 http://www.amazon.com/Offenbach-Orpheus-Un...9642&sr=1-3 Also topnotch is the first Cluytens "Tales of Hoffman": http://www.amazon.com/Offenbach-contes-dHo...9758&sr=1-3 This may be available from other labels as well; I have it on a libertto-less EMI reissue from 10 or more years ago. Do not confuse this recording, from the mid-1950s, with the second Cluytens "Tales," with Schwarzkopf et al.; that's a disaster.

Just got this email from composer-arranger-bandleader Anita Brown (Ted Brown's daughter): Dear Friends, This concerns a long-time friend of mine, and of most of you, who is a pillar in the International Jazz Community. My father's most recent CD includes Dennis' fine work (hear clips on iTunes thru my LINKS page) and I have had the pleasure of spending countless hours with him at The Village Vanguard after gigs. He has taught and inspired me so very much in business, music and spirituality. Dennis is truly a gem; a beautiful and spiritual person in addition to one of the finest bass players in the world. Learning of his illness just before Christmas was devastating to me. Please read below. I hope you can find the time and the means to help in some way. Every little bit helps. For those of you who don't know what "Sixteen As One Music" is, it is The Vanguard Jazz Orchestra's non-profit business name. Checks made payable to "Sixteen As One Music" are therefore tax deductible and being handled by The Vanguard Jazz Orchestra's Executive Board, FYI. With heartfelt thanks, Anita Brown and Anita Brown Jazz Orchestra Forwarded Message: Dear Friends and Associates; This email is in regards to Dennis Irwin, the beloved and world famous bass player whom we all know well. If you haven't already heard, Dennis is very seriously ill and will be leaving New York City quite soon to seek other treatments. Right now he needs our support both spiritually and financially. We will be having a benefit event for him at Smalls Jazz Club on Sunday, February 3rd after the Super Bowl. Even though this may not be the most convenient date, time is of the essence and we cannot wait here. We will begin at 10:00 PM and continue until 4:00 AM at Smalls. Everyone is invited to come down and participate by playing and also by making a contribution. A box will be set up so that the donations will be discreet and anonymous. Everything collected will go directly to Dennis. There will be no cover charge for this event but you'll be expected to contribute something, whatever's within your means. Smalls will be donating a portion of bar sales to Dennis as well (so come and drink!). Once again, the date is Sunday night, February 3rd starting at 10:00 PM, after the Super Bowl. Smalls is located at 183 West 10th street at 7th Avenue, just down the street from the Village Vanguard. Our website is www.smallsjazzclub.com <http://www.smallsjazzclub.com/ > . Any further questions or inquires please send an email to info@smallsjazzclub.com. If you cannot come and would like to make a tax deductible donation to Dennis, send a check payable to Sixteen As One Music, Inc to: Sixteen As One Music, Inc 888-C Eighth Ave. #160 New York, NY 10019 On the memo line write: Dennis Irwin. Please come out, bring your instruments and play and show your support for Dennis Irwin. Thank you so much! Smalls Jazz Club PS: Please forward this email to anyone in your email list you think would be interested.

I've belatedly become aware of Bishop, Johnson, and guitarist John Stowell through a couple of albums they did together, one with Rick Mandyck, one with just the trio. Excellent players who have their own voices.

A snippet from the website of singer Johnny Janis: http://www.starwellmusic.com/index.html "Another musical highlight for me was working at Le Bistro in Chicago with the Billy Wallace Trio. Five nights a week for two great years I couldn't wait to go to work. Plus I recorded an album (The Start Of Something New) with Billy's trio for Columbia Records." BTW, Janis offers a record, made some time ago but never released, that features him with Dodo Marmarosa and Ira Sullivan. I will be looking into this myself.

Just ordered it.

I wondered why Free For All and Joe G. were about the only ones who responded to it. When I die, if I go to heaven, I'll be listening to Raney/Zoller.

This latish (1988) Nistico album, Empty Room, with a very good Italian rhythm section, also sounds like Sal finally found that center within himself: http://www.amazon.com/Empty-Room-Sal-Nisti...t/dp/B000000G4T Samples can be heard.

Parts of that Hayes-Nistico interview are very poignant, if I can use that word. It's hard to be jazz musician, especially when, like these two guys, you were real good when you were young and now you've been doing that thing for a good while. Also I love Sal's last phrase in this exchange: HAYES: Right So you’ve always played a Conn, eh? NISTICO: Well, before that I had a Buescher. Which is a good sound but boy, it’s a big feeling in the fingers, getting around it The Conn is the same principle blowing–wise -- like, you blow and it feels like the metal is spreading.

Speaking of Sal and tenormen interacting with a big band, what say you of these with Sal? The first is with Basie, the next three with Herman, the last (not a video) is a long blues with a Detroit small group. It would have been nice to hear Tubby and Sal face off: Jumpin' at the Woodside: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CRmsW6tuH0 Four Brothers (dig Joe Romano's eyes; here and even more so on "Hallelujah Time" below, he reminds of Sid Caesar's "Progress Hornsby"): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEPrs5DkzsM Sister Sadie: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbjK9TZ3vnQ Hallelujah Time: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_5GvWEqbL8 Blues: http://jazzaudienceadvocates.org/musicians.htm

...fines?