7/4

February 4, 2006 Jazz Review | Marc Johnson Rainy Day Contemplation and a Burst of Breeziness, Too By NATE CHINEN, NYT Marc Johnson has a round, resonant tone on the double bass, and an almost offhandedly prodigious technique. In the late 1970's and early 80's, these made him an ideal partner for the pianist Bill Evans, who enlisted Mr. Johnson for what turned out to be his final working trio. Since then, Mr. Johnson has applied his expertise to his own ensembles, but sparingly: while his sideman credits are extensive, his albums are few and far between. "Shades of Jade," which arrived last year on the ECM label, is one of his most sumptuous and harmonious. It often dwells in chamber quietude; its atmosphere is rainy day contemplative. Mr. Johnson and his stable of collaborators — the tenor saxophonist Joe Lovano, the guitarist John Scofield, the pianist Eliane Elias and the drummer Joey Baron — bring depth and color to the music, preventing it from slipping into self-absorption. The same group, minus Mr. Scofield, has been appearing at Dizzy's Club this week, with a broader repertory and dynamic range. On Thursday night, the quartet played several tunes at a breezy clip, including a bop-meets-fusion number by Ms. Elias called "Bowing to Bud." Another piece with a bebop pedigree, the standard "Just Friends," was recast with the lilting bounce of the classic Ahmad Jamal Trio. Mr. Johnson's own "Blue Nefertiti" elicited sparks; Mr. Lovano soloed with warm-blooded gusto, and Mr. Baron thrashed happily at his toms and snare. Still, the ensemble's finest work was on ballads, and there were hardly enough of them. "Aparaceu," by Ms. Elias, was a black-velvet cushion for Mr. Lovano, one of the great tenor warblers of our era. "Shades of Jade," composed by Mr. Johnson with Ms. Elias, wafted through a meditative rhythmic sequence, alternating measures of 6/4 and 5/4 time. "Don't Ask of Me," an Armenian folk song, featured Mr. Johnson's arco bowing, which has a plaintive singing quality. "Don't Ask of Me," on the album, is a dirge complete with funereal organ; here it had a more evocative shimmer. Ms. Elias rustled through half-finished chords with the gentle randomness of wind chimes; Mr. Baron furthered the effect with mallets on cymbals. Mr. Johnson bowed his bass with pathos and passion. As a trio, the musicians went on to play "Alone Together," in the appealing mode of Evans. But the haunted hush of the previous song was still hanging in the air.

Jolie Scampi!

Road crew? Road managers?

The LAPD has a problem with prostitution. Dressing in women's clothing? I've been on the same bill and a cross dresser, they've been in the audience. I don't care, it's just part of the Arts world and playing colorfull places like the East Village and Brooklyn.

Any photos of him in drag?

Don't be silly. I don't think I've ever seen one of her movies.

I like her, quite attractive. But when I've had enough of anyone...I'm off to something else, flipping channels.

My Dad had the wagon.

Vroom and Vroom Vroom sounded better when they were titled "Red". Guy Fripp & Belew had more musical guitar sounds before the 90's.

Happy Birthday!

I tried it out, pretty screwy!

the Jeff Beck Relic Esquire!

Good news, I always wanted to check this film out. Never made the effort to look for it.

I've had one in my computer for 3 years. Didn't even have to order it that way.

Oh, I've crashed it, believe you me. I have too, but it's rare. Programs crash all the time.

With Win XP, programs crash, but not the OS.

...in the library with...a log?

Sounds like something I want to listen to.

You have missed a great deal of phenomenal music. Perhaps there's a generation gap here. By '85 I gave up on rock except for bands like King Crimson and with in 10 years they lost me too. Got more into fusion and jazz, by the early '90s I was dipping into 20th century classical, hindustani raga, gamelan and other non-rock music. No wonder I'm so unimpressed by that grunge crap.

January 31, 2006 New York Guitar Festival Review | Bill Frisell A Stew of Americana Served Up as a Serene Soundtrack By JON PARELES Bill Frisell's music easily became a soundtrack when it accompanied images by the cartoonist Jim Woodring at Zankel Hall on Sunday night. A little too easily, perhaps. Billed as a multimedia collaboration, the concert led Mr. Frisell back to the wistful, reticent, watercolor arrangements he has regularly visited on his own. Both Mr. Frisell and Mr. Woodring make the familiar unfamiliar. In Mr. Frisell's compositions, cozy, archetypal Americana — country tunes, blues, waltzes — is slowed down, melted at the edges, eerily reharmonized or disassembled and contemplated part by part. Mr. Woodring's work, in the tradition of 1960's underground comic books, sets homely characters (notably a puffy-cheeked cat named Frank) in hallucinatory landscapes populated by strange, biomorphic emanations. Mr. Woodring and Mr. Frisell have collaborated before, building on each other's images and music with "Mysterio Simpatico" in 2002. This reunion apparently used more ready-made materials. For the first part of the concert, Mr. Woodring provided slowly changing still images. Then came animated Frank cartoons from Japan, with Mr. Frisell's music substituted for their original soundtracks. Mr. Frisell, on guitar, led his 858 Quartet — with Jenny Scheinman on violin, Eyvind Kang on viola and Hank Roberts on cello — plus Ron Miles on cornet and Greg Tardy on saxophone and clarinet. With this group, Mr. Frisell leans toward chamber music: hovering chords or pizzicato patterns from the strings, gentle melodies and an occasional flurry of improvisation from the horns. He plays guitar with preternatural smoothness, wafting notes into existence with barely a hint of attack, teasing out melodies or warming the harmonies with sustained chords. The group played Mr. Frisell's own pieces and idiosyncratic versions of "You Are My Sunshine" and "What the World Needs Now." There was a bluesy waltz that allowed Mr. Miles's muted cornet to growl a little; a drone-based piece in which Mr. Kang played raga-like viola lines; harmonically convoluted ballads; transparent contrapuntal mobiles; and tunes with hints of country fiddle and of jazzy swing, though nothing too pushy. Delicate and leisurely, the music seemed to float in suspended gravity. Only one piece, with a bebop guitar lick set against the strings lilting a chromatic scale, sounded anything like typical cartoon music. Mr. Frisell's pensive, constrained pieces played against films that have Frank always on the move, surrounded by metamorphoses. They were homey and soothing rather than footloose, and they would have been more vivid on their own. On Sunday, they were usually overshadowed by a cartoon cat. The New York Guitar Festival continues through Feb. 8.

Scratch that. I've seen these episodes of Family Guy. Maybe I'll restring the classical.

I made it work for me. Well, that was a joke, obviously (I hope...), but there is something to be said for knowing your instrument well enough to know what you can't do (and more to the point, have no interest in ever doing) & then going about finding out how to work what you can to as expressively as possible. Then when you find something that you just can't express with what you have you can proceed to learn whatever it is you need to learn to do it. I'm not a Jazz musican, I'm a minimalist composer. I just try to play Jazz everyday to try to keep my chops together on the guitar. And I can't really play Jazz. It's not working to well today. I just saw two episodes of Surface and a re-run of Friends. Next up is re-runs of Family Guy. But I do have a string qt. that I have to notate and some more solo microtonal gtr music. Miles made the best from less, he wasn't Dizzy. (Not that I would really know) ...and back to you Jim.

Great idea. It is another tuned percussion instrument with the same keyboard. The technique is a little different. When I was a kid my Dad always told me that if you learn piano, you could learn anything.

I made it work for me.

This is the big one. This is what turns off a lot of younger players. I can only address this as a brass player, but I have to practice every day to keep in shape. It's just become a part of my life- once you establish a certain standard anything less is unacceptable. In this time of instant gratification and shrinking attention spans, the commitment to learning a craft can seem overwhelming. Improvement is sometimes dramatic and sometimes agonizingly slow. There are good days and bad days. The rewards are minimal at times, and monumental at times. I often say "I hate to practice, but I hate sucking just a little more, so I'll keep practicing". Yeah, brass players have to play everyday.