Nate Dorward

Incidentally Coleman's playing the Guelph festival this September. Haven't seen him play since Victoriaville in the mid-1990s (where it was mostly about the rappers, a bit disappointing, aside from a grooved-up "Star Eyes" riff at the end), so looking forward to checking him out again.

Well, my impression may be largely via the longer & longer gaps between recordings--in particular the 14 years between the 20th Anniversary Concert (FMP, 1986) & Globe Unity 2002 (Intakt, I think released in 2004?). The EFI website lists 13 records or singles from 1966-1982 by contrast. Mahall is a very interesting player, in fact just about everything of his I've heard is excellent. (If you want to hear him in a somewhat more "mainstream" setting try hunting down his work with Geoff Goodman). The one exception, oddly enough, is his (only?) solo disc on Psi, which is extremely dull. Far better to get hold of the limited-edition solo set on Berlin Reeds from Absinth.

Oh, that's good to hear. Though my impression is that it's more of an occasionally convened thing than a regular band at this point. THere's a trio disc of Monk tunes on Enja from the 1990s I recall.

Schlippenbach is one of the great European pianists--best known as a "free" player but he's done standards albums & Monk albums too. He's also well-known as the leader of the Globe Unity Orchestra, one of the longest-running European big bands (it seems to be disbanded now, but it went for over 3 decades in various formations). That said, I thought Monk's Casino wasn't quite as good as I'd hoped. There's a bootleg recording of the same group from a different concert which is much hotter IMHO. That said, a lot of people seemed to really like this set, so what do I know.... If you want great recent-vintage Schlippenbach, try the two discs on Psi (both of them in a "free" vein): Broomriding is a terrific quartet disc (it has a couple Dolphy covers & a wacky variant on "All the Things", incidentally, aside from the free stuff), & America 2003 is a great document of a recent tour with Evan Parker & Paul Lytton. Maybe others here would chip in with rec.s of AVS's more "mainstream" discs, an area of his work I know much less well?

Sure--will send a PM.

Fixed an important typo above (direction to Penguin). I think the only other Sam's that remains is the one on Barrington St. in Halifax.

Sam's is still open! The chain went bankrupt a few years ago but the flagship store is still maintained on Yonge. Last time I went it was definitely better for jazz than HMV, though the once-mighty classical section was more or less gone. I don't think Dave's Vinyl Museum is still around. There's a shop on Yonge roundabout Davisville called Backbeat which I used to frequent a lot, though I haven't been there lately--the phonebook says it's still there, though. For more avantgarde-oriented stuff there's Soundscape. There's another pretty good vinyl/CD shop near Around Again too, called if I remember rightly Penguin--just walk down to Queen St from McCaul. The link for the Red Guitar is here: http://www.theredguitar.com/ No schedule up for July yet, though. It's a nifty venue. In terms of baseball, if you're around on a Sunday, aside from the Jays do go see the Leafs play at Christie Pits. They're a member of Ontario's venerable Intercounty League. 2:00 every Sunday; they also play some home games on Wednesdays too (check schedule at http://www.leafsbaseball.com/). My wife & daughter often go to the games after church & have a great time (not least because the Leafs are a strong team: currently top of the league).

Mark--can't help on hotels, though can ask around (what's your price range?), but: --record shops: favourite 2ndhand shop for jazz is Around Again on Baldwin (cross-street: McCaul), which is also 2 doors down from the Yung Sing Pastry Shop. There's a Sam's & HMV at Dundas & Yonge for new shops. --live music: the Rex, Montreal Bistro, Red Guitar are three notable venues.

Rats, I thought there couldn't be more than one possibility .....

No - that bass clarinettist is a Swissman of Italian descent. (Where's ubu?) Maurice Magnoni.

Started this one while busy cleaning up the kitchen so comments on a couple early tracks are missing--will fill in later. 1: 2: Could be an all-percussion ensemble like Nexus, performing a “composerly” (western) take on tuned-percussion traditions from other cultures? Truthfully I was a little disappointed when the music got more chordally oriented after the opening. 3: 4: The question would be whether this was written for this instrumentation or not. Reminded me of Konitz’s album of French Impressionist music, actually, though the piano part is rearranged for string quartet there. A few (early) jazz touches later on but basically classical-music language & sounds like a classical saxophone player. Uh, basically there are only two names I know in this field (Edison Denisov & John Harle) & they're just names to me, so I won't guess! 5: Surely Debussy! Lovely piece in a travelogue vein. 6: First track here I’ve not really liked much – maybe it sounds too “nice” for me .... After a few minutes the sound goes a little distorted on the lead line – is this just an artifact of my CDR or CDR player, or is it part of the music? Maybe Mike can give more details on exactly what we’re hearing – i.e. how many players, & the instrument details (are the low notes vibes too or some kind of bass or percussion synth?). (Side note: I do always like recordings that pick up players’ vocalizing!) – Listening to the faster middle part I note that the slight rattly sound is now part of the middle line. I guess it’s just part of the music. 7: Heheh, a little period tuning to bend the modern ear! No idea what/who it is but I like this stately piece. 8: Well, obviously if I could nail the autoharp-like instrument or the language I’d have a head-start here..... I initially feared this would be like one of those syrupy ballads that play over the credits in a Miyazaki film but it’s actually musically pretty interesting. The first thing on this disc to really be “jazz,” despite the evident crosscultural influences! The thing that I did find a little offputting near the end was the drummer’s thwacking accents. 9: This is a lovely track off an album I used to play a lot on the radio show I ran for a while in the 1990s at CKDU. British folk-jazz led by a veteran bassist. Pity about the offputting album-title. What’s he been doing lately? -- Link here, though I'm pretty sure that the reviewer is wrong to date the album to 1974? 10: This one is quite intriguing. The opening reminds me a bit of Kevin Volans’ string quartets. I was a little disappointed when it turned out that the guitar was only laying down a static accompaniment behind the cello. 11: Wow, what an unusual ensemble – winds, guitar, bass, & at various times I thought it was harmonica, organ or accordion! Certainly two of those in there, maybe 3 for all I know... I’m a little puzzled why the horns simply drop out after a while & don’t return. I liked the piece just for the mood, the sound & the intricate arrangement. 12: Effective pool-of-sound sort of track (the clicking percussion reminded me of Bryars’ The Sinking of the Titanic!). If the vocals are actual identifiable words they’re so abstracted & stretched out that it’s hard to tell. 13: Germany’s answer to John Zorn? .... 14: I don’t think that I’ve heard “Für Elise” on something other than a piano before! What is this exactly (I really don’t know the diff between clavichord, harpsichord, spinet &c &c)? Gives a great pounding growling sound to the middle section.

Ah, Glenn Ferris of course--he's recorded several albums with that cello/bass format for Enja. The jazz-rock big-band track is the leadoff track off this one. Will turn my attention to the bonus disc later tonight or tomorrow--probably less to say about it, as my guesses about the classical music tracks wouldn't be at all informed (nice to hear some stuff on period instruments & with historical tunings, though!), aside from track 9 which I spotted immediately (from a great album by a former folk-rock bassist, though it's a pity that the album has such an indifferent title....).

Aha, so that was Wheeler..... Hm, could be that UJRE band I suppose. He did a lot of work in jazz-rock bands in the 1970s but this track sounds more like the 1980s or 1990s.... Hm, expat trombonists.... Glenn Ferris or Marty Cook? I'm just guessing now, I don't know their music well at all. Amazing that a guy who plays alto sax like that would spend the rest of the album playing piano! I hope he plays it as nicely as that!

BFT 37 comments I think I’ll just say up front that I don’t think I can i.d. anything here. Sounds mostly like European ensembles, obviously all very contemporary tracks (judging from the recording quality and the actual music). I think the word I’d use for this compilation is “light”: not “lightweight” but in terms of mood and timbre. 1: A version of “All the Things” with a sense of humour and a few twists to the changes. I love the warbly old version that opens & closes it! My ear is more caught by the arrangement and the general vibe than the solos themselves. My favourite moment is the vamp with all the horns soloing at once right at the end. Maybe Mike can satisfy my curiosity about exactly what the drummer is using/doing to get that hiss like an opening bus-door on beat 4.... 2: Trombone, cello and bass, it sounds like. It’s nice to hear how the theme gets extended or reworked each time it returns – the brief bits of improvisation are really part of that process rather than taking off into fully-fledged solos. Maybe Nils Wogram on bone, no guess as to the others. 3: Hm. Bass clarinet, marimba, and metal percussion/drums? An intriguing piece, presumably a one-off (at least, a full album of this instrumentation would be a bit much). Maybe a little tight and arranged for me – like most of (all?) the pieces on this compilation, it’s not just head solos head, it’s a carefully planned performance. 4: I like the old-but-new feeling here – on the one hand it definitely sounds recent, & that bouncy tuba/drum pattern (reminds me of Adam Nussbaum on the Bo Diddley tribute on Tactics!) wouldn’t be on an earlier record, but I was also reminded of a date like the Teddy Charles Tentet on Atlantic.... This one really has me stumped. Maybe recent work by a band that includes some older players? My favourite of the compilation so far. Pity the trumpet solo is pretty short, I liked that guy. 5: With a good-time groove like that you can get away with anything .... Another nice track. 6: Percussion, then a polytonal piano + tuned percussion head... I think I’ll have to wait for Mike’s comments to get the exact details on what we’re listening to. This one keeps surprising you, and I would have actually liked to hear them stretch this out more.... One of the more interesting tracks here. 7: Interesting how after listening to the last track I initially took the bass for tuned percussion (say a thumb-piano)! Not my favourite alto-sax sound (too tidy) but nonetheless an intriguing track. 8: Lovely slow two-guitar blues with some great unison bends. 9: Definitely the strangest track here. Sounds like some sampling, electronic augmentation, &/or overdubbing is going on, and this may well be a one-man band (or at least all the horns could be the same guy). Hm, what IS the lead horn exactly? Definitely a track on the “neato” rather than “substantial” side of the ledger... But, hey, it’s short. 10: The first track on here that I can’t say I’ve gotten much out of. Those synths give me flashbacks to the awful synth sounds on George Russell’s later albums. Trumpet player knows his Kenny Wheeler high-register stuff but it’s surely not Kenny? (though I know that KW’s done plenty of jazz-rock in his time). Don’t think it’s Ian Carr either. 11: Well, we’re certainly working through a lot of unusual corners of the music room on this BFT – surely the first BFT to feature jaw-harp? Pleasant Miles-style trumpet, & I like it when it gets into the sort of swing-groove-goes-Native-American halfway through. 12: Bach’s most annoying tune ... Oh, good, it was just the intro to, let’s see, “Nuages” in duo with alto sax. Now that’s an alto sax sound I like lots more than that on #7 and #10... call me old-fashioned, I guess I still prefer Bird’s descendants. No idea who this is, and though the instrumentation is completely unexpected it’s a lovely track. 13: Cello/piano version of “Joy Spring” with a touch of “Bemsha Swing” at the turnaround. It certainly takes the title literally, in terms of joy and springiness – a little too, um, bouncy and bright and tight for my taste. Hm, could be one of Lou Levy’s latterday albums I suppose, I know he liked to use cello. Nah, not Levy. 14: A nice ballad arrangement for vibes & big band, & really don’t have much more to say. 15: Our “outro”. I could have used more of this vibes player than the one on the last track! Is the fadeout & ghostly fiddle shapes at the end intended as a lead-in to the bonus disc?

A discussion of the book by the pianist & Shandean Robert W Getz here.

Why do you ask?

Sad to see this. Time to pull out a few Ligeti CDs....

Larry--yeah just faulty memory on my part!

I'm a bit confused now--my copy of Consequence has "Don't Blame Me"; Action has "My Old Flame". No extra tracks on either CD (the most recent reissues).

The Chabon is excellent, ditto Wonder Boys. On the other hand, I found Foer's Everything Is Illuminated sufficiently nauseating I couldn't get past the first thirty pages. Current reading: a stack of Colette novels/novellas; the 1957-1958 volume of the Complete Peanuts; Lem's Solaris; Jim Harrison's Sundog.

Title-track of Bluesnik has one of McLean's best solos bar none. The rest of the album's fine, though not on that level, & anything with Doug Watkins + Pete LaRoca has a lot going for it. PS as I think I mentioned elsewhere, Hubbard quotes from a Blues and the Abstract Truth tune at one point ("Cascades"). The album was recorded before BATAT, though.

Great album! Yes, get it: this one plus Action are my faves of the recent McLean RVGs/Connoisseur reissues. If you want McLean + Morgan you should get Jacknife too, with Morgan and Tolliver both on board (only one track together, though).

Whatever could track 9 be?

Dan Warburton suggests "Exquisitely Crafted Monotony"....

Yeah I love it when negative criticism is quoted in blurbs! Once I saw an ad for a poetry magazine that quoted my review of a previous issue for a blurb: Allen--I think a little commentary on the tracks is always nice to read.