JSngry

And he shot the man in Reno, just to watch him die.

He killed Bird, didn't he?

Organistas!

Not literally according to me, just according to my recounts of things that the two men in question have said, same as with the Boykin/Parlan story above, which, if memory serves, can be found in an old Coda magazine.

Well....if you can believe Ronnie Boykins, Lion dropped Horace Parlan because Boykins insisted on keeping the publishing for one of his tunes on a Parlan date. I guess Parlan wouldn't intervene or something...

But the bridge to "Well You Needn't" did eat his lunch pretty uglily. Just to be fair. Truthfully, I think his truly wonderful composing & arranging abilities ultimately trump his playing, which definitely did get stronger over time, but which also was not always, uh... "fully formed" early on. Also, I'd in no way call his tone "wimpy", but the parallel to the "smooth jazz" sound, although not really appropriate, does hit on the fact that his tone was not nearly as "declarative" in either timbre, density, or volume as the usual bop/bebop tone, yet it was not as "dry" as the "cool" players. It, and his whole style of playing, was more like a guy standing in the corner commenting on the action to a few people within earshot. He was a unique cat, Gigi Gryce was. That much is safe to say.

Yeah, native language...Chuck said something here somewhere a while back about that, that the young cats playing in the older styles, it's not their native language, and no matter how well they come to speak it, it's just not their native language, and those who knoww can tell. Or something like that. But what about this? What if you can somehow create a culture where you can convince yourself and enough others that it is your native language, if only by birthright, well hey, does that mean that you're fooling yourself, or does it mean that you're killing something off and remaking it in your own image, sort of a Stalinization thing? And if it gets going pretty good, this remaking, at what point does the deception take root and begin a new evolutionary branch on/of its own? Just because something is "wrong" doesn't mean it won't/can't "work", if you know what I mean.

Maybe the notion of "freedom of choice" when it comes to identity selection is more an American thing? I mean, we've had some pretty remarkable "makeovers" in our history. Then again, whatever freedom you do have is dictated by your imagination, and god knows there's enough battles going on, internal and external, to gain control of that...

the album you linked too (Open Sky Unit - Open Sky Unit) has Michel Graillier exclusively on percussion (while i'm at it... i really like that open sky unit album though it's quite different from the other stuff i listen too - most (of the few) fusion records i've heard are very different from it, much less lively/quirky, this is more like "soft machine plus soul=?" can you recommend anything similar?[there are sound samples...] [is this what return to forever is like? havn't heard them] anyway this album is definitely recommended as is the other j&m pelzer album reissued by whatmusic "song for rene" [which is again quite different and in a genre i don't know much about, spiritual jazz from belgium?] Sorry, but I know nothing about the Open Sky album. I found that link while Googling Prell/Pelzer. In doing that searching, I found out that many people seem to have thought that "Michelin Prell" was Tony Williams performing under a psedonym!

Larry, it's been my experience, personally, oberservationally, and anecdotally, that the finding & subsequent honing of a voice is in some ways the ultimate act of extended improvisation (one day you know, the next you're not so sure and go looking, and lord only knows how many times that cycle can repeat itself...), and it involves both the "objective" & the "personal". It's the personal that motivates, but it's the objective that delivers. In other words, I might "hear" all kinds of shit, but until I figure out how to actually mechanically replicate what I'm hearing, what have I got other than "notions"? And then, if/when I do get it all together "objectively", that's when the "self" thing comes into play, into the honing/refining/whatever, to make what I've finally gotten a grip on "objectively" more subtle, more nuanced, more...personal. Now, I know some players who try and do both at the same time, but I don't know anybody who actually "got there" by doing only that. At some point, you gotta confront the mechanics, and that's when "self" pretty much goes out the window. It might seem ironic that the path to "self" involves a negation of it, especially ironic that once you "invent" it in your mind/body/soul that you then have to actually create it mechanically, but, hey....that's just how it goes, or seems to in my experience. I do think that Land in particular is a very good example of what you're talking about, because here's a guy who never stopped working on his music. I know some find his later work empty and wholly derivative, but as you said, there is always that tone, that voice (and all that comes with that, including articulation, inflection, tonal shadings, etc.) We hear that voice evolve, but damned if we ever really hear it change, become something other than what it had always been once it became what it was (don't really remember right now how personal it was, but the earliest Land I've heard was on one of the Black California albums, and it was definitely not "fully formed", if you know what I mean. Opinions vary on this to be sure, but to my ears, I sometimes I hear the work at the expense of the results, but sometimes I hear - and very much dig - the results, and they are a direct consequence of the work. So really, it's not either/or, it's more "firtst/then. Or ideally that's how it is. sometimes, with some people, it just....stops. Oh well about that... As this pertains to the broader points at play, I think a big problem, huge problem, hell, maybe even the problem, is that so may players today spend their time on the mechanical without first even having the faintest notion of what they want to do with it other than play. It's as if in a lot of minds, the act of playing has become in and of itself the defining act, the statement itself. Never mind the substance of playing as it pertains to a truly personal voice (and really, you don't have to be an "innovator" to have a personal voice. You'd think that that would be obvious, but at the other end of the "anything goes" spectrum are the "only the very heaviest matter", and a pox on both their houses...), that's beside the point, and if you look at it from one sociologically pov, hey, maybe it is. Maybe just playing "complicated" music on a "real" instrument is a statement in and of itself. Ok, yeah, I guess it is. But if the statement is that one is defending, rescuing, advocating, whatever, something that is worth doing all that for because it really is that vital to humanity, go ahead and do it all the way, don't just fight for the body, body for the soul as well. And that, I think, is where so much comes up short, because craft is craft, and craft is a bitch in and of itself, and craft is necessary to fully create soul, but craft is not soul. Ok, yeah, you're brave and heroic and all that shit for showing dedication and discipline and discernment, but you're not heroic beyond that level, you're heroic as a mechanical role model, not as a soul role model, unless yours is a soul so hungry for meaning that craft is better than nothing because nothing is the only other alternative you have (and really, I suppose that might very well be a reality for many people. but it is not my reality, which might be the whole problem right there, for all concerned). I used to use the expression "music about music" a lot a few years ago, and I think it still holds to describe music that is at least one step removed from direct experience (well, ok, two steps really, because of the whole "detachment" phase noted above that is required to get to wherever it is you want to go. but for the sake of "public" consumption, let's call it one, ok?). That is getting us into the Uncle Skid/Kurt Vonnegut area of an artist responding to the art itself, and yeah, sure, there's some good music to be had there (maybe even some great, although my personal bent is to not look for it there, just because...) But at some point, the layer of detachment from the source becomes so great that you gotta...pretend that you're directly connected instead of admitting that your connection is more in spirit than in literalness, and that's when things start getting Wyntony Weird for me, and that's when I get off the bus and decide to walk a mile in my own shoes for a change. Pretty sure they still fit, although maybe sometimes it's time for new laces and a re-heeling... That's what I think too much music has come to - the objective in the service of the objective - under the guise of an invented/fantasized subjective. However, since yet again, perception ultimately becomes reality, nobody can convince those guys that this is really what they're up to, just as they can never convince us that it's not. And really, as much as it kills me to say this (and up until very recently, I'd not), "identity" is ultimately so much a matter of choice, even, especially, in the face of inescapables, that maybe at the end of the day, that's something we're all just gonna have to live with.

Maybe we could be a cover band in the style of an original band. Or vice versa. Let's think aobut it.

I'd think that anybody who assiduously learned a craft at anything approaching a high level was already good-to-go on the outside, objectivist perspective. I mean, scales, exercises, theory, these things very much require leaving "self" behind in order to master them. Anybody who's tackled an honest regimen of sustained practice knows that when it comes to sheer mechan9ics, things are either right or not. Even the slightest irregularity must be pinpointed and dealt with. The only time "self" comes into play is when & how much to be satisfied (or not) with the results. That sort of puritanical discipline can drive you crazy, but if you survive, hey, you got your skill set together, at least as far as execution goes. The question for me then is whether or not there was ever any "self" in the first place, and if so, how much of it survives the confrontation with the outside, how much of it is discovered as a result, and how much is nurtured during the process. Or even, how much do you have to forget in order to remember? Just saying that imo the tension/whatever between objective/personal is seems to be pretty much built into any artistic endeavor that does not involve the style of "free expression" where just being alive qualifies you to claim "artistry" for yourself. I've seen that up close and personal more than once, and god is that a sucker's game, albeit not an unprofitable one... But otherwise, both qualities qork together in a yin-yang type system of complimentary opposites forming a unified whole. The "game", such as it is, is always in the balance and relative shadings of the two. And I know we're also talking about "bigger" issues such as the place, real/perceived/other of one's place in "things", but for that, I think that both too little and too much awareness is a dangerous thing. Just as you can dumb yourself out of existence, you can also think yourself out of it. Playing of the type that we all hope for requires the much-cliched "now" to be in full force/presence, and all this other stuff is preparation for dealing with it when it gets here. In other words, yeah, be ready, but when the time comes, let go of it and don't look back or down, or anywhere, really.

Wayne Shorter Saxophone, Sax (Soprano), Sax (Tenor) Ron Carter Bass, Cello Chick Corea Percussion, Drums, Keyboards, Marimba Dave Holland Guitar (Acoustic), Bass, Guitar John McLaughlin Guitar, Guitar (12 String), 12-String Bass Guitar Michelin Prell (apparently Micheline Pelzer http://www.whatmusic.com/info/productinfo....2Fcatalogue.php ) Percussion, Drums, Percussion Arrangement

You think we should break the band up before we start it, you know, to keep things from getting too complicated and stuff?

It's the Christmas Blue Jay! http://www.organissimo.org/forum/index.php?showtopic=48625

Oooohhhh, I don't know....This team has lacked character for far too long, and for that, I think that Wade has to be held accountable. I mean, when a team repeatedly shows an inability to mentally perform at crunch time, it's more than just talent that hasn't been developed...

...and I would attribute that not to the absence of a Wynton-type figure, but to the remaining presence of a huge number of inspired jazz artists who came up in the environment of 40s, 50s and early 60s. And then what happened? All of those people died all at once?

I believe it's called choking.... Throw in that fake FG and it's called getting punked out like a little b***ch.

As if there was any doubt left, the Cowboys prove once and for all that they have no character.

The difference now is that the "traditionalist movements" aren't just part of the stream now, they are pretty much the entire river. And the public is ok with that, since there's other things going on in other musics and other lives that cover those bases for those who want them, and that those who both produce and consume the music of the "traditionalist movements" don't have any real need for. When the public wants adventure, or exploration, or counter-mainstream, or even just to dance all night long, they've got other places to go for that. When they want to celebrate The Grand Tradition, they've got the niche market of jazz. And truthfully, that suits most everybody, including a lot of musicians who don't really have either an interest in or a clue about reaching out to an audience, especially a changing one, just fine. All you gotta do is look at today's marketplace. Look at all the independent releases that fall outside the formula. A handfull of people buy them, a handful of articles get written, and a handful of gigs get booked and played. The cycle repeats itself every so often, enough that alternative circuits exixts. But there's no chance in 98.7% of hell that this will ever be anything other than what it is, because of the lack of a holistic scene where these musics and those musics can be viewed as part of the same family instead of Real Thing vs Some Other Thing. Times have changed one way, the music in another, other musics in other ways, and the marketplace in yet another. There's not a helluva lot going on in jazz that's in sync with that. Jim, I agree. The point that I was trying to make in my post is that the jazz river had already broken apart into numerous streams well before Wynton came along. The Wynton-led movement was largely about consciously recreating the river. I agree with most others on this thread that the artistic results of this endeavor ended up being rather disappointing. What I don't think is fair, however, is to postulate that there was big beautiful and healthy jazz river until Wynton et al came along and took a big shit in it. The issue brought up of the Lincoln Center establishment depriving other jazz artists of gigs due to their draining of non-profit or foundation budgets is an interesting one. I am rather skeptical, however. If we hypothetically imagine an evolution of jazz to the present without Wynton or the Lincoln Center, the more likely outcome, in my opinion, is that most organizations subsidizing American music would have forgotten about jazz completely. No, it wasn't all big beautiful and healthy. But it was flowing more rapidly, and with more currents, than it now is. And yeah, ok, some of this is simply jazz not keeping relevant to the technological impact on society (and by that I don't mean "electronics" nearly as much as I do a more sensory evolution). But - the environment of the times was such that any such rexponse/evolution was not only hampered, it was adamantly discouraged, and actively/aggressively disparaged. Whether this would or wouldn't have gone down like it did w/o Wynton is purely speculative, sure, but the point is that it did, and now here we are. It might have been anybody (considering the political climate of the time, it might well have been inevitable). But it was Wynton, and even if he personally is just an accident of history, a totally random soul who fell into a position of historical inevitability, hey, shit happens anyway, and if you did it, you did. He broke it, he bought it, and now, afaic, he can have it. It's irreparably tainted, and I think those of us who want better can have it, just elsewhere.

Cowboys v Ravens as well. Not...going....well....

You just thought you weren't talking about music... RIP. I was just talking in another thread about the importance/end of the neighborhood aspect of jazz, and here this comes. Jim, you were blessed to have had the experience.

And see, that's another thing about Jazz Today. Used to be that it was, at root, a neighborhood music, not just socially, but economically. Cats came up playing in neighborhoods, then advanced to playing in other neighborhoods, onwards and upwards. But now, where's the neighborhood musics? Hell, where's the neighborhoods, period? The last musical breakthrough was (arguably) hip-hop, and it definitely began as a neighborhood muisc. And already then, the DJ was the primary musician (or "musician" if it pleases the room...). I remember the scene when I was at NT back in The Previous Century. Lots of idiocy, some hipness, no real radicalism, in short the Best Of Some But Not All Possible Worlds, but above all, their was a neighborhood feel to the whole scene. Cats all knew of (and more often than not knew) each other, all different types would hang out at each others' gigs, show up at parties and shoot the bull, all that. And then when I went out of Denton & into Dallas to check out the world of Red Garland/Marchel Ivery/James Clay, that was waaaay different in a lot of respects (obviously), but not in the fact that the scene was still neighborhood based. No matter who came in or went out, the neighborhood (neighborhoods, actually, geographically speaking, but more than a few faces stayed the same no matter what, just as more than a few changed...) was the nexus of all activity.. Now...again, where are the neighborhoods themselves? Whole 'nother world now, whole different set of paradigms goin' on. Anyplace can be, hell, pretty much is, a neighborhood today, but that kinda makes it hard to pin down something specific in terms of what time downbeat is... Which leads me again to wonder - are "we", the "creative jazz musician" trying to put something out there that is built for a place (literally & figuratively) that no longer (or barely) exists anymore? God forbid that we lose our creativity and our desire to use it, but maybe what we're doing with it is pretty much doomed to fail, like a badass typewriter that is the greatest the world has ever known - but is still a typewriter. Sure, there'll always be a bit of a market for it, but.... Nurture the kids, I say. Let them do it their way, but never let them not know, and never make them feel that they have to know. Because the kids get all this shit, they were born into it. The worst thing we can do to them is to make them think that they gotta do it like it's always been done and the best thing we can do is to encourage them that,, yeah, hell yeah, it does gotta be done.

There's also a part of me that wonders (well, wonders less and less, actually) how much "creative music" is first and foremost about "self" with little or no consideration about how said "self" fits into any type of community, musical or social. And I say this as somebody who has been involved in quite a bit of "creative music" that has been very much been decidedly unconcerned with too much beside "self", be it self expression, self definition, self pride, self awareness, anything except how to be economically self-sufficient w/o getting some kind of sponsorship, be it something as "big" as grant money or else something as localized as finding a club owner who'll give you a place to play even though he loses money when you do. More and more, a part of me is saying that this is all bullshit, that if all you're do is playing for yourself, then you really don't deserve to get any support from anybody but yourself. Now, that doesn't mean that I've gone over to the side of the Unprincipled Whore (although I will play their gigs and take their money when the need arises), but there seems to have been a growing notion that "creative" = "wholly unfamiliar" that ends up creating a blanket excuse for a lot of cats who don't get heard just because, well, there's no real good reason for them to get heard besides that they are "creative" in the sense that, no, you've not heard anything quite like this, but no, that doesn't necessarily mean that it's important to too much of anybody besides the cat(s) doing it. And really, the fact that it's gotten this intellectually "complicated" to be a "creative musician" tells me that something is fundamentally out of whack. It's not just that we live in an increasingly dead pop culture with short attention spans. I mean, there's still lots of joy going around in peoples lives, lots of creativity elsewhere (even if it's micro-scale, "local", it's still the impulse at work), lots of life in the world today. I'm thinking that maybe, just maybe, since, unless you're entirely self-sustaining, you gotta have "sponsors" of one kind or the other, be it patrons or an actual audience, maybe it's not such a bright idea to seek patronage outside of "the real world", that to start thinking about actually cultivating a real audience in order to provide support, instead of always having to depend on the kindness of strangers is a smart thing for a creative musician to do. Not that A Free Jazz Tribute To Kenny G or anything like that suddenly becomes a palatable undertaking, but if the notion that "creative" is a state of being and not just a "musical concept" is true (and I believe that it is), then hey, there gots ta' be a way, if there is still an audience to be had for music that is not designed to be fully integrated into a totally mobile, fluid lifestyle in which everything information-related (and indeed, music is information, god help us if it ever ceases to be!) runs as part of a continuous stream to be accessed in bits and pieces as needed. And that's a huge if....