robertoart

To be fair, I don't think anyone is really defending this stuff. My wife's dad loved "Keytar Chick" back in the day so she's always incredulous when I listen to him (which is to say the "good" ones). That is one mental hurdle she can't jump! Yeah, I know. I just can't for the life of me, work out how musicians that have been as 'intellectually' brilliant as Corea has (and even 'conceptually great at times), can actually 'believe' in the 'art' of some (most) of the stuff that subsumes his musical 'vision'.

Here's where the problem is: No one knows who the fuck you are. So saying "yes I can" just makes you an internet tough guy with nothing to back it up. You'd be better off making your criticism and leaving it at that. Or telling us who you are and pointing us to <i>your</i> record with the superior version of "Stolen Moments". When you tell us who you are, I'm sure we'll be able to see that you're the modern-day KB, having racked up dozens and dozens of sideman gigs, where your particular bag is always technically perfect. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Cz4sjgckK0

The great Kenny Burrell playing something beyond his reach perhaps? That was the beauty of music back then.

And modest too. I don't think anybody would be saying anything like that 'to the screen'. Who gives a fuck if you can play an Oliver Nelson chart better than Kenny did in 1957 or something.

Do you guys/and or gals actually listen to this stuff....like......VOLUNTARILY? This is SMOOTH JAZZ for Particle Physicists. If INXS could play Giant Steps it would sound like this.

What about this one from 1973!

I was just learning to form coherent sentences and play air guitar.

The pitch/tone sound your trying to identify in Scofield, is, I believe, an outcome of his Legato technique, which means he plays his lines with lots of hammer-ons and pull-offs. A process native to the Guitar. I have an audio copy of a superb clinic Scofield did in the early 80's, where he identifies this for the students. The basic transcription is... "I have very bad right hand technique, I can't alternate pick very well, and so what I've learned to do and what a lot of other players lately have learned to do, and this is the sort of Jim Hall legato type school, is to not actually pick every note, but using hammer-ons - where the second note is hammered on - it's not actually picked - and using pull-offs - which is the same process in reverse...and finger slides. I've basically learned how to play fairly quickly - and to me sometimes it's even a smother sound than alternate picking. So if I were to play a Cmajor scale - I would play the first one - then hammer on - then pick the second and third - then hammer on -then pick the next one -then the next one -then hammer on.....now if I try to do that using alternate picking...yuk...I can't get nothing out of it. It sounds really bad. So I use a legato technique and not pick every note" So there you go. Pat Metheny has a variation on this approach, and so does Bill Frisell. I tend to to like the alternate pickers such as Martino and Benson

'Overt Bluesiness' Got it in one right there. Someone should write a paper on it... John Scofield Towards a Praxis Of Overt Bluesiness In American Improvised Music, For Profit And Pleasure

Star People was the first time I was able to catch 'the Miles bus' in 'real' time. All the 'guitar boys' had a hard-on for Fat Time, until they heard 'Sco' on Star People. I think I got off at the next stop though, or maybe the one after that Never used 'the Miles bus' again, unless the car broke down, or I was too drunk to drive. Oh yeah, I did get interested again when I heard Jean Paul Bourelly was in the mix, now there's a 'badass'.

So this song was written by Shilkret and Austin, Appropriating Black gospel music. It's 'secular' status then becomes something determined only by knowledge of the composers (or highly attuned crap meters like those of jsngry). Apparently the song was used as a substitute for Old Man River in an early film version. The difference between gospel and secular interpretation in the context of Tharpe's presentation is closer to a Black performer re-appropriating the song back into a Black Gospel expression. The lack of investigation or acknowledgement by the doco makers of the 'White Appropriators of Gospel' seems hardly relevant here given the context of Tharpe's performative use of the song.

Any recommendations for Kenny Burrell Organ sessions (as leader or sideman) with anyone other than Jimmy Smith?

It looks like to embed video - you click on the 'specialBBcode' icon to the immediate left of the 'font' drop down menu. When you click on the 'specialBBcode' icon follow the 'please select' drop down menu - and click 'media'. In the screen that pops up, paste your url link in the square marked 'media URL' then make your post, and video will show up instead of just the url link. There may be an easier way, but this is now working for me.

Well, I'm having technical difficulties today! The first two paragraphs here are my response, followed by Marks's original post. Confused? So am I I thought you had made a wordy reply, so I was a bit disappointed when I realised it was 1 paragraph × 5

Yeah, it's not like Mehldau is Matthew Shipp talking about Herbie Hancock

Quite the Electric Blues aficionado now MG

My links in other threads are not always embedding either. I know not why. Fasstrack, you need to work on your v-i changes.

Here is Cantaloupe Island. From 'Tough'. And I like it a lot. I think Harold Alexander must be on this one too. It sure sounds like him in the opening phrase of the solos. Bartee and Alexander sound absolutely fantastic together. I thing Grant Green may have had their sound in mind when he used Clarence Thomas and Houston Person for the Club Mozambique recording. Trying to find Pucho's version of Maiden Voyage as well, not on you tube unfortunately.

If we're allowed to be old farts, I suggest David Murray's Flowers For Albert from this one,

Was Milestones not asking about 'contemporary' performances that might have the 'spirit' of the old 'joyful' jazz?

This post is still here. The moderator must be making a cofee. Wynton is using too. Freelancer, Brad's past use of heroin - apparently he no longer does it - is no secret to anyone who has even a minimal familiarity with the guy. He has talked about it in interviews. I was being flip about him denying what many perceive as a definite Bill Evans influence on his music and I was making a silly aside about the influence on his personal life. Sorry if I offended you or any of his fans. Thanks skeith. No you didn't offend me. I really don't know much about Mehldau, beyond the Metheny collaboration, or some of his stuff with Bernstein. I'm not really a contemporary Piano Qrt. kind of listener. And don't take an active interest in reading Mehldau interviews in the the way I might with Metheny, Martino or David Murray perhaps. So my ignorance here is to the fore. It does prove confronting in a way, however, as the contemporary, super-academic University generation players seem so removed from the drug culture of the past. Perhaps I think of Mehldau in the same breath as Metheny who is so square and wholesome . Don't worry about me, it's still hard for me to accept Scofield and Martino were drug fuelled crazy men for a long time And I never got over the fact that as a Fifteen year old aspiring guitarist I read the old looking bald headed guy that played chord melody guitar (Joe Pass) was once incarcerated Heroin addict. I hope anyone that has had battles with drugs overcomes them. Then again, like that cynical old man Lou Donaldson says, 'if they are still making it...they're probably all still takin it.'

This post is still here. The moderator must be making a cofee. Wynton is using too.

Do big name, mainstream, 'on the cover of Downbeat' musicians still do 'heroin'. Wow, must have those 'middle class 21stC blues'.