Guy Berger

I more or less agree with Shrdlu on the '56 vs. '57 distinction, with the caveat that Trane got much better during 1956 (compare his playing on the May and October sessions with Miles's quintet). Still, his playing on Tad Dameron's Mating Call is great, and it's a lot of fun to hear him matching wits with Sonny on "Tenor Madness". Guy

I haven't heard the whole album, but "74 Miles Away" (the tune) is awesome. Cannonball's solo is intense -- maybe invents Gary Bartz's style. Guy

You can hear Ron Carter torturing a cello on McCoy Tyner's Expansions. Guy

Are they ever going to reissue the Joe Farrell album with John McLaughlin, Chick Corea, Dave Holland and Jack DeJohnette? Guy

I really like this one. As a bonus, I think BMG has it -- you might be able to get it for cheap. The version of "What Is This Thing Called Love?" is awesome. And now that Chris mentins it, so is "Chelsea Bridge" -- the only thing that's missing is Ben Webster. Guy

I went to see this tonight... way better than I expected. But given how much The Nation is whining about it, I shouldn't have been surprised. Guy

Yeah, it was pretty ridiculous. But at the same time, it seems like all the ESPN guys are blowing it out of proportion. We'll look back in June and it won't be anything other than a footnote. And as for Crazy Ron, it's all Don Nelson's fault! Guy

A great album. Herbie reminds us why he's one of the finest Rhodes players in jazz. Guy

His contributions to Miles Davis's Dark Magus at Carnegie Hall are really nice, though according to him he had much better performances with that band. Guy

This is the 50th anniversary of the legendary Christmas Eve session at RVG's studio. The session is split across two albums: Obviously any stuff from these CDs is fair game, but I'd like discussion to focus on the 6 tracks recorded on 12/24/54. I'll be posting various links and info as the date approaches. Guy

His playing on the first tune ("Mrs. Parker of K.C.", I believe) is mind-boggling. Other favorites by Roy: the tenor-drums duet on "Impressions" from Trane's Newport '63, Now He Sings Now He Sobs Guy

I haven't heard the whole thing, but "La Fiesta" is smoking. Guy

Gotta disagree. I don't have anything approaching a "complete" Joe Henderson collection, but out of ten CDs of him as a leader, this one is easily the weakest. Guy

More out of print Jackie Mac, Andrew Hill, Bobby Hutcherson would be very welcome. Guy

Not familiar with the band, but this website reviews their albums. Guy

The Chancler group was recorded on almost every date of their European tour -- hardly underrecorded! It's too bad those dates don't have Jack on them, though; the group was better when he was on drums. Guy

Miles had been playing around with static harmony since the early '50s. He experimented with it frequently when Garland was in the band. But that's tangential to the question of whether Miles hired Evans because of the "modal thing". Is there any record whatsoever of Miles intensifying his experimentation with modes while Evans was in the working band? You would think that if Miles really did hire Evans for his comfort in modal context, we would find some recordings from 1958 (live or studio) that reflect this interest. But as far as I know, we don't. Instead, we have a statement years after the fact, in a book which has all sorts of factual issues surrounding it. It's riddled with factual inaccuracies. I'd be interested -- are there any statements from Evans or Miles in 1958 that address the modal question? ...in March 1959, about a year after he first hired Evans, and several months after Evans left the band. Guy

Do you mean to say that contrary to everything I've ever read about Kind of Blue, its not (aside from "Freddie Freeloader" which Wynton Kelly plays on anyway) the breakthrough modal album? Dan, As John L mentions, Kind of Blue was recorded several months after Evans's departure from the band. During Evans's tenure in Davis's working group, the group had a similar live repertoire to that when Garland was in the group. The "jazz track" studio session with Evans didn't include any modal pieces. It's definitely plausible that Miles hired Evans because he had a different approach to the piano than Garland. But there's absolutely no recorded evidence that he did so because "Evans was into the modal thing." Guy

I think it's worth taking anything Miles said with a grain of salt -- particularly stuff he said 4 decades after the fact. I think Miles' explanation is pretty straightforward and there's no reason whatsoever to injest grains of salt with it, four decades after the fact or not. Modal playing was the new thing, it wasn't Red's bag anyway, he found what he wanted ... Except that AFAIK, Miles didn't record a single modal tune during Evans's actual tenure in the band. Guy

I think it's worth taking anything Miles said with a grain of salt -- particularly stuff he said 4 decades after the fact. Guy

Jim, I hope everything turns out alright. Keep us posted. Best wishes, Guy

In fact, "Flamenco Sketches" and "Spanish Key" have similar frameworks -- each soloist rotates through a series of scales during their improvisation. Guy

Praise the lord, the Warriors finally won a game. They play the Bobcats one more time this season so they'll finish at least 2-80. Guy

AND stuff was closed off too. Not such a simple "forward" progression. It took Miles about a decade to "rediscover" the blues. What about the Kelly/Chambers/Cobb band? Guy

I CAME TO THIS SITE LOOKING FOR NUDE PICTURES OF YOKO ONO WHERE ARE THEY???!??!? Just kidding. Guy