Big Beat Steve

So I figured ... I listened to those two Jazz Goes Baroque LPs for the first time in my very early record buying and collecting days in the 70s when I was about 16 or so and my mother more or less "made" me listen to it "now that you have become interested in jazz" because "this is what jazz is" (from her point of view, having come from classical music, of course, and never having truly been a jazz fan, but rather branching out into "third stream" to add some coloring to one's listening habits ... ). Needless to say I found it very odd ("wacky in your language? ) and un-jazzy, having at that time been all into swing, oldtime jazz and only just beginning to explore Bird and Diz. When I picked up those records a while back I gave them a casual listen (and pulled out the first one today again). For the reasons mentioned earlier it doesn't strike mas that odd anymore (though these discs will never be anywhere near my "desert island" jazz), and the overall sound, instrumentation, harmonies and interplay somehow makes for a very 60s-ish sound mix of chamber jazz, "advanced classics", movie score, and IMO somehow some of the tracks would not even have sounded all that out of place as a "progressive" lounge music background to a cocktail-sipping get-together in the 60s (at least the way we imagine this today).

I got the LP of the first one last year ... and just last week got the CD twofer with them: whacky stuff! I have first (German) pressings of the two LPs shown above (took them over from my mother who was into that classical-music-cum-jazz "third stream" stuff in the 60s - MJQ, Loussier et al. if you know what I mean ...). Will have to give them a closer listen again to see what it actually is all about. What I remember from listening to the first one of the two is that it isn't all that "wacky" if your ears are somewhat tuned to the very early Horst Jankowski piano/harpsichord-cum-woodwinds recordings (done LONG before that Black Forest nonsense), for example. As for the overall feel, it's not all that difficult to see what TTK finds in them ...

Not really. On the contrary, I try to see and judge such statements in the context of their time. Which is what prompted me to react to a TODAY's comment on a liner note statement by Whitney Balliett dating back to 1957 in the first place (in fact I am not unduly shocked by this statement, and seen in the context of its time, it isn't even hard to see how such statements came about IMO. It is rather when the impression sneaks up that such period-colored statements are still being upheld today despite everything we ought to have come to get to know better in the meantime that I feel there is a time to argue) . 20 years later those buffoons in the tee shirts were telling their kids that were really "hep" in back in the day, but they never smoked dope. Their kids were thinking "Maybe you should have". Why buffoons? Does it take dope to be really hep (provided all of these kids actualy were clean)? Why so condescending? Why not take them for what they probably just were? Just kids having a good time at a musical event that transcended the usual musical and above all social straitjacket that stiff, stilted, WASP America still was tied up in almost everywhere in 1951 (when that concert took place) in the way the US music market catered to the teenagers wanting to have a music of their OWN? Do you actually think that having one's own teenage music was a privilege of the oh so progressive 60s youth pop music market or, at best, the post-1955 rock'n'roll scene? The writing had been on the wall well before that time. Those who you call "buffoons" were anything but that. They were trailblazers in that they dared to go attend events (a lot of which were integrated at a time this was far from societally acceptable to white USA) that set the pace for things to come at a time when by far the hugest part of the teenage music listeners feared to tread there even at a mile's distance and preferrred to remain stuck in their "Tennessee Waltz" and "Blue Tango" schmaltz shoved down their throats by an ADULT music industry. (Yes this is one of the very, very few cases where I wish I'd been around back then) Buffoons are those who jump on a rolling bandwagon when there is nothing special anymore about jumping on such a bandwagon and who THEN claim how hip(pie?)-ish they were. Sorry but unless you did an exceedingly good job at hiding your tongue-in-cheek attitude (that may therefore have escaped me) you really missed the mark on that one.

O.K., referring to your post of 05:11, maybe I used somewhat inappropriate terms and maybe this is just a case of using one word instead of another to describe very much the same thing. The bottom line to me is that when I wrote "higher" I basically meant exactly what I understood Larry Kart to mean when he wrote "Rollins was aiming and succeeding at doing something that was both different (allowing for some overlap) and (dare I say?) more", and I'd understand your statement "let's not pretend that there are no empirical differences either. Sonny Rollins not played a helluva lot more notes (and spaces, and tones) than Jay McNeely, he considered and allowed more possibilities in his music as well". If you still object against the word "higher" because this would introduce an inappropriate hierarchy of "better" or "worse", then .. fine. I for one won't insist on that term. Of course this is not a case of modern jazz being automatically "art", though isn't it so that there were jazz scribes in the 50s who'd consider modern jazz being very much up there in the olymp of the performing arts, whereas R&B ... well ... And weren't there jazz musicians who very much preferred to be seen as "artists" as opposed to "entertainers"? To me those terms aren't mutually exclusive but others drew a line somewhere in there, it seems ... As for the Sonny Rollins/Rusty Bryant comparison, I'd agree with you too that one is as much an artist as the other in their own right (though I am not sure if you were primarily thinking of THIS particular LP. Because this would lead us straight back to the honkers and bar walkers corner and whatever they allowed or didn't allow in their music, etc. )

In fact the point I tried to make is just the opposite: Of course Trane would have not been one to "walk the bar", nor Rollins (etc.), and it would have been foolish to expect them to. But I don't think anybody loooking at (and understanding) modern jazz in the 50s would have seen them in such a role ever. On the other hand, judging by what has been written about all those "honkers and bar walkers" (as descendants of Illinois Jacquet or Flip Phillips who had often been accused of vulgarity, ugly tone, etc. in their JATP days too), it was them who were faulted for being primarily entertainers (and wanting to be entertainers, evidently) and not living up to the esthetics of those lovers of jazz as fine art of the 50s. So it was them who were denigrated for not living up to a role model they never set out to aim for in the first place IMO. A skewed perception on the part of the critics, scribes, etc. IMO. And it happened with many jazz writers. I agree modern jazz sax men of the 50s achieved higher levels in jazz as an art form (there is your "more" ) than those R&B sax men did. But for all the technical competence on their instrument the aims and the target crowds of the R&B sax men were quite different, their music served different purposes (within one larger overall framework IMHO) and to anybody broad-minded enough and not focusing very narrowly on one's very own yardsticks there ought to have been room for both after all? Beyond that point, personal taste does come in IMO, but that would be another discussion altogether. (As for that "universal" tag for jazz as dancing and partying music in earlier times - point taken. Make it "generally", O.K.? (With "partying" also including certain brands of jazz jazz being played to a seated audience that was non-dancing but very much drinking-glass clinking, O.K.?) JR Monterose also duly noted )

I think I understood quite well what you meant in your first post referring to the above liner note excerpt. It is not difficult to imagine the kind of gentlemanly bonvivant connoisseur speaking out against whatever would unsettle him in his comfortable personal jazz connoisseurdom. And I certainly would not have thought Whitney Balliett adopted the stance of the "art-conscious intellectual" who sneered at those "lowly, exhibitionistic" sax honkers. But such criticism has been voiced fairly often and typically in jazz circles about these musicians, first about Illinois Jacquet (who chronologically came first) and then about the others. Both in the 50s and later on. And by all accounts there was very much an aura of self-perceived intellectualism about many of those who voiced such criticisms. Now what strikes me as rather funny is that on the one hand there is the bourgeois gentleman speaking out against the alleged "ugliness" and "bad tone" of Sonny Rollins et al,, and then there are the "jazz-as-art-music-only" intellectuals (who'd certainly value Sonny Rollins or Mobley or J.R.Monterose very highly in their shrines of jazz art) using exactly the same invectives to speak out against other saxophonists who in their own playing catered to those who continued to see jazz (and R&B as a subgenre of jazz of the 50s) as a primary vehicle to cater to the dancing and partying audience (just like jazz had universally done in earlier decades). Now if this isn't amusing ... And this exactly is what I meant to hint at when I spoke of personal tastes and terms of reference that color our judgment. Of course those who'd be inclined to take sides in these debates would insist that there are musicians who are above all criticism and there are others who have forfeited any right to indulgence because they have not lived up to the art standards set up by those very critics, scribes (whoever ...). (Guess who'd be in which camp among the musicians named above?) Which is an attitude I for one would find just as objectionable. Project something into a piece of music that this was never intended to be in the first place and wilfully disregard what this very piece of music actually was intended to be (because these intentions evidently do not fit into your own self-perceived framework of what you, the jazz intellectual (no, not YOU in person of course ), would find comforting in jazz) and you are bound to have things all skewed up, particularly since this spells out clearly that those "jazz intellectuals" (for want of a better word) are just as easily unsettled in what they don't feel comfortable with in jazz as those "jazz bourgeois" à la Whitney Balliett are. And they resort to exactly the same clichés of criticism. To bring things full circle, such judgments ARE colored by personal tastes either way, and I'd be VERY wary of anybody claiming any sort of universal truth (and, hence, immunity from criticism) or superiority in their criteria of judgment, particularly since IMO the judgments quoted and evoked here need to be seen primarily in the context of their times..

Yet I wonder ... When exactly the same accusations are raised against Joe Houston, Big Jay McNeely, Chuck Higgins, Hal Singer, the early Willis Jackson, the latter-day Joe Thomas (who actually graced us with a tune called "Tearing Hair" )) and of course Illinois Jacquet or Leo Parker, the voice of what exactly is speaking there? Apart from, possibly, the voice of the oh so sophisticated "jazz-art-for-art's-sake" proponents who sneer at the lowly "exhibitionism" that only goes after the lower instincts of the masses (blissfully neglecting any of the original purpose of jazz music played to a live audience)... See? Look at it any way you want, it all boils down to one's personal terms of reference that determine the angle we use to approach a given subject and to pass judgment.

Just wondering ... Could it maybe be that this "voice of reason" thing is intended to mean that Mobley is not quite that much perceived to have been part of those hard boppers who went to great pains to spread that "Angry Young Men" aura around them (or at least appeared like that to the jazz scribes of the times)? So, relatively speaking, may he just have appeared - correctly or incorrectly - to be more "reasonable" than those all-out "angry" 'uns? Just wondering ... This'un? That section refers to Bill perkins, BTW, and as it happens, Hank "Mobely" is lumped in with Rollins. A product of its time, those liner notes, IMO, and opinions differ anyway, and of course those who are/were on a traditional/"mainstream" kick will see things palatable to them in jazz differently than those who, for example, by their own admission have seen the light in jazz when experiencing free jazz firsthand. Nothing wrong with either approach but isn't this how attitudes and approaches to the subject on hand are formed and passed on after all?

Actually, John, back in my university student days in the early 80s I fancied buying such a contraption for the 50s classic I used almost daily then (although these car record players would literally mill away the grooves of your 45s over time). But at about 250 Deutschmarks for a good working one - a PHILIPS Auto Mignon, the (relatively speaking) most common one here in Europe - it was out of reach for my student's purse, and by now average prices for a comparable one have quadrupled, so still nothing doing - as long as a minimum of common sense prevails ... Seems like he has seen the (strobe?) light.

Pleased to hear straight from the horse's mouth of the wise that I am quite normal after all in my vinyl listening. Because in fact I regularly do drive around in a classic car indeed.

+1 :tup You nailed it.

Doctor Blues! Panama!! Feeling The Spirit!!! Jersey Lightning!!!! :tup :tup

So you'ved got the ground covered for 20s Armstrong, Oliver and Morton? That would be important to know because that already is a wide field. Any preferences or personal favorites from what you've heard there? Generally speaking, if you want to try a wide field and get a general taste of 20s jazz, why not try one those very broad-minded compilations such as Vol. 1 (1900-27) and 2 (1927-34) of Allen Lowe's "That Devilin Tune" box sets? Each has 9 CDs, and the track selections are very eclectic and not what you would consider a "All Time Evergreens" compilation of jazz from that period but they cover a very wide field and there is good reason behind each of those track selections. Listening to compilations such as these that also cover the ground outside the rut of the obvious might help you explore the whole range of jazz (well, almost ...) from that period and find out for yourself which kind of artists/bands/orchestras you would like to investigate in greater depth later on. Another important aspect: Pre-1925/26 recordings that were recorded acoustically and not electrically can sometimes be rather demanding to listen to (remastering - GOOD remastering - notwithstanding). The fidelity just is "different". Are your ears tuned and adjusted to that? Because if listening is a chore you won't get that much enjoyment out of it. And that also dictates any recommendations that you might find useful.

Me too. They tried to turn me into a rightie in primary school in the second half of the 60s but never succeeded. The last one to try was my dumbass biology teacher when I was 10-11. No dice ...

The one Uptown release that impressed me most was the FIRST I ever bought: SERGE CHALOFF! What impressed me most about it at the time (of course this is a standard set by all the Uptown releases) is the ability of this label to REALLY fill gaps in discographies, its extremely thorough liner notes, and of course the music (which in this case struck even more of a chord with me because it was something way off the modern jazz reissue/resurrection rut of the umpteenth hard bop item ). I am very, very satisfied with all the other Uptowns I have since bought, but my favorite ones are those by Dodo Marmarosa, Allen Eager and Sonny Clark. Bird and Diz at Town Hall are a class by itself, the Mingus is fine (but as some tracks had been around elsewhere before it wasn't quite that much of a totally new experience), and I must admit I haven't dug deeply into the Hank Mobley CD yet.

Maybe a sort of continuation of this anthology of Spanish jazz? http://www.freshsoundrecords.com/jazz_en_barcelona_1925-1965_-_grabaciones_historicas_3_cd_boxset-cd-4359.html

Just so that it be said: Clunky & Jeffcrom, please don't feel like you are just dialoguing among the two of you only. I for one do check out this thread regularly and keep marveling at the 78s originals you keep digging up (including the label and album cover shots). While I have a good part of the music you are discussing (20s dance bands and very early blues possibly excepted), it is on reissues, of course, and my collection of 78s is light years away from yours and there is not really much new to be found and added these days anymore over here (and I don't feel like taking chances at having 78s shipped across the pond anymore) so I cannot really contribute much. But by all means keep up your input!

+1 :tup

Yes it is even more tragic if someone you KNOW is affected. Another added tragedy in all this is that unfortunately it is only too likely that this won't change a thing about that gun toting cult in too many places in the USA. All the deaths suffered in such amok nightmares are so very senseless but maybe some of the deaths would not be totally and utterly senseless if at least they served to shake up society at large and get people to think, to REALLY think the underlying attitudes critically over. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/14/opinion/why-we-let-the-school-shootings-continue.html?_r=0 ""]¶ I came to realize that, in essence, this is the way we in America want things to be. We want our freedom, and we want our firearms, and if we have to endure the occasional school shooting, so be it. " Shocking ...

I put my LPs in racks along one wall of my music room. Not much dust settling there even in those corners where I don't often touch the LPs so they don't get shifted (as it happens, in most of the bottom row). Occasional vacuuming with the open tube will take care of what noticeable dust there might settle in corners and crevices. My 45s are in smaller (open) boxes along the top of the shelves near the ceiling but not much dust settles there either though many of these boxes often don't get shifted (picked over) for a long time.

Now for some a little bit meatier sounds that go with this hat too:

Uh oh ... did Chewy usurp Chuck Nessa's account??

it depends on to what extent you would rate Benny G's larger 1948/49 lineups as "bop" lineups (they do figure on many of the bop-influenced BG reissues), but to the best of my knowledge, guitarist FRANCIS BEECHER also is still around. (He incidentally also was on the April 14, 1949, SEPTET session lineup that also included Wardell Gray, Doug Mettome, Clyde Lombardi etc. so should indeed qualify as part of the "bop GROUP" members). Many of you will unwittingly will have heard Francis Beecher often through the years: In fact he is FRANNIE Beecher of Bill Haley's Comets (do I hear anybody yell "heresy"? ) fame and appeared on most of his hit records as well as in his movies etc. Only a few years ago he finally retired from the lineup of the revived Comets (that regularly toured all over the world) due to health reasons but AFAIK he is still with us.

His album in the RCA Victor Jazz Workshop series (1956) is a very interesting one. His "Just Too Much" album on RCA (1955), OTOH, really is an oddity in places (and I am NOT talking about the cover artwork! ). Not bad really, but talk bout MM never coming to rest anyplace (see the link above) - maybe Hal Schaefer had his own moments like that at that time too. His version of "All The Things You Are" on that album sure sounds restless to me, as if he wanted it to get it over and done with as fast as possible ... And maybe I'm stating the obvious but others of his albums certainly were a lot less jazzy. Got his "Music That Reminds Me Of You" (UA, 1961) among a batch of others one day. Mood music if you're in the mood for it ("Sweet Sue" with strings all over the place and mildly dissonant piano up front and "Alexanders Ragtime Band" taken at sleepwalking tempo - ouch ...). Some previous owner of my copy seems to have had ambivalent feelings about that one ... two tracks got 5 stars, most were marked "SL" for "slows", and "among My Souvenirs" is annotated "Too slow - even for nite time" whereas next to "Solitude" it says "Pure garbage"! (Though I have a feeling TTK might feel differently about this album ...) At any rate, Hal SChaefer sure got around.

Tell the "Studies In Jazz" series publishers, not Vernhettes/Lindström. As for making niche things "cheap" - be careful. Cutting costs/corners will show up eventually too. Very, very sorry to say this but you ought to know THAT from experience too. Just see the number of glaring errors in the booklets to the "Devilin Tunes" CD series. Yes - this CD series IS great for its musical contents, but don't you think too that the booklets could have benefitted from somewhat more throrough proofreading etc.? (Yes I know the quality of those sets is very, very much OK for your selling price and does offer good value for money but doesn't that prove my above point?) And yes, I know this may not be P.C. to make such statements HERE and I am sorry if my reply appears like a rant about these complaints about pricing but it just is so that I really fail to see why you keep breathing down the neck of the self-publishing authors of the above books. There ARE MUCH more "meriting" targets in the US of A, i.e. a much closer point to START. And in case you keep moaning about the cost of overseas shipping from Europe to the US, that door swings both ways too. Some time ago I ordered a "special interest" niche product book from the 'States where they charged a flat shipping rate of $25 for every book, even if you ordered several of them (which normally would cut on overall shipping costs per item by ANY postal fee scheme). Though I had a hunch an effort to put this in a Global Priority Flat Rate envelope or box could have cut costs, there was nothing doing. I took the plunge anyway. In the end the product was worth it. Same case again last year with another niche book from the same publishers. Relatively expensive shipping on top of the book price but that's the way life is. Take it or leave it. In short, if you feel the book is worth the price (including shipping) - buy it. If you don't then don't. No use whining though. Nobody forces such books upon anybody at gunpoint.