Rabshakeh

I think that's right. The Artistry in Rhythm band is definitely soloist-centric. I spent the morning listening to other Kenton, which might have motivated my description. I think that the Kenton of the jazz history books is basically the Artistry in Rhythm Kenton. That's the closest to the bebop-friendly big band leader that he gets described as being. Otherwise he really is closer to some sort of "Big Band Plays Stravinsky" thing along with City of Glass, which is a Thing (even if not necessarily much of a jazz Thing) if find the AiR band records the most intelligible. l just googled the band. I see the internet is a bit lukewarm. Is this something worth investigating or is it more of a what could have been?

Those look great! Thank you.

I think your definition of getting their start there might be too. Put it this way, my understanding is that almost a whole generation of (white) jazz musicians rose to prominence as Kenton band members. I find it hard to understand because Kenton's music seems not very easily likeable to me.

That's interesting. There's something in the view (I think @Teasing the Korean's) that Kenton is not really jazz but actually more akin to the other trends in progressive / space age orchestral music. Many Kenton records seem further divorced from something like Woody Herman than the likes of Sinatra's jazzy big band records. There's more Stravinsky in there than Benny Goodman. He's a huge name in the 50s, and, whilst I was being silly above, a very large number of A listers got their starts in his bands.

Stan Kenton – Kenton / Wagner Just hilarious. Let's take Ride of the Valkyries and play it in the most lumpen way possible. You know what this needs, lads? Latin percussion.

Stan Kenton – Kenton Live From The Las Vegas Tropicana This one is a bit more direct.

Thanks!

I find it strange how much smaller Herman's presence is on LP compared to Kenton. Tonnes of famous Kenton records. Just a couple of singles comps for Herman.

Stan Kenton And His Orchestra – Live At Redlands University This one at least just sounds like a late 70s / early 80s professional big band record. Maybe that's because it influenced those records (if you believe the Wikipedia page).

Seems to me like it's been a quietish year this year for interesting new releases. Now that we are reaching 3/4 was through, I'd be interested to know what thread-relevant releases from the last 12 months or so that people have listened to most this year? (I.e., not what people listened to once and liked, but what's been spinning reasonably frequently.)

As a frustrated triangle player, I must acknowledge this one as one of the great records for jazz triangle. Perhaps The Definitive Jazz Triangle record.

Stan Kenton – Standards In Silhouette Stan Kenton – Back To Balboa Not a Kenton fan but listening out of some sort of neurotic duty to acquire knowledge.

As a 90s/00s childe, Stan Kenton has always been the moment in jazz I find most impossible to understand. He is obviously of extreme importance to jazz and how it turned out. He appears in all the books. His bands apparently nurtured the career of roughly (and I am careful not to exaggerate here) 93% of post-war white jazz musicians of note. People loved his music (and in the case of British fans travelled internationally to hear it). But I can't hear a single bit of that. I'd struggle to pick a soloist out, except for squealin' Maynard. With all that dissonance it isn't even a very pleasant listen.

I love a revived thread. Tony Malaby in 2004.

Thanks! Some good answers. Presumably what's good for Zappa is also good for Beefheart.

Whilst we are on Zappa and blues, does anyone know, from interviews or books, what blues musicians most influenced Zappa's own blues writing? His blues tracks generally sound quite similar to each other, but don't sound much like the standard Muddy Waters template that much white blues of the era starts with. (Not intending to say that all white blues of the 60s sounds like Muddy Waters, but, if it isn't MW, it is often quite easy to spot whatever the influence is, whereas here I find it harder. I may just not be familiar.) Howling Wolf's raspier records are obviously in there. Rhythmically I hear Billy Boy Arnold, maybe?

Who bought these? Surely some duck-tailed teenager hoodlum isn't going to suddenly buy a Claude Thornhill record just because it has "rock" in the title? And we're not yet at the post-Beatles stage where parents are buying nicely arranged instrumental versions of those loud rock and pops. Were these solely aimed at well-meaning uncles and grandparents buying mistaken Christmas presents, or something? I've had a listen and it's clearly still big band music, even if it now has a prominent guitar or baritone saxophone playing bass parts. It's actually alright. I weirdly quite like it. Boyd's shaken off Stravinsky, and it's a fairly gentle but danceable arranger's record.

Rudresh Mahanthappa's Indo-Pak Coalition – Apti Revisiting this for the first time since it was released. I don't find that it makes much impression, despite everyone involved being talented. It never gets much of a pulse going.

Hal Stein-Warren Fitzgerald Quintet – The Classic Sessions

Baby Dodds Trio – Jazz A' La Creole

Steve Lacy, Yuji Takahashi, Takehisa Kosugi – Distant Voices

Robbie Williams – Swing When You're Winning Harry Nilsson – A Little Touch Of Schmilsson In The Night A recent run of listening to Keith Jarrett and Anthony Braxton standards records, plus @Teasing the Korean 's recent post about Great American Songbook records has sent me on a popstars doing standards run. In the interests of science, mind. The Schmilsson's pretty good. Very much not a jazz album at all, though.

Yusef Lateef – Hush 'N' Thunder Revisiting this one. It's not his best, really. Lateef seems barely present on his own record. Kenny Barron seems to have written almost everything. Lateef's solos just fade out.

That's a strong recommendation... Thanks! This is the one that caught my eye.

My free jazz listening tends to be directly linked to when my wife needs a lie in.