Rabshakeh

I was listening to Pieces of Dreams on Fantasy (1974) today. Turrentine's a favourite of mine, but the experience of listening to this one really stood out. The setting is so crass and saccharine as to be almost unpleasant, and yet in spite of that it's actually a good record, simply because there's one man with a horn who knows how to turn this stuff into gold. It's all in the way that Turrentine will ride the slick smoothness for just as long as he wants and then suddenly lunge into a honk or a blues lick, just as it gets ethereal. You can follow what he's doing and respond to it at a gut level - but you can never quite predict it.

Just finished: Stanley Turrentine - Salt Song (CTI, 1972) Now ruining the mood with this: Music Revelation Ensemble - No Wave (Moers, 1980)

It was available from Jazzwise's website for a while. I thought it was a good list overall.

I liked this one too. A joyful take of free jazz history, up to that point.

Thank you for this. Sadly, key word for me is "singer".

Interesting looking one. I don't know it.

Henry Kaiser - Aloha (1981)

Jack DeJohnette's Special Edition - Tin Can Alley (ECM, 1980)

Evan Parker - Conic Sections (Ah Um, 1993)

Which was it? I’ve been trying to find it.

Thanks!

Ruby Braff - George Barnes Quartet - Live At The New School (Chiaroscuro, 1974) I'm going to need a couple more recommendations...

Thank you

I've been meaning to ask about Ruby Braff. What three would you pick for a beginner?

Currently on this mad one: Arturo Sandoval - Tumbaito This is my first time with pre-defection Sandoval. It's pretty... maximalist.

Really sad news.

That's true. I'm always impressed when I go on Reddit and the people there have a completely different set of ideas about jazz to those that I've encountered elsewhere. I'm sure it's true anywhere you go.

I should add that in terms of acknowledging the diversity of jazz, there's really no one out there writing like our own @AllenLowe, although his books to my knowledge are all up to the 1950s.

Seconded

These are just great.

Joe Farnsworth - Time to Swing (Smoke Sessions, 2020)

Rock music and "bands" have been dead for over a decade now, with a narrative that ended mid 90s at the latest. But the recent cultural revivals, temporary as they have been, have been of emo, 00s indie / sleaze and 00s pop. I'm not sure that these revivals are any more meaningful that a Blue Note coffee table book, jazz rap record or Gap advert, but it's telling that they're all from solidly outside the era of the rock narrative. Regardless, jazz is obviously dead from a wider cultural perspective (well, maybe). It doesn't mean that people who continue to follow its development should not remember what has happened in its recent history. That point doesn't follow from the first. Reggae is much deader than jazz, but reggae fans aged 22 still know Scientist, Beenieman and Vybz Cartel and those names show up frequently on e.g. introductory listicles or guides to reggae. Jazz has no equivalent ingroup cultural memory in relation to the period between its wider popularity and the present.

I’m not sure that any jazz has made a “cultural splash” since Sinatra and the Beatniks. I’m talking about in group recognition only. If we’re going by wider cultural recognition then the latest jazz is meaningful is surely the early 1960s. Certainly not Marsalis.

Agree with all this. I think that there's diversity even in the earlier stages - the older narratives were largely created by ignoring it, but it was there. Certainly each era has certain themes, concerns and ideas that are discenerable, a recent musical history with which to grapple, and technological and social issues that are specific to it, but I think that narratives are only helpful for orientation. Even in prime narrative territory, how would one account for the Gigi Gryces, Ben Dixons, Buddy Collettes and all the others doing their own thing in a way that appears normal at the time but happens not to form the majority approach for the following cohort and it's dominant critical apparatus? In general terms, I think that an approach that concentrates on themes might be better. I was impressed by Bill Shoemaker's book on 1970s Avant Garde jazz for precisely that reason. You can see themes in the period after the 1980s. Off the top of my head, you could point to: the bop revival; 80s funk and M base; the smooth/quiet storm, neo soul and various hip hop crossovers; the vanguard's rediscovering the Tradition; three generations of neo traditionalists and their gradual movement away from conservatism; the strange popularity of the AEC and WSQ; the growth of importance of institutions and festivals; the reissue era; the growth of importance of jazz education; Blue Note's retrospective domination; harmolodic funk; 90s free jazz revival; 90s swing revival (gag); older statesman groups like Motian's, Holland's, DeJohnette's or Jarrett's; ultra dry 1980s fusion; the Visionfest crowd in NY; the opportunities for larger statements in CD boxset era; the appearance of hard bop genre work like Eric Alexander; mopey po-faced piano music with Nirvana covers; ECM becoming a genre; jazz becoming cool again and then uncool again, twice; downtown stuff; Ken Burns and the influence of the Lincoln Center; etc. etc. None of it adds up to a narrative but there's enough there to hang your hat on. I think the problem is partly down to the size of jazz's audience - which is too small to allow for knowledge to pass down between listeners - and a critical viewpoint, aided by institutional and market forces, that doesn't move past 1982 and so doesn't really educate about the intervening period. The result is that each generation of jazz lovers is into music up to 1970/1982 and then whatever happened to be happening at the time it was paying most attention. As to the ongoing revival of interest in the 1970s, I don't see it as narrative driven so much as by an explosion of interest in those parts of the 70s bop and free jazz ecosystems that are now being dubbed "spiritual jazz", which has then overflowed to the rest of 1970s jazz.

Steve Lacy - Dreams (Saravah, 1975) Not true of the whole record, but to my ears the opening track "The Uh Uh Uh" sounds very much like electric era Ornette Coleman.