fasstrack

79. I heard him interviewed for his 77th on WKCR FM, Sept., '07

Wow. That title takes me back. When I first discovered jazz as a teen I went to the library and read all I could. also read liner notes as I listened. That 'Jazz Masters' series I was glued to then. Turned out listening alone would've been sufficient, as I developed an unrealistic image of what good music was according to these writers, and in some way tried to play that way, probably---in youthful naivete. Also the more musicians I met that knew the subjects, the more they tended to scoff and say this or that about so-and-so was BS. I took their word and am glad now I did, if only to develop a sense of critical evaluation and not believing everything in print. Writing by musicians themselves, as Bill Evans' thoughtful liner notes for Ben Webster/Joe Zawinul: Soulmates, can be quite illuminating. But I'm admittedly prejudiced. I currently read only autobiogs or biogs, or musician interviews. The facts of someone's life, craftfully and entertainingly told (Paul Desmond's writing, for example) can be very much worth reading. I especially like gig stories, they can be fun. Of course, musicians themselves have been known to be disingenuous, so the same caveat applies. FWIW I don't seem all that interested in musical analysis by professional writers, as I find myself shaking my head a lot. They seem to get it wrong too often. The critics/historians aren't useless at all, but can take you down some wasteful musical roads, especially while young. But we all have to learn by trial and error. However, I wouldn't mind reading some of this stuff again, knowing what I know now. Good stuff in there, no doubt.

Me like too. Still, anarchy is a bit inconveniant when playing in a group. Taste and growth (not the kind Dr. Van Nostrand removes) is one thing, the 'path of least resistance' in organized groups having to survive in the brutal music biz, sadly another. It's really a miracle---or close---when innovation (to me in large part improvement people embrace) happens and things actually change.

'Strophic'-based is the only kind I know. But what I don't know can fill several volumes. Anyway I have my hands full trying to master that type of song. One lifetime ain't enough........

That's right. I remember Neloms playing with Percy. Percy's band got fired (not sure why, but I heard he stuck up for guy in the band and the owner just fired everybody. He told the bandleader he'd fire me if I kept sitting on my amp) before they hired this drummer Honeyboy to lead. I got called to do it by the pianist on it, Chris Townes, who I had played with at an after-hours joint of which you had to be frisked to enter. I saw MFs inhaling from what appeared to be blowtorches and turned out to be my first exposure to what I learned was crack. Chris's brother is Sonny Henry. He wrote 'Evil Ways'. Yeah, it was blues in C. All night. In two tempos: shuffle and slow. Still it was great to work with him---though he was in a wheelchair and in poor health. I checked out a video some years later featuring him in his prime and it was really incredible.

oh, my. That is sad.

Sad if that is so. I saw some pictures on his website. He honestly didn't look good: overweight and sallow. Hope he's OK. I didn't think he was 80+. You sure of that?

That first statement says a mouthful. With your permission I will steal it. Re: the song form: Good for you. Glad I'm not the only old fart........

Don't forget the horn players also emulate human voices, e.g.: Johnny Hodges, Ben Webster. John Coltrane sounds like a blues singer to me. I think we're all trying to 'sing' in our ways. BTW: nice compliment, but I'll never approach the quality of Jimmy in this lifetime.The only player I've hung with that is in the drawer behind Jimmy IMO is Eddie Diehl, who I played with, as well as playing with Jimmy as student and admirer, for years and can vouch that he's that good to be almost as good as Jimmy---and there's still quite a gap. Doesn't stop me from trying to 'catch' Jimmy in one way, though: Not that I would copy, I've absorbed him years ago as a major influence and have a style made up of many things/influences including many of my own thoughts----but he generally set the bar so high that we have a gold standard to work towards. He's a great study and great artist IMO. I started out as a teenage blues player, BTW. By the time I worked with Big Joe Turner, though he dug me I was too 'jazz' for Doc Pomus----who was running the show---and he canned me. That's Show Biz........

Indeed. Good one. I think Benny Powell, who is 1/2 the front line w/T.K. Blue in Mr. Weston's group, is getting close to the 80-yard-line also.

Ed Bickert. I speak from experience as a guitarist, do you? It doesn't invalidate your opinion if you don't play guitar but I can't in good conscience take it as seriously as my own or another guitarist that has to solve these problems. Others may disagree according to taste, but it's quantifiable that solid bodies are in a different league than hollow, no sound w/o amp, require a different touch, offer not as much depth sonically, especially in the bottom. They play well, sustain better (they are better for louder situations, like, say an organ trio where the amp becomes more important. I find they don't blend as well w/elec. pianos and the two instruments become less distinguishable) and have the advantage of no feedback but you miss a lot of warmth and, more critically, the simulation of an air column most true jazz guitarists desire, since, when soloing, we basically take our phrasing and vocabulary from horn players---the really good ones anyway--from Charlie Christian on. (Of course I include myself as an example in approach, not achievement, as it is for others to judge my merits---but I absolutely want to play/extend that tradition)This is much harder to pull off without the fatness of an archtop. This next statement is especially subjective, but IMO players that settle for a flatter, less live sound I find are also usually are hung up in guitar licks and not trying to deal with the level of the greatest players like Jimmy Raney. Listen to Jimmy play, you can almost hear him 'breathe'. I don't deal with less than the warmest I can sound myself, though I enjoy solid bodies for what they are. Had several, and semi-hollows too. Telecasters are not Jazzmasters. Much better instrument. I had a George Harrison model for many years---and loved it. Ed Bickert sounds great on it, but also has a light touch and plays in situations where blasting is not required, and therefore can keep the volume down and get a great sound. The sustain is also very suitable to his chordal approach. Joe Pass made the Jazzmaster sound good b/c he was...........Joe Pass.

I think (I guess it's pretty obvious) that you could roughly translate that statement into commentary on all kinds of 20th-century music, from jazz to punk rock. And what kind of music is produced by a way of life produced by a certain kind of music? And what new music is emerging now, from the culture of hyperspeed interconnection and shard-strewn landscape of modernist/postmodernist texts? Beyond a fair-ish amount of new jazz (of all sorts) and a smattering of new indie-pop, I haven't really been paying enough attention. (Beware, Mr. Jones! ) Let's face it: every sector, every culture---especially in the arts---is rife with poseurs, wannabes, and copycats. The genuine voices and men/women of integrity are rare---and usually pay dearly for said integrity. Anyone telling me the jazz world is any different will get a hearty snicker from this 30-year veteran of it. Phoniness is as inexpensive, seemingly, as it is common. The Man in Black was such a man of integrity, as still is, blessedly, the great Pete Seeger. They are about keeping it real right down the line, and, as such, do not suffer fools, misrepresenters, or liars. They also have a rare gift of combining original, distinctive voices with an empathy that resonates with the vox popular. I also would rather hear Johnny Cash tell a story than many if not most 'jazz' players on the current scene---especially the self-absorbed ones who bore my ass off with a million choruses of what they practiced that afternoon with Aebersold records, and can't---or won't---relate to either audience, fellow players, or pretty much anything other than their all-important and suspect 'creativity'. It ain't about 'country' or 'city', anyway, but what's common in the human experience. Those who speak to it with artistic skill and accomplishment are artists. To address the rather distasteful matter of contemporary life and get it over with quickly: people nowadays are buffaloing themselves into thinking they are 'connected' in this atomized, faster-than-light-but saying nothing 'wired' culture. They certainly are not. To quote an old Billy Crystal SNL skit: 'I'm nauseous already'......But, not to worry, 'this too shall pass'. The more thoughtful of the young that grew up on the Net know something's missing and will figure it out. Everything will get back to basics anyway. It always does, that's a guarantee. Finally, all things being connected, when I saw this thread the other day, one thing led to another and I arranged Folsom Prison Blues for my trio. We will play it on an upcoming gig.

Yeah? My dad can beat up your dad........... I'm 54, biting hard on 55 and feel 84. (sigh and/or kvell)

Yeah, that's the video. Sound is awful but Joe sounds great. I hope that isn't Arnold Ross. Sounds kind of mediocre whoever it is. Not terrible, just boilerplate. Bass and drums are good, though. Good bass solo on the blues. They have a comments feature and I asked who the personnel are. It's either Arnold Stinson or Gary Peacock on bass, I believe.

BTW I have no dictionary here. Is it octo or octagenarian?

Just had my first Cerveza Mexacali beer. Viva Zapata!!

Happy birthday in advance. I forgot Bob Brookmeyer, also a kid at around 78. I was friends with the great Bill Finegan, who we lost at 91 last June. James Chirillo and I both studied with him and he was very dear to us and to American music. He wasn't in great health and losing his wife was a real setback, but his mind was razor-sharp and he kept writing---and did three charts for Warren Vache on a recent record that are as good as anything he ever did. Chirillo conducted and played on it. His son told me he has stacks of piano music by dad that is great. Speaking of Brookmeyer, he also considered Bill a hero and called him every day after Rosemary passed away.

I think you're talking about the 1st 8 bars. It's hard to pin down since a lot of that harmony is culled directly from classical music, especially Chopin and Romanticism generally. The themes could be from anywhere. They're playing in thirds. which is wide open as to influence. That very last fragment of melody of the last 8 does sound like a theme from Carmen, but it's really up for grabs. It ends on a flat 5. You're getting into areas of harmony that are subject to interpretation. This is all off the top of my head. I'm hearing it in my head, the music's not in front of me. The last 4 of the intro is pure bebop with the flat 9 or flat 5, have to check, and the syncopation of the last three notes. It's a hell of an intro any way you slice it.....

It's really gratifying and wonderful to see so many of our leading musicians playing and writing vital music well into their 80s (and beyond, as in Hank Jones). It's really a unique time in jazz history and shows how music keeps us young. Benny Golson, Billy Taylor, James Moody, Teddy Charles, Terry Gibbs, Clark Terry-----for openers. Then there are 'youngsters' Barry Harris and Phil Woods, both 78. It's not just that they survived or sound great for old men. They're playing and writing their asses off! And they survived.......

I'm confused now. The album I know has Wynton Kelly and, I'm pretty sure, Lee Morgan and is called 'the New York Scene'. Great article, BTW. Kelly's on piano, but Art Farmer - not Lee Morgan - on trumpet. Three quintet sides w. Golson & Farmer. Thanks. I used to have that. They play You're Mine, You as Benny's feature.

Thanks. Hope to see you. I'm trying to get a group off the ground with two superb musicians: Tim Givens on bass and cello, and Vanderlai Perriera on drums. We worked twice in January and rehearsed once last month. We think we have something nice and need some work. I have a lot of nice material and we at least hit the tip of the iceberg that rehearsal. People will sit in a bit last set, not too much. I want to feature the guys (and my own playing, too, I guess). But I always make the tunes and presentation the main attraction. I want to write some things to feature Tim on cello, he is superb----one of the best I've heard. Plus he knows every tune I call. Vanderlai is a tremendous talent with great ears, Brazilian, with his own take on jazz.

I'm confused now. The album I know has Wynton Kelly and, I'm pretty sure, Lee Morgan and is called 'the New York Scene'. Great article, BTW.

That wasn't my point. I'm a guitar player. That's not an instrument worthy of a player like Joe Pass. Doesn't have the warmth of a good archtop. Thin sound, no bottom, no depth. Can't be heard without an amp. It's not a guitar for a jazz player. But he made it sound good, and adjusted his touch b/c you can't play heavy or 'plink' with the pick on those solid bodies. It sounds horrible. Anyway, his playing on that cheap, shit guitar is actually my favorite of all of his. Just amazing control, great ideas, great energy and swing, and he made that thin sound with the light strings sound like a million bucks by adjusting his touch.

I heard and actually listened to Bakida Carroll the other day. They were playing him on the radio just like you play and turn people on to people previously unaware. Anyway, I dug him, especially his writing. One recording was called the Cage Door or something. It was intense. I liked Tomaz Stanko (not enough not to murder his name, apparently...) also after being turned on by IMO one of the best stations programming jazz anywhere: WKCR FM. You guys do such a service for musicians and fans. Contribute to Blue Lake, y'all. (I'm off the hook, living in NY, but youse.....

Was he on the video w/Joe around '60 or so? There was a TV show and they played "The Song is You" and "Sonnymoon For Two". It turned up on a video called The Genius of Joe Pass, also including a lot of solo performances, something with Ella, and duos with NHOP. But those first two tunes are scary. On a little toy Fender someone gave him just so he could play. Burning, and no wonder he scared even Wes, who declined sitting in back then. He was that good. Sounds of Syananon is a jazz guitar classic IMO. It really doesn't get better---unless it's Django or CC. Every solo he plays is so joyful and swinging and his articulation and chops with the pick are on the highest level. Good band, too. fasstrack, check out the video posted on the Night Lights Resolution: Jazz From Rehab program page... Is this the one you're talking about? Couldn't open it. Shitty, pirated wifi connection and a slow computer. I'd like to see it eventually though. Thanks, buddy.