fasstrack

Oops. Why did I think Brooklyn? Fuhgeddaboutit...........

The funny thing is that young man Julian Lage is a pretty straight ahead player (unless he changed). He started out, I think, winning blues contests, very talented with a stage father. I heard some recent recordings. Very nice and I don't know if he's even hit 20 yet. Never been to the Firehouse, but I rarely venture to Brooklyn these days. I figure I paid my dues: 31 years there---in Canarsie, no less----was enough

OK. I see your game. Good luck picking fights with people into that. I'm not responding to this stupidity.

I'm not gonna get in the mud with you. Be nice or I'll ignore you. I don't get personal with anyone here. If this isn't gonna stay civil and respectful, I got better things to do. I don't care who you knew or didn't know. Be polite to me, as I am to everyone else here and just about everyone else here, or I'll just ignore you. There's absolutely no call for that kind of comment and the terrible taste its in.....

I have to play with these guys and we have to have standards. We all have our pet peeves. Aside from the melody fakers I can't handle 'bangers;---on piano and drums especially. They make the night longer for me. Anyway, when I fuck up, and it's often in my book, other players would be hurting---not helping me---not to point it out.

Reread what I wrote about Ornette please, if you think my statements are intolerant. I'm addressing players working in the realm of the American Song Book and jazz tunes, where I live. I don't presume to judge free players. I met Phillip Wilson after he had been in the Butterfield Blues Band, a band I considered heroes as a youth (or 'yut' to 'My Cousin Vinny'). I heard him on some records with out players I thought were comical (they were trying to be and comical is a good thing). I liked Lester Bowie's cover of 'the Great Pretender'. I think Eric Dolphy's 'Out To Lunch' one MF of a piece and would love to learn it. His playing is virtuouosic and amazing. He could play the shit out of melodies. My point was about guys working in the more traditional fields and not doing their homework, and the fact remains: there are too many fakers of melody, good in other areas, but no cigar. The hardest two things to do in my years: play a melody correctly and with good tone and keep good time. If you can't do that....Chord changes are the frame for the picture to me, and not the main event, but you have to know the right ones---the ones the composer wrote, before taking liberties, otherwise you are also a faker. How can there be any argument there? Every player (not to mention singer) I know knows this. So before you take this as a slam on the avant garde please look carefully at what I write. It's not cavelier, but carefully considered after many years of observation/participation. Also, I don't know why you mention yourself and your mastery of melodies. I never heard you play and never uttered a peep about you. I'm sure you play quite well. Let's not take things personally here. It ain't that serious, anyway---though we all are passionate and well-meaning. I mean there are nuclear weapons pointed at each other, fer Chrissakes.......

You miss my point, my good friend. It's not about copying, playing your own or someone else's licks, but being at a professional level to cut gigs, and that includes knowing tunes and how to read and please a room (read: not just being there for you), for openers. I heard Kalaparush playing on the street (where I'm heading right now, BTW). He was playing Corcovado with a beautiful tone. He knows the deal. Why do I get so much resistance here to something so obvious to musicians like myself (the majority of us trying to, yes be creative and grow, but stay in the game)? As far as my earlier point, those of you with ears to, go out, really listen and hear how many jazz players mess up on melodies they should know in their sleep. If you can't hear it I can't help you. And I always will call 'em as I see 'em, being harder on myself than anyone.

You have my vote for the best, funniest, and especially the putting-this-s$%t-in-perspective answer. :rsmile:

Maybe it is too complicated---but it sure as hell should be brought up somewhere, since musicians are catching hell all over. I'd like to hear someone say something that reminds me to keep my faith b/c I really want to. But I know that if you want to play you do. If it's 'under the radar', who cares? As long as it has some use for somebody else, b/c everyone needs to hear music (and I don't believe mere self-satisfaction to be the be-all and end-all, but rather a curse on jazz, and self-inflicted. I know, that's definitely another topic for another day). On another pont: I personally shy away from quoting other players on someone's worth, even if they are giants. Certainly you respect the opinions of your heroes, but in the end it comes down to taste---hugely personal---and living your own life through your own ears. To give a particularly annoying example (not that you're doing this): though I love Barry Harris as a musician and social force in this music, and he has helped me personally over many years, he teaches a class in NY. There is much to e gotten from it, but his sychophantic students drive me nuts with 'Barry says this, Barry says that'....Does Barry hold their wee-wees when they pee? In the end every tub stands on its own bottom---an old saying in jazz.

You knew Bill Triglia? Is he still around? Great guy. He and Eddie Diehl called me one night totally zonked. I was living at home and those crazy greasy MFs woke my dad up like 3 AM. They were listening to a recording Eddie and I made and digging it..... Not everyone can have a jazz career, Allen. It's just not in the cards for some, not a good fit personality-wise, etc. It doesn't mean you forget music or have less value or can't play well anymore. The music biz, and especially the jazz biz, are pieces of $%%& and eat sensitive souls and true artists like Davey or---among countless others---my friend the late Chris Anderson and others alive. It did a hell of a job on me, I know---not that I compare myself to Davey or Chris. The point is it doesn't matter who praised you. There's room only at the top in jazz, and mostly for those with hearts like steel traps. Real artists do what they can when they can---unless they are being kept afloat financially by others or very, very lucky. Davey had to survive and there's almost no way to do that in jazz. I know what he could do, that's not the point. I'd almost bet my left testicle that he walked away from the big time b/c he was burned before. I just have known too many cats like him not to believe that was at least part of it. But please don't think that b/c a guy walks away from the pain and privation of a screwed-up business that he forgot or slacked off on the art. I seriously doubt that happened in this case.

Not true. He played club dates for years. He had a civil service job after that, but still played. I heard his daughter died after tripping on stairs. Very sad. Someone said it took a lot of pain for him to end up the way he did at the end, and I believe him. He was very nice and coherent and had kept his sense of humor, but was definitely the worse for wear, sorry to report. He looked a little off and smelled like a bag person---he actually had a shopping bag with him---and the place I dropped him off was a funky and possibly dangerous project in Coney Island. I'm glad I got to meet him once, though.

I just mention Jaki in that other thread and I agree. Davey Schildkraut: I grew up with his nephew, Alan, who as Alan Childs has been a successful touring drummer with top rock acts and shows and road rat. Davey I met in, of all places, the Cortelyou St. branch of the Brooklyn Public Library. He was talking to some kids doing homework around a circular table and they thought he was nuts. When he saw I had a book on Prez he started talking to me. Luckily for him, I'm equally nuts and I talked back. It didn't take long to find out who he was (I asked) and we did have the connection of Alan besides our association with jazz. We had a nice hang and I wound up driving him home. I asked him about playing on Solar and he said Miles just sang it to him and he learned it on the spot. Then I heard that he died and how, and it was horrible. He also had tragedy while alive, with a daughter dying in a terrible way. Don't know if he was a genius based on meeting him. I doubt it. He sure was a hell of a great player, though. I remember a guy saying he was the best musician he ever met coming out of Local 802.

Yeah. Lennie Tristano. There's a guy who could play the blues......(Sorry, couldn't resist). Yeah, let's agree to disagree and leave this alone. I accept your opinion and I guess you accept mine.

Maybe he was a little of each. I only had the one experience, and he was on a downhill trajectory of which we all know how it ended. I love his music, too, BTW, glad we got to play once, and am sorry he was in such bad shape when I ran into him. Re this 'genius' bit: Don't know if he was a genius. Depends on one's definition, I suppose. The only one I encountered in my life as a professional to date was Jaki Byard. He was really ahead of the curve in his thinking and I saw him in action as a band member for 1 and 1/2 years. Nothing short of brilliant, I am convinced. I guess Tom Harrell probably is one, I met him a few times and never worked with him, but I know what he can do, and he probably does qualify. To hear Phil Woods tell it, there's no question. Joe Cohn has amazing ears and is a thrilling improvisor and can put thirds under a fast complicated melody he's hearing for the first time. He can play back what you just played, the exact voicings. Every musician in the know in NY knows what he can do, myself included. Does this make him a genius? Not sure. Woody Shaw was a powerfully creative and vital musician. And he was very advanced at a young age. Isn't that enough?

Why? People should know about Ram. Maybe a new thread?

Well, you have strong opinions, and I guess you are entitled. You don't have to be a musician to have preferences, just know what you're talking about. I will take it on faith that you do and speak out of passion for this art form, since I have read you before here. But you never justified your claim with chapter and verse and, frankly, musical insights/examples, only gave more opinion. Please do so. (Also, small point: you meant 'reeks' of...., didn't you? I know, I hate when that happens ).

That's a strange statement. On what do you base it, and can you support it? I think his blues were very sparse and wise. Also, "Django", his beautifully conceived piece has a great little blues sequence toward the end, which ties the whole thing together and provides contrast with the other sections. Also, wasn't that John Lewis playing the intro to "Parker's Mood"? I heard several takes and they all were great, and very different from each other.

My personal favorite, usually in print journalism: 'No new ground was broken here, but....' I always wanted to mail one-o-them yo-yos a shovel, or bring them to a ne new building ceremony..... Also I got a chuckle out of 'he worried notes'.....I believe from the muscular, dark, and impressive pen of Peter Watrous. WTF? Did the note acquire a complex after? 'Everyone's in Show Business', I guess.....

Yeah, he was a real funny character. I remember he came to a rehearsal for George Kelly's Jazz Sultans and he was cutting an apple with a pocket knife and he kept eyeing me with this hilariously mad glint---like he was gonna cut me next! He was the first guy to tell me I was a 'hustler'. I never thought I was, and he meant it as a compliment. All musicians have to take care of business and ourselves, and that's what he undoubtedly meant. He also said I played with 'gusto'. He had a way with words, and was a musician's musician. Probably he was much an original as Prez in his personal style. In his day it was not at all unusual---in complete contrast to the current scene. I did play one radio broadcast with Ram on KCR in the early 80s, probably for a fundraiser or a yearly day-long event. It's in the tape archives somewhere, along with an airshot with George and several other performances I remember doing with people like Jimmy Lewis and Percy France, who was also a lovely man and wonderful, swinging tenor player. He did much to help me early on, including recommending me to George. I also met Eddie Durham, who just about invented my instrument, there. Very nice guy, too, and obviously my respect runs very deep. So many memories are flooding in now: Oliver Jackson, Walter Bolden, Johnny Carisi-----who I heard Jo Jones with my own ears tell to 'go to Florida and get a suntan if you wanna play with me' before he kicked him off the stand. Those guys were always there. That was the West End. A great place for a young cat to get schooled........... Anyway, I did much enjoy Ram's crisp and attentive accompaniment style. He was not confident as a pianist and I never understood why. But he was a great guy and character and I'm proud I knew the composer of Lover Man. The West End scene was the last hurrah for swing in NY and I was very lucky.

Probably. But two wrongs......make three wrongs----or something. Trust me, the stories beside my own are not nice ones----and that's all I'm saying. I'll not put the business of others on the street. Like I said, let's focus on the music. It's the greatest teacher.......... That's not my point. My point is that he no doubt got hit head-on by some full-force human evils during the course of his life and didn't "withdraw" or anything, he kept on doing it and became the giant that he became, asshole or not. In 500 years, if he is remembered at all, will it be as an asshole or as a badass? Most likely the latter, no? If all we study is "the music", then we never learn how to deal with mega-force assholes, of which there are many, and among whom have resided some of The Greatest Ever. So let's do study The Evil That Men Do as well as The Great Music They Make, and let it make us stronger, more resilient, and hopefully, less likely to represent the unseemly ourselves. If you train yourself to habitually avoid assholes who are also great artists (as opposed to simply learning self-defense skills), you'll miss out on more than you save. In my opinion. Whatever.....like I said, art has a lot of the answers to life's problems. I believe that. We have to listen louder......and to the right things. Like I said, my one (actually two, and the first one was more positive) less-than-nice brush with Woody has nothing to do with my appreciating his playing. We have to be bigger than that, than to let someone's BS or personality get in the way of what they may have to offer----in this case, a lot. Example: Just tonight on a bandstand I was invited to sit in at I had to deal with extremely claustrophobic space, an owner much less nice than he needed to be to a guy like me----bringing something good to his joint, and it no friggin' charge, other distractions. I chose to dig a little deeper and listen to the music----the cats on the stand, the music I responded with. It came out OK, good time had. We have to listen louder---and weed out BS----if we are to survive, let alone musically prosper. Further, I know several really dark people I don't want to be friends with anymore b/c they want to wallow, and deposit the clouds continually looming over their heads over mine. No way. No more. On this topic one told me that b/c Ram Ramirez insulted her she would never again play Lover Man. Gimme a MFin' break. Know what I mean? (not to mention bullshit. I knew and played with Ram from the West End days, he was a great guy, and one of the underrated pianists IMO). This pursuit is not for the faint of heart. If one isin the music field, especially a sector as thankless and impoverished as jazz, if one is not ready to deal with unhappy, maladjusted people, boy is it gonna be a long (metaphoric) night........ PS: Actually, the above aberrational story notwithstanding, I've been incredibly lucky, I guess. I find musicians to be almost uniformly good, if not great, people. I mean musicians, not poseurs (and there are plenty of those, Lord knows I've come to realize I have a great and rich life. The cats have been the best. That's likely b/c they learned their lessons not only from their peers and betters, but music itself.

Woody Herman got run over by the IRS, not a train. That is a classic.

BTW: to answer the poor thread-starter's original query: It was the L train. I took that train every day for many a frickin' moon. Origin: Rockaway Parkway, Canarsie, Brooklyn. Terminus: 14th Street, 8th Ave, the Mango, US of A.