fasstrack

Smart guy, but the first comment is a stupid statement from any angle, and the second is a stupid answer to your question. Cornell West is brilliant but he, i believe, is a very envious person. You mean envious of President Obama? If so you're probably right. He'd have to get in line, though. There's plenty to envy in our president's nonpareil qualities and plenty around to grit their teeth and envy. Except, of course, the gig... Smart guy, but the first comment is a stupid statement from any angle, and the second is a stupid answer to your question. Elucidate me. As the kids I used to teach used to say at times 'I'm confused'. What's a stupid answer, that West said he's a Christian or when Baraka pointed out that Christ died after calling out the moneychangers? Or neither? Anyway, FWIW that is why he died, let's face it. Assuming he was real beyond the Bible.

The problem, Valerie, is that I've heard her. Also, unfortunately, her 'songs'. To each his or her own, I suppose. Sorry to have offended you-and moving on. As the great music critic Snagglepuss put it so many years ago: 'Exit, stage left'.

Valerie: you are quite right! Quelle gauche of moi. Don't know what I'd do w/o you! They DON'T belong in the same sentence. So here are three separate sentences-to run concurrently, since I'm a merciful man: John Pizzarelli sucks. Jessica Molasky sucks. Ezparanza Spalding sucks.

Meant for Allen not Pete C. Sorry. Powder that cue, apply that English and...no caroms please. AS a Walter Brennan bhar2ter averred 'that's dirty pool'..

Okay, thanks for the vote of no confidence on the Fabulous Fying Ps. You respond, though, to a carom shot. What would make pleased as punch (also, I feel, the late. great Hubert Horatio Humphrey who may have supernatural listening abiliity and a love of debate that may well be immorta- and besides hailed from Minnesota-close enough for O) though, would be a response to my query of you right before your port at around 8:18. If you would, good and kind sir.

Allen: why waste bandwith on eye candy flash-in-the-pans of next-to-nada jazz cred who will be forgotten in ten years or less? (sorry, folks, I rarely criticize working musicians-b/c any success is good for the rest-but Ms. Spaulding's 'contribution' IMO ranks 2nd only in annoyability to that lightweight purveyror of 'likeable' mediocrity John Pizzarelli-lest we forget his equally talentless wife Jessica Molasky. Please, oh G-d of Abraham, hear my plea and give Jonathan Schwartz that ear transplant. His insurance doth cover it..). I thought my question to you right before your post germane though. Your response, sir?

Allen: Not sure what you mean re jazz audiences-unless it's pointing out instant white approval of anybody black on the stand, no matter what's going on up there musically. If so, no one needs that, or really wants it. I know the black guys I know hate that shit. Everybody who plays-with the rare exception of the preternaturally insecure and the odd ham-wants the props when a good job was done. Period.

I was talking about what I perceive to be Mr. Thomas's self-respect---and lack of tolerance for bullshit. You kind of have to give it up for that. I was an early casualty, or it felt like it was at the time (1968) of a kind of reverse discrimination when I was not picked to attend the HS of Art and Design in favor of many black kids. Did they deserve to go? I saw at least one portfolio and it put mine to shame. Did they deserve to go and I not to? I wonder. For me it worked out since music is more of a socially interactive pursuit, and it was calling my name around the same time. I wound up playing in groups with black kids and we never thought about any of this shit---just wanted to have fun and loved music. I guess with the visual art thing I 'took one for the team'. But every once in a while, like now, I think back and wonder where life might have taken me had I gotten in to Art and Design.

There never has been a level playing field in employment and never will be. Being against affirmative action is a legit view that is held by many in South Africa. Lucky Dube, the Reggae singer, was continually singing songs against apartheid but as soon as Mandela got in, he began singing songs about self-reliance, the need to educate yourself, and against corrupt police, and affirmative action. To refuse to talk about stuff until an impossible situation comes about isn't a mark of great openness, in my view; it's a loser's argument. MG Could not have said it better. Amen to all, especially the self-reliance piece. It's the one good thing about Americorrupt: sink or swim. Part and parcel of the above, the persecution/prejudice card---even when truth-based---just doesn't play anymore. We're a pretty cold society and people learn pretty quick to either do what it takes to survive or get ahead or find a nice street corner to lay your head and possessions (until the 'bulls' roust you, that is).

Amazing--you've just described every jazz bbs on the planet. But, no, people don't "shut out" jazz because of annoying jazz fans, they don't listen because they don't like it or don't like it enough. It ain't rocket science. Sorry, but that wasn't my point. I meant that people are--IMO---rightfully offended by elitism. If someone comes off as smarter than you chances are you won't want to like what he does or give him a chance as much as someone not above 'connecting' better. Remember a guy named Al Gore? He did a little thing called losing to a guy named W.... The other point is if these discussions were had in public they, in probability, 1. attract jazz nerds and a few flies, or 2. evoke comments such as 'WTF are these guys talking about (including me BTW) and who gives a f#%k?' Nothing like 'preaching to the converted' to get people into the tent of a music with a 3% market share....

Someone posted something about Stanley Crouch's assessment of Baraka---I think a millenium or two ago on this thread. Well, I like Stanley personally. I know a lot of people aren't nuts about his politics (he's actually harder to boil down than we might believe. Lotta surprises). But (I can hear the rope coming out now) I also admire Clarence Thomas in one way, aside from his excrable court decisions: he basically told prospective employers in interviews that if he was being considered for a position b/c of Affirmitive Action they could shove the gig. Anyway that, and certain conversations with Stanley since our friendship began have made me think more about black conservatism and its possible positive place in our society. The desire to be judged for oneself and one's talents, deeds, etc.---period---I think is at the heart of this from what I can surmise, as well as a fervent wish to back away from sterotypes of any kind. Sounds reasonable and healthy to me. Maybe there should be a thread on this?

No offense, and I don't mean to single you out---but it just hit me how inbred this thread is. What jazz nerds we are. If we wonder why people shut out jazz, I submit that perhaps it is because we shut out people. Just a thought....

Wanted to say one thing more: I thought Robin Kelly's biog of Monk one of the best music bios in every way. Just a tremendous and utterly human work. Someone on this board had a problem with some of his statements re the Israeli government's treatment of Palestinians---and posted Kelly's remarks. I am a person of Jewish descent who never has been to Israel and don't wish to talk out of my anus. If anything, just by raw instinct my heart would go out to the Palestinians, b/c I've seen it over and over in my life: oppressed turning into oppressors. But, again, I haven't been there and it is unwise to speculate on a complex situation from a safe distance. I think, though, that even if Mr. Kelly's remarks were offensive, muddle-headed or even wrong one must read him as if one were listening to Wagner, ignoring the garbage and ferreting out the good.

This stuff gets touchy indeed, and it is best to let personal experience---when possible---sort it out. People are not necessarily what they write-or are quoted as saying. And people evolve. Re Randy Weston: I had problems with some statements in Notes and Tones-thinking them anti-white. Specifically he told Taylor 'the white man, all he can do is imitate'. It's there in print. and Black nationalism---however, some would say, then warranted---didn't justify that statement. It spoke for itself. I was perturbed. Then, recently I attended a lecture he gave promoting his autobiog (African Rhythms). Both book and lecture were very worthwhile, though I had to warm to the book. I recommend it. The funny thing is Weston gives full credit and gratitude in the book to a white historian, Marshall Stearns, for turning him on the the African roots of jazz---not to mention getting him some gigs when he was just a dishwasher/cook in the Berkshires. And Mr. Weston warmly received me that day. The books were free (about a $30 value) to the attendees. Finally I lost a dumb job hanging out with him last year when he was honoree at All Night Soul. Another guy-Jewish he happened to be-said he and Randy had been friends since 50s. Without giving him a pass I now started to view that statement in somewhat of perspective. See, Randy put his money where his mouth was, opening a nightclub in Tangiers, and running it for 7 years. This, like organizing black musicians into a sort of union here, was (I suspect) partly in reaction to black musicians being subjected to a plantation system in recording and clubs here, and shut out of so many things. I consider Randy Weston's African leanings and what he's done with his life and music proudly proactive. I think all people could use him as an example of a life well-spent---a life that's still going! I've come to understand him as proud of the African roots of jazz and wanting to share them as a gift to the world. After reading his book I'm more aware of the musician's traditional role in African tribal society. After years of witnessing the rampant egotism of some of our 'stars' here in full action, this is a humbling breath of fresh air. I don't feel he would deny credit to any white or green musician-and would play happily with or hire anyone who could play his music. Follow the deeds then do some analysis.

Sam and I went to the Local 802 program---a special 2-day-a-week BA through the musician's union. He also preceded me in Jaki Byard's Apollo Stompers. I was interested in getting the band and I told him 'I don't care about the bread'. Chuckle. then 'That's good, 'cause no bread's involved'. He also played bari on a sax quartet arrangement of mine on A Child is Born. He was a great guy too, whose best friend was another unsung saxophonist, Jimmy Cozier. I went to a Mongo rehearsal with Sam, now that you mention it. Somewhere in Crown Heights. Mongo was cool and seemed down-to-earth. Sam was given the same outpouring of love at his passing as Wade. He was only 49, but he played and laughed right to the end.

(This was double-posted in the Jewish-black thread b/c it's germane to both IMO. If it annoys anyone I'll take one down. No biggie). OK: Wade's funeral (cracks knuckles)... I arrived at Unity Funeral Home on Frederick Douglass Blvd. today at 3 or so. Signed the book and went to look for Wade's family. Paid my respects and reintroduced myself to Wade's mom---after 37 years---and sat down. They are warm, lovely people, and before I split I met them all. I could see they've all had great, full lives. The only drag for me was the open coffin and 'nuff said. People were filing in and conversations started.Bertha Hope was there when I arrived, and sitting at a little Previa keyboard at the front left corner by a makeshift bandstand that also had a drum set. Barry Harris showed up soon after and I was sure glad he made it. We hugged and said hello. I told him 'Tardo (Hammer) is playing his ass off' 'Always did'. 'Where's your guitar?' 'I came from Midtown, man'. Soon cats I didn't know (except for Richie Clemmons, piano)-alto, keyboard, and drums- played as more people filed in. Jazz fans would know Harold Mabern, Stanley Banks, and George Braith. More 'workaday' cats filed in, too: Dwayne Clemmons, trumpet; Josh Benko, alto. Kathy Farmer sat at the keyboard and played My Romance beautifully. She was asked to stop and happily complied, since it was time to play recordings of Wade's groups. At little after 6 the preacher got up to start the official service. After his opening remarks, followed by Wade's niece' the floor was opened to those who would speak. Barry 'spoke' by striding slowly to the keyboard, introducing a 'dirge' he originally wrote for Walter Davis Jr., then playing and singing his own lyric about life, mortality, and what we do with our lives and gifts in-between---movingly. He got up, and walking as he talked remarked that Eubie Blake once 'said he wasn't done when he reached 100 years old. I plan to live at least that long'. The speech concluded---to applause---the moment he reached his pew to sit. Phil Schaap spoke about having known Wade since Wade was a teen, his transition from 'out' music to more traditional, and a bit about the 'Brooklyn beboppers'-to whom he said Wade belonged. Whatever-but Phil kept it short and sincere. I dug it. The next speaker made a sly comment on a silly typo on the program everyone was snickering over anyway: 'Selection: Take 5-Charlie Parker. (Brubeck's recording had been played earlier-introduced by our friendly preacher, sans correction) and it's beyond me why this was chosen or what Take 5 meant to Wade, but it's always wonderful to hear Paul Desmond, so what the hell! The speaker got a hearty laugh for pointing out that he 'never heard Bird play Take 5, but Bird loved Paul Desmond' Very cagey! It was time to go but I left full, revivified, and thrilled that every seat was filled to honor a guy I feared would be forgotten, and I had actually misjudged everyone by having no idea was this loved. I should have known. It's all in the life you live.

OK: Wade's funeral (cracks knuckles)... I arrived at Unity Funeral Home on Frederick Douglass Blvd. today at 3 or so. Signed the book and went to look for Wade's family. Paid my respects and reintroduced myself to Wade's mom---after 37 years---and sat down. They are warm, lovely people, and before I split I met them all. I could see they've all had great, full lives. The only drag for me was the open coffin and 'nuff said. People were filing in and conversations started.Bertha Hope was there when I arrived, and sitting at a little Previa keyboard at the front left corner by a makeshift bandstand that also had a drum set. Barry Harris showed up soon after and I was sure glad he made it. We hugged and said hello. I told him 'Tardo (Hammer) is playing his ass off' 'Always did'. 'Where's your guitar?' 'I came from Midtown, man' Soon cats I didn't know (except for Richie Clemmons, piano)-alto, keyboard, and drums- played as more people filed in. Jazz fans would know Harold Mabern, Stanley Banks, and George Braith. More 'workaday' cats filed in, too: Dwayne Clemmons, trumpet; Josh Benko, alto. Kathy Farmer sat at the keyboard and played My Romance beautifully. She was asked to stop and happily complied, since it was time to play recordings of Wade's groups. At 6 the preacher got up to start the official service. After his opening remarks, followed by Wade's niece' the floor was opened to those who would speak. Barry 'spoke' by striding slowly to the keyboard, introducing a 'dirge' he originally wrote for Walter Davis Jr., then playing and singing his own lyric about life, mortality, and what we do with our lives---movingly. He got up, and walking as he talked remarked that Eubie Blake once 'said he wasn't done when he reached 100 years old. I plan to live at least that long'. The speech concluded---to applause---the moment he reached his pew to sit. Phil Schaap spoke about having known Wade since Wade was a teen, his transition from 'out' music to more traditional, and a bit about the 'Brooklyn beboppers'-to whom he said Wade belonged. Whatever-but Phil kept it short and sincere. I dug it. The next speaker made a sly comment on a silly typo on the program everyone was snickering over anyway: 'Selection: Take 5-Charlie Parker. (Brubeck's recording had been played earlier-introduced by our friendly preacher, sans correction) and it's beyond me why this was chosen or what Take 5 meant to Wade, but it's always wonderful to hear Paul Desmond, so what the hell! The speaker got a hearty laugh for pointing out that he 'never heard Bird play Take 5, but Bird loved Paul Desmond' Very cagey! It was time to go but I left full, revivified, and thrilled that every seat was filled to honor a guy I feared would be forgotten, and I had actually misjudged everyone by having no idea was this loved. I should have known. It's all in the life you live.

Wade's funeral is today in Harlem. I guess I have to go. Will report back, as is my wont.

You're welcome, and thank Barry and the cats of his generation for giving me and my peers a story to tell. Postscript: I was told last night that there is indeed a cheap way to rescue individual text files from a bad hard drive. So now it's a matter of when, not if. Hopefully this year, and mostly my goal is to have it done and in print while Barry's still alive---and maybe have him write the forward. I'm hoping....

Remaindered! There's justice after all! Not necessarily -- the previous owner may have sold it. Such an optimist! Could you get me a cheap copy of The Protocols? My coffee table is uneven. I hate when that happens.....

Remaindered! There's justice after all!

Baraka is a better writer than anyone in this thread. You speak for yourself only.

The lofts and musician-run labels of the '70s constitutes a golden age, IMO, contrary to the dominant Marsalis-Burns narrative. As a distant listener I would agree with this. I would attach the new sounds and momentum of Ornette's Prime Time to that as well, extending it into the early 80's. I think of it as the end of a Modernist timeline for jazz in a way. Because this music was arguably the last time new sounds were generated from a total Black jazz social situation that still existed outside of the University system (even if the audience was significantly White). Perhaps this music has got kind of retrospectively colonised in a way, because people outside of Black American music were able to later participate and appropriate the sounds, without the Black cultural experience. Especially people from non-schooled music backgrounds. I think of the Ornette-Metheny Song X album as the symbolic end of this Modernist timeline too. Because it represents another ending/beginning -and that being Pat Metheny representing the maturation of the first wave of players that learnt in the University system as much as the inner city club scene. It also coincides with the different choices that the Wynton era were able to make. By looking back and having the luxury of choosing from the already fully formed past-sounds, to move into their future without the influence of that part of the music they wanted to disassociate with. Sorry for the thread cap. Pat Martino is my favourite Italian jazz musician. His story of being a young teenager and being taken into the cradle of Black American music and life is something significant I think. Which is different to a lot of Italian jazz stories, where I get the feeling the music has played out separately from the overall Black social culture. But this opinion is from reading and not experience. I think the history of Barry Harris's Jazz Cultural Theater needs to be documented. It's---and his---importance can not be underestimated. I wrote much of a book documenting what took place there and on the jazz scene in the late 70s and 80s. I was almost done and told Barry (who I've know since 1976) about it. Then, without me backing it up, it died with my hard drive on a lap top. It could be salvaged for a price, or I'll start again, but I'm going to finish so the world hears this story and also so I don't make myself a liar to Barry and everyone else who I told about this. But basically this was a black-owned enterprise which was a nightclub, center for jazz pedagogy, place where young players (like myself, Rodney Kendrick, Kim Clarke, Graham and Greg Haynes, Sue Terry---and many others) could gig, hang out with the older cats and learn, shoot the shit, and more. The teachers included Benny Powell, Frank Foster, Vernell Fournier, Charles Davis (accompanied by Jack Wilson), and, naturally, Barry. All were welcome, and if you could play or it even seemed like one day you'd play you were treated with nothing but generosity and respect. I got to know and was befriended by Pat Patrick, Cliff Barbaro, Chris Anderson, Junior Cook, Jack Wilson. Benny I had already worked with and C. Sharpe I knew before, but we got much tighter after Barry opened. Tommy Turrentine---always hanging around being a loveable pain in the ass---was on the scene, and Barry tried to help him with trumpet students. Tommy and I really loved each other. I also worked with Jaki Byard for 1 1/2 years once a month there. Barry had shake dancers his trio accompanied, a student big band I have recordings of---and a general bonhomie I hadn't seen on the scene anywhere. (the closest spaces to it IMO today in NY are Fat Cat and Smalls, another story for another day). He also never applied for a liquor license so 'young people could come in and hear the music'. There was a flea market and a 'jam for Jesse' when Jesse Jackson ran for president in '84. Records were recorded there and displayed in a case for sale. there Quite a place! Its years were 1982-87. I was a little late for the loft scene, but as you can see I didn't do badly at all. And I think JALC is a good thing and WM a good guy. Barry, now 82, continues his teaching at the Community Center at 250 W. 65th st. Tuesday nights. Rodney and I are still good friends and I talk to Kim once in a while. Both are real jazz musicians and would say in a second how lucky we all were to be around that place, time, and man.

I have been enjoying it from afar. Unfortunately, I don't have as much free time now as I did when I first made that meandering post. I'd like to wait until I have more time to post thoughtfully... I will say that upon further reading of Baraka, I am just as disturbed by his seeming misogyny, which appears just as blatant and problematic: "The average ofay [white person] thinks of the black man as potentially raping every white lady in sight. Which is true, in the sense that the black man should want to rob the white man of everything he has. But for most whites the guilt of the robbery is the guilt of rape. That is, they know in their deepest hearts that they should be robbed, and the white woman understands that only in the rape sequence is she likely to get cleanly, viciously popped." Again, I'm open to the possibility that this is taken out of context or that Baraka passionately repudiated this mentality later in his career, but it seems a shame that someone who styles himself such a revolutionary thinker would be so myopic and chauvinistic to the oppression of other groups. The more I read this sick horseshit the more I'm convinced of his need for attention. And from the looks of us he's doing a smashing job of getting it....

Not only the anti-semites. I remember being amazed in the middle of a seminal orchestration book---so seminal I can't remember the name or the author---a passage that was making some sort of negative comparison and the guy actually said 'such-and-such is like man to nigger'. I was amazed that this got by the censors alone. But other than that it was a great book, so I kept it and hoped the passage was just an unfortunate sign of the times it was written it (early 1920s, I think). I marked the page so I could show people. I'd love to see that book again to know if that sentence was ever removed. Now, see, if you were a genuine psychopath, you'd have a perfectly linear explanation that tied everything together nice and neat, no ambiguity, everything resolved in advance, and the only time your head would explode would be when a bullet went through it. Fraud! :g He must be a psychopath -- he's a moderator! He's worse: He's a moderator of us....