Steve Reynolds

Saw the duo live with Evan Parker I like the duo CD but it is far from preferred way to hear Mat Maneri I much prefer when he is plugged in and the band that he plays with is capable of exploding or imploding which this configuration certainly should be a prime example.

Mat Maneri/Lucian Ban Quintet with Tony Malaby on tenor sax, Bob Stewart on tuba and Nasheet Waits on drums Two sets and I be first in line Yeah Baby!!!!!!

I think Evans is great with Parker-Guy-Lytton on the live clean feed date

I'm trying to go see MOPDTK on March 16th Never listened to them and I want my first experience to be live from ten feet away

Worst CD I've bought in ten years

Kresten Osgood is a drummer that I looked up on you tube and he looks like he is really something Looked him up as he is booked as a leader with the following musicians in the quintet: Herb Robertson - trumpet Mat Maneri - viola Ed Schuller - bass Randy Peterson - drums Lordy Lordy Then a quartet with Michael Blake on tenor, Charles Burnham on violin, Alex Blake on bass and Osgood on drums One of the first cannot miss shows for me for the year. That drummer I saw on video WITH Randy Peterson?!?!? With Herb Robertson? Plus that quartet sounds like a burning monster unit Fwiw also some wonderful shows coming up at the club including 2/28 Nasheet Waits with Darius Jones, David Virelles and Mark Helias

first review I've seen here http://www.londonjazznews.com/2014/02/cd-review-jon-irabagon-trio-it-takes.html That sort of review - by shallow stylistic comparison - kills things for me. Makes me disbelieve the whole sector. He did drop about 25 names In any event, I liked the first trio disc with Fonda in place of Helias and they were very good live. The trio with Fonda is playing next week in NYC and I soul like to see them but it looks like its a no go.....

Hemingway's Toombow is on a par with anything But again as a drummer he is nothing special Well unless you've actually seen or heard him!! or maybe Hemingway is just another run of the mill drummer and composer on the level of maybe Charli Persip or someone like that...... standing on a whale fishing for minnows......

Please note that Paul Dunmall with a sextet is playing on May 3rd

Back in the day I lived to derail threads...... IMO this turned into a viable discussion - sorry if interfered with the Mikes thread. Sometimes posts just happen for me and I don't think to post them closer to where they belong. Peace and Blessings

Plus if one wonders why I mention Drake and Bennink, it's simply because of all the drummers that I think of as the great modern drummers that veer towards the outside or avant directions of the music, those two are probably the most connected to the swing and groove element of any of the others. Hard to think of any drummers of any era that personify those qualities more than Drake and Bennink As Han said during his 70th birthday celebration at Columbia University a couple of years ago: "drums are made for swinging" Qow, Baby

Understood It remains that Hamid and Han are among the greatest drummers who have ever sat behind a kit. As I've said interest may vary It is also that many who have seen them live have had their minds bended and altered greatly

Glad to see this discussion Of course mileage may vary And I know most or many of these musicians don't often even play near me and I'm near NYC I will say this What some of them DO play might surprise people Even my wife knows when it comes to drummers, everyone needs to see and hear Hamid Drake and Han Bennink live If you like jazz, you will not leave with your arms crossed You probably will leave in a state of wonder The great Gary Sisco used to say that Hamid was always Miles next drummer if you know what he means

Very dissapointed I was unable to attend tonight Will replace with a nice dinner with my wife. Trying to find solace in that as this one off band is an exciting lineup

Which living giants have you in mind. I find it a constant tension in resources both financial and time exploring jazz past and the future. Exploring the past is so much safer because so much of it has been critically review or become cult. It's harder work working out what's to follow of jazz/ improvised music produced today. So I'm all ears , what's new. Not the future and most are not new. It's simply that I refuse to treat jazz as a historical music despite it's wonderous history. The effect of doing so codifies it into an almost obsolete art form which is already the opinion of some and the actuality of most listeners in one form or another. Clunky - I think you know most of who I believe are what I sometimes refer to as "Giants" and maybe I make the comment or use the descriptor to try to make a larger point. But from my listening perspective we all mostly agree that the past greats range from Armstrong through Duke, Basie, Young, Hawkins, Eldridge, Dizzy, Clifford, Tatum, Coltrane, Mingus, Miles, Monk with maybe those and some others being considered the absolute pantheon of quote, unquote Giants of the Past of this music. So the thought process of most or many is that how could anything or anyone live up to them? Or if we think of the greats of each instrument separately from that sort of group of musicians - for drums we often think of Klook, Max, Elvin etc or for tenor we think of Hawk, Trane or Sonny (yes I know he is still with us ) etc. But as was once said when Miles died over 22 years ago, there are no more jazz stars - and maybe nothing more true has been spoken - but what I maintain is that when some others passed or have withdrawn from the scene did to age or whatever, that those musicians were creating EQUALLY viable and wonderous music as the past masters whose records could always be found at the stores that once were found in most every town. The most recent passings of who I consider modern day or iconic musicians that belong in any pantheon have hardly had a record or CD to be found in a Barnes and Noble but the day they died resonated so much I can still feel it. Joe Maneri and Fred Anderson Before that the great pianist, composer and bandleader, Mal Waldron whose modern post 1960's work is still thoroughly unheard by the cognoscenti. For two who are unseen and now not heard, Paul Bley and Misha Mengelberg Then to the ones who play, who write or write and play or show up or don't and who improvise, the list of musicians who exude brilliance on multiple levels for me include this stream of conciousnesss list: Evan Parker Han Bennink Tony Malaby Oscar Noriega Mat Maneri Hamid Drake Peter Brotzmann Paul Dunmall Tom Rainey Andrew Cyrille Michael Moore Ellery Eskelin John Hebert Jeb Bishop Wolter Wierbos John Edwards Mark Sanders Ches Smith Craig Taborn Sylvie Courvoisier William Parker Rob Brown Darius Jones Cooper-Moore Gerald Cleaver RANDY PETERSON Barry Guy Ken Filiano Joe McPhee Keith Tippett Steve Noble Alexander Von Schlippenbach Louis Moholo Paul Lovens Gerry Hemingway A three minute list - yes my preference veers towards the off beat or that god awful avant-grade term but all of the above are masters of what they do and beyond reproach in their improvisatory abilities so for me to not be interested as much in them as in their peers from the past would kill the music in my heart. Still....... Coming Down the Mountain

Wish more people would be obsessive about the giants who still walk this earth playing to audiences of dozens and selling recordings in the hundreds

Pascal Niggenkemper with Nate Wooley, Dave Rempis and Chris Corsano 7:45 Trying hard to switch my life a bit to catch this band

Yo La Tengo: I Can Hear The Heart Beating as One

Last track on Other Violets I believe that tenor playing at the end might be the last John Tchicai on record and it is stunning and almost otherworldly It is preceded by a studied yet intense drum solo by Tim Daisy and the tune by Jeb Bishop is post bop swing and groove and it's finest

CD # 2 is spectacular, IMO

They played this live back in 2000 or 2001 @ Tonic and it brought the house down. High point of the greatest night of music I've ever experienced live. I like the CD version but well you know compared to the Tentet with Drake from 15 feet away - nothing in the world compares to that visceral experience.

I want hear the 73 and 75 stuff the most as I've never really listened that seriously to either P or A

I agree, and I also miss the enthusiasm that reading those sorts of pieces created in me. That's just not to be found (or at least it's rarely found) today. The majority of what is missing is the critical analysis of current jazz and improvised music. So many of the people who can write are too close to the musicians and are blinded by their relationships and therefore espouse the positive and promotional aspect of the music or stay silent.

Or Brian Morton who remains as astute as any writer mostly specializing in jazz and related improvised music. Without the Penguin Guide's critical and mostly brilliant and informative critical analysis of jazz including especially the detailed chronicling of non-mainstream jazz of the 70's through the 90's especially who knows if I would have had the impetus to explore wonderful musicians ranging from John Law, Paul Dunmall to Gianluigi Trovesi among many others. No one else in the mid to late 90's was writing about Pino Minafra or John Stevens or Eddie Prevost or even Eight Bold Souls. Who else wrote about Horace Tapscott of Gerry Hemingway or Ellery Eskelin in 1998? No one as far as I know.

Yes we miss the halcyon days of hat and FMP or emanem. Guiding lights indeed. One had a very good idea of the sound and vision Ayler was also fine. Clean Feed is classic hit or miss