Oscar Aleman

[Durium]

El Redescubrimiento de Oscar Aleman

One of the subject at the 2005 IAJRC Convention in Copenhagen.

[AllenLowe]

I was just listening to that Aleman CD that Dave Grisman put out - excellent stuff though not, as Leonard Feather once claimed, on the same level as Django, Interesting, however, that he lived so much longer - which I could have heard him in person -

[Durium]

I was just listening to that Aleman CD that Dave Grisman put out - excellent stuff though not, as Leonard Feather once claimed, on the same level as Django, Interesting, however, that he lived so much longer - which I could have heard him in person -

Well, Allen,

I don't agree with you. Oscar Aleman was a great jazz guitar player, others then Django, so it is impossible to compare them with each others.

It's nice, indeed, that he lived much longer. One of the participants of our presentation in Copenhagen ( El Redescubrimiento de Oscar Aleman ) is Theo van de Graaff who visited Oscar's apartement in 1980 and lived and playued with him for two months.

[AllenLowe]

well, from what I've heard he was clearly working within a musical framework similar to Django's - sound-wise, stylistically, etc - it's just that, great as he was, he doesn't have that touch of manic genius that Django had, that sense of the music just exploding out of him - this is not meant as an insult, as that kind of inspiration is found in about 1 out of every thousand jazz musicians - I would be interested, however, in hearing some of his later recordings - are they available?

[kh1958]

There's an ebay seller in Argentina, musicshop780, who sells quite a few Oscar Aleman CDs.

I've bought from this seller and they are a bit slow but always respond to email.

[Dr. Rat]

well, from what I've heard he was clearly working within a musical framework similar to Django's - sound-wise, stylistically, etc - it's just that, great as he was, he doesn't have that touch of manic genius that Django had, that sense of the music just exploding out of him - this is not meant as an insult, as that kind of inspiration is found in about 1 out of every thousand jazz musicians - I would be interested, however, in hearing some of his later recordings - are they available?

I think Allen is right in that Aleman was working in the same sort of millieu (sp?) as Django, but without that "manic" quality, which to me often comes out in the really fierce propulsive quality of Django's playing.

Listening to Aleman, the first thing we are bound to note is the absence of that drive.

But I think that it is also possible that Aleman was able to do something quite his own and quite important while forgoing the manic--it just takes listeners a while to adjust to what we think is a missing piece (to a puzzle he wasn't working on).

--eric