So, What Are You Listening To NOW?

[paul secor]

2 hours ago, JSngry said:

More "cleverness".  

 

I guess I'm supposed to be impressed, and would like to be, but I'm not.

When I hear these sort of things, I'm reminded of reading a quote - can't remember where or who said it - but something to the effect that Stan Kenton can be on stage and make dramatic gestures, and every arranger in the audience can tell you exactly how it was done. Ellington can wiggle a finger, three horns will play, and the same arrangers will say - how did he do that?  I know that there was only one Ellington, but still the point was made.

[Larry Kart]

3 hours ago, Morganized said:

2 hours ago, paul secor said:

I guess I'm supposed to be impressed, and would like to be, but I'm not.

When I hear these sort of things, I'm reminded of reading a quote - can't remember where or who said it - but something to the effect that Stan Kenton can be on stage and make dramatic gestures, and every arranger in the audience can tell you exactly how it was done. Ellington can wiggle a finger, three horns will play, and the same arrangers will say - how did he do that?  I know that there was only one Ellington, but still the point was made.

 

 André Previn:

"You know, Stan Kenton can stand in front of a thousand fiddles and a thousand brass and make a dramatic gesture and every studio arranger can nod his head and say, "Oh, yes, that's done like this. But Duke merely lifts his finger, three horns make a sound, and I don't know what it is!"

 

Further re: Ellington's methods, in a specific famous instance (where Gunther Schuller FWIW got it wrong):

http://musicalexchange.carnegiehall.org/profiles/blogs/arranging-ellington-the-ellington-effect

[paul secor]

Thanks for putting my "quote" in proper context, Larry.

I'll have to read the Schuller piece when I have some extra time.

[soulpope]

3 hours ago, jazzbo said:

Great showcase for Barney Wilen ....

[JSngry]

3 hours ago, paul secor said:

I guess I'm supposed to be impressed, and would like to be, but I'm not.

When I hear these sort of things, I'm reminded of reading a quote - can't remember where or who said it - but something to the effect that Stan Kenton can be on stage and make dramatic gestures, and every arranger in the audience can tell you exactly how it was done. Ellington can wiggle a finger, three horns will play, and the same arrangers will say - how did he do that?  I know that there was only one Ellington, but still the point was made.

You guess wrong, you're not "supposed" to be anything. You will have the response you have for the reasons you have it.

As for Kenton vs. Ellington, yeah, sure. But the gap between "Stan Kenton" and Willie Maiden is immense. "Stan Kenton" was ultimately a concept. Willie Maiden was a real, honest to god talent, not a concept, a realization. I'd go so far as to state with no uncertainty (since it's just my opinion) that Willie Maiden & Bill Mathieu are the two people who really "got" that whole Kenton thing in a way that so many other, and so many more greatly lauded) writers did not. They heard real personal possibilities in that music. Which is not to say that somebody like Johnnie Richards didn't, but Johnny Richards was a freak and was going to be a freak with or without "Stan Kenton". Gene Roland, that's another one, but go figure THAT guy out. And of course, Bob Graettinger. But that's a whole 'nother world. Hell, universe. Dee Barton, very narrow but deep within himself.

Besides, the Schuller quote is too easily appropriated by people who just hear names like "Maynard Ferguson" and/or "Stan Kenton" and automatically think Loud Brassy Cheap White Music and then superimpose all their personal moral projections about why they don't want to be associated with That Type Of Thing, and poof, end of thought process. Especially people who can't engage with the music from either a technical or emotional standpoint because they don't have the tools or the curiosity. That's just lazy. Fuck lazy thinking.

I mean, if you can't hear the difference between Pete Rugolo, Johnny Richards, Bill Holman, Slide Hampton, and Willie Maiden, that's not their fault, there are plenty of distinctions to be had. That's like saying that everybody who speaks Spanish sounds the same. And when somebody says something like " Duke merely lifts his finger, three horns make a sound, and I don't know what it is", well, that's bullshit. I can tell you what it is - it's somebody in total command of a full tonal and intonational palate making very specific decisions, that's what it is, and you best believe that a writer like Willie Maiden is taking the tonal and intonational palate of his performers into consideration as well, in Ferguson's band, with the reduced instrumentation, and with Kenton's the expanded instrumentation. You don't play a Willie Maiden chart the way you do a Bill Holman chart...well, you can, but that does neither writer any favors and everybody else no favors at all.

All you have to do is just listen to the music itself,. Not you "impression" of what you hear, but what is actually there.

 

Anybody with an ear can tell you how that's done. What nobody can really tell you is how somebody thought like that in the first place, because there is no formula here, there is just imagination, palate, and decisions.

Formula would have been to just do this for a bigger instrumentation, but that's not what happened, is it.

Individuality is the ultimate enemy of the generalization!

[Bluesnik]

Hall with Carl Perkins, a pianist I like very much, and Red Mitchell on bass.

[BillF]

[duaneiac]

[HutchFan]

[Larry Kart]

6 hours ago, JSngry said:

You guess wrong, you're not "supposed" to be anything. You will have the response you have for the reasons you have it.

As for Kenton vs. Ellington, yeah, sure. But the gap between "Stan Kenton" and Willie Maiden is immense. "Stan Kenton" was ultimately a concept. Willie Maiden was a real, honest to god talent, not a concept, a realization. I'd go so far as to state with no uncertainty (since it's just my opinion) that Willie Maiden & Bill Mathieu are the two people who really "got" that whole Kenton thing in a way that so many other, and so many more greatly lauded) writers did not. They heard real personal possibilities in that music. Which is not to say that somebody like Johnnie Richards didn't, but Johnny Richards was a freak and was going to be a freak with or without "Stan Kenton". Gene Roland, that's another one, but go figure THAT guy out. And of course, Bob Graettinger. But that's a whole 'nother world. Hell, universe. Dee Barton, very narrow but deep within himself.

Besides, the Schuller quote is too easily appropriated by people who just hear names like "Maynard Ferguson" and/or "Stan Kenton" and automatically think Loud Brassy Cheap White Music and then superimpose all their personal moral projections about why they don't want to be associated with That Type Of Thing, and poof, end of thought process. Especially people who can't engage with the music from either a technical or emotional standpoint because they don't have the tools or the curiosity. That's just lazy. Fuck lazy thinking.

I mean, if you can't hear the difference between Pete Rugolo, Johnny Richards, Bill Holman, Slide Hampton, and Willie Maiden, that's not their fault, there are plenty of distinctions to be had. That's like saying that everybody who speaks Spanish sounds the same. And when somebody says something like " Duke merely lifts his finger, three horns make a sound, and I don't know what it is", well, that's bullshit. I can tell you what it is - it's somebody in total command of a full tonal and intonational palate making very specific decisions, that's what it is, and you best believe that a writer like Willie Maiden is taking the tonal and intonational palate of his performers into consideration as well, in Ferguson's band, with the reduced instrumentation, and with Kenton's the expanded instrumentation. You don't play a Willie Maiden chart the way you do a Bill Holman chart...well, you can, but that does neither writer any favors and everybody else no favors at all.

All you have to do is just listen to the music itself,. Not you "impression" of what you hear, but what is actually there.

 

Anybody with an ear can tell you how that's done. What nobody can really tell you is how somebody thought like that in the first place, because there is no formula here, there is just imagination, palate, and decisions.

Formula would have been to just do this for a bigger instrumentation, but that's not what happened, is it.

Individuality is the ultimate enemy of the generalization!

Good points above, but some facts got garbled. The person who said that thing about Kenton and Ellington was Andre Previn, not Gunther Schuller. Also, in the post I linked to from Darcy Jame Argue 

http://musicalexchange.carnegiehall.org/profiles/blogs/arranging-ellington-the-ellington-effect

Argue shows in detail how, in the specific case of "Mood Indigo," no less a talented musician than Schuller (who certainly had an "ear"), both in his transcription of  the opening of "Mood Indigo" and in his explanation of what Ellington was doing there, inaccurately described the specific decisions Ellington made.

[HutchFan]

Cal Tjader - Huracán (LaserLight, originally released on Crystal Clear Recordings)
with Clare Fischer, Gary Foster, Poncho Sanchez, a.o. 

 

 

3 hours ago, Larry Kart said:

Good points above, but some facts got garbled. The person who said that thing about Kenton and Ellington was Andre Previn, not Gunther Schuller.

I thought it was Michel Legrand who said that . . . 

Could easily be mis-remembering! 

 

 

Edited August 21, 2017 by HutchFan

[soulpope]

5 hours ago, HutchFan said:

My favourite late(r) Bill Barron outing ....

[HutchFan]

2 hours ago, soulpope said:

My favourite late(r) Bill Barron outing ....

Mine too.  

 

NP:

Dannie Richmond Quartet - Ode to Mingus (Soul Note)
with Bill Saxton (ts), Danny Mixon (p), Mike Richmond (b) 

Powerful Mingus tribute.

[soulpope]

1 hour ago, HutchFan said:

Mine too.  

 

NP:

Dannie Richmond Quartet - Ode to Mingus (Soul Note)
with Bill Saxton (ts), Danny Mixon (p), Mike Richmond (b) 

Powerful Mingus tribute.

Bill Saxton being an interesting but unfortunately underrecorded reedman ....

[sidewinder]

Vocalion CD

[soulpope]

[kh1958]

Christian Scott, Diaspora (Ropeadope)

Edited August 21, 2017 by kh1958

[sidewinder]

[HutchFan]

Mongo Santamaría - Mongo at Montreux (Atlantic, 1971)

[HutchFan]

Bill Barron - Modern Windows Suite (Savoy)
Despite the title, this CD does not include all of the music from Modern Windows -- only side A (4 cuts) from the LP.  On the other hand, all of the music from The Tenor Stylings of Bill Barron LP is included on the disc. So Modern Windows Suite seems like an unnecessarily confusing choice for this reissue.   

. . . Oh well. The music is good! 

[mikeweil]

 

3 hours ago, HutchFan said:

Mongo Santamaría - Mongo at Montreux (Atlantic, 1971)

That was a smokin' band Mongo had at Montreux. Only bummer is they didn't restore the percussion track for the CD issue - Saoco, a tune by Armando Peraza. (You can watch it on YouTube, search for the title.)

Edited August 21, 2017 by mikeweil

[Buddha the Magnificent]

Mal Waldron - All Alone (GTA Records, 1966).  Mal Waldron - piano.

[HutchFan]

1 hour ago, mikeweil said:

That was a smokin' band Mongo had at Montreux. Only bummer is they didn't restore the percussion track for the CD issue - Saoco, a tune by Armando Peraza. (You can watch it on YouTube, search for the title.)

Absolutely. I love the dynamism, the thrust of that record.

And thanks for the heads-up about "Saoco."  I had no idea.   

[mikeweil]

 

[soulpope]

1 hour ago, mikeweil said:

 

Dynamite .... and Carter Jefferson ....

Edited August 21, 2017 by soulpope