I've spent much of this week listening to my Dad's 2 CD compilation of the work of guitarist Charlie Christian whilst driving up and down the A34. This collection includes a number of the famous recordings with Benny Goodman as well as some air checks which I'd never heard before. For me, Charlie Christian has always been one of the most magical names in jazz and this was , in part, instilled in me by my Dad who revers the guitarist. The Goodman tracks are incredible and there are other recordings by the likes of Meade Lux Lewis with Edmund Hall and the legendary Minton recordings which only serve to enhance his status. Harmonically, Christian was probably the most ambitious jazz musician around at the time who wasn't playing piano. It would have been fascinating to have heard what he might have produced had be not succumbed to TB. I think everyone recognises that he would have been one of the most important players in the be- bop movement yet I wonder whether an electric guitarist of his prowess would have also impacted upon rock in the 1950's and whether rock and roll might have sounded different in comparison.
The attack of his electric guitar seems extremely modern and does seem like the precursor to Charlie Parker from a rhythmic point of view. What I have found incredible is the three different versions of Goodman's sextet / septet. The first group with Lionel Hampton seems routed in the 1930's whereas the other two groups definitely are more progressive. This is also reflected in the orchestra track "Solo flight" where Goodman's orchestra is in superb form. That said, the energy of the septet with Cootie Williams and Georgie Auld is quite staggering and there are moments on some of the tracks like "Breakfast feud" where I would argue that the drive of this small group was probably unequalled until some of Mingus' groups nearly 17 years later. I didn't really appreciate how this group function either because they are playing charts where some of the writing such as "Air mail special" is quite frightening. These are remarkable achievements for any era of jazz and whilst a lot of purple prose has been deservedly written about Christian's guitar solos, no one ever seems to comment on his ability as a rhythm player - even more driven than Freddie Greene in my opinion. There are moments when these recordings almost become airborne when the piano / bass / guitar and drums get going. Auld sounds better than I recalled whereas Cootie Williams produces some really pithy, free-booting solos that play around with the groove in such a manner that you might have thought Goodman poached him from Basie's band and not Ellington's. I would also have to add that Benny Goodman's clarinet is sensational. There has been comments about the Shaw v Goodman merits before on this site and whilst I would consider myself a Shaw fan, I think with the passage of time it is clear than Goodman is by far the more convincing jazz soloist. Goodman fronted the small group and big band equivalent of a top four premiership football team whereas Shaw seems increasingly like a club who is running away with the leadership of the Championship yet never had a star striker like Christian who had the vision to foresee where the music is going. Checking out the Edmund Hall tracks, it's pretty clear that he saw the Goodman route as the bona fide approach for jazz clarinet. Goodman might not have strictly been the "king of swing" yet around 1940-1, I think it can be safely argued that he was at the vanguard of where jazz was heading both in respect of the small groups with Charlie Christian and the under-appreciated big band of the early 1940's which was his finest.
The attack of his electric guitar seems extremely modern and does seem like the precursor to Charlie Parker from a rhythmic point of view. What I have found incredible is the three different versions of Goodman's sextet / septet. The first group with Lionel Hampton seems routed in the 1930's whereas the other two groups definitely are more progressive. This is also reflected in the orchestra track "Solo flight" where Goodman's orchestra is in superb form. That said, the energy of the septet with Cootie Williams and Georgie Auld is quite staggering and there are moments on some of the tracks like "Breakfast feud" where I would argue that the drive of this small group was probably unequalled until some of Mingus' groups nearly 17 years later. I didn't really appreciate how this group function either because they are playing charts where some of the writing such as "Air mail special" is quite frightening. These are remarkable achievements for any era of jazz and whilst a lot of purple prose has been deservedly written about Christian's guitar solos, no one ever seems to comment on his ability as a rhythm player - even more driven than Freddie Greene in my opinion. There are moments when these recordings almost become airborne when the piano / bass / guitar and drums get going. Auld sounds better than I recalled whereas Cootie Williams produces some really pithy, free-booting solos that play around with the groove in such a manner that you might have thought Goodman poached him from Basie's band and not Ellington's. I would also have to add that Benny Goodman's clarinet is sensational. There has been comments about the Shaw v Goodman merits before on this site and whilst I would consider myself a Shaw fan, I think with the passage of time it is clear than Goodman is by far the more convincing jazz soloist. Goodman fronted the small group and big band equivalent of a top four premiership football team whereas Shaw seems increasingly like a club who is running away with the leadership of the Championship yet never had a star striker like Christian who had the vision to foresee where the music is going. Checking out the Edmund Hall tracks, it's pretty clear that he saw the Goodman route as the bona fide approach for jazz clarinet. Goodman might not have strictly been the "king of swing" yet around 1940-1, I think it can be safely argued that he was at the vanguard of where jazz was heading both in respect of the small groups with Charlie Christian and the under-appreciated big band of the early 1940's which was his finest.
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