Rahsaan Roland Kirk with Archie Shepp, Charles Mingus, Roy Haynes & others on the Ed Sullivan Show, 1971:
JR
JR
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Chet Baker & Paul Bley, "Diane" (Steeplechase). Chet and Paul in duo. Paul Bley adjusting to Chet at every step to make it work. An exceptional recording.Comment
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‘Happenings’
Bobby Hutcherson with Herbie Hancock, Bob Cranshaw & Joe Chambers
Blue Note (1966)Comment
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Allan Holdsworth's None too Soon - which he describes as a bebop record, hence my reason for posting it here. Absolutely wonderful! I have posted his version of Coltrane's Countdown before on here - my only complaint is the fade out - I am not a fan of such a way of ending especially when you're hearing incredible sheets-of-sound guitar playing.Comment
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I have enjoyed AH's playing since I first came across Gazeuse! by Gong in 1976. I saw him live a few times, including a Level 42 gig at the Hammmersmith Odeon.Originally posted by Joseph K View PostComment
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Cool.Originally posted by Beef Oven! View Post
I too saw him live, at the Robin 2 club in Wolverhampton in 2007. I could have stayed and spoken to him afterwards, they were selling records and I could have had one signed too. Alas, I had to catch a train home! Such a shame. It was only a small club, and there weren't that many people there. It was also a shame that bass player Jimmy Johnson told this guy to stop filming ... if only some of that night was on youtube now... I believe that was one of the last ever times Allan played in Britain.Comment
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I think that guitarists like AH are better suited to intimate venues. Shame you couldn't hang around a bit - sadly the chance will never come again ...Originally posted by Joseph K View PostComment
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The Ayler Track is interesting. He is a player that seems to me to be less and less avant garde as the time goes by. I have never heard him play alto before but the trio backing him are the same musicians that appear on the album "New Grass" that I am very fond of. The bass player always seems pretty rudimentary to me with the pianist almost being mainstream. The bassist seems not a great deal better than many local players and isn't especially impressive but I feel the same about his playing on "New Grass." Only Bernie Purdie really does anything as interesting as Ayler on this record.
I feel obliged to throw a hand grenade in to the mix and say that I don't find Ayler to be that "progressive", "modern" or "outside." Having listened to him , I feel that a lot of the time he is playing changes and some of the phrases seem like a poor copy of Sonny Rollins. From a timbral point of view, you could argue that he had antecedents in players like Illinois Jacquet or Arnett Cobb. There is a visceral quality about Ayler's music which immediately appeals and there is also something quite naïve about his compositions that appeals. Despite that, I do sometimes ask myself how he would have faired in the revitalised scene of the 1980's. Someone like David Murray would have destroyed his technically even if Murray would probably own up to an indebtedness to Ayler.
"New Grass" is not a great jazz record nor a great pop record either. However, there is such a degree of oddness about it that it is a hard record not to like - even where Ayler takes the saxophone in to the stratosphere exposing the rather ordinary rhythm section and rudimentary comping from Cobbs. The strangest thing about the record is the players in the horn section who were more used to big band work than either r n'b or free jazz. I think the music director, Bert De Coteaux was someone associated with pop acts but despite being flawed, it is a record that I frequently play and really like. If all pop records were like this, I probably would not be in to jazz. However, if all jazz records sounded like "New Grass", I wouldn't be into that either! It is a relic of it's time and very dated in every aspect.
Ayler almost seems like a full stop in the development of jazz or at least a point at which the music really returned back to it's slavery-era origins.Comment
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I've always thought jazz to be more suited to small venues than concert halls and especially stadiums, due to the more intimate conviviality and the ways in which that feeds back into performance. That's one of the ironies about jazz logistics: smaller venues obviously = less takings for bands!Originally posted by Beef Oven! View Post
I have a great cassette of the Ray Warleigh/Allan Holdsworth band in a double BBC broadcast from 1973 or 4, with Pat Smythe (he of the Joe Harriott Free Form recording) on Fender Rhodes, Ron Matthewson bass and Bryan Spring drums; Gilgamesh on first. That would have been before Allan Joined Nucleus, then going on to Soft Machine before his first period in America with Life Time, but Allan already had phenomenal chops which must have elicited gasps when he turned in an acoustic solo with no diminution of dexterity. Alan also played violin pretty well at that time.
If the Beeb has a recording of that sesh in their vaults it might help give one or two on this forum a different impression of British jazz of that period from the one they are sometimes given to disparage. Below is another, which has turned up on youtube, from 1980, also with Warleigh, and Smythe this time on "acoustic piano", with Chris Laurence on bass and John Marshall, drums, and it is nearly as good as the abovementioned.
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Many thanks S_AOriginally posted by Serial_Apologist View PostI've always thought jazz to be more suited to small venues than concert halls and especially stadiums, due to the more intimate conviviality and the ways in which that feeds back into performance. That's one of the ironies about jazz logistics: smaller venues obviously = less takings for bands!
I have a great cassette of the Ray Warleigh/Allan Holdsworth band in a double BBC broadcast from 1973 or 4, with Pat Smythe (he of the Joe Harriott Free Form recording) on Fender Rhodes, Ron Matthewson bass and Bryan Spring drums; Gilgamesh on first. That would have been before Allan Joined Nucleus, then going on to Soft Machine before his first period in America with Life Time, but Allan already had phenomenal chops which must have elicited gasps when he turned in an acoustic solo with no diminution of dexterity. Alan also played violin pretty well at that time.
If the Beeb has a recording of that sesh in their vaults it might help give one or two on this forum a different impression of British jazz of that period from the one they are sometimes given to disparage. Below is another, which has turned up on youtube, from 1980, also with Warleigh, and Smythe this time on "acoustic piano", with Chris Laurence on bass and John Marshall, drums, and it is nearly as good as the abovementioned.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=entwwl8TJCE
Pat Smythe Quintet was good. The other was a bad link.Comment
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Sorry about that Beefy - my poor eyesight. If it doesn't automatically segue on from the first one, try clicking on the one below, which is the second number of the broadcast.Originally posted by Beef Oven! View PostMany thanks S_A
Pat Smythe Quintet was good. The other was a bad link.
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Bluesie
A really nice youtube interview with Philly Joe Jones plus some great drumming sequences. Of special interest is the part where PJJ talks about the Joe Morris band with Johnny Griffin and Elmo and Elmo's influence on Bud and Monk and Hassan Ibn Ali. This section of the Interview starts at about 31 mins in.
elmoComment
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