What Jazz are you listening to now?

[Joseph K]

The Dizzy Gillespie tune 'Woody 'n' You' played by Bill Evans then Keith Jarrett and then John Scofield, via youtube.

[Stanfordian]

‘Know What I Mean?’ - Cannonball Adderley
Julian 'Cannonball' Adderley with Bill Evans Percy Heath & Connie Kay
Riverside (1961)

[Serial_Apologist]

‘Know What I Mean?’

People say that all the time around here.

[cloughie]

People say that all the time around here.

Coleman Hawkins Greatest Hits

[gradus]

Romane and Francis Varis album Ombre. For anyone who loves the Django/Grapelli legacy, it's lovely listening mixing virtuosity with improvisational flair, lyricism and fantastic playing by Varis.

[Stanfordian]

‘White Gardenia’ - tribute album to jazz singer Billie Holiday
Johnny Griffin with Nat Adderley, Clarke Terry, Ernie Royal, Jimmy Cleveland, Paul Faulise, Urbie Green

[Quarky]

59th Street Bridge song: Desmond/ Hancock:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTVAJ20Bww4

...Slow down, you move too fast...

[Joseph K]

Herbie Hancock - Takin' Off

[Ian Thumwood]

59th Street Bridge song: Desmond/ Hancock:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTVAJ20Bww4

...Slow down, you move too fast...

Quarky

I was totally unaware of this record. Paul Simon's links to jazz would seem to be limited to the likes of the Breckers and Tom Malone appearing on the "Gracelands" album but there are tracks on YouTube where his backing band consists of A list jazz musicians. I was really quite staggered a few years back when I stumbled upon this. There is a cover of a Paul Simon tune on an Arild Anderson I have and I think Brad Mehldau is another musician who has recorded his tunes - in fairness to Mehldau, he has probably recorded more "pop" material than any other contemporary jazz musician so this should not be a surprise.

The Paul Desmond track was a bit of a shock. I see that the album was orchestrated by Don Sebesky and was from an old CTI label. Getting in to jazz in the 1980s, this label had a reputation for being extremely commercial and although Sebesky is famous for writing a celebrated guide to orchestration, the stuff he recorded in the 1970s has not aged well. There is a similar issue with Don Ellis who was much vaunted around the late 60's / early 70's and technically ahead of his time in many respects yet , like Sebesky, I feel this music says more about the musical attitudes of the time than anything really musical. CTI, in particular, is pretty typical of why the 1970s is often looked back so disparagingly as the music was really aimed at commercial success. A collaboration of Paul Desmond and Don Sebesky performing Simon and Garfunkel material must have seemed like a winner in 1974 whilst these days, I am afraid, it struck me as a bit cheesy. You wonder just how much players like Paul Desmond put into records like this. There is another record where Desmond teams up with Jim Hall to play the Rodriquez concerto which I felt was pretty risible. I do not feel that this stuff has stood up well with the passage of time and maybe it was indicative of a time when jazz started to lose confidence in itself. You can, however, start to see parallels with players like Kenny G when you hear Paul Desmond in this mode.

[Quarky]

Quarky

I was totally unaware of this record. Paul Simon's links to jazz would seem to be limited to the likes of the Breckers and Tom Malone appearing on the "Gracelands" album but there are tracks on YouTube where his backing band consists of A list jazz musicians. I was really quite staggered a few years back when I stumbled upon this. There is a cover of a Paul Simon tune on an Arild Anderson I have and I think Brad Mehldau is another musician who has recorded his tunes - in fairness to Mehldau, he has probably recorded more "pop" material than any other contemporary jazz musician so this should not be a surprise.

The Paul Desmond track was a bit of a shock. I see that the album was orchestrated by Don Sebesky and was from an old CTI label. Getting in to jazz in the 1980s, this label had a reputation for being extremely commercial and although Sebesky is famous for writing a celebrated guide to orchestration, the stuff he recorded in the 1970s has not aged well. There is a similar issue with Don Ellis who was much vaunted around the late 60's / early 70's and technically ahead of his time in many respects yet , like Sebesky, I feel this music says more about the musical attitudes of the time than anything really musical. CTI, in particular, is pretty typical of why the 1970s is often looked back so disparagingly as the music was really aimed at commercial success. A collaboration of Paul Desmond and Don Sebesky performing Simon and Garfunkel material must have seemed like a winner in 1974 whilst these days, I am afraid, it struck me as a bit cheesy. You wonder just how much players like Paul Desmond put into records like this. There is another record where Desmond teams up with Jim Hall to play the Rodriquez concerto which I felt was pretty risible. I do not feel that this stuff has stood up well with the passage of time and maybe it was indicative of a time when jazz started to lose confidence in itself. You can, however, start to see parallels with players like Kenny G when you hear Paul Desmond in this mode.

Many thanks for your expert analysis, Ian, with which I don't disagree.

My thought process in listening to this track was that, despite the very sombre circumstances, it's a beautiful spring day, and my internal system has really slowed down to a point I haven't been in a long time. I could hear my dad's words "the trouble with you Quarky, is that you're too 'Asty". Feeling groovy sprung spontaneously to mind.

I quite liked Desmond's cool interpretation of it - forgetting the strings, commercial bias, etc.

[Ian Thumwood]

Please to discover this. No idea that Dickie Wells recorded as early as 1929:-

There is a more recent version by Steve Bernstein's MTO where the first half is performed in a hell-for-leather version of the first half and then if mutates in to a Coltrane-like drone.

[Serial_Apologist]

Many thanks for your expert analysis, Ian, with which I don't disagree.

My thought process in listening to this track was that, despite the very sombre circumstances, it's a beautiful spring day, and my internal system has really slowed down to a point I haven't been in a long time. I could hear my dad's words "the trouble with you Quarky, is that you're too 'Asty". Feeling groovy sprung spontaneously to mind.

I quite liked Desmond's cool interpretation of it - forgetting the strings, commercial bias, etc.

Well it is just one of those probably much over-used F-E-D-C Monteverdi-style repeated descending cadence riffs beloved of so much popular music from since forever; but it's what the musicians and arranger do with that that "makes" it - Herbie's "cheeky" bitonal semitone-up modulations as he improvises modally over the top of the sequence, the interweaving instruments that follow his solo before the recap.

[Serial_Apologist]

Please to discover this. No idea that Dickie Wells recorded as early as 1929:-

There is a more recent version by Steve Bernstein's MTO where the first half is performed in a hell-for-leather version of the first half and then if mutates in to a Coltrane-like drone.

When you hear something like that, how much in advance of other big band stuff happening around that time was it? It suddenly seems like the gap from there to Benny Goodman in the late 30s seems not quite so big after all.

[Joseph K]

Herbie Hancock - Maiden Voyage

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

Palle Mikkelborg Ensemble- 'The Mysterious CORONA" (Yes really), from 1967, with the cream of Danish jazz . I think it was his debut. Starts with a "classical" string section (v effective) and then Le Jazz..."Corona", here 'tis!

http://youtu.be/kRQlC9iZJ_g