What Jazz are you listening to now?

[Joseph K]

[Stanfordian]

‘A Swinging Affair’ - Dexter Gordon
Dexter Gordon with Sonny Clark, Butch Warren & Billy Higgins
Blue Note (1962)

[Jazzrook]

Andrew Hill with John Gilmore, Bobby Hutcherson, Richard Davis & Joe Chambers playing 'Le Serpent Qui Danse' from his 1964 BLUE NOTE album 'Andrew!!!':

https://www.YouTube.com/watch?v=IV68Ey2J6iE

JR

[Joseph K]

John Coltrane - Live at the Half Note

I used to own this then finally I ordered another copy last week.

[Ian Thumwood]

Joe might find this article interesting. Oddly, there is no Herbie Hancock on this list. I only have one of these albums, Chick Corea's "Return to forever" which I bought when I was about 18 and had been exploring the pianist's acoustic work. It was not an album that I particularly liked at the time as it sounded really dated back in 1985. Corea is a bit of a marmite musician for me. I love his acoustic work, especially with the trio with MV and RH , yet the Fusion and Spanish stuff often sounds risible to me. He is someone who is excellent as a live performer where he builds a great rapport with the audience and seems good fun. I just don't like electric keyboard too much.

https://jazztimes.com/features/lists/jazztimes-10-key-post-bitches-brew-fusion-albums/

The whole issue of Fusion is only touched upon in this list. I don't think it is unique to the 1970s and it has definitely become a defining style in jazz. Back in the late 1990s I read an article about Fusion in the old "Jazz Hot" magazine which produced a list of far greater length and depth but was interesting because it had musicians who you might have considered to have been solidly in the jazz mainstream in the list. Seem to recall some of John Abercrombie's ECM efforts being in there. I would never have considered him to have been a Fusion musician although I think that is where he made his name with bands like "Dreams." The Jazztimes list has a lot of stuff I am not familiar with ("Compost", anyone?) but only seems to cover one decade. There is nothing by non-American musicians other than Airto on this list either. Whoever compiled this could have gone much further in to 1980s when the production values became much slicker but stuff like Allan Holdsworth is right off my radar and too far away from the jazz's core for my liking. I quickly grew out of that kind of stuff when I was a teenager. The further forward this list will go, the more it would include FM-friendly stuff which has little to do with jazz. No room in the list for the kind of stuff pioneered by Ornette's "Prime time", Last Exit, etc, etc. Maybe the Free-funk stuff of late 70s and 80's is more in the spirit of "Bitches Brew." Anyway, the list is a kind of opposite to "must have" records for me. Not my bag...…..

[Stanfordian]

'Straight Life' - Jimmy Smith
Jimmy Smith with Quentin Warren & Donald Bailey
Blue Note (1961)

[Ian Thumwood]

Stuck at home, I have dig out some CDs that I haven't played for a while including the Dave Holland album "Dream of the elders." I was underwhelmed by this record when it came out. It sat in between those groups with Steve Coleman which were so compelling and the later quintet with Chris Potter and Robin Eubank which was, for me, one of the best groups of the late 1990's and early 2000's. This album came out in 1996 and featured steve Nelson on vibes / marimba who was a stalwart of the later band plus Gene Jackson on drums and Eric Person on alto and soprano. These two musicians seem to have disappeared and I have not heard anything by them for ages. There is also one track which has Cassandra Wilson on vocals.

I was surprised how good this record was. It hasn't dated the slightest and almost feels like a precursor to the quintet. I have lost track of Dave Holland's more recent records but if there was a competition for being the most consistently excellent jazz artist, he would come close to being top. This is a great little quintet and far better than I recalled. Glad I dug this record out.

[Joseph K]

John Coltrane - Impressions

[Ian Thumwood]

John Coltrane - Impressions

This is perhaps the one Coltrane album that I cannot get in to. It is a strange disc because "After the rain" is one of his very finest ballads and "India" is quite good too. However, the title tack goes, on, and on, and on, and on...……

I think this record was culled from a studio session with a live performance and there is something about it which seems unbalanced. It is ages since I have played this, largely because it is a record I have never been able to overcome my dissatisfaction with. To me, it always seems that this is the record where the criticisms of Coltrane being self-indulgent have some traction. There is insufficient within the tune "Impressions" to make it interesting and there is something a bit irritating about it. There was a really good thread several years ago about tunes that crop up on jazz records that people are fed up with and it included things like "All things you are," "Stardust," "All Blues," and I think Horace Silver's "Peace" made it to this list too. Personally, I feel the same about "Impressions."

It is really annoying that "After the rain" which be on this record! I wish it was on another that it did not feel so negative about.

I have quite a lot of Coltrane in my collection and this is easily my least favourite. It is strange that this extended workout is so monotonous whereas "One up, one down" just seems to abound with ideas. I tend to think that if a favourite artist issues a record that is unpleasant, you tend to be more unforgiving than if it is by someone whose music you have taken a punt on.

[Joseph K]

The performance of 'Impressions' from the album of the same name comes from the November 61 Village Vanguard recordings.

I love this performance, as I do other performances of Impressions, e.g. Stuttgart 63, Newport 63 with Roy Haynes or Antibes 65 (the last time Coltrane recorded it I think).

I am sorry you can't appreciate it. I wonder if you feel the same way about the many versions of So What Miles recorded...

[Tenor Freak]

On a big ECM kick at the moment, exploring some artists I've not been familiar with, or works I was aware of, but had never heard. For example, Don Cherry & Ed Blackwell's "El Corazon" (very good BTW )

NP: Dino Saluzzi, "Responso Por La Muerte De Cruz" from his 2003 ECM disc "Responsorium".

[Stanfordian]

‘Free For All’ - Art Blakey
Art Blakey with Freddie Hubbard, Curtis Fuller, Wayne Shorter, Cedar Walton & Reggie Workman
Blue Note (1964)

[Ian Thumwood]

On a big ECM kick at the moment, exploring some artists I've not been familiar with, or works I was aware of, but had never heard. For example, Don Cherry & Ed Blackwell's "El Corazon" (very good BTW )

NP: Dino Saluzzi, "Responso Por La Muerte De Cruz" from his 2003 ECM disc "Responsorium".

Bruce

I would be interested to hear you impressions of the music you are listening to. I have been digging out a number of discs including a lot of ECM stuff. It is intriguing to listen to ECM records when you have not given them a spin for ages because my perception of some of these records is changing. I really enjoyed the Dave Holland record I played yesterday but the Saluzzi I have in my collection did not live up to my recollection. By contrast, I had forgotten how good Jarrett's "Koln concert" was. I am getting the impression that the music on this label is really inconsistent and the constant introspective feel to much of what they put out starts to seem repetitive. (Here is an introspective piano trio, introspective acoustic guitar, introspective quartet, etc, etc.) Listening to samples of new releases last night, the label no longer sounds quite so radical these days and I am starting to think these records are really over-produced. The "house style" is too pervasive whereas the appeal of the label used to be the variety. As I said previously, when ECM is good, it is a terrific label but it churns out a vast quantity of really forgettable stuff too. It is a real marmite label and I can understand why some people love the label and others like the late, great Humphrey Lyttelton refused to play any of it on his "Best of jazz" programme.

NP : Wayne Shorter -"Allegria."

[Tenor Freak]

Hi Ian

Based on what I have heard so far I would agree, that the output is patchy. I started off with the latest Carla Bley trio "Life Goes On", then the two previous releases which were on autoplay. I'll probably need to go back to those discs individually, because the cumulative effect of three CDs' worth of intricate music began to do my head in, especially as I am WFH and needed to concentrate. Then I went with the Cherry/Blackwell disc which is a classic for good reason; definitely will listen again to that. Then I tried some new releases. Avishai Cohen "Big Vicious" which I stopped after three tracks because it was too rocky. Wolfgang Muthspiel "Angular Blues" which was quite enjoyable, similar to many an old John Abercrombie release, though Muthspiel plays classical guitar as well as electric on a few tracks. Then a new name to me, tenor saxophonist Ozed Tzur, "Here Be Dragons" which was a bit "meh" to be honest, as was Joanna Hülsmann's CD "Not Far From Here". I had heard of her group from the recent J To Z broadcast, but apart from her cover of David Bowie's "This Is Not America" the music was unmemorable.

I will carry on, there must be more gems buried in there.

[Tenor Freak]

Forgot to say, the two Dino Saluzzi CDs I have heard remind me a lot of the Egberto Gismonti "Magico" trio, in terms of the atmosphere created by the musicians: mellow but still passionate. Of the new names (to me) this is the best of the bunch so far.