What Jazz are you listening to now?

[Stanfordian]

Kenny Burrell with Will Davis, Martin Rivera, Bill English & Ray Barretto
'Soul Call'
Prestige (1964)

[CGR]

Kenny Burrell with Will Davis, Martin Rivera, Bill English & Ray Barretto
'Soul Call'
Prestige (1964)

I love Kenny Burrell's guitar playing.

[Serial_Apologist]

I love Kenny Burrell's guitar playing.

By the way, CGR, I've been wondering what your initials might stand for. Capital Gains Repayment???

[Stanfordian]

Lou Donaldson with Herman Foster, Ben Tucker, Dave Bailey & Alec Dorsey
‘Gravy Train’
Blue Note (1961)

[CGR]

By the way, CGR, I've been wondering what your initials might stand for. Capital Gains Repayment???

Close.

Wouldn't know a Capital Gain if one came and punched me on the nose. Now when it comes to Repayments, that's more like it.

How about Cool Guitarist, Retired ? May be not.

I don't really wish to expose my middle name to ridicule.

I should have simply used CR - Carriage Return.

[Serial_Apologist]

Close.

Wouldn't know a Capital Gain if one came and punched me on the nose. Now when it comes to Repayments, that's more like it.

How about Cool Guitarist, Retired ? May be not.

I don't really wish to expose my middle name to ridicule.

I should have simply used CR - Carriage Return.

I sympathise, being myself in possession of a ridicule-able middle name!

(Parents, they............... )

[Beef Oven!]

I sympathise, being myself in possession of a ridicule-able middle name!

(Parents, they............... )

I can’t decide whether my first or middle name is the most rubbish - and it was supposed to be a Christian act! Bloody parents!

[Ian Thumwood]

"Sedimental you" - Mark Dresser Seven

Nicole Mitchell (flutes, Marty Ehrlich (clarinets), David Morales Boroff (violin), Michael Dessen (trombone), Joshua White (piano), Mark Dresser (bass) and Jim Black (drums.)

Shame that the piano is a bit out of tune on some tracks but this is probably as good as an example of how good the current avant garde is but with the likes of Mitchell and Ehrlich on board it was never going to be less than interesting.

I has taken me an age to plough through this record which I bought on a whim. I had heard Mark Dresser in concert when he performed with Gerry Hemmingway's band at some time in the mid 1990s. It was a strange concert that intrigued rather than impressed but I suppose that I am now ready for a record like "Sedimental You. " I am not quite sure what initially appealed to me in this record which had a excellent review on line other than the fact that Nicole Mitchell is one of my favourite jazz musicians and Marty Ehrlich is a player I associate with the kind of creative jazz that is really worth listening to instead of being in that worst of categories, "worthy." I think the overwhelming impression of this disc is the technical prowess of the musicians. This is hugely complicated music and the band pull it off with aplomb.

Two people on this board are going to want to check this out, SA and Richard Barrett. I feel that this record offers plenty for discussion. It is "avant garde" but the ambition of the writing is the main attraction despite some terrific solos, especially by the pianist who is a new name to me. I suppose there is a chamber music feel to the music which is largely medium - slow tempo and has the air of the kind of music written by Mahler / berg / Shoenberg, etc. i.e. The dark, woody sonorities you associate with German classical music in the turn of the last century. The bass and violin are both bowed and the use of clarinet and flute also add to the chamber music feel. However, there are sections where the music swings in the traditional sense as well as contrafacts where Dresser elongates the number of beats in successive bars to made "I'm getting sentimental over you" sound like it has melted in to something different. For me, this is not really a fusion of jazz and classical music but a musically intelligent approach to jazz where the composer imposes a really strong musical identity.

The clash of contemporary music and jazz often produces some of the most boring music to listen to in my opinion. It is often dififcult to tell what has been composed and what has been improvised. The ideas are often good but it rarely manifests itself in music that you would want to listen to again. there is no such difficulty with this disc. Dresser's approach seems to succeed where others fail as he is bolting very melodic fragments together. There is also a sense of dynamics about the music which really helps too. The fact that his fan includes some amazingly strong soloists is yet another attraction. All in all, I suppose the lasting impression is of someone who is an extremely accomplished composer. I think there will be many who will not like this approach yet I doubt there will be any who are not impressed.

If you accept the SA mantra of continually developing jazz and pushing the music forward, this record certainly ticks all the boxes. It is pretty impressive and, in my opinion, a musical success. Granted that it is "avant garde", I think this is a good example of what jazz can aspire to. It is the writing that impresses most immediately but the use of microtonal ideas and a mash up of time signatures and tonalities that serves the music rather than being a device for it's own end that leaves me with the notion that this is as about as "cutting edge" as jazz gets and, save for the odd names given to the titles, a wake up call for what contemporary classical music could aspire to as well.

Sonny Rollins said that jazz should be the sound of surprise and this is a description which I think has haunted the music with it being an excuse for modish bands which don't last the distance. maybe Mark Dresser is really hinting at a possible future ? Here is a musical approach that owes a great deal to the European Classical tradition yet eschews the more tedious European aspects that befall a lot of contemporary jazz.

Don't recall Mark Dresser's name ever coming up for discussion on this board before.

[Stanfordian]

Blue Mitchell with Clark Terry, Julius Watkins, Jerome Richardson, Jimmy Heath, Wynton Kelly, Sam Jones & Albert Heath
‘A Sure Thing’
Riverside (1962)

[elmo]

Trawling around an antique shop with Mrs elmo a couple of days ago I came across a couple of boxes of vinyl and in amongst the MFP hits of 1978, James Last etc I came across
Curtis Fuller's " Fire and Filigree" on the Bee Hive label with Sal Nistico and Walter Bishop jnr a really good album with some very strong soloing from Curtis and Walter. The album album has not been issued as a cd other than on the Mosaic box set of the whole label.

The other album was a revelation - an old Sidney Bechet Riverside of sides from 1947 rec by Rudi Blesh for the "This is Jazz" programme. I was not aware of these sessions but absolutely wonderful stuff with giants like James P Johnson, Wild Bill, Muggsy S and a superb rhythm section Danny Barker, Pops Foster and Baby Dodds that would swing you into bad health.
Got both for 7 quid - good deal eh.

elmo

[Serial_Apologist]

Trawling around an antique shop with Mrs elmo a couple of days ago I came across a couple of boxes of vinyl and in amongst the MFP hits of 1978, James Last etc I came across
Curtis Fuller's " Fire and Filigree" on the Bee Hive label with Sal Nistico and Walter Bishop jnr a really good album with some very strong soloing from Curtis and Walter. The album album has not been issued as a cd other than on the Mosaic box set of the whole label.

The other album was a revelation - an old Sidney Bechet Riverside of sides from 1947 rec by Rudi Blesh for the "This is Jazz" programme. I was not aware of these sessions but absolutely wonderful stuff with giants like James P Johnson, Wild Bill, Muggsy S and a superb rhythm section Danny Barker, Pops Foster and Baby Dodds that would swing you into bad health.
Got both for 7 quid - good deal eh.

elmo

An antiques dealer!!! Could this be the LAST straw? Or just the vinyl solution?

[Stanfordian]

Kenny Drew with Freddie Hubbard, Hank Mobley, Sam Jones & Louis Hayes
'Undercurrent'
Blue Note (1960)

[Stanfordian]

Jimmy Smith with Blue Mitchell, Jackie McLean, Ike Quebec, Quentin Warren & Donald Bailey
‘Open House’ & ‘Plain Talk’
Blue Note (1960)

[Serial_Apologist]

Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers - Caravan, and Buhaina's Delight

Delighted to have just brought this on a bit of a shopping spree Up West, at Ray's for £8 new. "Caravan" will replace the LP I bought when aged 18, now well worn out, and while this was less well received by the critics than "Buhaina's", being seen as more restrained than the usual Messengers fare, it was the only Messengers on sale in the local provincial record shop at the time, and apart from the rather, to these ears, constricted title opening track, the one that actually complied with what seemed expected to be in the tin, there is some lovely playing from Freddie Hubbard on "Skylark", and a couple of great compositions from a Wayne Shorter still very much playing in the Coltrane manner. Curtis Fuller's OK too.

The other stuff I got I'll talk about eventually, when I've had the listen.

[Ian Thumwood]

SA

Listened to the Peter Hurt yet?

The Mark Dresser album is fascinating. The music sounds extremely difficult to play and is quite complex. I am often put in mind of Stravinksy's comment that Hindemith's music was a digestible as cardboard when you encounter projects such as this which may be considered to be "worthy" yet Dresser's approach of using richly lyrical phrases manages to make this music hugely approachable for something so ambitious. Sometimes the use of clarinet, flute and violin recalls Classical Chamber music from the early 20th century but then the music mutates in to clear jazz territory. It is rather like one of those pieces of clothing since appear to be two colours at once. The music is challenging but by no means inaccessible. I don't recall Nicole Mitchell's flute sounding prettier and the use of arco bass with the violin boldly the soloists. All in all, a pretty amazing experience.