What Jazz are you listening to now?

[teamsaint]

Miles Davis - The Lost Quintet

Incredible music.

And a nice cover.

[Joseph K]

And a nice cover.

Yes, although really the quintet wasn't 'lost' - there is a four disk boxed set of it, Miles in Europe 1969: The Bootleg vol. 2, with one of the disks being a DVD of a show in Berlin, and there is footage of some of one of the shows in France:

Also some aspects of the production of 'The Lost Quintet' disk could be better - IIRC one of the track breaks is wrong! But the music is fantastic.

Now spinning here: John McLaughlin, Que Alegria. A very fine album which manages to blend - or should that be 'fuse' - a few different musical traditions: jazz, rock/pop, Indian, blues, also hints of European classical music, and I detect hints of South American guitar genres... but it all happens very organically and is not forced - on the contrary, it's absolutely masterful.

[Joseph K]

Miles Davis - Big Fun

[Serial_Apologist]

Dave Douglas Charms of the Night Sky Band live set:

http://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=Dave+Douglas+Charms+of+the+Night+Sky+Band+on +y outube#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:2eb8de5f,vid:nrY8ZM4_O_ w

Using his detectable influences lightly, Dave Douglas writes great improvisation-friendly materials and always manages to assemble sympathetic colleagues for his projects. He was probably the first American jazzer in the Millennium to turn my attention back to what was going on across the waters after a long lapse and once more find things of interest.

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

This week's edition of the London Review of Books (just out) had a poem, I assume biographical, about John Coltrane by the American poet & writer, August Kleinzahler...

Part...

"It’s evening, after dinner, the family downstairs, doing what they do.
John will come by now and then to sit with me
on his way back from Van Gelder’s studio in Hackensack
after recording all day. Art Taylor or Red Garland might drop him off here
on their way back into the city. Usually, they all just hop on a bus,
the 162 to the Uptown Port Authority at 168th Street, by Columbia Presbyterian.
Are you familiar with his composition ‘Route 4’, the highway they travel?
It really moves.
I never know when John will turn up, but I’m always happy when he does,
more than happy. Mom and Dad seem amenable to his visits,
even Grand (the dog), very out of character, who barks like mad when the doorbell rings..."

Not often Red Garland gets a mention in the LRB.

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

"Route 4" , from "Dakar", Trane, Cecil Payne, Pepper Adams, Mal Waldron etc, Prestige.

http://youtu.be/pjPbHRAi7Nw

[Serial_Apologist]

This week's edition of the London Review of Books (just out) had a poem, I assume biographical, about John Coltrane by the American poet & writer, August Kleinzahler...

Part...

"It’s evening, after dinner, the family downstairs, doing what they do.
John will come by now and then to sit with me
on his way back from Van Gelder’s studio in Hackensack
after recording all day. Art Taylor or Red Garland might drop him off here
on their way back into the city. Usually, they all just hop on a bus,
the 162 to the Uptown Port Authority at 168th Street, by Columbia Presbyterian.
Are you familiar with his composition ‘Route 4’, the highway they travel?
It really moves.
I never know when John will turn up, but I’m always happy when he does,
more than happy. Mom and Dad seem amenable to his visits,
even Grand (the dog), very out of character, who barks like mad when the doorbell rings..."

Not often Red Garland gets a mention in the LRB.

A rather different but nice anecdote told by Iain Ballamy on one of the tapes I wa going through yesterday,

Ruby Braff in conversation with Louis Armstrong:
"Hey Louis, how come you get to play your best with pick-up bands?!
"Well I just dream up one in my head out of my favourite musicians, and play along with that"
"Who would they be, Louis?"
"Get lost! I'm not giving you my secrets. Find your own band!".

[Jazzrook]

John Coltrane with Art Taylor & Paul Chambers playing 'Goldsboro Express' in 1958 from the overlooked Prestige album 'Bahia':

https://www.YouTube.com/watch?v=hfC0tQvhic4

JR

[Jazzrook]

Iggy Pop played this hard-to-find Little Walter track last Sunday on his excellent BBC Radio6 programme which usually clashes with JRR:

https://www.YouTube.com/watch?v=l989qn3BLbU

"Little Walter was as much a musical genius as Mozart" (Miles Davis).

JR

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

Little Walter "Blue and Lonesome" , Chess, first take. "Little Mother Fkr Walter!" says Leonard Chess? as he rolls the tapes! Magnificent. Walter with a face map of all the fights he'd been in. "Walter was pretty good at getting into fights, no so good getting out of them;" - Jimmy Rogers.http://youtu.be/bhm_R6NrAhI

[Jazzrook]

Little Walter "Blue and Lonesome" , Chess, first take. "Little Mother Fkr Walter!" says Leonard Chess? as he rolls the tapes! Magnificent. Walter with a face map of all the fights he'd been in. "Walter was pretty good at getting into fights, no so good getting out of them;" - Jimmy Rogers.http://youtu.be/bhm_R6NrAhI

Powerful stuff, BN - puts the Stones version in the shade. Any idea where I can find this take on CD/LP?

JR

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

I'm sure there must be other sources but there's this...

"In 2009, The Complete Little Walter Chess Masters: 1950–1967 was issued by the Checker/Chess successor, Hip-O Records/Universal. The five compact disc box set contains 126 recordings and is believed to represent all of his solo recordings. In 2010, the set received a Grammy Award for Best Historical Album."


There was a Walter French LP in the late 1970's on Le Roi Blues (bootleg?) that had it along with other outtakes. Apparently the materiel "escaped" from the Chess vaults "via Canada"!

[Jazzrook]

I'm sure there must be other sources but there's this...

"In 2009, The Complete Little Walter Chess Masters: 1950–1967 was issued by the Checker/Chess successor, Hip-O Records/Universal. The five compact disc box set contains 126 recordings and is believed to represent all of his solo recordings. In 2010, the set received a Grammy Award for Best Historical Album."


There was a Walter French LP in the late 1970's on Le Roi Blues (bootleg?) that had it along with other outtakes. Apparently the materiel "escaped" from the Chess vaults "via Canada"!

Thanks, BN. The 5-CD set & the French LP seem very hard to find. Will keep searching but may have to settle for this version on 'The Essential LW':

https://www.YouTube.com/watch?v=8KfYsRuwcVg

JR

[Ian Thumwood]

Been enjoying Nels Cline's double cd called 'Lovers ' and which was created as a kind of mood music project of the kind that was popular in 1970s. The album was tended to be romantic but the result is a decidedly eccentric take on Easy Listening with the material consisting of works by Jimmy Guiffre, Michel Portal, Henry Mancini, Annette Peacock. Thurston Moore,etc. There are are quite a few standards and some Cline originals.

I really like Cline's guitar yet he is almost eclipsed by Michael Leonhart's arrangements which resemble Gil Evans. There are some smaller group tracks too which do not differ in style from the overall concept. The arrangements are incredible and if the mood is generally sore, this is a hugely compelling double cd. It is so eclectic in its repertoire and styles , mixing standards with Left Field rock and 1960s style arrangement.

Leonhart's own 'Painted Lady Suite' is also pretty good and features a huge orchestra which is like an update of Paul Whiteman's approach to symphonic jazz. It is good but a bit overblown when contrasted with the Cline discs which represent a concept 25 years in the making. The Cline disc would interest SA although probably too strange to appeal to Joe. It is fascinating listen and a very original idea.

[elmo]

Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers "Arabia" rec Copenhagen 1962 - Wayne Shorter, Freddie Hubbard, Curtis Fuller, Cedar Walton, Jymie Merritt, Art

Incredible Wayne Shorter solo on this track, a precursor of his "Free for all" solo and just builds the intensity until he lifts the bandstand.

https://youtu.be/W9M7mbhXp8A

elmo