A multitude of small delights constitute ......

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

Alyn has a delightful mix of interesting arrangers and hot stuff....

Geoffrey will get ian's rocks off on Herbie Richard and Elmo [mine too ]


Kevin Le Gendre "presents a performance from the current BBC Radio 3 New Generation Jazz Artist, saxophonist Trish Clowes and her quinet. The set brings together Trish with the very first BBC Radio 3 New Generation Jazz Artist, pianist Gwilym Simcock. Recorded at Kings Place, London with a stellar line-up including guitarist Chris Montague, bassist Calum Gourlay and drummer James Maddren."


Jon3 does Jazzzahead in Bremen a selection from the edge of European music making ... excellent scheme eh?

[Serial_Apologist]

Thanks Calum!

A shame Trish has dispensed with her string quartet - resourceful as she and they were with it a year ago on a broadcast - but anything Trish puts her mind and saxes to should be good going by past experience.

Geoffrey's programme is a must for those who've overlooked, missed out on or maybe misjudged Herbie Nichols and Dick Twardzik, though the latter got the thumbs up from Howard Riley on a special feature programme he presented a few years ago, citing Twardzik as an influence. And at last I get to hear Elmo Hope!

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

Christ, Elmo Hope on R3! Once every twelve months or so! My threat to reveal Caroline Thompson's Cayman Island slush fund has paid off. At last. "Barfly" is one of the great Elmo album tracks, in fact that entire 59 trio album is classic. Dig Frank Butler...listening.

BN.

And, before he leaps in, yes, Alyn Shipton did play my Elmo trio request...but only because I said my mother had been run over by a News International truck and was in a coma.

[Old Grumpy]

Thanks Calum!

A shame Trish has dispensed with her string quartet - resourceful as she and they were with it a year ago on a broadcast - but anything Trish puts her mind and saxes to should be good going by past experience.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

Geoffrey is a must catch programme, excellent overview of three very telling pianist/composers ...

[grippie]

Geoffrey is a must catch programme, excellent overview of three very telling pianist/composers ...

I only hope that it doesn't get the end cut off by 15 minutes to fit in Through the Night that follows.

They did it to the Venuti and Lang and the Bud Powell programmes

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

seemed like a full length listen grippie ... [but i did not notice]

the Trish Clowes set on JLU is also one to catch and listening again to it reinforces that view; very intelligent and wonderful improvising and composition ....

[Ian Thumwood]

The Geoffrey Smith programme was interesting but it would have been better to have had more analysis. It was good that three neglected pianists were featured yet was familiar with about 75% of the music chosen.

Last week I was on a music workshop which studied three of the Miles' "Birth of the cool" arrangements including "Boplicity", "Move" (which I didn't appreciate was another "I got rhythm" contrafact) and "Deception." The latter tune was by far the most modern and typifies the more progressive approach to harmony of the time which I think sets it apart from the other charts - including Gil Evans. This ties in to the three pianists featured of GJS as Nichols, Twardzik and Hope seemed to take jazz harmony in a totally different direction to many of their contemporaries. I was amazed how how similar they were in many respects and especially in the case of Hope and Twardzik, just how influential Bud Powell seemed to be.

That said, Twardzik is a really odd case as I feel that if he has not died aged 24 he would not have been celebrated for working with Chet Baker and, I feel, would have associated himself squarely within the avant garde of the 1960's. That said, his playing and compositions are the best things about Baker's recordings and , having heard "Fable of Mable" for the first time, it made me wonder if his works with Baker were indeed his best efforts. I could have seen Twardzik going along a similar path to someone like Paul Bley. To my ears, he seems almost misplaced in the early 1950's.

As for Herbie Nichols, the programme didn't plough too deeply into why his music is so different. Unless you see the music written down, I suppose that it isn't obvious although it is clearly very different from anyone else. The harmonies are perculiar (and sometimes purposely wrong as is the case with the tune "in honour of Garner" which gently ribs Errol's technique) and the structure of the compositions are not the obvious AABA. I think he was the most original writer in small group jazz until the arrival of Wayne Shorter. This din't really come across in the programme even if his neglect and early demise was correctly identified as one of the great misjustices in jazz. I would much sooner listen to Nichols than practially any other pianist from the 1950's as he was seriously exploring what jazz could be in a manner that was far more radical than the likes of Lewis or even Tristano who I also hugely admire. There was a more insightful interview with Jason Moran on Ethan Iveson's blog which looked more closely at what Nichols was about - both seems to rate him as one of the greatest amongst all jazz pianists.

Hope was interesting too. The session with Land is a classic and Hope is one of the reasons why this record is elevated beyond a West Coast blowing session. It was nice to hear the trio records which were interesting and would be well worth exploring. He has a crisper style than Nichols and isn't quite as disonant. I think he is also the most indebted to Bud Powell even if marginally more eccentric. Of the three he was probably the most conservative but it is criminal that he was been over-looked.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

thanks for those considered remarks Ian!

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

thanks for those considered remarks Ian!

The more I listen to Elmo Hope the more convinced I am that he was really something special. Even the boppish playing of the early fifties has wonderful off centre moments. The 59 trio album is majestic and reveals the mature Hope. Also one of Jason Moran's favs. Richard Cook said Elmo was the "watercolourist" to Monk's oils, and there is a lot in that.

BN.

Btw ckout Horace Silver's trio ballad playing...Elmoesque.

[Ian Thumwood]

I picked up the CD "The New Tristano" last week. If you want to discuss "radical" approaches to jazz piano in the 1950's I think that Lennie Tristano needs to be added in to the mix. I am a fan of his playing and his approach to jazz. The liner notes are intriguing , especially insofar as Tristano's criticism of the music of Coltrane and Miles at the time. (1962.)

The CD is very short yet it includes "C minor Complex" which I think is not only Tristano's greatest recorded performance but a tour de force of piano playing that knocks the spots off most other performances up until that time. When I first heard this tune on JRR, I was stunned by the brilliance and I never tire of hearing it. The technical aspect of the playing is staggering. What I find perculiar is that whilst he was radical in many respects, there seems to be much that is traditional that underpins his music. I think that many of the tunes appear to have been based on standards ("Deliberation" sounds like it is based upon "Indianna" / "Donna Lee.") and this seems at odds with the notion that Tristano invented free jazz in the two performances with the sextet in the late forties. I've also been struck at just how much he was influenced by Charlie Parker and whilst not playing "be bop" per se, he is still very much of than generation.
Even when it comes to addressing the problems of performing solo, his approach is to resort to a vigorous walking bass line which makes a lot of the music on the disc sound "samey." I wonder whether this pianist with such a technique didn't explore other possibilities and, upon reflection, I wonder if the regular beat offered by this kind of approach mirrored the unflexible role of bass and drums in his own groups.

I feel Tristano is pivotal in understand how modern jazz piano functions and I doubt if anyone explored the potential of the mechanics of the music as much as him. Having read interviews with Lee Konitz and Peter Ind, I have a lot of admiration for what Tristano tried to achieve. The album "The new Tristano" may sometimes be a bit theoretical in it's approach and I don't really buy the notion of the emotional depth of his piano playing. It is a bit cerebral. However, like J S Bach, the music is extremely intelligent and I consider Tristano to be one of the greatest pianists in the early history of Modern Jazz.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

welcome aboard on Tristano Ian .... checked out Connie Crothers? she was a pupil and is a long time advocate of Tristano and ridiculously little known!

great documentary on Mr T