I know it’s tempting fate to post something with a title like Long Long Summer, but we’ve had such lovely warm weather for the last week or so I couldn’t resist putting this up while the sun’s still shining. I particularly wanted to share this track (a) because it matches the weather perfectly and (b) because it’s by the great Dizzy Gillespie Quintet of 1962 with Lalo Schifrin on piano, man best known as a prolific composer of film and TV scores. The band also featured Leo Wright, a very under-rated saxophonist and flautist. They all play terrifically on this original composition by Lalo Schifrin. There’s also a chance to see an interesting collection of photographs of Dizzy Gillespie, and his amazing cheeks!
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Long Long Summer
Posted in Jazz with tags Dizzy Gillespie, Lalo Schifrin, Long Long Summer on May 28, 2012 by telescoperC Jam Blues
Posted in Jazz with tags Ed Thigpen, Oscar Peterson, Ray Brown on May 22, 2012 by telescoperI finished a marathon session of examination marking yesterday evening, and gave the papers another check through this afternoon just as a precaution against any errors on my part. Now I’m satisfied with them I’m going to hand them over to the second examiner tomorrow morning for another check. We do take a lot of care over this things, you know…
Having got such such a big job out of the way I think there’s grounds for a minor celebration. On top of that I noticed this afternoon that the total number of visits to this blog has just passed the one million mark! Thanks to everyone who has visited for taking the trouble to read my ramblings. I hope to be able to pass on news of an important development on the blog very soon…
In the meantime, here’s a video I’ve been waiting for a good day to post. It’s the great Oscar Peterson Trio vintage 1964 in excellent form playing a Duke Ellington standard called C Jam Blues which, as its name suggests, is a 12-bar blues in the key of C Major. I have many reasons for loving this performance: Oscar Peterson’s lengthy improvised introduction is worth a shout all on its own, but watch out for the little look he gives to bassist Ray Brown at about 2.34 to signal him in at the start of the next chorus. Look out too for the flawless performance of the legendary Ed Thigpen on drums; one of my Dad’s absolute favourite drummers, and mine too. The three musicians are definitely all on the same wavelength for this track, but the eyeball communication between Ed Thigpen and Ray Brown seems almost psychic.
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Posted in Jazz with tags Louis Armstrong, Muggles on May 10, 2012 by telescoperA bit fed up today, and too tired to post anything substantive, so I thought I’d cheer myself up this lunchtime the old-fashioned way with a bit of Louis Armstrong. This was recorded in 1928 by Satchmo with the later incarnation of the Hot Five, which naturally numbered six people in total. The title, Muggles, has nothing to with Harry Potter but is a slang word popular in 1920s Chicago that refers to a certain smoking material of an illicit nature, to which Mr Armstrong was rather partial all his life and which no doubt contributed to the relaxed atmosphere pervading this recording session..
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Here’s That Rainy Day ..
Posted in Jazz with tags Bill Evans, Here's that Rainy Day, Jazz on April 28, 2012 by telescoperIf yesterday’s post made you wonder how difficult it is to turn a piece of sheet music into sound using a piano keyboard, then perhaps today’s will make you wonder how a pianist like Bill Evans managed to create music as beautiful as this without any score at all! This is Here’s that Rainy Day from the 1968 album Bill Evans Alone. Miles Davis said of Bill Evans “He plays the piano the way it should be played”. I, for one, won’t argue with that.
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Left Alone
Posted in Jazz with tags Abdullah IBrahim, Archie Shepp, Dollar Brand on April 15, 2012 by telescoperHere’s a lovely little duet by saxophonist Archie Shepp and Abdullah Ibrahim, who was born in South Africa and formerly known as Dollar Brand. A good time to post it, as it’s called Left Alone and I’m spending the day on my own finishing a few things off before returning to Blighty tomorrow…
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Posted in Jazz with tags Cement Mixer, Jazz, Slim Gaillard on March 31, 2012 by telescoperWell, term is over and, inevitably, there are signs that the weather is on the turn. Time, I think, for a bit of inspired silliness by the great Slim Gaillard. I’ve posted about Slim before, but for completeness Slim Gaillard was a truly remarkable character who led a remarkable life, as his wikipedia page makes clear. He was a superbly talented musician in his own right, but also a wonderful comedian and storyteller. He’s most famous for the novelty jazz acts he formed with musicians such as Slam Stewart and, later, Bam Brown; their stream-of-consciousness vocals ranged far afield from the original lyrics along with wild interpolations of nonsense syllables such as MacVoutie and O-reeney; one such performance figures in the 1957 novel On the Road by Jack Kerouac.
In later life Slim Gaillard travelled a lot in Europe – he could speak 8 languages in addition to English – and spent long periods living in London. He died there, in fact, in 1991, aged 75. I saw him a few times myself when I used to go regularly to Ronnie Scott’s Club. A tall, gangly man with a straggly white beard and wonderful gleam in his eye, he cut an unmistakeable figure in the bars and streets of Soho. He rarely had to buy himself a drink as he was so well known and such an entertaining fellow that a group always formed around him, just in order to enjoy his company, whenever he went into a pub or club. You never quite knew what he was going to do next, in fact. I once saw him sit down and play a piano with his palms facing upwards, striking the notes with the backs of his fingers as he does in this clip, wherein he interpolates an upside-down but nevertheless very accurate version of the opening passages of Debussy’s Claire de Lune. I’m posting this primarily because it’s such a hoot, but I think it also demonstrates what a marvellous musician he was both on piano – check out the size of his hands! – and on guitar, playing a medley of his hit Cement Mixer to accompany his own gloriously daft vocal.
Other random things worth mentioning are that Slim Gaillard’s daughter was married to Marvin Gaye and it is generally accepted that the word “groovy” was coined by him (Slim). I know it’s a cliché, but he really was a larger-than-life character and a truly remarkable human being. As one of the commenters on Youtube aptly put it “To Slim Gaillard, the whole world was just one big O-roonie”. Enjoy!
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Posted in Jazz with tags Clifford Brown, Jack Montrose, Jazz, Joy Spring on March 28, 2012 by telescoperHaving an early morning cup of tea in the garden just now, as the fine weather continues, I suddenly remembered this classic from 1954. Fortunately someone has put it on Youtube so I can share it right away. This piece will forever be associated with the late great Clifford Brown who plays trumpet and leads the band, but the real star of the show for me is the arranger, Jack Montrose, who wove a rich texture around the melody of Joy Spring, with more than a hint of the West Coast “Cool” that was to dominate the US jazz scene in later years.
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Posted in Jazz with tags bebop, Charlie Parker, Jazz, Kim, Rhythm Changes on March 18, 2012 by telescoperLast week saw the 57th anniversary of the death of Charlie Parker, aka Bird, a musical genius on the saxophone whose influence not only on jazz but on twentieth century music is incalculable. I’ve posted quite a few tracks by Bird over the years and one thing I’ve learned from doing that is that he’s by no means everyone’s cup of tea. I can’t do anything about that, of course, but I can at least point out the existence of his wonderful legacy to those (regrettably many) people who’ve never heard of him or his musicI still remember the mixture of astonishment and exhilaration I felt when I first heard him on record and if I can give that sense of joy to just one person via the blogosphere then it’s worth a hundred posts.
Here’s Kim, another one of Bird’s tunes based on the rhythm changes, with an alto sax solo improvised at breakneck speed and with incredible virtuosity. The other day I was talking to a friend of mine who only has a passing interest in jazz and he asked me whether Charlie Parker really was that good. Well, if you’re asking that question to yourself, listen to this and then you’ll have the answer. As far as I’m concerned this is three minutes of pure awesome….
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Posted in Jazz with tags Booker Little, Frank Strozier, Waltz of the Demons on March 3, 2012 by telescoperI stumbled across this on Youtube; it’s in 3/4 time and I’ve never been very good at waltzing. I thought I’d post it on here because it features Booker Little, fabulous trumpet player who sadly died very young (at the age of 23) in 1961. He was an inspired improviser with a highly individual sense of phrasing, and an amazing ability to articulate complex ideas at fast tempi. Listening to him playing makes you wonder into what new directions he might have taken jazz had he lived even just a few years longer.
The band was led by alto saxophonist Frank Strozier, and the excellent rhythm section of Wynton Kelly (piano), Paul Chambers (bass) and Jimmy Cobb (drums) will be familiar to fans of Miles Davis. This track is called Waltz of the Demons..
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In the Dark 