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The "Kind of blue" group was Miles, Trane, Adderly, Evans, PC and Jimmy Cobb.
That line up carried on without Trane and Adderly with Hank Mobley in replacement, who I thought was a fantastic horn player, but Miles disliked and got rid of him. He then formed his "Second Great Quintet" with Himself, George Coleman, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Tony Williams, but Coleman didn't get on with the band or something (Even thought I thought he was great, not that my opionion counted or anythign
So, err, yeah.
I remember i'd played a whole host of Monk tunes, but when I bought Monk live at the It club, I understood how they were meant to be played. The interesting thing about that recording is how Monk is starting to loose it. He comps for a head or two for Charlie Rouse's solos then wanders off and gets a drink or something, or possibly just falls asleep at the keyboard untill it's time for him to have a (brief) solo. He even manages to change tunes in one song, the band keeps up with him (just) as he weaves between Evidence -> Straight No Chaser -> Evidence. Enthralling to listen too.
One of my lecturers saw Monk in person. Said it was horrible, he just lay at the keyboard doing nothing while the rest of the band played their butts off to an increasingly dissedent audience.
Ellington wrote some amazing pieces. Happy Go Lucky Local rocks my world every time I hear it. Latin American Sunshine is a bit repetitive but I like it alot, and Such Sweet Thunder is probably the most badass song I've ever heard.
I got a Monk collection and I love it. I'm about to go over the edge and get really into Monk. Definitely one of the most innovative pianists I've heard outside of Bill Evans, and I really relate to his improvisation, if that makes any sense.
I'd hit "At The Five Spot" or "At the Jazz Workshop"
live in Japan (Tokyo? something like that) is meant to be good.
Just think, what songs you dig, then look at one of thoose and pick the one with the most songs you know and you're away.
Thats what I did, anyway
If faith is just a silent tribute, mine is just a desperate act.
(Brubeck's Out of Time might just be the second greatest jazz album ever, and for whatever reason it's somewhat obscure if you're not into jazz. Go buy it now.)
No idea at all.
I also got The Inner Mounting Flame by Mahavishnu. It was better than Weather Report but I'd definitely rather listen to John McLaughlin with Miles.
So I think people generally have more of a problem with his ideas than they do with his music.
I heard him play classical trumpet once and I was amazed that this guy could also play jazz well. That's a pretty rare ability. Although I do think his ideas are pretty dumb.
The music stands on its own as entertainment, for me. I care what he thinks as much as I care that Charlie Parker was a junkie.
Well, on second thought, it probably did.
edit: Also, another counterargument is "well, if you like jazz from the '40s and '50s so much, why don't you just listen to music that's actually from that period instead of Wynton trying to copy it?"
Instead I hand people copies of Cds that are out there, that advance the "Craft" (So as to speak) and are the product of a good 60 years of evoloution. I'm looking at you, Mr Dave Holland.
Ps: Wynton sucks lol, also becuase he hates hith brother for 'selling out' and playing with The Dead, and Sting and stuff. Don't worry that he's recorded the greatest interpretation of A Love Supreme since Trane's orignal version (Which craps all over Wynton's soggy big band effort Bo-Ring!)
But aside from that, he's a great player. He's just a gas-bag.
Yeah.
I honestly think Countdown gets way less respect than it deserves.
My favorite thing about Giant Steps, though, is how COMPLETELY terrible everyone else is. They are fucking clueless, and then Trane comes in and bails them out. It's funny.
Edit: It is getting better. But the album insert said Miles's chops weren't really up to par for this concert, and it was right. This bassist has ridiculous tone though, I'm going to find out who it is.
The "Idon't know where I am, so I won't commit to any chords and just noodle" piano solo gets me every time too.
Brad Mehldau's version of Countdown is pretty swauve, on Art Of The Trio Vol. 2(?) nice stuff.
Does anyone rate any of the later Atlantic Material? 26-2 etc?
9/8 and 5/4 are awesome time signatures, and fuck anyone who says different.
Any spectular (lesser known) vocal tunes you know of? Honestly, I get a bit a tired of combo tunes since (to me) they seem to run together unless the soloists are absolutely amazing.
I'd be interested in this as well, although I think you kinda have to broaden your definition of "jazz" to get a lot of vocal stuff in it. Scat aside vocals rather strongly hinder improvization.
Oh wait... man, I just realized Ornithology is the study of birds... Charlie Parker... Bird.
But yeah man, Ornithology, Anthropology... there are a lot of really great Charlie Parker standards. Recently, I've been playing and listening to a lot bebop, and I seriously got a headache, so much stuff was happening. Or maybe my headache was unrelated. But I digress.
A hell of a lot of modern jazz works on crazy time signatures - That work.
Chris Potter does a fantastic version of Mingus' Boogie Stop Shuffle which instead of following four bars of four four, follows a bar of four a bar of three a bar of four a bar of two. So it's like a Seven Four/Six Four cycle. And it works. And they can play over it. Very grand.
And i've harped on about Dave Holland enough in this thread as it is, but seriously. Not For Nothing. Time signatures abound (I mean working time signatures, not, oh grand, lets do something ine sixty-three thousand / thirty 8! Arn't we good!). Time is now just becoming a natural evoloution of the jazz pallette. Brubeck and company are special becuase they got it to work first.
The thing about Bird that gets you the most, is that a fair few of his earlier tracks (Antropology nee Thriving On A Riff) was a tune where they just rocked up to a recording date and went, right, How Highs the moon eh? Okay, i'll just whip up this head on the spot for you. Zing!
Producer: Ahh, lets call this "Anthropology".
I disagree about BeBop as being complicated. It's actually (In my experiance) easier to play than some of the later harmonic styles. A BeBop piece is nine times out of ten going to be over a set of changes based on I've Got Rhythm, or How High The Moon or even a blues. Meaning, that the changes are going to be more key-centric than something written by Miles or Coltrane, and thus, are normally quite simple solo lines.
You can grab a Parker transcription and literally see him jumping up the arpegio, third after third. And anything else he does is just one of his tricks (Banging that 9th, or 11th. Hitting that Major 7th descending passing note, what have you) where as you CAN pick up a Coltrane transcription, (Any of you read Downbeat? They published on of Trane's Impressions solos, try and understand that) and have NO IDEA what he is harmonically thinking. But melodically, it works.
But the real difference is this, you can grab a Parker lick over a F major chord, and you can then play that lick over any darn major chord and it'll be a beautiful melodic statement. Grab a lick from a major chord by Trane, and unless you know the 8 bars previous, the 8 bars after and at what part of the solo that lick is meant to come from, then it'll sound (By Comparrison) like rubbish.
So leading us back to the original statement: Parker's brilliance (Aside from that fact that he pioneered a sound) is that he sounds complicated, and stunning from a very small pallette.
Like I said before I'm a sucker for big band music although it seems to be less artistic than combo improv. Some of my favorite vocals are "My Heart is Heavy as Lead" and "Girl from Ipanema" - you know, sort of of classic jazz arrangements.
And out of curiosity, why is Charlie Parker's nicknamed "The Bird?"
Very well put. By flatting some ninths and including dimished and regular sevenths, Bird created some absolutely flying lines. Bebop major, Dave Baker calls the scale with both sevenths.
However, don't sell bird short. He started doing some insane lydian stuff later on. And, I mean, compared with what people WERE playing, Bird is a genius.
However, I think Dizz and Fats get downplayed. For my money, they were at least AS talented as Bird. Nobody could touch Dizzy in technique, and miles just ripped off Donna Lee from a Fats Navarro solo. But this just might be my trumpet bias.
Captain Marvel is a great album. More Chick Corea than Stan Getz, but stil amazing.
I really fucking love "Moment's Notice." Today my dumb ass finally got a copy of Blue Train for myself and I'm listening to "Moment's Notice" for the fourth time today right now. Which, again, is another really fun song that's more substantial than something like "Blue Rondo a la Turk."