The Crazy Rhythms, 2 Chucks, Savoy Jazz

The 2 Chucks are Charlies Kennedy, who passed in April, and Ventura, the former a little bit Chu and a little bit Pres, the latter by way of Hawk, Ike Quebec and Bird. C.K. makes his horn dance on the title track and he's nifty throughout. But the supporting cast really strikes me in his five selections, Al McKibbon on bass in particular. He doesn't really solo or do anything fancy yet is so solid in the foundation he lays, I can't help but marvel at it. Pianist Johnny Guanieri and guitarist Bill De Arango produce some nice solos on what is small group swing advanced enough for the time (1945) to display elements of bop. Lovely version of I Can't Get Started. De Arango has some Django in him.

Ventura's five songs are dandy, too, starting with a wailing Dark Eyes. He's likewise pyrotechnical on Charlie Comes On and Jackpot, but leavens those with a ballady Ever So Thoughtful and a swift yet less frenetic Big Deal. Specs Powell does some laudable drumming.

That's how I roll

Nice long paddle this morning under cloudly skies and with a few sprinkles. Along the way, I saw a Great Blue heron, a muskrat, a turtle and a scary catfish about two feet long.

Then I started thinking about those movies where a giant alligator shows up in some place it shouldn't be, and I paddeled faster. Hey man, I saw Lake Placid. I know how this works. OK, that was a crocodile, but same outcome.

A baker's dozen...

...randomly generated from my iTunes library.

1) Ca Mi Queria, Cristina Branco (surprisingly light-hearted fado); 2) Como Fue, Ibrahim Ferrer (melancholy big-band-backed Cuban jazz singing); 3) If It's Good (Then I want It), Louis Armstrong (Pops sings, then blows, it's good, I want it); 4) Every Time It Rains, Randy Newman (I love him when he's ironic, but he's a balladeer nonpareil as well); 5) Twisted, Wardell Gray (if Charlie Parker played tenor); 6) Duel of the Jester and the Tyrant Part 1 & 2, Return to Forever (groovin' long-form fusion); 7) Stompin at Decca, The Django Reinhardt Festival (violin and saxophone capture the gypsy's essence and a guitar in the mode of the master follows, plus ensemble)

8) Deep Blue Sea, Nat Simpkins (sax, organ and guitar, to have sex by, naturally); 9) Scrapple from the Apple, Charlie Parker (what more need be said); 10) There's a Small Hotel, J. J. Johnson (lyrical isn't a term you associate with the trombone, except maybe with this guy); 11) Lonesome Home Blues, Tommy Johnson (who's not Robert, but pretty much as good); 12) The Porch Faces Sunset. Richard Leo Johnson (who coaxes a symphony out of a piece of National Steel) 13) Go Ahead John, Miles Davis (pulse, drum, thrash, a compact funk-eee omelet)

Frank Macchia, Saxolollapalooza, Cacophony

Big band...sound, in any event. Six reeds and drummer Peter Erskine. Macchia did the arrangements for a sax sextet a long time ago and finally got to record them, and some new ones, with a bunch of pro-phuker on-call L.A. reedistas, including Eric Marienthal.

Down By the Riverside is a very New Orleans second line rendering as is Java, big time. Beautiful version of My One and Only Love with Gene Cipriano on bari carrying it. They do more interesting things with Working Day and Night than Michael Jackson ever did, I venture. Duke and Juan Tizol would have dug the version of Caravan, which just popped the word intricate into my mind. Eminently swinging Shortening Bread, thoroughly bluesy Creole Love Song (Marienthal's closing solo is just soaked in the blues), odd but intriguing Swing Low, Sweet Chariot that begins noirish and ends choir-like. This is boffo music.

Cristina Branco, Sensus, Decca

Grew on me through three listens. Initially, I thought it wasn't very fado on the front end, more Latin jazzy. My Love is like Barbara Streisand singing My Funny Valentine, only not the same words and in Portuguese. But this, and the piano accompanying her, doesn't negate the fact that it is fado at its roots. The comparison also is a commentary on her voice, which is marvelous.

The Portuguese guitar kicks in on the next track, Songs of the Mountain Women, and we are back in traditional fado territory. She makes fado of Shakespeare on If Thy Soul Check Thee, and darn good fado, too. By Sonnet Destroyed we're in proper, gut-wrenching fado mode. He Only Wanted is actually kind of hopeful.

As per Michael Jackson...

In the last hundred years, there have been many, many musicians, even limiting it to Americans, at least as, and in some cases more, significant: Joplin, Fletcher Henderson, Bessie Smith, Woody Guthrie, Gershwin, Sinatra, Ella, Armstrong, Ellington, Miles, Monk, Patsy Cline, Mingus, Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Barbara Streisand, Philip Glass, B.B. King, Muddy Waters, Elvis, Prince and Springsteen. Make your own list.

Jackson made (some) interesting music and was, up to an obvious point, good at marketing himself. He has a measure of cultural relevance as a black man (albeit apparently not willingly) who crossed boundaries. Then again, so does Sonny Rollins (willingly, I might add) and, when Mr. Rollins, or Fred Anderson, for example, pass, the media and thus the world will scarcely notice the ripple, which I find truly sad.

The venerable New York Times on the day of Jackson's death led its Web page with five, count them five, stories about it. I guarantee that on the day Quincy Jones dies, the NYT will not lead its Web page with five stories about it and not because he lacked importance in comparison to Michael Jackson by any rational measure. What he lacks is a freak show quality to his life. Prurience is not the same thing as significance.

Helder Moutinho, Luz De Lisboa, Ocarina

"One may ask: the fado singer sings the fado, or is himself that very fado he sings?" Theme of Au Vieux Chanteur, To the Old Singer, one of 11 excellent fados from Mountinho, the first male fado singer I have encountered since I became interested in the music who really grips me.

The others haven't been bad, just not as emotive as the many women whose fado CDs I now own, which is important to me because, while I am learning more with each disc, I still understand just a little Portuguese and it's the emotion, not the words, invested in the music that really attracts me.

Someone like Mariza, Ana Moura or Cristina Branco it makes no difference that I don't understand (most of) the words she's singing, I can understand what she is singing about without knowing (most of) the words, a power that comes, perhaps, because they are the fados they sing. Ditto this guy. Also, excellent Portuguese guitar playing from Paulo Jorge Santos.

Sound familiar?

Yes, and equally absurd: "June 30, 2009--Now that the president and the Democrats in Congress have set a fall deadline for legislative action on universal police protection for all Americans, battle lines are being drawn on Capitol Hill. On the right are conservative defenders of America's system of for-profit, private mercenaries. The Democrats are divided among progressives who favor universal, publicly funded police who would protect all citizens against crime, and moderate and conservative Democrats who argue that any citizen security reform should leave America's existing system of soldiers for hire in place.

"Do we want long wait times when we call for the police, like people in countries with socialized police forces?" Sen. Russell Flack, R-Ga., asked during a floor debate yesterday. "Under our system, we can choose our own police officers, as long as we pay for protection out of our own pockets. Do we want some government bureaucrat choosing the police for us?"

The whole piece is here.

15 songs at random from my iTunes library...

...at the Facebook behest of my friend Virginia Black.

I should do this more often.

1) Barrett's Privateers, 3 Pints Gone (maybe the best band name ever, great song, too); 2) Nutty, Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane (At Carnegie Hall no less, how could you lose?); 3) Might As Well Be Spring, Sonny Stitt (how he could play the saxophone with such lyrical grace); 4) Round Midnight (and a delicious version of what is probably my favorite song, I might add), Kronos Quartet; 5) Song Of The Pharoah Kings, Return to Forever (a logical extension of Miles electric)

6) Trodin' Jah Road, Morgan Heritage (reggae didn't begin and end with Bob Marley); 7) I'll Say She Does, Six Brown Brothers (proto-jazz by a proto-World Saxophone Quartet, only a sextet); 8) Confirmation, The Modern Jazz Quartet (an elegant, naturally, reading of a Bird classic); 9) Jesus Christ, Woodie Guthrie (get over it, you conservative pigs, Jesus was, in fact, a laborer and a democratic socialist); 10) Martha Argerich and the Berlin Philharmonic, Prokofiev Piano Concerto #3 (she is one wicked piano-playing chick)

11) Crepuscule, Django Reinhardt (no one, and I mean no one, played the guitar like him before or since); 12) Work In Progress, Stephen Scott (elements of Monk and Herbie Nichols, he's one jazz pianist on the scene today who should be more appreciated, I dug him when he played with Sonny Rollins); 13) You Torture My Soul, John Lee Hooker (him and his guitar at Sugar Hill, all by their lonesome, you don't need no more); 14) Fables Of Fabus, Iswhat?! (a thoroughly worthy hip hop-inflected homage to Mingus, who I think would have appreciated it); 15) The Lamp Is Low, Booker Ervin (fitting that one of Mingus' favorite saxophonists follows)

What, Michael Jackson change?

Sad, sad, sad.

And speaking of the Allison family...

This is Luther Allison's Little Red Rooster. There are many other Little Red Roosters (kind of) like it, but this one is Luther Allison's. It is nass-tee. Followed by Evil is Going On. I need to drink whiskey and smoke cigarettes now.

Thoughts on Bad News is Coming, Motown Universal.

Pretty nasty Dust My Broom, too.

Bernard Allison, Keepin' the Blues Alive, Cannonball Records

He's an argument for the blues being genetic, because he sure musta got a bunch of Luther's genes. Rockin' Chicago-electric blues, although he'd go over big at the W.C. Handy Blues Festival in Henderson, Ky., or the Austin City Limits Music Festival. Young Boy's Blues is a corker and Walkin' would take me a long way, strollin' or drivin'. You Gave Me the Blues is a soul-inflected blues ballad with some great guitar licks, like those aren't crawling all over this. Delicious cover of Ike Turner's Rocket 88 and boffo B-3 backing from Ron Levy.

The only thing I wonder is why there is a BB rolling around in the chamber on the left side of the CD jewel case.

Ana Vinagre, Paixoes, Figueira Productions

With her husband Jose singing on some tracks, too. She's another American fadista, more experienced than Nathalie Pires but rawer, which I intend as a compliment, although I really enjoy Nathalie Pires.

Vinagre's voice is powerful and expressive. She gets right down to the emotional core at the center of fado songs. But I detect very little in the way of post-processing or effects on this CD. I have to think that if I walked into a hole-in-the-wall club in Portugal to hear "real" fado, this is pretty much what I'd get, from the opener Paixoes Diagonais on. Barco Negro slips in some sea sounds. They're endearing rather than jarring, however. The guitar playing is excellent, and unflitered, as well. I believe I'll buy her other disc.

Heat is on

Froze my butt bathing in a river in Alaska in July once. Would have
taken it today. One warm paddle up, in a head wind to boot. The breeze
was nice coming down though.

Mariza on Letterman

Note the silence of the audience. No one, it seems, dares utter a peep because this woman obviously means serious business.

For all the wonder of her voice, I think her stage presence is just as stunning. Even Dave seems to have been impressed. OK, I'm madly in love and I admit it.

Steve Reid, Nova, Universal Sound (Import)

First thought, hey Miles' On the Corner, maybe with some of the rougher edges sanded off by Weather Report. But that doesn't quite get it after a traveling through a few times. Steve Reid drummed behind a lot of people and I hear a lot of people in this.

Martha and the Vandellas as a high schooler and there is a funky Motown hum underneath, with Ornette (jammed when the two worked at Macey's), Fela Kuti, '70s and '80s Freddie Hubbard, Jacke McLean, Sam Rivers, Archie Shepp and even Horace Silver wrapped around it. These are just impressions. The band does a great job of incorporatng it all into set pieces that range from Afro-beat (Lions of Juda) to free jazz in a Coltrane's Ascension or Pharoah Sanders' Karma mode (Sixth House). I like Les Walker on electric piano and organ, Joe Rigby on saxes and the two bass array (acoustic and electric, note how the former bowed colors Free Spirits-Unknown). Ahmed Abdullah on trumpet doesn't so much stand out as round out the sound but does a fine job of it.

Folk Songs, Bill Frisell, Nonesuch

Initially, I was thinking I would start this post commenting that Folk Songs sure wasn't the Bill Frisell of, say, Unspeakable. But in relistening to the latter, as well as Nashville, I am struck by Elvis Costello's excellent liner notes, which come down to a comment Monk supposedly once made to a young Bob Dylan, who approached Monk one night between Monk's sets and told the pianist he was Bob Dylan and played folk music in The Village. Monk looked up from his piano and said: "We all play folk music."

Profound when you consider the roots of jazz and applicable to Frisell because in reality Folk Songs, Nashville, Unspeakable or The Intercontinentals for that matter are all folk music of a stripe. More avant-garde, or more like Monk's jazz, in the case of Unspeakable to be sure, country music-oriented in Nashville, tilted toward traditional European folk music in the Intercontinentals and a compilation of Frisell performances of American folk music, loosely stated, in Folk Songs, kind of a Frisell folk "best of." That covers a boffo rendition of I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry, and cool versions of Shenandoah and Sittin' On Top of the World, among other things. Fine Frisell.

Nathalie Pires, Corre-me o fado nas veias

Nathalie Pires, whose CD I bought directly from her Web site, has a voice that could make her a queen among pop divas, or a vaunted country or jazz singer for that matter, but she sings fado, despite being a 23-year-old American college student, and the world is a better place for it. (She's the daughter of Portuguese immigrants, fluent at speaking and singing Portuguese and her father composed for, played and sang in Portuguse bands in the U.S., so it comes naturally.)

Her first CD is a nice mix of lively, ironic, kind of que sera, sera, this is what is fado (fado does, after all, mean fate) like E Ou Nao E; Italianesque operatic theatrical singing-style fado like Ai Mouraria; and very traditional, painfully sad fado like Com Que Voz and Estranha Forma de Vida. There is outstanding guitar playing as well, including a wonderous solo run on Variacoes em Re, which proceeds as if there were no singer on the track. But wait for the payoff. Fado, and a young fadista, of the first order.

On H2O...

...and sent from that water, floating back toward the U.S. 52 bridge after paddling up past it.

Felt comfortable enough with the boat tonight to do an upstream ferry across the river even beating a quarter wind on the bow.

Saw a group of hawks riding that wind, a mother duck and her babies resting on a log, which probably would have interested the hawks, and a muskrat or beaver swimming along with a nice branch full of green leaf sprouts, probably dinner.

Me, I had Jimmy John's after.

Ecology 101

Whenever someone tells me drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, or logging or mining some other piece of what few pristine places we have left, can't possibly hurt, I think of all the stories like this one about the demise (and recovery, thankfully) of an English butterfly I've read over the years.

The crux:

"It turns out that, like many butterflies, the large blue tricks local ants into rearing its young caterpillars. But unlike other species, the large blue relies upon a specific red ant, Myrmica sabuletiI, for its nanny services. Because of that unique relationship, the butterfly's population started to crash when that ant species declined.

"The ants ran into trouble when farmers stopped grazing their livestock as they had for generations and a virus ravaged the population of wild rabbits. Grasses grew too long, causing soil temperatures to drop by a few degrees. That was just cold enough to make the area inhospitable to the ants, and that hurt the butterflies."

And industrial-scale operations won't have a negative impact on an ecosystem as tenuous and delicate as the tundra? If you buy that, Bush, Cheney, Sarah and the rest of their totally irresponsible, corporate-backed ilk have one they'd like to tell you--again--about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and the need to go to war there.

Jazz in the house...

The White House, that is. Yet another reason I dig the Pres (and not just Lester Young) and the First Lady.

I vote yeah...

Mixing jazz and beer is most definitely something I am in favor of, especially tasty jazz and beer, which all these choices appear to be.

A short-term goal in my life is now to listen to Sun Ra's Lanquidity (a Herman Blount classic) while drinking La Sancerroise au Gruyt.

Pat Metheny, One Quite Night, Nonesuch

I think Pat was screwing with us on the title because the baritone guitar he plays in a solo session is definitely not quiet. I had to turn my stereo down for fear of upsetting the neighbors. (Warm today, had the windows open.)

Maybe he means quiet as opposed to "loud" like the cream, red and yellow checked sports coat I had back in the '70s. The CD is quiet as in elegant and timeless. A nice version of Don't Know Why, an engaging take on Ferry Cross the Mersey (avant-garde jazz version) and a whole bunch of Metheny, ranging from Over on 4th Street, which practically rocks, to the intricate and melancholy I Will Find a Way. Good guitar.

Why the heck not?

So you are walking along a road and you come across Dick Cheney lying in a ditch. Maybe he had another heart attack, we can only hope, or something.

You see him and you kick him, right? I mean, it's not like you're going out of your way or anything. I'm thinking a nice boot to the head, or the nuts, assuming he has any.

Nevoa, Fado Distraido, Phantom

A pretty jazzy fado session where she even works alone with a bass at times and, when the guitars kick in, they remind me of Django Reinhardt's Selmer more than the Portuguese version.

Kind of like if Madeleine Peyroux made a fado CD. Nice though.

Marcus Strickland, Open Reel Deck, Strick Muzik

Definitely not a ballads CD. Thoroughly 2000s jazz with a hip-hop, kind of, element, via spoken word artist Malachi, but wrapped around a lot of just stellar saxophone playing. Try Subway Suite 2nd Movement on for size with Jon Cowherd's piano a bonus and Mike Moreno standing out on guitar, too.

On Prospectus, I'm thinking, Who's in there, Sonny, Trane, Wayne Shorter, Branford Marsalis? And then I think, He doesn't sound like anybody, just himself, and damn good at it, too. That he did this live is even more amazing. Look, Marcus Strickland is just an incredible sax dude. Scintillating.

Marcus Strickland, Of Song, Criss Cross

Marcus Strickland's ballad CD is good music for a Friday morning when a little peaceful ambiance is welcome. What he and pianist David Bryant do with Bob Marley's Is This Love? is worth the price of admission alone. They turn it inside out, but in eminently logical ways, never in a jarring fashion.

Strickland's saxes are great, as is to be expected. Bryant is a major part of what makes this session memorable, however. Interesting versions as well of What's New, The Party's Over and the James Brown-associated It's a Man's World, with a nice bass solo from Ben Williams. The Other Strickland brother, E.J., is perfectly complimentary on drums. Really nice stuff that reminds me of Coltrane's Ballads or Branford Marsalis' Eternal.

For the flip side, see Open Reel Deck.

A view down the river...

...sent from the river.

Sonny Rollins, Reel Life, Concord/OJC

One of the few Sonny sessions I didn't own, it may not even have been on CD until this reissue. Call it Sonny and guitars, three of them, including a young Bobby Broom, back with him in the '00s. Reel Time is from 1982, however, and all the guitar players, plus Jack DeJohnette on drums and percussion, make it one of Mr. Rollins' early '80s things where he dips a toe in Weather Report-style fusion without diving in all the way.

I like them. I treasure his sound the last decade or so, but I enjoy it in this period as well, when he had a little bit of an Eddie Harris kind of airiness going. The tunes are generally upbeat and rockish or calypso leaning with but one ballady trad number, Billy Strayhorn's My Little Brown Book, and an interesting update of Howard McGhee's McGhee, which certainly doesn't make one think "bebop." I could see myself driving all day listening to the title track. The final cut, Solo Reprise, indicates that Sonny can say more in 2:11 than most saxophonists do in three or four times that.

Meat Loaf, Bat out of Hell Live, Sanctuary

I think living a worthy life comes down to, in some measure, having a sense of humor and not taking yourself too seriously. Which is one reason I have this affinity for Australia, an entire country, nay, continent that seems to have a sense of humor and seems not to take itself too seriously.

This must be true of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, which backs Meat on a complete rendition of his classic, albeit not classical, CD. They do Paradise by the Dashboard Light and all, performed live in 2004. They even work in a boys choir. Meat's voice isn't what it used to be, or isn't live what it is dressed up in a studio, but the symphony makes up for that and, interestingly, never sounds out of place. (It veritably soars on For Crying Out Loud.) Just plain fun and some pretty good music in the bargain. The audience must have thought so as well. It sings along in places. Bet the Melbourne Symphony doesn't get that on Beethoven's Fifth.

The height of, like, melancholy

Mariza and a bowed double bass on Duas Lagrimas De Orvalho, Transparente, that's it.

Sea song

Despite my general reservations about over-orchestrating fado, I have to say the more complex instrumentation and instrumental effects behind Dulce Pontes on Lagrimas mostly work.

Struck me during a third listen this morning, on Canção do Mar (Song of the Sea) in particular, where the musical background gave me a mental impression of Pontes on a shore singing with the waves and wind accompanying her. I don't think she really needs this stuff. She has a voice quite capable of being interesting on its own. But the accouterments on the CD tend to have a charm as well. Laurindinha and As Setes Mulheres do Minho remind me of something like Paul Simon's Graceland.

Amália Rodrigues, Raizes, Blue Moon

In many respects, the perfect fado CD. That it is Amália suggests it, of course, and then there's the traditional, spare accompaniment of just a Portuguese and two standard guitars, which compliment, but never clash with, her voice.

More than that, I enjoy the mix of tempos in the 18 songs, plenty of sad and soulful slow numbers interspersed with zippy tunes like Grao De Arroz and Lerele that I would characterize as more ironic than happy. Made me think of the first time I listened to Robert Johnson: The Complete Recordings.

Dulce Pontes, Lagrimas, Movieplay

Heavily orchestrated fado with a lot going on around her, including some '90s electronic effects, and, I have to say, it's sometimes a little distracting and subsumes her voice in a few places, which is annoying because she has a marvelous voice.

Then again, it is impressive to hear her rise above the excess in the background on tunes such as Zanguei-Me Com O Meu Amor and Os Indios Da Meia Praia and there are interludes of stripped, down more traditional fado, gripping ones at that. Estranha Forma Da Vida, for one.

Time Out (50th Anniversary Edition), Dave Brubeck, Columbia

The classic session and a bonus DVD with a mini documentary about it. The real attraction is a second CD with live Newport appearances by the Time Out quartet (including a performance of Take Five, of course) that very nearly puts Dave Brubeck in a new light for me.

Not surprised to hear a ration of Tatum, Waller and even Monk in his playing but he's, dare I say it, as gut-bucket bluesy as Champion Jack Dupree in places, like St. Louis Blues. The integration of Someone to Watch Over Me into Blue Rondo à La Turk is priceless.

Jim Hall & Bill Frisell, Hemispheres, ArtistShare

Sympathetic is the word that kept coming to mind as I listened to the two CDs in this set repeatedly. The first disk is duets with Hall and Frisell, the former of whom usually, but not always, holds the center while the latter dances around and outside it.

I really like the second disk, which is the two guitars in a quartet with Scott Colley and Joey Baron fitting in like it was meant to be on bass and drums. Includes wonderful versions of My Funny Valentine and In a Sentimental Mood and a breezy romp through Sonny Rollins' Sonnymoon for Two.

Pretty (long) boat

My new canoe on its way home.

Some more text on teens texting

I think elements of this story are interesting (the number of texts kids send for one thing), but it commits one of the journalistic sins that most annoy me: lack of perspective.

People of all ages in this day and age face constant, ubiquitous communications and the pressure to respond to them. Is it more of a problem for teens, a theme this story is built around? I doubt it.

In fact, these two short sentences in the long piece make me wonder if any basis, other than speculation by reporters and editors, exists for the notion that teens texting is a problem at all, let alone more so than for adults.

"The rise in texting is too recent to have produced any conclusive data on health effects."

"Peter W. Johnson, an associate professor of environmental and occupational health sciences at the University of Washington, said it was too early to tell whether this kind of stress is damaging."

At least those brief qualifiers were included, although they hardly negate the overriding message of the story--teen texting, be afraid parents, school officials, lawmakers, et al, be very afraid.

Reminds me of the '50s comic book scare and any number of other historical bouts of youth problem mongering, from rock music to video games. I expect this kind of thing from People or USA Today. I'm sorry when it appears in the NYT.

Hey you kids, get off my lawn

Not sure I want to think about this too much, especially before going to sleep.

"Microbes that live in and on our bodies outnumber our own cells 10 to one." The top breeding ground, according to the researchers at the National Human Genome Research Institute in Bethesda, Maryland, who did the study?

No, not your stomach or intestinal tract. Not even your linty belly button.

Your forearms.

Back in the saddle...

... or the adjustable tractor seat anyway.

Back living in a river town for the first time in a quarter century, I'm buying my first canoe in that long as well. I had the folks at We-no-nah make me one of their solo Prisms in Kevlar and I am picking it up today after work.

So exciting.

A day late...

Should have said happy birthday to Miles yesterday and I find it interesting that Wallace Roney was born May 25 as well, albeit it in 1960 not 1926. Fate or what?

Today: Vibraphonist Lionel Hampton records Flying Home with a classic solo by tenor saxophonist Illinois Jacquet in 1942, which I'll be taking a listen to, for about the 100th time, this evening.

Trey Wright, Thinking Out Loud, Blue Canoe

Confession: Pat Metheny and Kurt Rosenwinkel, both of whom I've enjoyed live, as well as John Abercrombie, don't really interest me very much with their recordings, although I recognize their excellence as guitarists. Which is why I'm a Bill Frisell guy, I guess. Trouble with Bill is, he gets pretty out there and sometimes it would be nice to listen to some jazz guitar that is more traditional in a Grant Green or Wes Montgomery vein and yet modern and consistently interesting.

Wright's Thinking Out Loud is that kind of session. The songs are diverse, with no one sounding quite like another, and his playing reminds me of Frisell without slipping over the edge, but more in the "feel" of it than in an imitative sense. He's definitely got his own sound. It has enough facets to it that I don't miss the presence of horns, as I do on occasion in jazz guitar trio sets. Bassist Mark Miller and drummer Marlon Patton also are big reasons why this set doesn't come off as hornless. They're as tricky as Wright and the three are seamless playing together. A nice find.

Mariza, Transparente, Times Square Records

Mariza with (more) strings, particularly the bowed kind. Nonetheless, it is still very deep fado and her voice, as always, remains the commanding presence.

I am consistently amazed at the emotional effects of her singing, and the singing of fadistas in general, despite the fact that I know very little Portuguese.

This morning I had a thought. When I heard her this spring, Mariza was doing very well with her English. (She even did a boffo version of Crying during the concert, a fado for her American friends, as she put it). How I would love for someone to suggest to her a session of traditional American blues.

I want the CD when it comes out...

Music aside, the idea is nifty, too.

Lenny Breau, Five O'Clock Bells & Mo' Breau, Genes

I don't really tire of hearing My Funny Valentine, but it does, like any song after after a few hundred listens, become harder to rivet my attention unless you are doing something special. Breau does on this, taking it in a flamenco direction at one point, among other things. I rate it with the stunning Bobby Timmons version of MFV on This Here is Bobby Timmons. Fantasic guitar playing all over the Breau disk (which actually started life as 2 different LPs) in the bargain. I remember Hank (as in Williams) is about as nifty a recrafting as My Funny Valentine.

And while we're on the subject of Harry...

This is sure a CD I'm buying when it comes out

I hate reality shows and a loathe American Idol, but if you haven't looked at the clip of this gal singing in the U.K. version of AI, do yourself a favor. Unbelievable.

Puts me in mind of a favorite Harry Chapin song "Mr. Tanner" and of the story about drummer-bandleader Chick Webb, who took one look at a young Ella Fitzgerald and said there was no way he'd have an ugly girl like that fronting his band, until she opened her mouth and sang, at which point he hired her on the spot. (Chick himself was a homely fellow, and a dwarf, so he had no real business talking.)

Testing posts from my iPhone.

Resonates with me at this point in my life

"Can't we just return to the bare bones? Relaxing with the present, relaxing with the hopelessness, relaxing with death, not resisting the fact that things end, that things pass, that things have no lasting substance, that everything changes--that is the basic message."

--Pema Chodron

Wynton Marsalis, He and She, Blue Note

So I have been listening to this again and again since I bought it Friday. Why?

I am sick with a cold and it is just too much effort to change CDs? Because it is easy on my virus-addled brain? Maybe the former, but I don't think the latter particularly.

Not that it isn't easy on the ears, because Wynton Marsalis pretty much always is by nature. But there's some complex, if impeccably rendered, music here, drawing, as is also natural with Marsalis, on New Orleans, Armstrong, Ellington and the Jazz Messengers along with, in places, Mingus (who's all over The Razor Rim), Coltrane and the avant-garde. I hear something new that I like, and that surprises me, in it with each listen.

The music tracks are interspersed with Marsalis-recited poetry touching on aspects of gal-guy relations that I could take or leave, although they add up to a nifty narrative in my mind, fit like a glove with the music and are delivered in quite a soothing manner, which is good for nursing a cold.

Like Marsalis' Big Train (a favorite of mine not especially popular, the fate of He and She, too, I fear) a CD ultimately greater than the sum of its parts.

Makes me sad...

emptyboxes
Originally uploaded by mrgreg

A graveyard for unused newspaper boxes in California, which is, sadly, well populated.

Makes me think of the old graveyard joke about people (and papers) dying to get in.

Also makes my stomach churn

What took ya so long?

Now this, I think, is nifty, also surprising because I would have thought a King, Douglass, Carver, Attucks, et al, would have made it on before, although the state-themed quarter thing hasn't been around all that long.

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Jazz legend Duke Ellington is the first African-American to appear on an American coin, the U.S. Mint says in introducing the latest in its line of state-themed quarters.

The District of Columbia commemorative quarter showing Ellington playing the piano will be introduced by U.S. Mint Director Ed Moy at a news conference Tuesday at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History.

Ellington won the honor by a vote of D.C. residents, beating out abolitionist Frederick Douglass and astronomer Benjamin Banneker.

... and David, we'll miss ya

Listening again to It's Mr. Fathead last night and this morning I was struck by two things. First, I just love hearing him play Hard Times. Second, he got impressive range out of his horn, which can sound like an alto one moment and a baritone the next and also features a lot of the kind of tenor sweetness that gives me goose bumps when I listen to Sonny Stitt. What a loss.

Happy (25th) birthday, Mac

So long Fathead...

Glad I took the opportunity to see David "Fathead" Newman when he was at the Jazz Kitchen in Indianapolis in recent years.

He was a guy, like Sonny Rollins, who seemed to get better with age. But you could always hear that Texas tenor sound (big as the open range, of course, like everything in Texas) in his playing.

While his new stuff was always good (I'm partial to Chillin' and Song for the New Man, both on High Note), my favorite David Newman CD buy remains the old 32 Jazz set It's Mr. Fathead, where you get four of his early LPs (including one with Ray Charles) for the price of one, sort of. Mr. Gentle, Mr. Cool, a set of all Ellington pieces from Kokopelli, also is another real good 'un.

Things I learned...

...that I wasn't looking out for.

Never thought about how much Bess, You Is My Woman relates to Rhapsody In Blue until I listened to Richard Twardzik render the former on Pacific Jazz Piano Trios, Mosaic. He's a big band on whatever he plays in any event. Stunning, classical rendition of Round Midnight, too, which says a bunch about Monk the composer. I'll Remember April is not like any version I've heard before, and that's a trick.

Top 10 reasons to buy Kind of Blue again...

The 50th anniversary edition, that is (so two reasons per decade).

10) So What.

9) Freddie Freeloader.

8) Blue in Green.

7) All Blues.

6) Flamenco Sketches.

5) What the hey, it might be the last version you can hold in your hand.

4) Cool blue LP in the box, even though you probably haven't had a turntable in years.

3) Nifty posters and 8x10s of Miles, Trane, Cannon and the rest of the guys.

2) The making-of DVD.

1) It's only maybe the greatest collection of American music ever.

Miles Davis, Ascenseur pour l'echafaud, Verve

One of Verve's recent Originals reissues, which I just bought for $11.99, which is a good thing since it lasts for just over 36 minutes, but it's worth it at that.

I don't know whether there's a more concentrated example of Miles working the mute than this French movie sound track he did, eventually issued as an LP. I'll import it into iTunes as a single, megamute track.

Plus you've got European jazz legends Wilen, Urtreger and Michelot in support, not to mention seminal bop drummer Kenny "Klook" Clarke. Michelot lays down an all-time bass solo on Visite du Vigile and Miles and Wilen are, like, Miles and Cannonesque on Au Bar du Petit Bac.

Oh, and it leads to Kind of Blue.

This plays behind the flick of my noir life.

Gabriel's new trumpetmate

Forget (no, don't) Freddie Hubbard's own great sessions, Ready for Freddie, Breaking Point, Red Clay, Straight Life, First Light, et al; this list struck me in reading his L.A. Times obituary today:

"Seemingly the first choice for artists of every stripe, he was present on many of the most significant jazz albums of the '60s, among them Ornette Coleman's Free Jazz, John Coltrane's Ascension, Eric Dolphy's Out To Lunch, Oliver Nelson's Blues and the Abstract Truth, Wayne Shorter's Speak No Evil and Herbie Hancock's Maiden Voyage." And, I would add, Sonny Rollins' East Broadway Run Down (and Coltrane's Africa/Brass as well). Now that's a list, and it doesn't even include his stellar Jazz Messengers stuff, like Caravan.

I got to see Freddie Hubbard twice this year, first at Yoshi's in San Francisco in April for his 70th birthday celebration performance. Still working on overcoming a series of health problems, he was, frankly, awful on the horn(s). But with the good soul, and the sense of humor, he exhibited and the effort he exerted despite everything, you just had to pull for him. Plus, the band he had around him, which included Bobby Hutcherson, James Spaulding and George Cables, among others, was fabulous.

In August, I thought about heading home before his appearance at the Indy Jazz Fest. I stayed and was so glad (now, even more) that I did. He was never going to be the Freddie Hubbard of the '60s and '70s again, but he sounded a lot better and seemed to me to have figured out how to cope with his limitations, judiciously employ the chops he still had and maximize them in the context of the band. It was a memorable show. I'm sorry I won't see another one like it.

Good enough to eat...

Herbie Hancock Maiden Voyage, Joe Henderson Page One, Lee Morgan the Sidewinder today.

I could probably live fulfilled on the classic Blue Notes.

But I did throw in Monk Underground and Mingus Black Saint and the Sinner Lady, the latter a classic, or classical, in any company.

Happy Holidays

Henry's 2008 Xmas card
Originally uploaded by mrgreg

The 2008 Xmas card from the great bassist, and artist extraordinaire, Henry Grimes, which appeared in my inbox yesterday.

Many thanks and happy holidays to Henry and Margaret, and the rest of you, too.

How to have a good morning...

Chester Arthur Burnett, aka Howlin' Wolf, (Cause of it All) makes me want to get nasty.

Anthony Braxton (Mosaic box) gets my neurons firing like little arc welders.

Eddie Harris blowin' the Love Theme from the Sandpiper (The In Sound) makes me glad to be alive.

Jolie Holland, The Living and the Dead, Anti

So this morning I'm reading Ted Gioia's excellent new book Delta Blues: The Life and Times if the Mississippi Masters Who Revolutionized American Music, in particular a discussion of the dark nature of some of Robert Johnson's most popular songs, which would seem to be oxymoronic. But I think people, myself included, are often attracted by raw emotion and tragedy in art, whether it is paintings, movies, plays or music (not to mention books, try Steinbeck's In Dubious Battle on for size.)

This occurred to me over breakfast and Jolie Holland's latest, The Living and the Dead, which is mostly every bit as dark as Hellhound On My Tail and might have made me think of Robert Johnson, or Son House and Skip James, even if I hadn't been reading Gioia's book when I first heard it. Holland's music isn't the blues, although it doesn't lack for blues elements, along with folk, pop, rock and a smattering of jazz.

But her lyrics are certainly emotive in the manner of the great blues songs and the way she uses vocal modulation reminds me of some of the tools employed by a James or a Johnson. (I've always loved her voice, which is kind of twangy, truth be told. Then again, Son House's was not exactly Ella Fitzgerald's, nor Louis Armstrong's for that matter. It's what he did with it that counted.)

Mexico City, and especially Corrido por Buddy, leave me feeling like I do when I walk out of the theater after seeing something like No Country for Old Men or finish a book like The Road (talk about dark, just check out Cormac McCarthy). Like I've been through an emotional wringer, sad, yet exhilarated, too.

Well dust my broom...

Woke up this morning, coffee maker wouldn't heat...

Woke up this morning, coffee maker wouldn't heat...

Woke up this morning, coffee maker wouldn't heat...

Thank the gods for my micrcrowave, and for Earl Grey hot tea.

Broken Mr. Coffee Blues.

Al Gallodoro, Out of Nowhere, Basta

With the Beau Hunks, a Dutch retro pre-swing pop jazz band in 1999. Chops like Pee Wee Russell on the clarinet and Benny Carter on the alto sax with the verve of a youngster like Anat Cohen, even though the Paul Whiteman, TV and other orchestra vet was well on at the time (he passed Oct. 4 at 95).

Great versions of Back Home Again in Indiana and Struttin' with Some Barbecue and a cool original, dedicated to his guitar-playing grandson, in Kevin's Tune. It may be rooted in before-Ellington jazz, but there's nothing "old" about it. Need more Al Gallodoro. Just sorry it took his death for me to find him.

I am woman, hear me roar...

I find it ironic and really cool that the blues musician I am almost certain is the best interpreter today of thoroughly male-dominated traditional Delta blues, both singing and most certainly guitar playing, is a 59-year-old woman who is, frankly, hot, although I'd probably be in love with Rory Block even if she looked like Son House, the legend she pays tribute to on Blues Walkin' Like a Man, Stony Plain. She was just as lovely on The Lady and Mr. Johnson, Rykodisc. If she's going home on the morning train, or driving her Terraplane, I'm in for the ride.

What's next, Wynton Marsalis hiring a woman horn player for his Lincoln Center band?

Never mind.

Jake Langley, Movin' & Groovin', Alma

Remember Wes Montgomery and Jimmy Smith on, say, Dynamic Duo? Well, this is right there. You can talk all you want about how they put a modernist touch on it, blah, blah, blah, but the fact is, it's just an old-fashioned organ, guitar, drums trio romp, and a butt-kicking one at that.

Joey DeFrancesco (and though the Jakester leads this session, this is, in fact, Joey D's working trio) plays the Hammond JS left him when he passed and I figure Jimmy must have been taking a break at Club Heaven and channeled some inspiration the way of this session. I don't think Langley was playing Wes Montgomery's old guitar, but he might as well have been. You walk away from Bobby Timmons Dis Here drenched in bluesy soul. They're flat-out symbiotic on Canadian Sunset. Great stuff.

Happy birthday to me...

For which I bought The Complete Dean Benedetti Recordings of Charlie Parker from the wonderful folks at Mosaic, which Scott Yanow on allmusic refers to as "quite unlistenable." Now, I like Scott Yanow's AMG entries and books and find them to be, generally, useful guides. But here, he's plain wrong, especially if you've delved into the accessible Charlie Parker (Yardbird Suite: The Ultimate Collection and JSP's Charlie Parker: A Studio Chronicle come to mind) and want more, more, more.

The first more, more for me was The Complete Savoy Live Performances (mostly at the Royal Roost) and more recently The Complete Savoy and Dial Studio Recordings (which is basically what you get on the JSP set, plus all the alternate takes, which, as this is Charlie Parker, inevitably are different every take and instructive, if not scintillating, which they often are).

So comes the Benedetti recordings, by a guy who was actually an accomplished musician and musicologist, not a degenerate heroin dealer, as thoroughly incorrect legend has it, who put a recorder (tape and disk, not wire, again as legend has it) to Parker live at performances in California and New York, after Bird's stint in rehab in Camarillo and his return to New York, which is to say at the height of his powers.

Dean Benedetti, more or less, turned on the recorder when CP soloed and turned it off otherwise. Would I like to hear all of every set? Sure. Does it matter that I am listening as I type this to one Charlie Parker solo (more or less) after another? No. The music is incredible. I kept waking up last night with it playing in my head after listening to it before bedding down. That's powerful. The sound is fine, even really good, if you consider where it came from. The hair on my body stands on end sometimes listening to this stuff.

An observation...

2 CDs of Best of Miles Davis on the juke at ye olde Esquire Lounge in downstate Illinois. I slip in 3 bucks and spin up 8 tunes. As they play, I notice people moving their heads to the rythm, tapping feet, mouthing it. While talking about Dwight Yocham. Somehow, I don't think Dwight will translate as well 40 or 50 years from now.
-- From Mr. Greg's Sidekick II

Melvin Jackson, Funky Soul, Limelight/Dusty Groove

Exhibit A in the anti to the notion that those guys from the Art Ensemble of Chicago only went abstract because they couldn't play (semi anyway) straight. King Curtis would have been impressed by Roscoe Mitchell here and Lester Bowie sets the pace for about any rock, soul trumpet maven. Melvin anchors it all with his double bass fed through an electronicizing device to a point where it reminds me of Michael Henderson's effect on Miles Davis' electric bands, years before Miles Davis copped Henderson from Stevie Wonder. The title track is George Clinton funk-eee and the rendition of Eddie Harris' Cold Duck time is precious. But it's all good.

Silence, David Murray and Mal Waldron, Justin Time

Gotta wonder if Mal Waldron recording Soul Eyes, his composition, one last time knew it was the last time, because he sure puts every bit of heart and soul into it.

And David Murray, on bass clarinet in this instance, is right there with him. Amazing affinity between the two on the whole CD, as a matter of fact.

Sitting here now, I can't bring up a better piano and reeds duet session, and I rate it as one of my favorite, in a long list of them, Murray disks of any sort.

What they do with the Miles Davis electric tune Jean-Pierre says a lot about their skill, and the elemental musicality of Miles' electric stuff as well.
-- From Mr. Greg's Sidekick II

Hey, it is Indiana...

Blue skies at the Indy Jazz Fest Sunday, too, until just prior to the end of Paquito D'Rivera's set, when a deluge accompanied by lightning rolled in; oh well, I wasn't staying for Fourplay anyway. D'Rivera, accompanied only by 20-year-old pianist Alex Brown, was really good, playing everything from Piazzola to Gillespie to his own tribute to the Dizzy one, A Night in Englewood. I enjoyed his clarinet as much as his saxophone, which he made sound amazingly like a bandoneon on the Piazolla piece.

I think a lot is going to be heard from Brown, by the way. He matched Paquito blow for blow from a creativity and chops perspective. Worries me that age and guile may not always, in fact, beat youth and speed.

Ramsey Lewis and his trio with first-call Chicago bassist Larry Gray were nifty as well. I like the way he mixed the Motownish, funky, soul-oriented stuff he became notable with, church music, the blues, Ellington and even classical in a wide-ranging, consistently catchy show.

The bonus for me was getting there early enough to hear the IUPUI Jazz Ensemble, which was great, and even better with guest artist Oliver Nelson, Jr., on flute and piccolo. Nature or nuture, the guy's a heck of player just like dad.

Blue skies...

Over the Indy Jazz Fest this afternoon. Freddie Hubbard was sounding better than when I heard him at Yoshi's in San Francisco in April. I think he's getting some of his stuff back, particularly on the flugelhorn. You sure couldn't beat the supporting cast he brought along, James Spaulding on alto and flute, Curtis Fuller on trombone, George Cables on piano and Joe Chambers drums. Every one a big hitter. Still, it was a younger guy who really stood out to me, Javon Jackson on tenor. Very creative blowing.

I really dug Jerry Gonzalez and the Fort Apache Band in the set prior. Amazing how he works the mute Miles style and yet doesn't come off as the least bit imitative. You just don't hear a lot about these guys outside of a small circle and they ought to be headliners. I love the way they put their own stamp on Monk's stuff. I'd like to hear them do a full show instead of one of those hour-long festival things.

Listening to their Moliendo Cafe now, which I bought at the fest. Nifty version of Stardust. Joe Ford rates right up there with James Spaulding in my book and Carter Jefferson on tenor is strong on this as well.

His-tor-eee

Willie Pickens and six young dudes, marvy singer Saalik Ziyad leading them, making surprises at Fred Anderson's Velvet Lounge. Essence of AACM. Note to self, keep and eye out of saxophonist Fred Jackson and trombonist Norman Palm IV. These guys have some chops.
-- From Mr. Greg's Sidekick II

Guessing...

Wayne Shorter doesn't much need to record anymore, but wishing he would, at least live. His current quartet is a creativity machine.
-- From Mr. Greg's Sidekick II

Thinking ahead...

Retire to the beach?
Nah!
I think I'll retire to the South Loop, get up late every day.
And spend my evenings at the Velvet Lounge.
-- From Mr. Greg's Sidekick II

Superstar

In my almost empty co-op listening to Irvin Mayfield and Ellis Marsalis, good stuff for the end of a trail.
-- From Mr. Greg's Sidekick II

Irvin Mayfield, Love Songs, Ballads and Standards

With Ellis Marsalis. Hey, not a note out of the tradition, unless maybe it's Neal Caine slipping a few in on the bass, but it matters not a tad. So I have to listen to Ellis Marsalis play standards, kind of, with Irvin Mayfield, who's, like, channeling Louis Armstrong wherever he goes; what's the problem? Highlights: My One and Only Love and Yesterday. (They're doing "standards," I said, not chestnuts.) Mo' Betta Blues is worth the price of admission alone.

Slap me silly...

In a galaxy long, long ago and far, far away my man Rodd Zolkos introduced me to Tom Waits' Small Change and tonight I'm listening to it and I take a gander at the lineup and I notice Jim Hughart, bass, and that ain't so surprising, because TW used JH on bass regularly. But Shelley Manne on drums and Lou Tabackin on tenor? Not the least bit surprising that I've always loved this.

Nice little group...

Just happens to have Lester Young playing tenor, Walter Page and Jo Jones holding down the bass and drums spots, Mr. 5x5 Jimmy Rushing shouting (Evenin' slays me) and a guy name of Bill Basie in the piano chair. (He's playing organ on Goin' to Chicago and I'm giddy.) I hear no notes out of place anywhere and the acute sense of time is simply amazing.

New Classic Columbia, Okeh and Vocalion Lester Young with Count Basie (1936-40) set from my pals at Mosaic, which threatens to keep me up for like the next four hours anyway.

But I'll dream good.

Warm and dry at the Velvet Lounge

Kelan Phil Cohran plays
An electric kora, harp thing he made himself
And somewhere in the cosmos Sun Ra is smiling
-- From Mr. Greg's Sidekick II

Every town should have one...

Headed back from Berkeley and languishing at O'Hare between flights.

I'll miss walking by this place on my way from motel to campus and
environs. I have to rate San Francisco as a pretty good jazz town.
-- From Mr. Greg's Sidekick II

Sing-a-long for Fred

So I (along with the rest of the audience) got to sing happy birthday to Freddie Hubbard accompanied by Bobby Hutcherson. Now that's living. James Spaulding was great on alto and flute. They should have given some more solo space to Craig Handy on tenor. And drummer Lenny White III, who's off on tour with Chick Corea and Return to Forever this summer, was a beast.

Dinner at the Fillmore Street Cafe

Jazz legends on the walls
The house salad bops
Ready for Freddie
-- From Mr. Greg's Sidekick II

Barking dogs

I walked a long way for this view, but at least there was a free, clean
public toilet when I got there.

On to the new Yoshi's and Freddie Hubbard's 70th birthday show.
-- From Mr. Greg's Sidekick II

Sunny Sonny

Sonny Rollins' concert at Berkeley last night was my seventh time seeing Mr. Rollins and, not surprisingly, I haven't heard the same thing yet. Musically, checks in a No. 2 on my memorable list. Orchestra Hall in Chicago a few years ago is No. 1 because of the amazing, expansive flights he went on, some of them lasting nearly half an hour. (The Olympia in Paris and Carnegie Hall for his 50th anniversary performing there last September are memorable for the music and, well, because it's Paris and Carnegie Hall).

Berkeley, I think, compares to the first time I saw him, in Ann Arbor, Mich. His solos weren't as long and he let his band carry more of the load. But when he played, it was plenty long, full of interesting ideas and joyous. He made me chuckle several times last night at the clever touches he threw down and I noticed that he smiled a lot, too. I think he was having fun.

Highlight: In a Sentimental Mood, both his own playing and his comping with percussionist Kimati Dinizulu, who's really become an integral part of what he does these days, as has guitarist Bobby Broom. At one point, it struck me what a masterful comp man he is, besides being the great soloist, and that makes this concert memorable as well.

Goin' to church

Having coffee in the Fillmore Cafe across the street from Yoshi's, the new one in the Fillmore Jazz Preservation District not the old one in Oakland, and the Church of St. John Coltrane, which doesn't cut much dash in digs, it's a store-front chapel, but makes me feel pretty spiritual anyway.

Love the cross made of two soprano saxophones.

Sonny Rollins at Berkeley tonight, so it promises to be a day of
religious experiences.
-- From Mr. Greg's Sidekick II

Great BJ

Never got to see Stitt and Ammons (or Stitt and Rollins, Rollins and Coltrane, Rollins and Hawkins for that matter, not even Zoot and Al) but I have to think Joshua Redman and Branford Marsalis locking horns, so to speak, was something like it. I'd have paid $25 for a recording of their interchanges on Blues Up and Down and Body and Soul had they been selling CDs in the lobby after (musicians in this digital age need to start doing that). Boss tenors (and sopranos, too, which they whipped out on Redman's Mantra #5). Will go down as one of my best memories from a jazz show.

Time for that BJ

Headed to Chicago's Orchestra Hall to hear the Joshua Redman Trio with Branford Marsalis tonight and been listening to their stuff all week.

Today it's Branford's Romare Bearden Revealed. I'm Slappin' Seventh Avenue brings to mind the word jaunty. Branford's soprano (he plays tenor, too) sounds a lot like a clarinet. Jungle Blues starts out making me think Ragtime and quickly morphs into a trad, Jelly Roll Morton-like New Orleans thing, albeit modernized, again with the clarinet-sounding soprano (tell me he's not channeling Sidney Bechet). Brothers Wynton and Delfeayo do some talking on the trumpet and 'bone.

The program is diverse, Seabreeze a Latinized slow dance number; Wynton's J Moood a blues-based advanced post bop piece in the manner of Miles Davis' second great quintet; B's Paris Blues with a Django feel and amusing solos and interplay between Branford and Doug Wamble, who goes it all alone in kind of a Piedmont style on Autumn Lamp. I think of Laughin' & Talkin' (with Higg) as abstract bebop. The duet between Branford and Harry Connnick Jr. (forget his singing, he's a boffo pianist) on James P. Johnson's Carolina Shout is a blisteringly fast minor classic.

It occurs to me that every time I put this on I find something else to enjoy in it.

BJ week, day 4

Branford Marsalis, Random Abstract. Sophisticated, if not overly exciting blowing from a much younger Branford (this is from '88, 20 freaking years ago) who already was developing many of the distinctive touches he uses today, I think to greater effect. The guy who really keeps striking me throughout the session is pianist Kenny Kirkland.

Nice version of Monk's Crepuscule With Nellie, a song I have a thing for. Reminds me of T.M. and Rouse.

Joshua Redman, Wish. The young lion (this was issued in '93) in a strong hard bop session with older cats, and Ornette Coleman alums, Charlie Haden and Billy Higgins and Pat Metheny on guitar, who stands out, not that Redman doesn't play well, he does, but more like Wayne Shorter in the Jazz Messengers than O.C. The Deserving Many is sure a snappy tune. Maybe it's the guitar, but I hear regular Latin, Spanish influences on this. Nice jazz ballad made of Clapton's Tears in Heaven.

BJ week, day 3

Joshua Redman Quartet Spirit of the Moment Live at the Village Vanguard. Less ethereal and more earthy, but also less individual, than his mature sound today. He makes me think of honkers like Arnett Cobb and Illinois Jacquet on Jig-A-Jug and Remember. (I wonder if the "Jug" is a reference to Gene Ammons?) The soprano piece Second Snow could be Coltrane, which is a compliment in terms of technical proficiency if not innovation. Dialogue is an abstract, free thing constructed around a marchy theme ala Albert Ayler. The standout is the stamp very much his own he puts on Sonny Rollins' St. Thomas. Reminds of Mr. Rollins having his way with something like, say, Autumn Nocturne. The melody is more an underlying framework for improvisation than recognizable on the surface for much of his run, yet it's all quite logical. Lot of S.R. on Roots and Herbs, his song or no.

BJ week continues

Today it's Branford Marsalis' Eternal. This time through I hear a lot of Coleman Hawkins- and Ben Webster-like interludes I didn't notice before (check out Dinner for One Please, James) and I admire the pulse Eric Revis sets down with his bass and the subtlety "Tain" Watts displays on a program all pretty much ballady tunes.

BJ week

Mind out of the gutter; that's B as in Branford Marsalis and J as in Joshua Redman, whom I'm catching at Orchestra Hall in Chicago Friday night.

Marsalis, Braggtown. Brings to mind another mature quartet fronted by one of the most powerfully inventive saxophonists of all time playing off a drummer with thunder, lightning and, yet, gentle rain as well in his sticks, a lyrical pianist and a bassist adept at holding it all together. Branford no longer sounds much like Coltrane, however. He makes me think more of Rollins and Dolphy with some Sanders and Coleman (Ornette and George for that matter) thrown in here, but it's an impression more than anything overt because his playing is all him now. Jack Baker, Blakzilla and Black Elk Speaks are noisy and pretty freely improvised romps, offset by quietly complex tunes like Hope, Fate and O Solitude almost classical in nature. His shift between soprano and tenor on the solos in the latter gives me goose bumps.

Redman, Elastic. His electric trio/quartet with Sam Yahel on B3, Rhodes and a host of other plugged-in keyboards and synths, which fits well with Redman's, as one review of him live I read lately put it, "silvery improvisational style, fluid eighth-note streaks and rangy altissimo runs." I've always been attracted by the way he works the high register and you get a lot of that on this, on soprano and alto (where he's got Charlie Parker speed) as well as tenor. Dig Molten Soul, Still Pushin' That Rock and Can a Good Thing Last Forever? Boogielastic shows off one of the cleanest sax sounds around. Ton of music in The Birthday Song. I enjoy his tendency to play more of the whole horn now, but this is an overall goodie with a lot of creativity and musicianship on display.

Trane tome

Interesting story in my newspaper yesterday about a local guy's, and others', handiwork. Even at $150 this sounds like it's worth it.

I am working my way through Downbeat's Miles Davis Reader right now and I find it captivating to read what Miles was saying at the time about music so important to me today, and what other people were saying about Miles and his music. His Blindfold Test appearances are a hoot in particular.

The story, in part:

"CHAMPAIGN – For nearly seven years, Chris DeVito spent literally thousands of hours holed up in the University of Illinois newspaper and music libraries, researching jazz saxophonist John Coltrane.

"Using microfilm and other archives, he scoured hundreds of mainstream, black and underground newspapers and jazz magazines, looking for references, no matter how obscure, to Coltrane's gigs as a sideman or a band leader and to his life and his music.

"At the same time, Wolf Schmaler of Ottweiler, Germany, was doing similar research in Europe on the pioneering jazz musician's tours there. Their work plus more was compiled for "The John Coltrane Reference," an 821-page book recently published by Routledge Press. DeVito, of Rantoul, is lead author.

"The tome represents a massive amount of painstaking work by not only DeVito and Schmaler but also two other Coltrane experts, one in the United States and the other in Japan who focused on the discography. One, Yasuhiro Fujioka, uncovered rare recordings and met with the musician's son, Ravi Coltrane.

"The book, edited by jazz scholar/performer Lewis Porter, offers a detailed and expansive chronology of Coltrane's life and music from his birth in 1926 to his premature death in 1967. The discography updates two earlier ones that had been considered standards and had been compiled by Fujioka and co-author David Wild.
Among the many illustrations are vintage photographs, copies of more than 350 album covers, and newspaper reviews and interviews, some of which had never been reprinted before."

-- Melissa Merli, The News-Gazette, 3/23/08

Sonny Rollins, Next Album

Been on a '60s and '70s Rollins kick recently, Next Album is Mr. Rollins with George Cables on electric piano and Bob Cranshaw hitting the electric bass pretty hard (albeit not with the overwhelming pulse you get from Miles' electric bassists) in a session leaning into the fusion wave of the time (1972) starting with Playin' in the Yard. For all of that it's pure Rollins (see The Everywhere Calypso), who sounded like himself even playing with the Stones, let alone his own kind-of rockish band.

Kenny G could learn something from his rare turn on the soprano in recrafting Poinciana. Skylark is classic Sonny having his way with a popular tune, no fusion about it (Cables and Cranshaw go acoustic).

A little gem I should spin up more often.

Today's playlist

Wynton Marsalis, All Rise. Got to hear it live last year with the Chicago Symphony and Chorus and I have to say this is quite close to that performance, which was marvelous. Picked it up on a bargain table for $7.99, all the better. I am filing it under Classical, although there are some really jazzy bluesy interludes.

Coltrane, A Love Supreme. What the hey, it's Easter. Like I need an excuse to listen to one of the greatest pieces of music ever created.

Billy Mitchell, This is Billy Mitchell. Got to thinking about him the other day listening to Thad Jones' Detroit-New York Junction. Should have been a bigger deal, not a Coltrane or a Rollins maybe, but at least a Hank Mobley.

Wynton, Black Codes (From the Underground). Miles' second great quintet influenced and almost abstract in places (especially when Branford is saxing), which is different for Mr. Classicist. I like it when he stretches all that technical proficiency he has out.

Branford Marsalis, The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born. Mostly a trio session he's still coming to grips with Coltrane and Rollins here but clearly on the way to the very personal sound he has today, which I think makes him the most interesting saxophonist in jazz who isn't Sonny Rollins, James Carter or Wayne Shorter.

Joshua Redman, Back East. I'm going to hear him at Orchestra Hall Friday night, with Branford as a special guest so I am listening to their stuff all week. Oddly, it will be the fourth time I've seen Dewey's boy even though he isn't someone I would generally go out of my way to catch (he's been in Champaign-Urbana three times). I think this disk shows some impressive artistic growth, however, perhaps no where more than on I'm an Old Cowhand and Wagon Wheels, nods to Mr. Rollins' famous trio date Way Out West that nonetheless aren't the least imitative. His Monkian The Surrey with the Fringe on Top is quite innovative, while Zarafah is like an East Indian blues and his rendition of Shorter's Indian Song (dueting with Joe Lovano) sounds Albert Ayler-tinged to me. He duets with Dewey on Coltrane's India and Dewey plays his last recorded date, the song GJ, written for his grandson, on the final track. Both pretty gripping. I have a feeling Friday's show will be memorable.

Wynton, Blue Interlude. Pure Ellingtonia, from a septet no less.

Velvet Lounging, how I love it

Lester Lashley's vibes are junky
The vibes he makes on them are golden
What"s that tell me/you
-- From Mr. Greg's Sidekick II

Otis Taylor, Recapturing the Banjo, Telarc

Cahl, bless his heart, sent me this. Now, I like Otis Taylor anyway, because he's one of a few modern blues guys whose CDs I cue up and never am quite sure what's going to hit my ears next, which is to say he advances the art in a jazz-like way that isn't always the case with the blues today.

But this is even a step beyond that involving, as it does integrally, the banjo, an instrument I basically loathe as a device employed mostly by peckerwoods.

Taylor, a stellar cast including my men Corey Harris, Guy Davis and Don Vappie, whom I saw playing in Orchestra Hall in Chicago last fall, recapture the banjo, an African-American instrument at its roots, not only for the blues, but I'd say folk, jazz, rock and more (and just see Live Your Life for all of them).

Check out Hey Joe for a serious rock-blues employment of the banjo. Who knew?

I've sung Little Liza Jane since I was a kid, but I will sing it far more cooly now that Davis has showed me how.

Five Hundred Roses is what you might get if John Lee Hooker had been a banjo player.

The banjo wasn't always, clearly, the purview of Grand Ole Opry white boys, as Vappie et al make clear on the trad New Orleans tune Les Ognons and, ditto, Alvin Youngblood Hart on Deep Blue Sea.

Still the extensibility happens mostly in the tunes penned by Taylor, of which there are plenty.

This is not your father's, assuming he was an inbred mofo, Dueling Banjos.

This is your brain on jazz...

Interesting study scanning the brains of jazz musicians with functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging as they improvise (on a keyboard in this case).

The crux: performance-monitoring regions of their brains shut down and various areas associated with dreaming, with all of the senses and with regulating emotions kick in, in addition to an area involved in organizing self-initiated thoughts and behaviors.

In other words, they stop thinking about what they're doing on a conscious level and just let it come to them, which sounds a lot like Mr. Sonny Rollins describing what happens to him in concert, or Michael Jordan in one of those stretches where he'd hit every shot he tossed up for that matter.

Thanks, Teo

So sad to read that Teo Macero died. He produced a ton of stunning
sessions by jazz artists from Monk to Wallace Roney.

I owe him big for some of my favorite Miles Davis electric music, which
is some of my favorite music period, including In a Silent Way, which I
think is Miles' masterpiece. Not to mention Sketches of Spain.

I won't say Miles couldn't have done it without Teo, but he would have
had to find (and later did) someone to take Teo's place and the stuff
might not have been as uniformly interesting and evolutionary (and
later wasn't}.

I hope they're working somewhere tonight.

Teo was a pretty good bop sax player, too, which people tend to forget.