MOG - RSchaut's Posts

Save Me

RSchaut — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 20:08:57 GMT

I'm in trouble. Deep dark, blackest black of night trouble. I'm running out of words to describe this guy's music. I don't have enough superlatives in my vocabulary. Every time I turn around, I hear something from Derek Trucks that touches me to the depths of my soul and sends my brain spinning at the breadth of musical ideas.

So stricken am I that after spending an evening at the WaMu Theater in Seattle awash in the Soul Stew Revival put together by Derek and wife Susan Tedeschi, I've spent nearly every waking moment today scouring the web trying to hear more. I can't get enough.

I run out of words, but Derek Trucks seems to never run out of interesting things to say. So, I call on you, my fellow moggers, to tell me I'm not crazy. Follow this link, and listen to just under an hour of stuff mostly from Songlines, and tell me if you, like me, are unable to hear any other guitar play alive today who is capable of turning in a set like it.

Why do I think I'm crazy? There were empty seats in that theater last night. A lot of empty seats. I listen to the NPR concert linked above, and I ask, how on earth can that possibly be?

So, please. Save me. Tell my I'm not crazy.

"Waitaminute..."

RSchaut — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 20:01:21 GMT

Excuse me for bein' a bit trite, but ain't nobody ever done it better...

Reminiscing

RSchaut — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 09:46:06 GMT

Finally catching up on Mog stuff that's been parked off in one of my mail folders, I caught Bartleby's post that got me reminiscing about my youth. Though my immediate remembrance sparked by Bartleby's post was of my jazz ensemble days, I started thinking more about all of the music I was listening to back then.

I, along with my friends, was a progressive-rock head back then. We'd do silly things like scribble the lyrics to Ian Anderson's Thick as a Brick on the blackboard of the instructional materials center just to see how long it would take before one of the teachers noticed them and erased them.

Since I was a teen-aged prog-rock fan, it seems almost inevitable that I would have fallen in love with Annie Haslam.

Renaissance began on the heals of the demise of The Yardbirds, and was formed by Paul Samwell-Smith, Keith Relf, and Jim McCarty. They recorded two albums before attrition took hold until the only person left was late-comer, and guitar player, Michael Dunford.

Pursuing a folk/classical/rock combination, Dunford started looking for musicians with more classical musical training. Among those who answered ads in Melody Maker was the operatically-trained Haslam. Given her three-octave range and superbly sweet voice, I'm rather certain that Dunford didn't see much point in looking any further. The renaissance of Renaissance had their lead vocalist.

Unfortunately the original record label, Sire, seems intent on ignoring much of their progressive rock archive, and it's exceedingly difficult to find some of their best work. The two compilation disks, Tales of 1001 Nights, Vols I and II are missing key pieces of work.

So, I'm a bit forced to settle for one of their lesser pieces. Nevertheless, this 1977 performance from The Midnight Special gives a good taste of the purity and range of Haslam's voice. And, while the video is a bit grainy, one can still see quite well that which would capture the hormonally-driven fancy of a boy barely old enough to drive a car.

Derek Trucks and Carlos Santana

RSchaut — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 19:32:43 GMT

Given the common affinity that Derek Trucks and Carlos Santana have for the music of John Coltrane, we shouldn't be at all surprised to find them exploring this connection in some way. So, when I'd heard that the Derek Trucks Band was going to be opening for Santana on the latter's summer tour, I made a mental note to keep track of the various ways one might get an auditory glimpse at such a collaboration.

And, it hasn't taken long for a reasonable reward. Thinks to archive.org and Derek Trucks' generosity with bootleg recordings, we have this treat.

This version of My Favorite Things is a Coltrane classic that's been in Trucks' repertoire for quite some time. The recording does have some of the drawbacks of a bootleg recording (e.g. overheard comments from people close by), but the audio quality is sufficient to give us a nice taste.

For those of us unlucky enough to live near any of the venues where these two have played together, this is as close as we're likely to get.

Though, I wouldn't be at all surprised to find them collaborating on, say, Santana's next album. Until then, enjoy.

Dan Federici--RIP

RSchaut — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 05:06:26 GMT

By now just about everyone has heard the news that Dan Federici lost his battle with cancer yesterday. For those who might not be aware what all the fuss is about, here's the first part of Kitty's Back from the 1975 Hammersmith, Odeon show in London.

Or, imagine what this would be like without Federici's organ setting the opening grace note:

Springsteen called him Phantom Dan. At times, it was hard to know he was even there. But the music wouldn't have been the same without him.

Oscar Pettiford

RSchaut — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 06:42:35 GMT

Wow, has it really been nearly a month since I've posted? Time flies when you're head down in work, which, for the record, I still am. I've just had to come for a bit of air, and ran across this YT video featuring Oscar Pettiford.

The recording ban from 1942 to 1944 that was engineered by then head of the American Federation of Musicians union, and trumpeter, James Petrillo, couldn't have come at a worse time in the history of jazz. Just as be bop was in its infancy, we have this black hole that is rather difficult to penetrate when it comes to hearing how the music evolved.

We do know, however, that one of the first, if not the first, be bop combos to be playing on 52nd Street was Dizzy Gillespie's band that played at the Onyx Club. Oscar Pettiford played a pivotal role in that band.

And, while it would be nice to hear the parallel evolution in Oscar Pettiford's playing, we also know that his primary contribution to the instrument was to break out of the mold wherein the bass player remained confined to marking the chord changes by hitting the root note of each chord at each transition. Pettiford brought a more lyrical style to the bass, and made it more of an equal instrument in the band.

Whenever I hear a bass player, whether it's Allen Woody with the Allman Brothers and Gov't Mule, or Bootsy Collins, or anyone else, playing a more active role in the development of a song's melody and harmony, I think back to what Oscar Pettiford did.

You can hear some of Pettiford's style in this recording of from the 1955 album Basically Duke. You can check out the YT video link for the personnel, but Joe Wilder and Clark Terry are some names that people should recognize.

A Little Something for Our Man DMDM

RSchaut — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 05:21:25 GMT

Our man, DMDM, said this, and, for some reason, I though of Joni Mitchell's Free Man in Paris. I have no idea if this is the right kind of medicine, but the song has that rather soothing effect on me.

One of the more fascinating aspects of Joni Mitchell's music is the ambiguity of the chords she uses. In music, a chord is defined by its root note, so an ambiguous chord is one that's equally amenable to one or more root notes.

Bass players find it difficult to play with her, because it's not clear how they should work from chord to chord. Bass players focus on the root notes, and when the whole point of the music is to remain ambiguous, how do you find a bass line that preserves that ambiguity?

Few bass players navigated this ambiguity better than Jaco Pastorious. Charlie Mingus, of course, exhibits similar dexterity, and, had he not passed away during the recording of Mingus, that album might have turned out to have been one of Joni Mitchell's best.

Whatever the twists of history, we still have this video, which, among other things (e.g. Michael Brecker on sax, Lyle Mays on keyboards, Don Alias on drums and Pat Metheny on guitar), Jaco deftly navigating this ambiguity in Mitchell's music. The DVD is Shadows and Light, which was record back in 1979 as one of the first HBO music specials.

Django Reinhardt

RSchaut — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 22:33:25 GMT

This video could well fall into my series of posts on great guitar solos, but I felt a bit of trepidation about that in that I can't positively place the song. I think it's Honeysuckle Rose, but I'm finding my ability to recall various melodies, particularly when such liberties are taken with the melody as we find here, to be something of a failing faculty. So, if I'm wrong on the song, someone, please, correct me.

When it comes to Reinhardt's contributions to jazz, it's difficult to know even where to begin. But, there are three points worth noting. The first is Reinhardt's personal history. Having grown up in Manouches gypsy encampments in Belgium, Reinhardt's personal history parallel's the slave ancestry of American jazz itself, and, undoubtedly influenced his own assimilation of the ethos that jazz expressed.

Second, Reihnardt was both illiterate and untrained. The result was an enigmatic personality that was at once sympathetic and brash. He was easygoing and charming, yet often inconsiderate. He exhibited a number of characteristics that psychologists associate with Augsberger Syndrome. As a consequence, performances that ought to have been artistic triumphs often bordered on disaster.

Third, as a result of a fire, the ring and little finger of Reinhardt's left hand were almost completely paralyzed. This led to some innovations in technique that very few artists have been able to fully incorporate into their playing. The video shows a number of aspects of this technique, the most visible of which is the way he bends notes. To my knowledge, he's the first to have employed this technique in jazz guitar.

In his tomish A New History of Jazz, Alyn Shipton takes 42 pages to discuss the subject of European jazz through World War II. Of those, more than 7 pages are devoted to Reinhardt--quite a lot when you consider the wide field Shipton has set for himself in that book.

Reinhardt's influence on music in general can be seen in a variety of ways not the least of which would be songs that are a tribute to him. The most obvious would be John Lewis' Django, which became a staple of the Modern Jazz Quartet. Also, Dicky Betts has said that the Allman Brothers' Jessica is a tribute to Reinhardt. Betts had wanted to write a song that could be played with two fingers.

The quintet in the video appears to be the Hot Club du France lineup that featured Stephane Grapelli on violin, Louis Vola on bass and Joseph Reinhardt and Roger Chaput on the other two guitars.

Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers

RSchaut — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 09:07:04 GMT

I've already mentioned two of the three drummers who payed pivotal roles in the development of bebop: Kenny Clark and Max Roach. I've yet to say much about Art Blakey, and I think it's time I remedy that oversight.

Along with Horace Silver, Art Blakey, through the lineage of various incarnations of The Jazz Messengers, was one of the driving forces behind the form of jazz known as "hard bop." Hard bop is both a reaction to the somewhat frenetic and cerebral nature of bebop and a reflection of the drumming style of Art Blakey. As a form, it's hallmark is simpler melodies with a more pronounced, hard-driving rhythm. It's jazz that's deliberately held closer to its blues roots with a funkier edge than bebop.

The contrast between Kenny Clark's almost subdued style and Blakey's more pronounced style typifies this difference between hard bop and bebop, but the development of the form worked through Blakey's collaboration with a line of gifted musicians starting with Horace Silver, and continuing on through people like Benny Golson, Clifford Brown, Lee Morgan, Bobby Timmons, Freddie Hubbard and Wayne Shorter. Of these, Wayne Shorter was perhaps the most prolific, and the Messengers' music from the Shorter period tends to be held out as classics of the hard bop style.

Together, Art Blakey and these Jazz Messengers produced some of the most accessible, and perhaps recognizable, jazz music in the 50's and 60's. Dat Dere, to which Oscar Brown Jr. later added some of the most memorable jazz lyrics ever written (and, for which, I have, in my office at work, an 18" gray plastic elephant that was given to me by my children) and Moanin' are songs most casual jazz listeners have heard at one time or another.

I've tagged Arabia, from Mosaic as it's also typical of the hard bop style, though likely not a song folks have heard before. We'll see if Mog can connect it up with Rhapsody (I've had mixed results in that regard). You can also head on over to BurningDervish's recent post for a brief note about the Caravan album.

For the video, I've included a performance that is from 1980, and comes from the days with Wynton Marsalis was the musical director during Marsalis' "neotraditional jazz" movement. The video also gives a good view of Blakey's unique style; particularly his left-hand accents. As a side note, MOG's own Branford Marsalis is also in this version of the Jazz Messengers.

Even after Wynton left the Jazz Messengers, a number of other talented musicians continued on with Blakey until shortly before is passing in 1990. These include Terrence Blanchard, Donald Harrison and Kenny Garret.

Great Guitar Solos: David Gilmour, Shine On You Crazy Diamond

RSchaut — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 22:04:02 GMT

When asked to choose an outstanding David Gilmour solo, many people would choose the one on Comfortably Numb. If memory serves, it even ranked near, or at, the top of a couple of different polls about the greatest guitar solos of all time.

For me, I'll take his intro to Shine On as a better example of the soloist's art.

If a solo is a conversation between the soloist and the rest of the band, then an important part of the art of conversation is knowing when not to speak (or to speak softly, as it were). In this solo, Gilmour demonstrates this art with particular skill and aplomb. He knows when not to play as well as when to play.

His use of silence is particularly effective when combined with the way he hints at the melody to come without actually stating it. By the time the vocals kick in, it's as if you've already heard the song.

Music for Love II

RSchaut — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 16:58:21 GMT

I couldn't find a video of Joe Jackson doing this song, but I don't think it's necessarily something less to listen to Inara George's version.

When it comes to lyricists from the new age/punk era, I think Joe Jackson heads the list. To be certain, Elvis Costello turned a decent phrase or two (c.f. Watching the Detectives), but Joe Jackson consistently turned out song after song laced with wit and charm.

Fools in Love is a great example. After disparaging all fools in love, he cuts strait to the quick with, "I should know, because this fool's in love again."

One could do an entire series of posts about Joe Jackson's lyrics, from the poignant Real Men to the geek anthem (at least it was an anthem for this geek back in 1979) Is She Really Going Out with Him (check out the a capella version from Joe Jackson: Live 1980-1986). Joe Jackson's is a career worth wading through. For now, let's just enjoy a song that's appropriate for woeful valentines:

25 Years Ago

RSchaut — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 06:48:27 GMT

25 years ago, Michael Jackson's Thriller was released--well at least it is if you trust the fact that iTunes has just made available the 25th Anniversary Special Edition of the album.

It's somewhat ironic that, during the broadcast of of Mowtown 25: Yesterday, Today and Forever, Michael Jackson unveiled his signature move:

The irony? Thriller wasn't a Mowtown record.

For comparison and contrast purposes, I give you Marvin Gaye's performance from that same night:

I believe no further comment is necessary.

Music for Love

RSchaut — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 02:59:26 GMT

Ecompassrosa has a take on Valentine's Day that I can identify with. And, despite our shared disdain, I, too, will offer a selection in honor of the upcoming celebration d'amour.

You could pick just about any song off Tierney Sutton's I'm With the Band, and you wouldn't go wrong, but I'm particularly fond of her version of Irving Berlin's Let's face the Music and Dance. There's just something about her delivery that's both sensuous yet entirely innocent--as if to signify that a true union has both a physical and a spiritual dimension.

Actually, no, that's not quite right. When she sings this, she's saying that the physical part of the union is really more of a reflection of the spiritual part of the union--that the real union is spiritual.

And, for that reason, I'm really taken with her rendition.

Again, my apologies to non-Rhapsody folks who have to take whatever 30 seconds worth of the song someone has decided you should hear. RIAA and all...

Great Guitar Solos: Carlos Santana, Europa

RSchaut — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 21:15:49 GMT

In another post, I said that "solo" is really not quite the right word for a great solo. A truly great solo is really an interaction between the soloist and the rest of the musicians. This one is a textbook example. Santana's use of sustain in the middle of his solo as a grace note while the rhythm section builds to a climax is just outright spine-tingling, and the ensuing decrescendo, with exceptional unison between soloist and band, brings us back down to earth in a most beautiful fashion.

I don't know if Santana still does this, equipment has changed since 1977 when this recorded, but, as part of his preparation for a show, he would find the sweet spots on the stage where he could use positive feedback to get this incredibly long sustain and mark them on the stage with tape.

In the video, you can see where Santana turns to his right toward the stack of amplifiers behind him as he plays these notes that seem to just go on for ever.

I don't think the video is the same as the recording that was released on the album, but they are, most definitely, from the same tour.

Lastly, in my opinion, the collective whole of the percussionists he had on this tour, Paul Rekow, Graham Lear, Jose Chepito Areas and Pete Escovedo, is the best he's ever had behind him.

A New Derek Trucks Tune?

RSchaut — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 04:55:24 GMT

You know how it happens, even if you can't recall the details. You start in one place looking at some bit of music somewhere, and end up clicking through several other links until you get to a place you've been before.

Only, this time, there's something you haven't seen/heard before. In this case, I ended up on the dTb's My Space page, where the embedded flash player queued up a tune I hadn't heard them play before.

Knowing they allow bootlegs of some live performances, I did some poking around, and sure enough, there it was on the Internet Archive. A version of I Know, performed at Jazzfestival Frankfurt this past October.

I can't find an older set list that includes this song, though the song's title doesn't exactly lend itself to definitive results. Nevertheless, it would seem they've added a new song to their repertoire, so I've uploaded it here.

Miriam Makeba

RSchaut — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 02:59:59 GMT

Miriam Makeba has every right to sing the blues, not the least of which being Soweto Blues, penned by her former husband Hugh Masekela. She's lived a hard life that includes the death of her father when she was six years old and repeated bumps against politics in various forms that resulted in a stunted career that should have been stellar had it been based solely on her talents.

She's, perhaps, most famous for a song the actual title of which is unpronounceable by western tongues (Qongqothwane is one transliteration) and has become known as The Click Song. But, she's a soulful singer who has blended forms of blues, jazz, latin and African Folk music in various ways throughout her career.

The video is from Paul Simon's Graceland (The African Concert). The concert was recorded in 1991, when the apartheid regime in South Africa was in its dying throes, and that political backdrop informs the song as well as the performance. It's quite likely the reason Makeba's rendition of an ostensibly blues song sounds so triumphant.

Early Be Bop

RSchaut — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 01:51:13 GMT

Earl Hines' orchestra was never recorded. It's a shame, but it featured both Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker, and any recording of that orchestra would be able to give us some insights into the earliest efforts to bring be bop out of the after hours jam sessions and into the mainstream.

In 1944, Hine's orchestra folded, but his singer, Billy Eckstine formed his own big band that also featured Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. It also featured a young Sarah Vaughan.

I've been trying to find a representative recording of that band's forays into be bop, and it's a bit difficult. First, the band didn't focus entirely on be bop. With both Sarah Vaughan and Blly Eckstine on vocals, the band tended to do more than its share of ballads. Second, the ballads tended to be the more popular songs from that band. The combined effect is a dearth of anything boppish in network video land.

Sarah's rendition of Cherokee comes close, even if the recording isn't all that hot. Despite the shortcomings, you can hear the counter-play between Sarah's singing and the undulating, almost wavelike, undertow of the piano.

Cherokee is also the song Parker said is the tune that he used to work out his be bop ideas. In the Eckstine orchestra, it would have undoubtedly received a bit of Dizzy Gillespie's touch as well.

I don't know, for certain, that this performance features Eckstine's band. I haven't been able to find any information about the video itself. Having said that, if this does not actually feature Eckstine's band, given the history of Parker's association with the tune, it's highly likely that the rendition follows fairly closely one that would have been performed by Eckstine's band.

Lastly, I should note that, in addition to Gillespie and Parker, Eckstine's band included Fats Navarro, Gene Ammons, Dexter Gordon and Art Blakey. As a friend of mine is fond of saying, with more than a tinge of sarcasm, it's a shame he couldn't find anyone to play with him.

Great Guitar Solos: Duane Allman, Stormy Monday

RSchaut — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 23:06:15 GMT

I'm not going to try to make a list of great guitar solos. It's been done all too often, and it's extremely difficult to come up with any kind of objective criteria for deciding whether or not a guitar solo is "great" in some sense.

What I will do is, from time to time, share some solos that I think people should listen to, but I'll also endeavor to tell you why I think you should listen to it.

One of the things that makes for a great solo, guitar or otherwise, is when the artist breaks the rules, as it were, yet still makes it work. In my post on Coleman Hawkins' Body and Soul, I'd pointed out that many of the older musicians thought that Hawkins was playing the wrong notes. Hawkins broke the rules, but made it work anyway.

In a similar vein, Duane Allman breaks the rules in this solo from Stormy Monday. There are two basic blues scales, one that works well in major keys and one that works well in minor keys, known as the major and minor pentatonic scales (pentatonic meaning that there are five notes in the scale).

As a rule, you don't mix the two, but, in this solo, Duane weaves back and forth between them in almost dizzying fashion, yet the performance is so smooth, you barely notice that fact unless you listen very carefully to the subtle differences in tension and release.

My apologies to people without access to Rhapsody, but I couldn't find any recording that I could upload without taking a chance on incurring the wrath of the RIAA. Nevertheless, there's a new deluxe edition of the Fillmore East album that's well worth tracking down.

Playing with the Stones

RSchaut — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 19:36:20 GMT

If you're a fan of curling, you'll love this. If you're not a fan of curling, well, you should be.

Hope for Us Amateurs

RSchaut — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 04:13:31 GMT

With some great editing software, and a lot of patience:

Trying Hard not to be Pretentious

RSchaut — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 03:27:53 GMT

A few years ago, my colleagues and I were on a cruise around Seattle's Lake Washington, one of those mandatory fun, team-building morale events. As the boat cruised inside Yarrow Point on the east side of the lake, the tour guide pointed out Kenny G's house, at which point someone next to me said, "So that's the house that schlock built."

In a parenthetical note in an earlier post, I'd said that I consider "smooth jazz" to be an oxymoron, but that doesn't quite capture the full point. Because, being smooth doesn't mean it can't be jazz. To illustrate the point, I've included a relatively recent video of the Dave Brubeck Quartet performing Three to Get Ready.

I once heard someone describe Paul Desmond's saxophone as "creamy," and thought, immediately, that it's the perfect simile. To be certain, cream is, indeed, very smooth. It is, however, also very rich and has a lot of flavor. And, that's the difference between "smooth jazz" and jazz that's smooth.

If the primary attribute of a piece of music is the fact that it is "smooth," then that piece of music has been stripped of the very attributes that we would associate with jazz: complex rhythms and/or harmonies--dynamics that create and release tension in interesting, often surprising, ways. To that end, "smooth jazz" is an oxymoron. If it's jazz, then there are other attributes that contribute to its richness and flavor such that we don't think of it as being just "smooth."

In all of that, I'm also trying hard not to be pretentious. To say that smooth jazz is an oxymoron does not imply that all of the music that gets labelled as "smooth jazz" is bad music. Consider the Earth, Wind & Fire video I just posted. It's difficult to distinguish that from a lot of good music that gets labelled as "smooth jazz."

But, I wouldn't use the word "jazz" to describe Earth, Wind and Fire's music. Granted, there's a good deal of jazz influence on the music, but that doesn't make it jazz. Instrumental soul music, maybe. R&b without lyrics, perhaps. It's just not jazz.

So, listen to Paul Desmond, and see if you don't hear the difference. But, don't feel guilty if you also get a hankering to listen to, say, Sade's Is it a Crime.

EWF

RSchaut — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 02:27:36 GMT

Perhaps I'm in a pseudo funk, but I can't resist following up this morning's post about George Clinton and Parliament with one featuring Earth, Wind & Fire; in no small part because Clinton often referred to EWF as "Earth, all Wind and no Fire."

While George Clinton was pure funk, and pushed funk to its limits, EWF went in another direction. Funk was the base, but Maurice White's experience with jazz and exposure to world instruments during his work with Ramsey Lewis added an entirely different flavor to EWF's music; a flavor that apparently didn't sit well on Clinton's palate but sat well on a lot of other people's palates.

To be sure, the formula didn't always work well, but when it did, the result was a unique blending of funk, jazz, soul and r&b influences.

The video here, and the tagged version off the live album Gratitude, give an idea of this. A good solid groove with ample room for individual improvisation. To me, this is a funk/r&b version of what Miles Davis was doing on Kind of Blue; using a broad sketch of tune with a basic, simple melody as a vehicle for improvisation. The jazz influence, in this case, is direct in that they originally recorded this song with Ramsey Lewis.

I'm not sure of all the line-up differences between the Gratitude version and the video below, but I do know that Gary Byas replaces Don Myrick on saxophone. The video is from the 1997 Montreux Jazz festival.

Clinton

RSchaut — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 06:15:35 GMT

No, not that one. This one.

Perhaps I got the A Political Blues, but the Clinton most on my mind lately has been George.

"Funk not only moves, it can re-move! Dig?"

Gary Burton/Makoto Ozone

RSchaut — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 05:45:18 GMT

The music Gary Burton has recorded for the Concord Jazz label is a little difficult to come by on the web. It doesn't show up in iTunes, nor does Rhapsody seem to have at least two of the titles I know of.

One that's worth seeking out, however, is Like Minds with Chick Corea, Pat Metheny, bassist Dave Holland and drummer Roy Haynes. It's a formidable quintet making formidable music.

To give you a taste of Gary Burton's abilities, I was able to track down a rather nice video of Gary Burton performing Mongo Santamaria's Afro Blue along with Makoto Ozone. Burton isn't as focused on latin music as someone like Cal Tjader, but, when Burton does play latin-tinged music, he's reminiscent of Tjader.

21 Years Ago Today

RSchaut — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 13:12:30 GMT

I'll let Percy say it for me.

Gettin' Deep

RSchaut — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 05:56:43 GMT

Somebody's just posted some new videos from Gov't Mule's The Deepest End: Live in Concert. This one features the Dirty Dozen Brass Band with guests Paul Jackson (who performed on the original recording with Herbie Hancock) and Bernie Worrell. For the audio, I've tagged John the Revelator, which also features the Dirty Dozen Brass Band.

This entire show was an amazing concert. They started somewhere around 10:00 PM, and didn't finish until nearly 4:00 AM. Guest bassists for the show include George Porter Jr, Victor Wooten, Jason Newsted and Les Claypool. Other musical guests include Sonny Landreth, Bela Fleck and Carl Denson. The whole show finishes up with an awesome rendition of Thorazine Shuffle featuring George Porter Jr, Dave Schools and Jason Newsted all playing bass.

The package you can buy in stores includes two CD's and DVD which covers nearly the entire concert. Great stuff all around.

What's the "Clave"?

RSchaut — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 01:43:25 GMT

Discussions about Cuban and Caribbean music tend to center on the clave (pronounced "clah-vay"), which is the basic rhythmic building block at the center of all these forms of music. The term comes from the word for the sticks that are used to mark out the rhythmic pattern. If you're listening some Cuban or Caribbean music, and you want to find the clave, listen for the sticks.

In order to understand the clave, we have to understand some basic music terminology. Musical time is measured in terms of the duration of various notes. The most common time signature in music is 4 beats per measure, with each beat occupying 1/4 of the measure. This is known as 4/4 (pronounced "four four") time.

If the quarter note is the basic unit of time, then half that duration is known as an eighth note (1/8th). Half of an 1/8th note is a sixteenth note. You'll see 1/32nd notes in jazz, but we don't need to get that fine in order to understand the clave.

Musicians will count out beats in a measure using the numbers. So, when someone talks about "the one", they're talking about the first beat in a measure. The "four" is the fourth beat.

To count out 1/8th notes, we'll often insert an "and" between the numbers, and you'll hear people talking about the "and of the four," which means the 1/8th note that comes after the fourth note in a measure.

To count out 1/16th notes, musicians insert an "e" before the "and" and an "a" after the "and". So, you'll often see a rhythmic pattern where the beats are counted out with "1 e & a 2 e & a," where each syllable is given an equal duration.

With that terminology in mind, check out this explanation of the son and rhumba claves. I like the explanation given there, because it includes some MP3's of the basic forms. For us auditory learners, which most music lovers are, hearing is believing.

Be sure to read some of the information on the side bar as well as the main article. A lot of people who attempt to explain the clave mess up the musical terminology, and the Rhythm Web site does a good job of being clear.

One thought to keep in mind. While the clave is almost always explicit in various forms of latin music, it's often implicit in many forms of funk, soul, R&B, rock and jazz. Once you get accustomed to finding the clave in latin music, try finding a clave in music where it might be implied rather than explicit. It's another way to understand how the underlying rhythm in a piece of music works.

After that, here's Ruben Blades performing Todos Vuelven. The clave, here, is a 3:2 rhumba clave, and, at about 1:50, you can see Ruben clapping the distinctive rhumba clave rhythm. See if you can spot the difference between what a 3:2 son clave would sound like and the rhumba clave used here.

Tal Wilkenfeld

RSchaut — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 05:33:28 GMT

Having just been clued in to burningdervish's Chicks on Bass project, I thought I'd lobby a bit for the next artist in the series.

Tal Wilkenfeld is a 22 year old, Australian bassist who has recently toured with Jeff Beck, appearing with him during the Crossroads Guitar Festival this past july, is an up-and-coming artist who shows an enormous amount of promise. She's also performed with Hiram Bullock and Chick Corea.

She's just released her first solo album, Transformation, which is not yet in Mog's database (I haven't checked Rhapsody). So, we'll have to content ourselves with a "video". No pictures. I'll leave that one for burningdervish.

She's a Soul Senda

RSchaut — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 21:08:53 GMT

I've mentioned Van Morrison's A Night in San Francisco in an earlier post. In 1993, Van Morrison released Too Long in Exile which featured collaborations with John Lee Hooker. A Night in San Francisco was recorded in December of 1993, and I'm inclined to believe that the collaboration on Too Long in Exile led to the line-up that appears on A Night in San Francisco.

And, what a line-up it is. In addition to a solid back-up band headed by Georgie Fame (and featuring the afore-mentioned Candy Dulfer), vocalists in this concert include Junior Wells, Brian Kennedy, Jimmy Witherspoon and Shana Morrison. The result is distinctly not the singer/songwriter side of Van Morrison. Rather, it's the bluesman, soul singer, performer, musician Van Morisson.

For some, this might be disappointing. For others, like me, the result is a joy to listen to. Most songs are medleys, like the one I've tagged for Rhapsody, and include a variety of spontaneous interaction. In one song, for example, Jimmy Witherspoon, with no small measure of irony, asks the musical question, "How long will it be before I become a man?" Morrison answers, "It's up to you!"

The video I've included was made for the Too Long in Exhile, but it gives a good sense of what the show sounds like. Lot's of improvised vamping; great musicians having a wonderful time making beautiful music.

Ray Brown Trio ft. Kevin Mahogany

RSchaut — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 16:03:00 GMT

When Bassist Ray Brown first went to New York in 1945, he met up with Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie and Bud Powell. From that kind of height, one's career can only go down, but Ray Brown never fell very far. Overshadowed by people like Oscar Pettiford and Charlie Mingus, he still managed to play a role in jazz, playing with Oscar Peterson and Jazz at the Phillharmonic. He was also briefly married to Ella Fitzgerald, and backed her band for a while.

Kansas City's Kevin Mahogany used to be a tenor sax player, but has since turned his attention to vocals. He reminds me a bit of Joe Williams. If you can find it, his album, Double Rainbow is worth the price of admission. It has one of the better vocal versions of All Blues I've ever heard, and the title track is very nice. He's also recently released an album featuring big band jazz, and I've simply been too occupied to check it out. (If someone has, let me know.)

The Ray Brown Trio has had a few different incarnations. This one features Larry Fuller on piano and George Fludas on drums. The performance is from Ray Brown's 75th birthday concert, and features a fun bit of trading fours between Kevin Mahogany and George Fludas.

Peter Gabriel & Youssou N'Dour

RSchaut — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 16:16:36 GMT

Even for Peter Gabriel, So was a breakthrough album, due in large part to his willingness to incorporate a variety of musical styles through collaboration with other artists.

The most popular song from that album In Your Eyes, has become a concert staple for Gabriel. It features Youssou N'Dour, and the video below, shot in Geneva in 2005, is a reprise of that collaboration.

Peter Gabriel is well known, and doesn't need any pointers from me. Youssou N'Dour, however, isn't all that well known, but he should be. He's extremely popular in his home of Senegal.

After you've watched this video go check out this video and this post from DLuebbert for more of Youssou N'Dour's work.

Uptown, 13th Ward

RSchaut — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 17:45:31 GMT

Last week DLubbert posted a couple of items from the Wild Tchoupitoulas and The Meters. I'd asked him to talk a bit about the connection between these two groups and the Neville Brothers, and he gave a pretty good response.

In their live performances, the Neville Brothers often make references to this musical connection. In the opening bars of Shake Your Tambourine from Live on Planet Earth you can hear one of the brothers, calling out, "Uptown. 13th Ward. Home of the Wild Tchoupitoulas Mardi Gras indians."

The first video here, featuring both the Neville Brothers and the Meters doing Fire on the Bayou, shows the direct connection between the two groups. After a short break near the end, the band plays a short bit of Hey Pocky A Way.

In the second video, from the Sessions at West 54th program, there's a point where Aaron Neville makes explicit reference to "Uptown, 13th Ward." Later in the tune, Art sings about "Wild Tchoupitoulas from the big 13". Hey Pocky A Way is a version of one of the chants that the Wild Tchoupitoulas would use in their "battles".

I was first clued in to this connection by DLuebbert himself. He and I worked together some years ago writing software for the Mac. He'd renamed his Mac's hard disk to "Wild Tchoupitoulas," and I'd asked him about it. Thus began my education about the world of Mardi Gras indians.

As for why they refer to themselves as "Indians," that is a long bit of history involving West African slaves joining ranks with Native Americans in the New Orleans area. In particular, Native American tribes offered safe haven to escaped West African slaves.

Laurindo Almeida and MJQ

RSchaut — Sun, 27 Jan 2008 06:11:33 GMT

I've mentioned Dizzy Gillespie's first big band from the late 40's. In order to give the horns a rest from the demanding charts, the rhythm section, featuring Percy Heath, Milt Jackson, Kenny Clark and John Lewis, would play a couple of numbers throughout the gig.

Following the demise of that first big band, the rhythm section broke out on their own to form MJQ. At one point the MJ stood for "Milt Jackson," but the quartet is more generally known as the Modern Jazz Quartet-one of several meteors that were shot into orbit from that band.

There are probably other videos that showcase the particular talents of MJQ. There's one out there from David Sanborn's Night Music where they give a wonderful rendition of Django. But this one's rather unique in that it showcases a lesser-known, mostly classical guitarist from Brazil. It also shows the quartet's versatility.

I can do without the host's pretentious downgrading of modern guitar players (as if he knows anything more about the various forms of guitar artistry than we do), but the performance is just exquisite. Indeed, I'm hard-pressed to think of a better rendition of One Note Samba than this one.

A Precursor to Bebop

RSchaut — Sat, 26 Jan 2008 15:37:45 GMT

In the wee morning hours of October 11, 1939, Coleman Hawkins and his orchestra wrapped up a gig at Kelly's Stable on 52nd street. A scant 6 hours later, the orchestra, a smallish, nine-piece band by the prevailing standards of the swing era, straggled into the recording studio at Victor records. After Hawkins' years of playing as a soloist in a variety of venues and settings in Europe, this recording was supposed to mark Hawkins' triumphal return to the American music scene.

And, in some ways, it did. After recording a couple of charts that the band had been performing at Kelly's Stable, Leonard Joy asked Hawkins to record a tune that had become the centerpiece of the band's performances.

"[Hawkins] reached over some place and got a bottle of Cognac, took a good healthy sip, laid it down, and then he got right under the middle of the microphone and he said, 'Make an introduction to Body and Soul'," recalls pianist Gene Rodgers. "He just played with no interruption, flat-footed, and he probably didn't even hear the accompaniment. His eyes were closed and he just played as if he was in heaven."

Body and Soul became a hit, and, had social, economic and temperament factors not interfered with his goal, Hawkins might well have succeeded in having one of the best-known swing bands in the country.

All of that is interesting history, but that's not why Hawkins' rendition of Body and Soul played such an important role in the development of Jazz in general and bebop in particular. Hawkins' performance, both in the musical nature of the performance itself and in the role it carves out for the virtuoso soloist, provides the basic blueprint that later musicians like Thelonious Monk, Charlier Parker and Dizzy Gillespie would follow.

This is not quite bebop. While Hawkins' musicial ideas were highly inventive (indeed so profound is this solo that many older musicians simply thought that Hawkins was playing the wrong notes!), he's still playing very closely to the chordal structure of the song; by that I mean that Hawkins' method of building and resolving tension rather closely follows the patterns established by the underlying chords.

It does, however, point the way to more complex harmonic structures and phrasing that would, along with the rapid-fire chops, become the hallmarks of bebop. In this sense, Body and Soul forms a musical bridge between the swing era and bebop.

Candy Dulfer Gettin' it On

RSchaut — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 05:03:20 GMT

I first encountered Candy Dulfer's soulful alto and tenor sax on Van Morrison's A Night in San Francisco. That two-disc album is worthy of mention in its own right, being not so much as a Van Morrison concert as a romp through various elements soul, funk, R&B with a jazz twist. It features people like Georgie Fame, Junior Wells, John Lee Hooker, Jimmy Witherspoon and Brian Kennedy.

Candy's particular mix of jazzed up funk, R&B and soul fits in so well what the rest of the mix on that album that I had to track down some of her music. Apart from some forays into smooth jazz (an oxymoron if you ask me), she has shown some inventive solo work that is worthy of notice.

I'm partial to some of her live work, Live at Montreux, 2002 being my favorite. So, I went searching through various videos trying to find some similar work, and ran across this. I don't know much about the venue, the performance or the people with whom she's performing, but, sometimes, everything just clicks. In this case, the result is a wonderful rendition of Marvin Gaye's Let's Get it On.

See, mom? All that singing along with the records does pay off. For some of us, at least.

Gospel Music?

RSchaut — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 21:04:38 GMT

Last month, DLuebbert posted this item containing a video of a performance by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. In the comment thread, he gave a wonderful introduction to the basic ideas in Qawwali music. If you haven't seen it already, check it out now. It will help you understand the rest of this post.

One of the issues that arose in that discussion was the "alap," or opening, portion of a qawwali tune, in particular the arhythmic, improvisational nature of the the alap tends to sound foreign to western ears. It does, however, have a rather long-standing tradition in south-asian, middle-eastern spiritual music.

I'd pointed this out in the end of that comment thread, but I came along rather late in the game. So, I decided to post the same video here. It's a chant of a prayer in Arabic. The prayer comes from the Baha'i religion, but this kind of chant is common in Islamic culture as well. In fact, this is referenced in Jon Hendricks' lyrics for A Night in Tunisia,

"Thrill to the chant of - the Muezzin Callin' all t'pray aroun' the closin' o'the day Becomes a regular occurrence"

I do not know the name of the woman doing the chant. It's not likely to have been a recording of a musical performance per-se. Rather, I'm guessing it was recorded during an observance of a Baha'i holy day. The backing slide show is mostly the Baha'i gardens on Mt. Carmel, in Haifa.

Like the alap portion of a qawwali song, this chant is entirely improvised. I've heard many individuals chant the same prayer, and it's never quite the same even when the same person repeats it. Also, you can hear a similar 12-note scale with the seemingly arhythmic, yet poetic, wandering.

All of this, to me, underscores the devotional nature of this music. I like to think of it as south-asian, middle-eastern gospel music. Whether it's a qawwali tune sung as part of a sufi ritual, an Islamic call to prayer in a mosque, Baha'is observing one of their holy days or a Sunday chorus in a southern Baptist church, the purpose is pretty much the same. And, for many people, so is the effect.

Son House

RSchaut — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 15:14:07 GMT

There are a couple of ways of finding music you might like. One is to take a look at personnel who are on an album you like and search for other music that they play. Another is to find out the artists who influenced artists you like.

This is a case of the latter. Derek Trucks lists Son House as one of his influences, and an is artist that Trucks listens to from time to time. So, I looked him up, and found this archival footage from the "Night Music" show.

I'm fascinated by House's use of the slide. It's never parallel to the frets, which creates a somewhat discordant sound when two strings are played at the same time.

Quincy the Producer

RSchaut — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 07:27:45 GMT

I've been wrestling with the best way to talk about Quincy Jones the producer, and there's really no way to get around discussing Michael Jackson. Quincy produced Michael's two break-out albums Off the Wall and Thriller. The first was a phenomenal success in its own right. The latter set the standard for success that really hasn't been surpassed since.

The credit for that success, in my opinion, goes more to Quincy than to Michael, and nothing shows this to quite the extent that Beat It does. Start with TOTO as your backup band, loop Eddie Van Halen in for the guitar solo, and put Michael out front dancing. Nothing short of the genius of Quincy Jones can take those incoherent ingredients and turn out a smash hit.

The video is really just an audio interview of Steve Lukather, Mike Porcaro, Greg Phillinganes and Quincy himself discussing the making of the Thriller album.

Yvette Marie Stevens

RSchaut — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 06:40:20 GMT

The started out as just "Rufus." Then they became "Rufus featuring Chaka Khan." Now, if you want to find the bulk of their discography in iTunes, you search for "Chaka Khan & Rufus."

Their first hit, written by Stevie Wonder with Chaka Khan's vocal style in mind, was Tell me Something Good. Their last hit, which garnered them a grammy, was Aint Nobody, which has since become a Chaka Khan concert staple.

I could have chosen either one for this post, but I chose the former, just because I'd forgotten just how...tiny...she was to be belting out songs the way she did.

Nevertheless, the live Stompin' at the Savoy, which features both this song and the version of Aint Nobody that won the grammy, is a worthwhile overview of their catalogue.

Giant Steps

RSchaut — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 04:52:14 GMT

Well, the Giants have finally gotten revenge for the 1961 and 1962 NFL championships. In their honor, I thought I'd offer a little John Coltrane.

The video features animated musical notation of Coltrane's solo, which gives a sense of what it would be like to try to sight-read the piece. No wonder people get lost trying to play this.

Miss Celie's Blues

RSchaut — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 18:09:28 GMT

Quincy Jones wrote the score for a total of 33 major motion pictures, starting with Pawnbroker, and that doesn't include scores, like Austin Powers, where Quincy's music was used off the shelf.

With that kind of library, how do you choose? In the Heat of the Night (as mentioned by bartleby), or its sequel They Call me Mister Tibbs wouldn't be bad choices. But, The Color Purple is, to my mind, the cream of the crop. The breadth of the score is staggering, and there isn't a bad song in the whole bunch.

The score was nominated for an Oscar, but lost out to John Barry's score for Out of Africa; a travesty if you ask me. Not that it would matter to Quincy all that much. He has 26 grammy's.

So, here's Miss Celie's Blues, from The Color Purple:

A Quincy Jones Connection

RSchaut — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 19:44:12 GMT

Deadmandeadman suggested I do a series on Quincy Jones. The problem with such an idea is, where do you even start? Well, one way to start is to draw musical connections to Quincy Jones that people might not know about. This is one of them.

Quincy Jones is an enormous talent, and is gifted in so many areas, not the least of which is doing some impressive arrangements; a skill he honed while doing arrangements for Dizzy Gillespie's big band that toured the world on behalf of the US Department of State.

One of the songs for which Quincy delivered the definitive arrangement is Benny Golson's Killer Joe. Manhattan Transfer used that arrangement as a template for their performance.

And Manhattan Transfer have their share of fun with this. The first time I saw them perform this, Tim Hauser strutted on stage in a purple zoot suit, twirling a two-foot long watch chain, hat askew, shoulders hunched and lips pouted. It cracks me up every time I conjure up the image.

But, you can listen to the Quincy Jones version that I've tagged for audio and compare it to the Manhattan Transfer performance. The similarities are remarkable.

Quincy Jones Big Band

RSchaut — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 15:45:34 GMT

In 1960, Quincy Jones put together a big band that is largely considered to have been one of the best big bands ever. It had a trumpet section that included Clark Terry and Benny Baily, and a sax section that featured Sahib Shihab, Budd Johnson and Phil Woods.

The band was originally formed as part of a musical that flopped when it hit Paris due to the political unrest there arising from the government's policy on Algiers. It was a rough time, but, instead of folding, Quincy took the band on a tour of Europe.

Jazz Icons has a DVD of two shows. The video here, from that DVD, features two songs, Birth of a Band and Bobby Timmons' Moanin'.

Pleasant Surprises

RSchaut — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 23:17:36 GMT

Here's the scene. You're about two thirds of the way through a fantastic concert featuring a hot, young guitarist and his band. You wonder if it gets any better than this.

He's got a ridiculously talented wife who's not on the bill, but had been performing with him a month ago. You don't really expect her to be in the show, but it's in the back of your mind.

The band has just finished a stirring version of My Favorite Things similar to one done by John Coltrane. As the applause dies down, the guitar player starts a familiar, loping intro of a song you remember hearing.

About four bars into the song, that ridiculously talented wife walks out on stage. And, when she opens her mouth, magic happens.

When you listen, there's a point where she adds a flourish to the end of the word "serenade," and he echos it back starting the echo before she's finished. He knows where she's going before she even gets there. Improvised call-and-response. This is why we listen to live music in the first place.

And, you know it doesn't get any better than this.

Are We Not Men?

RSchaut — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 15:16:04 GMT

Mac World San Francisco. Huge product release, press meetings, customer meetings, and, of course, the Mac World BLAST! at the Warfield, featuring Devo.

I didn't think these guys were still around, but, here's a clip from last year. The audio quality is a bit sub-part, but. after all, it is Devo. Turn your volume up real high, and you'll get a sense of last night's bash.

The only real question is, what, on earth, am I doing posting this at 7:15 the morning after?

Vocalese

RSchaut — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 03:39:42 GMT

Putting lyrics to jazz tunes has been an art since, well, since there were jazz tunes. A full history would be pretty long-winded, but one of the more impressive practitioners of this art form is Jon Hendricks.

I was hoping to link to the Charlie Parker version of the song, but, after a couple of attempts, MOG seems to not find the one that's available in Rhapsody. The album in Rhapsody is Charlie Parker, Miles Davis and Friends. This is the version that would have been recorded during the Dial sessions in Los Angeles.

The video is is really just a static picture. The audio is from Another Night in Tunisia, performed by the Manhattan Transfer with guests Bobby McFerrin and Jon Hendricks. Hendricks is the voice singing the part that matches Parkers' solo nearly note for note.

As a side note, if you've ever heard of the famous Charlie Parker alto break, it was a variation of this solo. When he first played it in the studio, the other musicians were so stunned by it that they couldn't finish the song. The moment was preserved for posterity, and can be found on a four CD set sold as "Complete Charlie Parker on Dial". It's loaded with alternate takes, and is largely of historical significance and/or for rabid ornithologists.

The Corrs w/ Ron Wood

RSchaut — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 19:16:47 GMT

I guess I'm on a Rolling Stones thing today. Who knows where certain video searches will lead?

Anyway, some covers are brilliant (Joe Cocker's Feelin' Alright), some were bad ideas from the outset (Tito Puente's Take Five), and others are intriguing. This one falls into the latter category. I haven't decided what I think of it yet, but I admire the way they put their own stamp on Little Wing without losing the ethos of the song.

Little Feat w/ Mick Taylor

RSchaut — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 17:15:06 GMT

One of my desert island disks is Little Feat's Waiting for Columbus, which was recorded live at the Rainbow Theatre in London and Lisner Auditorium in Washington, DC. Part of what makes that a desert island disk is the inclusion of the Tower of Power horns. On the break for Dixie Chicken, for example, the horns break into a little dixieland jazz before the song returns to the second verse.

This clip is from the Rainbow Theatre show, and features Mick Taylor on guitar. The performance in the clip differs slightly from the one on the album, and I'm not entirely sure why. The album had some overdubbing done to it, but there are other parts that are slightly different. I'm inclined to think that the differences are overdubs.

This was two years before Lowell George died, and gives a good idea of the energy of that show. I also love George's humor in this song; "I don't care if it's the unholy four of John Wayne and Dorothy Lamar."

Dizzy Shells

RSchaut — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 16:16:06 GMT

If you're a fan of Saturday Night Live, then you've probably seen Steve Turre. One of his longest gigs was the trombone player for the SNL band. His visage is instantly recognizable.

Turre does some fascinating stuff with conch shells of various sizes, and turned out an entire album featuring his unique use of these as a musical instrument.

Here's a clip showing some of how he does it. By the way, this is the same concert from which came the video of Paquito D'Rivera, Slide Hampton and Claudio Roditi that I'd linked earlier.

Blue Scholars

RSchaut — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 01:55:28 GMT

I've always told my kids that I don't have any conceptual problem with the underlying premise of hip-hop music. The connection between poetry and music is so old, that it would be unfair to simply dismiss hip-hop offhandedly.

So, when my daughter said she thought these guys were worthwhile, I needed to follow through on my word and investigate them. And, you know what? She's right.

Now, there's a lot of conscience rap out there, but I also have to admit that, with a large amount of hip-hop, the language has simply passed me by. I'm not as lithe as I used to be, and I'm not talking about physical capacities.

But these guys bring something different to the table--something that I can only describe as cerebral. To illustrate the point, I've embedded a live clip of a performance of Cornerstone. Yeah, I know, they've released a new album, Bayani since this one came out, but I'm trying to illustrate this point.

The song is Cornerstone, and there's an explicit reference in the song to the "stone that the builders refused." This comes from the Bible (118th Psalm, v. 22), and that one line provides an entirely fascinating context for the song. Indeed, by that reference, the whole song can be understood as an interpretation of that one verse.

In that verse from Psalms, God takes the "stone that the builders refused" and makes it a cornerstone. According to Blue Scholars, this is symbolic of the under-appreciated people in society; people who's work and contribution receive little or not reward or recognition, but without which society would fall apart. The "builders" represent the privileged and powerful in society.

Whether you agree with it or not, this is heady stuff, and, to me at least, is a level of thoughtfulness over and above even some of the most conscious rappers today.

Indulge Me

RSchaut — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 01:20:06 GMT

I grew up in Green Bay. Saturdays. NFL Films. The voice of John Facenda, and the music of Sam Spence. Ramblin' Man from Gramblin', the school even has the right logo.

With Dallas' loss, we get a championship rematch that hasn't happened since I was too young to remember.

Rhapsody has the tune, but Mog doesn't seem to know of any albums. Oh, well.

But, hey, the song does have a great example of Kenny Clark's style of drumming...

Yeah, I know. It's a lame connection. I did ask for a bit of indulgence.

Chuck Leavell

RSchaut — Sun, 13 Jan 2008 19:14:59 GMT

Chuck Leavell is one of those musicians most people have heard, but few have heard of. He's had a long and storied career both as a side musician and as the front man for his own jazz-fusion group, Sea Level (C. Leavell).

That really cool piano solo in the Allman Brothers' Jessica? Chuck Leavell. The guy whose piano solo raised Eric Clapton's eyebrows in the Unplugged version of Old Love? Chuck Leavell. That sort of nondescript guy sitting behind the keyboards in your favorite Rolling Stones live video? Chuck Leavell.

Chuck Leavell also played on the Black Crowes Shake your Money Maker, and this stripped-down, acoustic version if She Talks to Angels gives a really good idea of Leavell's talents.

Max Roach and Kenny Clark

RSchaut — Sun, 13 Jan 2008 18:36:34 GMT

After yesterday's post featuring some younger drummers, I would be terribly remiss if I didn't give a (hi) hat tip to the two men whose inventiveness and style turned jazz drumming on its ear.

Kenny "Klook-mop" Clark is generally credited with inventing the style of using the ride cymbal to keep time rather than the base and/or snare drum. This left the drummer free to use the base and snare to add accents. Whenever you hear that now familiar jazz ride cymbal sound, think of Kenny Clark.

Max Roach's contribution is a little harder to articulate. Every great improvised solo you've ever heard has a rhythm section adding embellishments and accents to fill some of the voids. In that sense, I've always thought that "solo" is the wrong word, but it gets used because there really isn't a better word. A "solo" is really an interaction between the featured musician and the other musicians who are laying down the backdrop.

Max Roach's contribution was to radically enhance the drummer's interaction with the soloist. He took Kenny Clark's idea of using the ride cymbal to keep time while perfecting the art of accent and embellishment in ways turned what would have been mundane solos into true works of artistic genius.

After all that talk about interaction between drummer and soloist, I have, ironically, chosen a video of Max all by himself. I did that for two reasons. First, there is so much out there that's representative of Max' ability to interact with soloists that I simply gave up trying. Besides, I've already linked to the Jazz at Massey Hall concert, which is as representative of his work as anything else.

The other reason I chose this particular video is that it shows some of Max' inventiveness and creativity. These are the kinds of things Max would use to embellish and accent a soloist's performance.

One for the Drummers

RSchaut — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 23:38:02 GMT

Dave Weckl, Vinnie Colaiuta and Steve Gadd at the Buddy Rich memorial concert. If you have friends who play drums, now you know why they take on such an air of reverence when these names are spoken.

What Time is It?

RSchaut — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 18:56:24 GMT

In response to DLuebbert's post of a John Scofield and Pat Metheny video, Brittany asked about appreciating this kind of music. He gave a great answer about rhythm, and it's well worth the time to read.

His response reminds me of a game I play with my kids, called "What time is it?" Most music is built up using rhythmic patterns that repeat over certain counts. Musicians speak of these as "measures". When you listen to a song, you can count out the beats until you hear the rhythmic pattern repeat, and that count represents the time signature of the song.

A waltz, for example, has three beats per measure. Most rock and blues songs have four beats per measure. But, as my last post about Take Five shows, you're not limited to 3, 4 or even 6 beats per measure. You can do five.

Some songs are harder to pick out than others, which is where the "what time is it" game comes in. I'll find some songs where the pattern can be difficult to find, and ask my kids to figure it out. The trick is often to listen to the bass line.

I've embedded a video of Sting's Seven Days. You get fleeting shots of drummer Vinnie Colaiuta. (I'd prefer to just watch him in this video and no one else, but, what can you do?) Like Take Five, has five beats per measure.

For the audio tag, I've linked Saint Augustine in Hell from the same Ten Summoner's Tales album. It's one of the hardest non-jazz songs I've found with which to play "what time is it?" So as not to spoil it for anyone, I'll give the answer in the comments, but you've pretty much mastered the "what time is it" skill when you can figure that one out.

The Story of Take Five

RSchaut — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 18:00:39 GMT

I've been trying to figure out a way to tell the story behind Paul Desmond's Take Five, because it's a difficult story to convey in writing. The video I've embedded, however, gives me a way to tell it.

The embedded video is a fun vocalese version done by Kurt Elling and Al Jarreau using the lyrics written by Iola Brubeck, Dave's wife. Watch the video before you read the rest of the story.

So, the story. Take Five gets its name from the quintuple (five beats per measure as opposed to the usual 3, 4 or 6 beats per measure) time signature. Drummer Joe Morello had worked out this cool little 5/4 riff, and Brubeck suggested that Desmond should try writing a song to go with it.

Desmond wasn't keen on the idea. I'm paraphrasing, but he, essentially, said, "Are you kidding? I don't know to do 5/4 time!"

Brubeck insisted, and Desmond relented saying he'd give it a shot.

A few days later, Brubeck asked Desmond how the song was coming along. Desmond said that he'd only come up with two phrasings, and Brubeck said, "Well, let's hear them."

Desmond pulls out his horn, and plays the part that's sung:

Won't you stop and take a little time out with me Just take five

Brubeck says, "That's nice. Let's hear the other one," at which point Desmond plays the part that's sung:

Though I'm going out of my way Just so I can pass by each day Not a single word do we say It's a pantomime and not a play

Brubeck sits back, smiles and says, "Well, play that first part twice, then the second part, then repeat the first part again, and there's your song."

And that's how Take Five was written.

Lastly, Take Five was also the concert vehicle for Joe Morello's drum solo, so I've pointed the audio tags to the "Great Concerts" recording, which also happens to be one of my favorite recordings of the song.

Buddy Rich 1978

RSchaut — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 22:17:48 GMT

If you're at all into big bands, sooner or later, you get around to Buddy Rich. He had several, but he always said that the band he had in the late '70s' was the best he'd ever had.

In the never-ending quest for the perfect recording, several techniques were tried by different studios. One technique is an update of the original way records were recorded. Using much more modern equipment, the recording was fed directly to a lathe that cut the master in as live recording. No breaks between songs, and any mistake meant that you threw out the master and started over from scratch. You didn't try this with just any band.

In 1977, this version of Buddy Rich's band recorded a disk for Gryphon records, entitled Class of '78, that used this direct-to-disk recording technique. As far as I know, this record is only available on vinyl, but this same band did a show in Holland in 1978 that was taped, the DVD for which was released a year ago last September. The video here is just a preview.

But, if you still have a vinyl disk player and you happen to run across a copy of Class of '78, snatch it up. You won't be disappointed.

Dance of the Gremlins

RSchaut — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 19:15:59 GMT

Those of you with the patience to poke through what I've posted so far have probably figured out that I'm partial to big band jazz. There's just something about that wall of sound coming at me like a tsunami that gets my heart pumping and my blood moving, and when a big band just nails it, man, there's just nothing else like it.

This is another Akiyoshi video, performing Ellington's Dance of the Gremlins, that was uploaded to YT just last week. I like this one for two reasons. First, it shows Toshiko's piano skills, skills that are often forgotten in light of her incredibly awesome composition and arrangement skills.

The other is that I'm partial to a 6/8 groove. There's just something ineffable about that kind of swing.

So, waltz with me.

Only One Diva

RSchaut — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 17:04:07 GMT

Yesterday, DLuebbert posted this item featuring Aretha Franklin, and it reminded me of the first VH1 "Divas" concert.

I don't know. The whole thing struck me as a bad idea from the get go. Four popular female singers who each have some chops, but whose only real claim to fame is having sold a significant number of records and Aretha almost thrown in as an afterthought. Damn it, man, but the other four wouldn't even be there were it not for Aretha.

For the encore, they all gathered on stage, brought out Carole King, and did Natural Woman, and my sole thought through the whole number was, man, there ain't but one diva on that stage.

So, ladies and gentlemen, I give you Aretha Franklin and her backup singers:

Incongruities

RSchaut — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 07:16:01 GMT

OK, I'll admit to some bias, but any group that can play Mongo Santamaria's Afro Blue and Ozzy Osborne's War Pigs in the same live set is my kind of group. But, then, I also love a good vinaigrette salad dressing, so I'm one of those folks who is fascinated by mixing things together that don't seem like they'd go together.

Gov't Mule started as side project between then Allman Brothers Band bassist Allen Woody and guitar player Warren Haynes who were joined by drummer Matt Abts. In their early work, they revived a bit of the power trio ethos of Cream and Rush, but it was heavily laced with southern rock and blues.

Tragically, Allen Woody died in 2000, but rather than simply let the project die with him, Haynes and Abts embarked on what the termed the "Deep End" project, an effort that involved collaboration with a number of different bassists and culminated in The Deepest End: Live in Concert.

The concert was held on May 3, 2003 in New Orleans, at the same time the Heritage Jazz Music festival was going on. So, while there were a number of bassists and other musicians who could share the stage, many of them had other gigs going on at the same time.

One of them was the Meters' George Porter, Jr, who, in addition to arriving at the sound check and closing out the concert during a three-bass encore, performed on this song.

So, you have a predominately funk/R&B bassist playing with a rock group performing Haynes' haunting Beautifully Broken, but that's not all. Interwoven with Beautifully Broken is Prince's When Doves Cry to form a medley in a way that accentuates the haunting nature of the original Beautifully Broken.

Things that ought not go together, but do...

Diz and Bird

RSchaut — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 05:56:00 GMT

On May 15, 1953, two seminal events took place simultaneously. One was Jersey Joe Wolcott's defense of the heavyweight boxing title against Rocky Marciano. The other was a concert of jazz heavyweights known simply as The Quintet. The former affected the latter, and, quite possibly, turned Jazz at Massey Hall into a masterpiece that belongs in any serious jazz collection.

The boxing match affected the concert in two ways. First, because of the block-busting nature of the boxing match, turnout was low at the concert. The result was a group/audience interaction that more closely resembled that of an intimate club rather than a significant concert venue such as Massey Hall.

The second effect involved the musicians themselves, specifically Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie.. Dizzy was deeply interested in the outcome of the boxing match, so, during Parker's solo on the opening number, Duke Ellington's Perdido, Dizzy ducked off the stage to listen to the fight on someone's radio.

The result sparked an almost sibling rivalry between Bird and Diz that DLuebbert rather accurately characterized as being like two kids in the backseat of the car. This is evident in Parker's introduction of the very next song, Salt Peanuts as having been penned by, "my worthy constituent, Mr. Dizzy Gillespie."

Fortunately for jazz fans, if not for boxing fans, Marciano knocked out Wolcott in the first round, at which point Dizzy no longer had any interest in the match and could turn his attention to the concert. The result is a splendid recording that captures Bird and Diz translating this sibling rivalry into a professional one-upmanship of epic proportions.

To be sure, there are other reasons for the epic nature of this concert. Parker, having hocked his horn to feed his addictions, was relegated to playing a white plastic alto sax, and the rhythm section, consisting of Bud Powell, Max Roach and Charlie Mingus, played a seriously important role in turning this concert into a stellar example of the Be-bop form.

But this concert thrived on, and because of, a very special musical relationship between Parker and Gillespie.

In To Be or Not To Bop, Harold "Stumpy" Cromer gives a vignette where he and Dizzy went down to Birdland to watch Parker. When they got there, some sideman was paying a solo while Parker was just leaning in the crease of the baby-grand piano. Cromer doesn't say it explicitly, but the image conveyed is one of a Charlie Parker pulled down by a huge weight on his shoulders.

At the door, Dizzy, who had his horn with him, said, "Watch this," to Cromer, pulled out his horn, and started playing over the top of the soloist at which point Parker perked up and started playing his horn back. All the way from the door to the stage, Charlie and Dizzy were trading eights and fours, and the people were going crazy. My sense of Dizzy is that he wasn't saying, "Watch this," in a sense of showing off. Rather, it was based his knowledge of the effect it would have on Parker.

If you've ever had a relationship with someone where you had something so in common that you could carry on conversations without having to explain everything, conversations consisting of just a few succinct words or phrases, then you have a sense of the musical relationship between Parker and Gillespie.

So, whenever you listen to Jazz at Massey Hall, and chuckle at Dizzy's clowning around during Salt Peanuts, don't forget the very deep and abiding love that Parker and Gillespie had for one another, the respect they had for each other's ability and their ability to commune with one another rather than just communicate.