Jazz and the Ambiguity of Influence, Pt. 20: Six Heresies
Do I love jazz? Yes, I love jazz. Unreservedly. Which doesn't mean that everything that transpires under its banner is perfect. After all it is music made by humans. And listened to by human beings who have opinions, which is what makes being a fan fun. And in my opinion jazzers often go down aesthetic pathways that are less than salubrious, even when the practitioners think they are. So in that spirit, let me offer a few contrary takes, heresies if you will.
Miles doesn't play so well with his second Great Quintet
No one's jazz career is more cleanly defined by distinct phases than that of Miles Davis. Like he once said, "I have to change, it's like a curse." Among the most legendary phases are those of the first and second Great Quintets. The first, from the late 50s, featured John Coltrane and fairly defined what adventurous yet swinging hard bop could sound like. The second one, from the early-to-mid 60s, featured Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter (to just name two), who went on to become giants of the music. Knotty and spiky, and both inside and outside at the same time, this quintet really set the template for what all post-bop would sound like, even up to today. Here's the catch: Miles' own playing with the group is harsh and seems to lack some essential groove or swing. I'll grant that he does a great job stirring the pot, making sure there is lots of rhythmic interaction. And yet, I just find his playing hard to take. I think he was trying to push into a new way of playing that didn't really suit him, not least because he was playing way too many notes. That's just not him. Once he started to morph into his next, more rock-oriented phase, his phrases became more spare again and his tone got better, more like the old days. Ironically the move to rock and electronics that alienated so many people brought him more back to himself. You heard it here first.
I actually prefer Sonny Rollins' tamer 1980s records
The conventional wisdom, asserted ad nauseam, is that Sonny's studio records from the late 70s through the 80s, on the Milestone label, are hugely disappointing since he doesn't get to that place of transcendence that happens live when he stretches out far enough to enter into that inspired zone where the spirit is speaking and consciousness is expanding. Okay, I get it. But those studio albums are trying to do something else. And they succeed on the terms that were set by Sonny and his wife and co-producer, Lucille, which is to make jazz records that are highly listenable while featuring passages that do push the edge and playing from the musicians that is combustible while still being firmly in the pocket. And let me just say: listenability can be undervalued in the jazz world. It can get obscured by the emphasis on chops and the quest for innovation. Look, I love that too. I wouldn't be a jazz fan if I didn't. But I keep returning to those 80s Rollins records. Interesting fact. It was during this period that Rollins recorded the tenor sax part for the Stones' "Waiting On a Friend." Superb! He should have done more pop records. He brings real style to the endeavor.
The award-winning singer Samara Joy is boring
I don't know. I could be wrong here. When it comes to traditional jazz singing I'm always looking for that ineffable something that brings it to life. The form itself is so established that it's nearly played out, unless someone injects some revitalizing ju ju. But it could just be me. She won a Grammy Record of the Year and I see great reviews in the jazz press from sources I respect, but my attempts to listen have left me indifferent. Now, I am a huge fan of straight ahead jazz singing. What made the legends great? Let's look at the female pantheon. Billie Holiday had a unique horn-like tone, super ability to swing, and a way of phrasing that made each of her interpretations seem like ultimate, final word on the subject. Sarah Vaughan possessed operatic range and tone, and invested each performance with a force and fullness that was undeniable. Ella Fitzgerald had the most beautiful tone of any jazz singer ever, and her buoyancy and sense of swing made her performances truly brilliant and glowing. My favorite, Carmen McCrae, especially in her later years possessed a gravitas that lent a superior sense of emotion to everything she touched. My sense is that Samara Joy is just too young to be able to make the music resonate from the inside out. But who knows, maybe next time I try listening to her, something will click and I'll get it. Happens all the time.
The celebrated early Louis Armstrong recordings don't move me
I've become a huge Armstrong fan over the last several years. I don't think anyone else has brought so much joy to music. He strikes me as a bodhisattva of sorts and one of the most remarkable Americans we have known. Always seeking to learn more, I recently read Gary Giddens' critical biography of Armstrong called Satchmo. I also read Armstrong's compelling memoir of growing up in New Orleans in the first years of the 20th century. Like all jazz critics, Giddens hails Armstrongs 1920s sessions with his groups the Hot Five and the Hot Seven as among the most important jazz recordings ever, demonstrating unparalleled artistry from Armstrong in particular. Indeed, grand claims are made on behalf of these recordings, placing them in the league of Bach, for example. I just don't hear it. There are a couple issues. Sometimes an aesthetic advancement is made which makes it historically important -- in this case Armstrong moving the soloist into a more prominent role. This may be so, but a century later it doesn't sound innovative to our ears. The second problem is that the recording technology is so poor you get virtually no low end and the percussion has to be kept to a minimum so as to not overwhelm the microphones. Without these, the music sounds a little tinny and weak. I take it on faith that there actually was a lot more power there, because Armstrong's memoir tells us how much their bands would bring the house down in the honky tonks and whore houses where everyone went to party. Personally speaking, I prefer mid-period Pops; the sound is great, the playing is great. Highly recommended are the two discs where he plays the music of Fats Waller and WC Handy respectively. And my favorite Armstrong performance of all time is from 1931 when he performs "Stardust" with a level of daring and invention and impossible swing that is unequaled by anything else I have ever heard in American music.
Monk's Columbia recordings of the 60s are often lacking
Many years ago I picked up the box set of Thelonious Monk's 1960s recordings on Columbia. I quickly became weary -- no, alarmed! -- at how many of the tracks just featured all the musicians taking solos one after the other, sometimes with Monk indulging his habit of laying out while others are soloing. Why can't he do some comping beneath the solos? The pianist can add a lot of intensity and rhythmic and harmonic interest while playing in support. I suspect that at this point, Monk was bored. There was the feeling of, well, it's just time to do another record date. Which is really how jazz as a recorded medium had largely approached the whole matter. Call some guys, run down a couple standards, a couple originals, throw in a ballad or two, then go in and cut it. Maybe it was Miles with Kind of Blue, in 1959, who introduced to jazz the idea of the album as a coherent aesthetic statement. Regardless of the genesis, the truth is that for both jazz and pop, including rock, jazz, and blues, etc., the early norm was just to throw a bunch of songs together and call it an LP. As the 60s progressed, that all changed. But back to Monk. I'm not saying that all the 60s records were weak. Not at all. Actually, the blame is on me for buying a box set! Usually I go the discerning route, with the understanding that even great artists can do less than great work. Where to start with Monk then? I say go with The Genius of Modern Music, Volumes One and Two, compilations of cuts he recorded for Blue Note in the late 40s. Between the dissonance and the fierce swinging, you can almost hear these as the beginning of rock and roll, even as he defined a new path forward for jazz. I also like him on Prestige. But most of all, I recommend listening to his solo recordings. Somehow his challenging, avant garde chordal choices make the melodies even stronger.
Many Gil Evans recordings are problematic
Gil Evans was one of the hippest white guys ever. Hipper even than Mezz Mezzrow! Born in Toronto in 1912 and raised in the West, by the time he arrived in NYC in the late 40s, his basement apartment behind a Chinese laundry became the go-to place, along with Dizzy Gillespie's, to learn about and explore adventurous harmonies of the type that transformed post-war jazz. Among the people who came by was Miles Davis, who became his lifelong friend and musical collaborator, with Evans providing the orchestration for their celebrated recordings of the 50s: Sketches of Spain, Miles Ahead, and Porgy and Bess. What Evans did was write charts for a large band that left windows for Miles' brooding solo horn to emerge through. Here's the thing. To me, Evans often is too dependent on unison voicings for the orchestra, which, while compelling in their colorings, seem a bit simplistic because of the lack of counterpoint. Another problem is that the horns, especially the trumpets, can sound harsh. There are also audible mistakes. I think all of these point to an issue that somewhat hobbled earlier jazz of the most ambitious sort. Basically, there was no money in it at all. No one was commissioning Evans to write his arrangements, there was little time for rehearsal, and often the recording quality simply was what it was. No sound engineers getting the levels just right, reducing hiss and blare, as they were able to do with classical orchestral recordings. It was just jazz after all. The musicians themselves were just grateful to be able to survive and play, so at the margins where one might approach perfection, some things were perhaps not as refined as they could have been. But that's not an issue now. Those jazz pioneers fought and won the battle to establish jazz as a great American art form. And now we see a level of complexity and ambition in orchestral jazz that would not have existed without people like Gil Evans, as well as many others such as Stan Kenton. Quick personal story to wrap up. When I was traveling in Europe in the 80s I met a family (this was in Munich I think) consisting of the father, who was street musician soprano sax player, his wife, and their small child. She would carry the baby in her arms while they pushed in their baby carriage the huge boombox that he would play along with while busking. We hung out and ultimately exchanged addresses. And to my delight, a few weeks later there appeared in my mailbox an envelope with a 90-minute cassette he had recorded in a bar, using said boombox, featuring the Gil Evan Orchestra. So amazing to hear them in an informal setting. Loose and flowing, with peaks of mad improvisation that would meld back into the lush orchestrations. The word I would use, I guess, is transcendent.
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