Jazz for aficionados

Today's Playlist:

Fats Navarro and Tadd Dameron -- THE COMPLETE BLUE NOTE and CAPITOL RECORDINGS.
2CD set.

My first CD by Navarro. CD #1 is Dameron with Fats on three different sets / groups, and another set of Dameron with Miles Davis.

CD #2 is Fats with Howard McGhee, Fats with Bud Powell and Fats with Benny Goodman. The set with McGhee is awesome! Two great trumpet players dueling!

Fats died at age 26. This guy was in a class by himself. The most beautiful trumpet playing I have ever heard.

Some others on board include Sonny Rollins, Wardell Gray, Dexter Gordon, Milt Jackson and Kenny Clarke. And this is when they were all young!!

Excellent booklet with great photos.
Recorded 1947-49, Mono. Great sound.

Fats Navarro -- THE FATS NAVARRO STORY
4CD box

"Fats Navarro's trumpet had a clear singing quality and purity of tone that no other trumpet player could match. He was BeBop's most perfect trumpeter."

This was an uncreditied review written on the back of the Box Set. It says it all. He is now my favorite.

Outstanding Booklet with photos and notes. Includes Bird and Eckstine among others.
Mono.

I think anyone who has not heard Navarro before, will have to rearrange their Jazz Trumpet pecking order. He really is that good.

You get the impression this is BeBop being born or at least weaned.

Cheers

****You get the impression this is BeBop being born or at least weaned. ****

That's exactly what it was. Beautiful player and a great example for understanding the evolution of the harmonic language of jazz improvisation. Navarro was a kind of link between the swing players and the bebop players that he influenced (Clifford Brown), who would later play in an even more harmonically sophisticated style. It's particularly clear when one compares some of the sidemen playing along side Navarro. Many of these swing players were still locked into a harmonic concept which stayed very close to the basic building blocks of each chord. One can hear how Navarro was more adventurous by comparison and strayed farther away from those basics, but still relatively "inside" the harmony. Later, more modern players like Brown would go further outside the harmonies and, just as modern classical composers (Stravinsky) did, threw away a lot of the traditional rules of harmony. Keep that in mind as an interesting and important parallel before being too quick to judge Stravinsky's concept of a "beautiful melody". Cheers.

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Listening to Pandora. Saxophonist Buck Hill playing a tune called 'Yesterdays' from the album 'This Is Buck Hill'. I've never heard of Buck Hill before. Check him out if you have a Rhapsody account.

The cat can play.
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Yes, he can! Well, he is very old now (88) and not playing like he used too; but, he definitely could. Interesting and unique tone on the tenor for a player playing in that style. Another, almost forgotten.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3Mc7SydNIEg

Today's Playlist:

Etta Jones -- DON'T GO TO STRANGERS

Throughly enjoyable CD. Jones is as good as anyone not named Ella. Excellent song selection and accompaniment.
Excellent recording quality.

And all this time, I thought 'Fine and Mellow' and 'All the Way', were owned by Billie Holiday and Little Jimmy Scott respectively. Maybe not.

Check it out!

Stravinsky -- THE SOLDIER'S TALE

I thought I would listen to what I 'assumed' would be 'noise', for a few minutes, before dinner. Turned out, I could not move for the entire hour the piece lasted!

Fascinating!! I could not leave it. The story is so irresistible. The Music and the story are perfectly matched. You cannot conceive of one, without the other.

The narrator on my version, was Sir John Gielgud. When it comes to voice, he is the master.

The Trumpet part was extremely difficult playing, but the Boston Symphony Chamber Players were up to the task.

I will listen to Firebird and / or Rite tomorrow.

Cheers