Jazz for aficionados


Jazz for aficionados

I'm going to review records in my collection, and you'll be able to decide if they're worthy of your collection. These records are what I consider "must haves" for any jazz aficionado, and would be found in their collections. I wont review any record that's not on CD, nor will I review any record if the CD is markedly inferior. Fortunately, I only found 1 case where the CD was markedly inferior to the record.

Our first album is "Moanin" by Art Blakey and The Jazz Messengers. We have Lee Morgan , trumpet; Benney Golson, tenor sax; Bobby Timmons, piano; Jymie merrit, bass; Art Blakey, drums.

The title tune "Moanin" is by Bobby Timmons, it conveys the emotion of the title like no other tune I've ever heard, even better than any words could ever convey. This music pictures a person whose down to his last nickel, and all he can do is "moan".

"Along Came Betty" is a tune by Benny Golson, it reminds me of a Betty I once knew. She was gorgeous with a jazzy personality, and she moved smooth and easy, just like this tune. Somebody find me a time machine! Maybe you knew a Betty.

While the rest of the music is just fine, those are my favorite tunes. Why don't you share your, "must have" jazz albums with us.

Enjoy the music.
orpheus10
Good point, but Gershwin’s music is missing one of the key ingredients in Third Stream, improvisation; according to Schuller’s definition. As you often point out just because there is improvisation does not make it jazz; probably one of the reasons that, as pryso points out, Schuller did not want to refer to Third Stream as TS Jazz. Conversely, just because it has elements of Classical and Jazz (Gershwin) does not make it TS. Personally, while I think that Schuller’s reasons for giving this fusion of two musics a new title was well intended I think it points to how the preoccupation with titles and with locking music into rigid genre designations can simply confuse matters; and I suspect it was greatly a reaction to purists’ objections to the perceived “contamination” of one genre with elements of the other. Using Schuller’s own definition Ellington’s large scale orchestral works, for example, would qualify for TS designation much more than Gershwin’s.

pryso makes some really interesting comments that touch on some of this with his account of how he learned to appreciate Classical by recognizing its “ties” to Jazz. Excellent observation since I think that sometimes a listener’s reaction to music is a kind of knee jerk reaction to the genre based on a preconceived notion of what the genre is supposed to be. I think that if there were a shift, or at least an openness, to focusing more on the common ground in all music and it’s performance that musical tastes would broaden. Then the focus can be on the quality of the performance or how well the composer exploits the things that “tie” the different genres and which may be familiar to the listener from experience with a favorite genre. Is a rhythmic groove by Miles’ rhythm section “better” than a great orchestra playing Bach? Does the presence of strings on a recording like Bird With Strings diminish the greatness of some of Bird’s very best perfomances on record? Take the exact same string arrangements, but have a Hammond B3 play them instead. Does the music all of a sudden become more “jazz”?

Anyway, great posts all.

Some fairly recent TS from the great clarinet virtuoso Eddie Daniels.  The album is “Breakthrough” and I’m almost shocked that there is only this cut from it on the Tube:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jHxCm9G54ZQ

Well frog, is this famous Miles' number classical or jazz or Third Stream?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvcU_v8ruGE

Curious minds want to know. ;^)

And yes, I'd heard of Eddie Daniels, possibly even heard one of his recordings on my local FM jazz station.  But I couldn't say I was familiar.  I rather liked that though.
acman3, that was totally new to me.  That is interesting since I've commented a couple of times on connections I found between Baroque/Bach and jazz.

Now to clarify my position since I commented on likes and dislikes by identifying musical categories.  In fact, I basically agree with frogman and Duke Ellington, "There are two kinds of music. Good music, and the other kind."
Well, pryso, I would have bet my “six eye” copy of that great record that it would be the one in the link even before clicking on it 😉.  I think that record makes my point about how genre designation can create a lot of confusion; and, for me, ultimately a pointless exercise.  That record is as good an example of what most people would call Third Stream as any...most people.  How about some more confusion?

There is something that is left out of most definitions of “Third Stream” that is, for me, what makes me say “Third Stream!”; and is the thing that, if forced, would make me say that the record is a jazz record...more than anything else.  I am talking about the ATTITUDE of the music and the playing.  To my ears many “Third Stream” compositions, in an attempt to straddle the line between Jazz and Classical, end up sounding somewhat self-consciously deliberate and stiff and without the looseness and relaxed attitude of good jazz.  To my ears this record has very much a jazz attitude.  Whatever anyone chooses to call it, it is great music.