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Rifftides

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You are here: Home / 2007 / Archives for April 2007

Archives for April 2007

Three Little Bops

April 30, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Rifftides reader Bruce Tater came across a classic Warner Bros. cartoon from the Looney Tunes series. He called our attention to Three Little Bops, a perfectly preserved piece of 1950s hipness. Stan Freeburg is the narrator. Shorty Rogers did the music. Notice the stylized drawings of the nightclub audience. Don't miss Shorty's little sui generis muted solo near the end. Here's the link. … [Read more...]

Reaction To Jessica Williams

April 30, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Jessica Williams linked readers of her blog to the Before & After test she allowed me to give her for the current issue of Jazz Times. In the test, she reacted to recordings by ten pianists. To read some of the comments she received, go to Currents and scroll down. Oddly, Rifftides has received no reaction to the article despite Ms. Williams' unreserved assessments. … [Read more...]

Weekend Extra: Sonny’s Sunset

April 28, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

National Public Radio's Weekend Edition Saturday included a report by Howard Mandel on Sonny Rollins, who recently founded his own record label, Doxy. In a sound bite, Rollins asked Mandel not to identify him as a corporate executive of a record company. "Don't do that to me man," he laughed as he pleaded with Mandel. "No, I don't want to screw anybody." Then he talked about the contradiction between corporate thinking and jazz thinking. The corporate culture is anathema to jazz. We don't like … [Read more...]

Good Old LaFaro And Previn

April 27, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

The past couple of days I have been listening to two CDs containing fresh old music and enjoying it as much as if hearing it for the first time. LaFaro Scott LaFaro had a rich musical life before he joined the Bill Evans Trio in 1959 and helped change the role of the bass in interactive improvisation. In 1957 when he was twenty-one, LaFaro was playing in Chicago with Pat Moran, a young pianist from Oklahoma who had studied at the Cincinnati Conservatory and been infuenced by Bud Powell and … [Read more...]

Conover Honored. It’s A Start

April 26, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

There will be a concert this weekend in Washington, DC, honoring Willis Conover, the Voice of America jazz broadcaster who was one of the most effective public diplomats in US history. The nation he served did little while he was alive to recognize his contributions and since he died in 1996 has done less. Efforts to persuade President Clinton, then President Bush, to award him a posthumous Presidential Medal of Freedom have gone nowhere. To read a Rifftides posting about Conover, go here. You … [Read more...]

Other Matters: Vitka With Vonnegut

April 25, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

During a 2005 trip to New York to promote Take Five: The Public and Private Lives of Paul Desmond, one of my rewarding encounters was with the longtime broadcast journalist Bill Vitka. After we talked about Desmond for CBS Radio News, Vitka mentioned that he had recently interviewed Kurt Vonnegut. He said Vonnegut told him that Desmond was his favorite musician. Back home, I arranged for Vonnegut to be sent a copy of the book. Vitka and I planned to get together with the great writer on a later … [Read more...]

DBQ Fun And Games

April 25, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Rifftides reader Jon Foley recommends a YouTube clip of the Dave Brubeck Quartet with the comment, "They were in a good mood that night!" They sure were. I thought that we had linked to this performance before, but I can find no trace of it in the archive. The clip isn't dated, but it is amost certainly from the quartet's 25th anniversary reunion tour in 1976. The piece is "Three To Get Ready." I have no idea what set off the merriment, but the silliness was contagious and brought out Brubeck's … [Read more...]

Linking to Louis

April 24, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

If you are new to Blogville and wonder what those underlined words in blue are all about, you should know that they are links. When you click on a link, you are spirited away from Rifftides to another place on the internet that amplifies, explains or demonstrates the linked term. Happily for Rifftides, all you have to do is close out of the linked site to get back to home base. Perhaps you'd like to try it. Click on this link. You will be rewarded. (Pause) Welcome back. That was Louis Armstrong … [Read more...]

Gene Bertoncini

April 23, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

From time to time, Rifftides Washington, DC correspondent John Birchard reports on musical events in the US Capital City. NO STEREOTYPES, PLEASE The Smithsonian Jazz Café hosted a 70th birthday celebration for guitarist Gene Bertoncini on Friday, April 20th. What words come to mind when you think of Bertoncini? Taste, quiet beauty, delicacy? All true. But it was a different Gene Bertoncini on display Friday night. The Café was packed and LOUD. The place attracts a blend of true jazz fans, … [Read more...]

Coherence

April 23, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

The British musician Graham Collier is an astute observer and a good writer. (Rifftides recently reviewed one of his early recordings.) In the current entry on his web site, Collier comments favorably on artsjournal.com blogger Terry Teachout's review in Commentary of Alyn Shipton's massive A New History of Jazz. Unfortunately Teachout's review is available on line only to Commentary subscribers. Part of it is quoted later in this posting. Collier questioned TT's observation that "it is by no … [Read more...]

Bird’s “Plastic” Alto: Going, Going…Long Gone

April 20, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Just in case you have lost track of the famous white plastic Grafton alto saxophone that Charlie Parker played for a time, here's a reminder. The horn, actually cream-colored and made of acrylic, was among items sold at Christie's in London when the Chan Parker Collection was auctioned in 1994. Chan, never legally Parker's wife, was the mother of two of his children and inherited most of his possessions when he died in March, 1955. As part of the pre-bidding activity, alto saxophonist Peter King … [Read more...]

Compatible Quotes

April 20, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

It was the kind of success that resists analysis, but it undoubtedly involved the contrast presented by (Dave) Brubeck and (Paul) Desmond, the pianist openly touching on the pensive, the boisterous, and the bombastic, the saxophonist a self-effacing master of a coolly detached, liquid lyricism. --Stuart Broomer, pianist and critic, Amazon.com review The word bombastic keeps coming up, as if it were some trap I keep falling into. Damn it, when I'm bombastic, I have my reasons. I want to be … [Read more...]

Re: Cullum And Others

April 19, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Regarding the poll described in this item, a singer who requests anonymity for reasons of "career protection and seemliness" writes: Your Jamie Cullum piece is spot-on, but it is worth noting that, unlike those many jazz singers who self-produce, Cullum is on a prominent European label (and a label with the savvy to rig polling). There are plenty of singers out there on labels who are just plain awful. I'm sure the need to attract the interest of label execs does help to filter out many of the … [Read more...]

Carol Sloane’s New Venture

April 18, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Carol Sloane has joined the ranks of bloggers, telling stories accumulated during her career as one of the best singers on earth. Her first entry has an introduction and a gripping story about the time she went to prison. I look forward to regularly reading SloaneView.I have added it to the links in Other Places in the right-hand column. … [Read more...]

Jamie Cullum Among The Giants

April 18, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

A new jazz radio station in England, theJazz, recently conducted a poll of its listeners to determine--as they put it--the "best ever jazz record." This was the result, as reported on the BBC web site. TOP TEN 1. Miles Davis - So What 2. Dave Brubeck - Take Five 3. Louis Armstrong - West End Blues 4. John Coltrane - A Love Supreme 5. Miles Davis - All Blues 6. John Coltrane - My Favourite Things 7. Weather Report - Birdland 8. Jamie Cullum - Twentysomething 9. Duke Ellington - Take The 'A' … [Read more...]

Singers

April 17, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

The traditional record industry is imploding. It is impossible to say what will emerge from the turbulence. Some analysts of the music business are predicting that the compact disc will quickly go the way of the LP, the cassette, the eight-track tape, the 45, the 78 and the cylinder. They say it's going to be an iPod world, an MP3 world. How long will technology allow those new means of music delivery to survive? Are you ready for a digital implant in your brain? In the meantime, CDs … [Read more...]

Correspondence: Orrin Keepnews

April 16, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Responding to the Rifftides review of the Cannonball Adderley CD in the current batch of Doug's Picks, its producer writes: A somewhat important point needs to be made about the current ownership of a significant, if relatively small, segment of the records produced by Orrin Keepnews. I'm in a pretty good position to know about his work, since that's who I am. From 1953 to until the end of '63, Bill Grauer and I were Riverside Records. I produced records; Grauer handled business matters. Then … [Read more...]

Correspondence: The Future Of OJCs

April 14, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

Rifftides reader Eric R. Quick writes from Gaithersburg, Maryland about one of the CDs reviewed in this recent posting and about the valuable collection of which it is a part: With regard to Red's Good Groove - you say get it while you can (I already have the CD) Will the OJC catalog (or much of it) be deleted by its current owners? What is the word? Should I be purchasing all those discs I have never gotten around to buying? I passed along Mr. Quick's question to Nick Phillips of Concord … [Read more...]

Correspondence: On Tony Scott

April 14, 2007 by Doug Ramsey

After reading the Rifftides remembrance of Tony Scott, Jair-Rohm Parker Wells sent a message from Stockholm. Mr. Wells discusses a facet of Scott's musical life about which few people may have known. I'm a bass player. I played with Tony in Germany in the mid-seventies and then in the US in the early 80s. There are two reasons i feel compelled to leave a comment here. The first is, Tony's graduation didn't cause me to remember him again. I never forgot him. During the last couple of years, i … [Read more...]

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Doug Ramsey

Doug is a recipient of the lifetime achievement award of the Jazz Journalists Association. He lives in the Pacific Northwest, where he settled following a career in print and broadcast journalism in cities including New York, New Orleans, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland, San Antonio, Cleveland and Washington, DC. His writing about jazz has paralleled his life in journalism... [Read More]

Rifftides

A winner of the Blog Of The Year award of the international Jazz Journalists Association. Rifftides is founded on Doug's conviction that musicians and listeners who embrace and understand jazz have interests that run deep, wide and beyond jazz. Music is its principal concern, but the blog reaches past... Read More...

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Doug’s Books

Doug's most recent book is a novel, Poodie James. Previously, he published Take Five: The Public and Private Lives of Paul Desmond. He is also the author of Jazz Matters: Reflections on the Music and Some of its Makers. He contributed to The Oxford Companion To Jazz and co-edited Journalism Ethics: Why Change? He is at work on another novel in which, as in Poodie James, music is incidental.

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Doug’s Picks

We’re Back: Pianist Denny Zeitlin’s New Trio Album for Sunnyside

As Rifftides readers have undoubtedly noticed, it has been a long time since we posted. We are creating a new post in hopes  that it will open the way to resumption of frequent reports as part of the artsjournal.com mission to keep you up to date on jazz and other matters. Pianist Denny Zeitlin’s stunning new trio album […]

Recent Listening: The New David Friesen Trio CD

David Friesen Circle 3 Trio: Interaction (Origin) Among the dozens of recent releases that deserve serious attention, a few will get it. Among those those receiving it here is bassist David Friesen’s new album.  From the Portland, Oregon, sinecure in which he thrives when he’s not touring the world, bassist Friesen has been performing at […]

Monday Recommendation: Dominic Miller

Dominic Miller Absinthe (ECM) Guitarist and composer Miller delivers power and subtlety in equal measure. Abetted by producer Manfred Eicher’s canny guidance and ECM’s flawless sound and studio presence, Miller draws on inspiration from painters of France’s impressionist period. His liner essay emphasizes the importance to his musical conception of works by Cezanne, Renoir, Lautrec, […]

Recent Listening: Dave Young And Friends

Dave Young, Lotus Blossom (Modica Music) Young, the bassist praised by Oscar Peterson for his “harmonic simpatico and unerring sense of time” when he was a member of Peterson’s trio, leads seven gifted fellow Canadians. His beautifully recorded bass is the underpinning of a relaxed session in which his swing is a force even during […]

Recent Listening: Jazz Is Of The World

Paolo Fresu, Richard Galliano, Jan Lundgren, Mare Nostrum III (ACT) This third outing by Mare Nostrum continues the international trio’s close collaboration in a series of albums that has enjoyed considerable success. With three exceptions, the compositions in this installment are by the members of Mare Nostrum. It opens with one the French accordionist Galliano […]

Monday Recommendation: Thelonious Monk’s Works In Full

Kimbrough, Robinson, Reid, Drummond: Monk’s Dreams(Sunnyside) The subtitle of this invaluable 6-CD set is The Complete Compositions Of Thelonious Sphere Monk. By complete, Sunnyside means that the box contains six CDs with 70 tunes that Monk wrote beginning in the early years when his music was generally assumed to be an eccentric offshoot of bebop, […]

More Doug's Picks

Blogroll

All About Jazz
JerryJazzMusician
Carol Sloane: SloaneView
Jazz Beyond Jazz: Howard Mandel
The Gig: Nate Chinen
Wonderful World of Louis Armstrong
Don Heckman: The International Review Of Music
Ted Panken: Today is The Question
George Colligan: jazztruth
Brilliant Corners
Jazz Music Blog: Tom Reney
Brubeck Institute
Darcy James Argue
Jazz Profiles: Steve Cerra
Notes On Jazz: Ralph Miriello
Bob Porter: Jazz Etc.
be.jazz
Marc Myers: Jazz Wax
Night Lights
Jason Crane:The Jazz Session
JazzCorner
I Witness
ArtistShare
Jazzportraits
John Robert Brown
Night After Night
Do The Math/The Bad Plus
Prague Jazz
Russian Jazz
Jazz Quotes
Jazz History Online
Lubricity

Personal Jazz Sites
Chris Albertson: Stomp Off
Armin Buettner: Crownpropeller’s Blog
Cyber Jazz Today, John Birchard
Dick Carr’s Big Bands, Ballads & Blues
Donald Clarke’s Music Box
Noal Cohen’s Jazz History
Bill Crow
Easy Does It: Fernando Ortiz de Urbana
Bill Evans Web Pages
Dave Frishberg
Ronan Guilfoyle: Mostly Music
Bill Kirchner
Mike Longo
Jan Lundgren (Friends of)
Willard Jenkins/The Independent Ear
Ken Joslin: Jazz Paintings
Bruno Leicht
Earl MacDonald
Books and CDs: Bill Reed
Marvin Stamm

Tarik Townsend: It’s A Raggy Waltz
Steve Wallace: Jazz, Baseball, Life and Other Ephemera
Jim Wilke’s Jazz Northwest
Jessica Williams

Other Culture Blogs
Terry Teachout
DevraDoWrite
Alex Ross: The Rest Is Noise
On An Overgrown Path

Journalism
PressThink: Jay Rosen
Second Draft, Tim Porter
Poynter Online

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