{"id":1417,"date":"2008-07-30T01:04:00","date_gmt":"2008-07-30T08:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp\/?p=1417"},"modified":"2008-07-30T01:04:00","modified_gmt":"2008-07-30T08:04:00","slug":"other_places_friedwald_on_the","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/2008\/07\/other_places_friedwald_on_the\/","title":{"rendered":"Other Places: Friedwald On The VJO"},"content":{"rendered":"

Not long ago in a Recent Listening in Brief<\/a><\/strong> posting, I brushed by the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra’s new CD. Brevity by no means indicated a lack of enthusiasm for the latest recorded work of that remarkable institution. Will Friedwald, the jazz critic of The New York Sun<\/em>, is another VJO enthusiast. He attended the band’s recent performance at New York’s 92nd Street Y in the summer concert series overseen by pianist Bill Charlap. Here is some of what he wrote about Thad Jones and Jim McNeely: <\/p>\n

\n

Fifty years ago, when Jones was playing in Count Basie’s trumpet section, he had a hard time getting the Count to play his music. When he did, Basie felt obliged to “dumb” Jones’s music down — he regarded it as too complex for mainstream audiences, especially for dancers, who essentially wanted everything in foot-patting foxtrot tempo. This, naturally, was a big part of what impelled Jones to launch his own big band (in collaboration with the drummer Mel Lewis). <\/p>\n

If Jones’s charts seemed radical in their day, when they’re compared with the more deliberately complex and concert-styled works of Mr. McNeely, they now seem amazingly straightforward and swinging. Not that Jones’s charts were simplistic or lacking in intricacy; as Mr. Charlap pointed out, “Little Pixie” is, on the surface, a basic variation on “I Got Rhythm,” but it’s got as much going on as a Stravinsky ballet.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

To read all of Friedwald’s column, go here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Not long ago in a Recent Listening in Brief posting, I brushed by the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra’s new CD. Brevity by no means indicated a lack of enthusiasm for the latest recorded work of that remarkable institution. Will Friedwald, the jazz critic of The New York Sun, is another VJO enthusiast. He attended the band’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1417","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-main","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1417","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1417"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1417\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1417"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1417"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1417"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}