ECM: C/D, S&D

I am still working my way through the Touchstone series. The one I keep coming back to is "The Pilgrim and The Stars" from Enrico Rava. Clearly influenced by Miles Davis around Bitches Brew but Rava plays very melodic lines on top of the music which gives it a very European touch. My introduction to Jon Christensen too.

All the Kenny Wheeler albums on ECM are worth investigating too. The last one I purchases was "Music for Small and Large Ensembles" and I wish I got earlier as it's a gorgeous album, starting in a somewhat Metheny/Mays-vein (without the Brasilian influences) but then moving to the usual very strong writing (and orchestratino) that Wheeler was known for. The interplay between Mike Brecker and Wheeler on "Double, Double You" is also amazing. And I haven't even heard his output on CamJazz..

the mark isham and rainer brüninghaus records referenced upthread are incredible

All the Kenny Wheeler albums on ECM are worth investigating too.

I only have ever heard Gnu High, but it's got the Peacock / Jarrett / Dejohnette trio backing him and it's really good.

Angel Song - Kenny Wheeler's album with Lee Konitz, Bill Frissell and Dave Holland is gorgeous.

Reminds me: just came across an old Downbeat Blindfold Test where Dave Liebman raves about Wheeler's playing on the title track of Jane Ira Bloom's Art and Aviation (Arabesque, 1992), and gives the whole thing 4 1/2 stars.

deer wan by wheeler is great

(w/holland, DeJohnette, garbarek, Abercrombie)

Edward Vesala's Nan Madol really hit the spot this morning.

I am still working my way through the Touchstone series. The one I keep coming back to is "The Pilgrim and The Stars" from Enrico Rava. Clearly influenced by Miles Davis around Bitches Brew but Rava plays very melodic lines on top of the music which gives it a very European touch. My introduction to Jon Christensen too.

just played this this morning, very good.

listened to the koln concerts today and now listening to yellow fields by eberhard weber, probably my favorite of the 3 albums mentioned.

Angel Song - Kenny Wheeler's album with Lee Konitz, Bill Frissell and Dave Holland is gorgeous.

Seconded, and it also has great comping by Bill Frisell. I wish "It should've happened a long time ago" on which he also plays was available as a single disc. It's only available as part of a 6cd box of all Paul Motian's work for ECM.

Tord Gustavsen Trio - The Ground, is transporting me very efficiently through some boring work admin duties this morning.

"It Should Have Happened..." is a high point (among many others) here---Frisell w The Bad Plus, mostly playing Motian compositions, at Newport in 2012---stream/download: https://www.npr.org/2012/08/08/158004697/the-bad-plus-with-bill-frisell-live-in-concert-newport-jazz-2012

Hey all, so I was a bit bored this afternoon and made this ECM mix for fun.

It's a collage of about 50/60 different songs, just short little slivers of each, overlaid and crossfaded to make up this weird little hour-long patchwork quilt, often two or three tracks at once.

I went for beatless or interstitial sections, originally I was going to try to make it much more ambient but I used a lot of the earlier records so the first 20 mins came out more gnarly and 'free' sounding in places, but it gets pretty ambient towards the end.

I even managed to get the bass solo from the first track on The Mal Waldron Trio's 'Free At Last' in there (ECM 1001!)

All your faves are present - Jan, Keith, Terje, Gary, Rainer, various Steve's and David's and even Arvo and Meredith.

Hope you like -

https://we.tl/t-kvHasMjdRy

i'm so in love with john surman i can hardly stand it

Surman's Rain On the Window with Howard Moody on church organ is probably not one of his high rated albums but I love it!

There's a Marcin Wasilewski Trio album with Joe Lovano coming. That could be interesting.

Thimar w/ surman, dave holland and anouar brahem that's a classic.

was trying to find the Surman album I haven't heard for ages, it was Upon Reflection I was looking for, Edges of Illusion is a reet track!

Very much agree x2.

Maresn3st, I dig.

ty!

I'm glad I started this thread 19 years ago, even though I never had anything to say further on the topic.

I was prompted by an IG post by a former member of this parish to dig out Surman's Road to St Ives. It's terrific and ghostly and sort of damp and chilly. Though that was my experience of Cornwall three summers ago, so may be projection. Nice smiley, sunny photo of JS in (presumably) Oslo in the CD booklet.

Within the halls of Neptune was on my Spotify daily mix today! I’ve been listening to a ton of Don Cherry recently and want to rep for this one

https://shop.new-art.nl/assets/image.php?width=800&image=/content/img/new_products_queue/1432888623.jpg

ecm complaint: keith jarrett is given waaaay too much leeway to explore his yen for semi-classical improvisation. I do not need 90 minutes of Keith Jarrett improvising on an organ in an abbey!

Jarrett on an off-day is still more interesting than Garbarek, Metheny or (God forbid) Gary Burton at their worst.

inclusion of metheny there baffles me

jarrett’s worst affectation is his singing, but his solo concerts are so powerful that yeah sure i’ll have 90 minutes of him on an organ, why not, his instincts are that sharp

I’m that rare beast, an ECM stan who doesn’t really get Metheny, so take my shortlist of overprolific awfulness with a grain of salt.

Jarrett on an off-day is still more interesting than Garbarek, Metheny or (God forbid) Gary Burton at their worst.

― pomenitul, Friday, May 1, 2020 3:58 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

this is insane

I enjoy Jarrett's quartets, and his solo piano - although at times he moves into territory which is like a melange of denatured spiritual jazz with Ludovico Einaudi - but I've not gotten any enjoyment from in the light, arbour zena, and hymns/spheres.

At least Jarrett can sport the Romantic abandon of the intuitive experimentalist when he drops a clunker. And I did say ‘at their worst’ – Garbarek’s early work may well edge our my Jarrett faves. I think Burton’s music is unsalvageable trash though.

I have some amount of cautious respect for Metheny, I just don’t recall ever enjoying his stuff.

In the middle days of the April lockdown when the weather was extraordinary and I was sitting in the garden with spring thickening all around me I listened to a good deal of Metheny and assumed it had been written precisely for this moment.

I think Burton’s music is unsalvageable trash though.

― pomenitul, Friday, May 1, 2020 5:13 PM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

I find this troubling. Is it possible you just don't like vibraphone? A lot of people loathe that instrument. Or is it his compositions you dislike? Because he's done an entire album of Carla Bley tunes that's just wonderful. Also, his duo work with Towner, Swallow, Corea et al is uniformly excellent, and the previously mentioned Ring LP is one of the best ECMs. I've always meant to check out Duster, which is supposed to be a really good one, too.

I do enjoy the sound of the instrument, it's just that Burton's vibes are too cheesy for my ears. I'll stick to Bobby Hutcherson.

burton quartet records on rca victor are fucking great.
haven’t heard much of his ecm output so far

People who don't like Gary Burton or Metheny, have you heard Like Minds?

No I haven't but Dave Holland's on it so I may be persuaded.

Pat Metheny has a bunch of great stuff on ECM, and Offramp and Bright Size Life are goddamn masterpieces.

It's been a long time, I think I'm more amenable to the elevator-esque facets of that style than I was ten-odd years ago when I went on an exhaustive ECM binge.

Roy Haynes is the real star of Like Minds, I actually had to check to see if it was his name on the cover.

Gonna check this out. Looks like an expansion of Question and Answer featuring Metheny/Holland/Haynes, which is just a straight up sick jazz album

Speaking of similar allstar lineups The Song Is You (not ECM) featuring Braxton, Corea, Metheny, DeJohnette, Konitz, Vitous, is worth checking out. Think it was recorded in the early 80s, but released more recently.

Those with any interest in Burton should check his original Quartet, meaning the one with Larry Coryell, Steve Swallow and Bob Moses: youthful, groovy, even barefoot, even shroomy at tymes, yet not too noodley--just jazz, shaded w rock, Latin, folk, country, and whatever else they absorbed and recombined, growing up and getting out of the house in the 60s.
Also, probably his Tennessee Firebird, judging by what I've heard of it, hard to find the whole thing, although I haven't looked in a while.
Also the one Carla Bley wrote and arranged for him, A Genuine Tong Funeral,
Never heard much of his early records w Metheny, but got my girl their Reunion, and it became her soundtrack for many after-midnight Windows 95 treks, business and recreational.
I like Metheny better as a costar than outright leader--though his designated debut as the latter, Bright Size Life I hear more as the former, mainly because Bob Moses (and Jaco, ok), and yeah Question and Answer, and the ones w/incl. Charlie Haden, and omg Song X w Ornette (must get expanded reissue), But I liked his RIP pianist Lyle Mays, did like Mays' own Pictionary better than what he got to do with Metheny.
Would like to hear his Steve Reich projects.

he Song Is You (not ECM) featuring Braxton, Corea, Metheny, DeJohnette, Konitz, Vitous, is worth checking out. No Doubt!!!

I agree, I have a hard time getting into Metheny albums, but I love hearing him as a side man and being like 'oh yeah that guy is fucking sick'. #1 on that list is the Kenny Garrett Coltrane tribute, Pursuance.

Y'all really should give Offramp a second try. The guitar synth heroics on the first couple tracks are the best.

The first side of when Witchita Falls is really something... love bright size life and watercolors is nice... I need to spend more time with offramp, most definitely

there’s some badass metheny live shows on YouTube, btw

Please share

American Garage in places is like his lost city pop album, it's amazing