'Jazz': Search and Destroy

Daryl? Daryll? [Consults FIELDS OF GOLD: the Best of Sting 1984-1994, to discover HAHA absolutely no musician credits given!! That'll teach those fusion fatheads to whore themselves to the Man]

(Man != Maaan)

I am now listening to Fields of Fire. Yes I am.

OK: I was at a screening of Pokémon 3: The Spell of the Unknown this morning. The short shown with it — Pikachu and the Pichus — is set in old cartoon New York (Pikachu has a kind of countryboy adventure in the Big City: lifts, alleys, airshafts, flagpoles, you get the picture. The entire 20- minute work is soundtracked not with computer blings and John Williams knock- off, but with CLASSIC HOT SWING!!

The programme did not leave me any better informed or more enthusiastic about jazz. That's not necessarily a bad thing, or the prog's fault. Possibly I am ineducable. But one thing did stay with me beyond the bombast - and beyond the soloists and blowers and wild men.

I loved the last few seconds, in which Duke Ellington said goodbye, as it were. That seemed right - as though he had been orchestrating it all. I don't know owt about Duke E. 'Take The A Train' was played countless times during the series (I saw it on the credits over and over again, often x2 for one episode), but I still have no idea whatsoever how it goes. I know more about 'Z Train' than 'Take The A Train'. (Has anyone ever heard 'Z Train'? For that matter, has anyone ever heard 'Take The A Train'??) Still, the thing is, Ellington somehow seemed more compelling as a figure, to me, than many of the others. Perhaps because he came across as not a Musician (though I daresay he was a great one), not a Soloist, but a Composer - an organizer. In pop I am attracted to the idea of the figure who conceptualizes, plans, organizes (the Arranger, to use a Joyceans' term?), then delegates and deploys, gives the plan to someone else and goes off to hide behind it. Maybe it's even a Flaubertian- impersonality schtick, this, the omnipotent artist hidden behind their handiwork. (Bacharach?)

I daresay that Duke E was not really the kind of figure I am trying to describe. But I got a feeling that he was a wee bit closer to it than some of the up-front soloist types. A writer, a thinker, a planner, a leader - that was the image I got. And I like that, and I took away a small fascination with this fellow. I appreciate, though, that jazz folks may think I've got it all wrong.

But having said that: I think the program focused a bit too much on some of the players' roles as soloists, to the detriment of their other qualities. Charles Mingus definitely fits the description you gave, despite (I think) being much more prominent as a soloist than Duke. (This makes sense, of course, because Duke was such an influence on Mingus.) A lot of other musicians known for being soloists played big roles in other areas, as well - it just helps to have more familiarity with them to see how. Probably not on the scale of Ellington, but then his band was big and so there are a lot of different things for a mastermind to mastermind.

aargh...

Branford Marsalis: It's a Jazz Thing

World renowned saxophonist Branford Marsalis goes in search of the true spirit of contemporary jazz, embarking on a musical journey taking him from New York to Chicago and Paris to London.

Who is watching?

10.04 :: Branford Marsalis to present new TV documentary

...The 90-minute documentary was made by production company Somethin' Else and is directed by Christopher Walker. The documentary follows Marsalis' travels around Europe and the US as he meets leading contemporary figures in jazz including Herbie Hancock, Michael Brecker, John McLaughlin and Dave Douglas, Bill Frisell, Medeski Martin and Wood, Tim Berne, Evan Parker, David S Ware, Ken Vandermark and the Art Ensemble of Chicago. Commenting on the project, Jez Nelson, the executive producer on the show, says: 'There hasn't been a major, terrestrial jazz TV show for many years ? so this is really exciting for us. Branford is that rare thing ? a great musician who's also a superb and engaging presenter ? this should be a fantastic journey!'

So far NYC and Chicago have been visited

NYC, including

David S Ware
Tim Berne
DJ Spooky
Frisell
Dave Douglas
Michael Brecker

Chicago including:

Chicago Underground Trio
Ken Vandermark
Art Ensemble of Chicago

This wasn't a history as such but more like 'this is jazz in 2004' type prog (I'm assuming that the date of broadcast - falling on the same weekend in which the london jazz fest begins - isn't a mere coincidence).

Branford set his position as an anti-pop market - this is a minority music; we've accepted this and we're just doing our thing. Given what I saw in 'jazz' I couldn't believe that there wz a prog with tim berne, matthew shipp, ken vandermark...and that even acknowledged jazz could come out from places like europe - not only that but he visited paris, norway, sweden, london etc. so from that pov I liked it!

He wz consistently for jazz as an imporvisational, acoustic art (and with a capital A too, which I found odd when he mentioned that his younger listening consisted of rock and funk) but he would only take an arg so far - when criticizing matthew shipp's experiments with hip-hop I half agreed when listening to samples but prob not even for the same reasons (isn't improvising with a steady beat jazz anyway - so what if the beat is a hip-hop one?) and I loved matthew's dismissal of genre (against marsalis setting out boundaries for it). His bias against electronic music really fell flat when a norwegian musician talked abt hancock's 'sextant' as a model for what he was doing and how it wasn't all button pushing.

He wasn't for 'chasing the kids' and competing with rock but when ken wandermark talked about how his emotional intensity would reach out to first time concert goers - but at the same time being dismissive of technique (and wandermark sort of agreeing!) it was just odd even if I knew where he wz coming from.

time spent on hawkins is partly because his progressivist leanings, harmonic ideas, etc. gave him certain affinities with the young players that he ended up associating with later in his career, to benefit of both parties; and because the story of his career provides a contrasting example of a swing-era musician looking for a way to be professionally successful (or just secure) apart from occupying a standard part in the swing music industry.

along with the berliner book, certainly the best thing i've ever read on jazz.

oh, and the musicological stuff is demanding (i can kinda follow the basic harmonic theory jargon but i've never studied it enough to -feel- what it means, which makes reading this stuff a battle against vagueness) but consistently illuminating.

[Please forgive me for not re-reading everything up-thread; I will do so later and discover that whatever I say has already been said.]

I loved the series, because I tend to be ignorant of pre-bebop jazz, and there was a wealth of material that was new and wonderful from those early decades. It was nice to see the young Louis Armstrong in full possession of his mojo, and to learn that his lithe singing — quite a bit removed from the gravelly self-parody of the Louis I would see on TV as a kid — was almost the equal of his trumpet playing.

But I was among the chorus of haters (like Jarrett) who resented the coverage of the post-Ornette-goes-to-New-York years. I've calmed down since, and can see the documentary now as a history of the jazz industry rather than a history of jazz. It makes sense, in that context, to cover the fifth decades of Ellington and Armstrong's careers, rather than give adequate space to "Not Jazz as We've defined it" — New Thing, AACM, Brötzmann, fusion, and so on.

It's odd/interesting that the Ornette portion was so nicely done, considering the short shrift given to what follows him, but it makes sense in light of the later acceptance of his music by the Jazz at Lincoln Center people. Welcome to the jazz-industry canon, Mr. Coleman.

The film begs for a Jazz II, covering 1960 onwards, but with Carla Bley and Rafi Zabor replacing Wynton and Crouch as consultants. Unfortunately, that's not the sort of thing that attracts the corporate sponsorship. Give it 20 years.

Anyway, I think your approach is the right one - yeah, the film was incomplete, but now there's a perfect opportunity to create their own take on it or to cover the ground that was missed. Hell, there should be 10 films.

Wynton Marsalis called this 11-year old jazz pianist his hero last year

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/13/arts/music/joey-alexander-an-11-year-old-jazz-sensation-who-hardly-clears-the-pianos-sightlines.html

that led me to Kojo Roney (Wallace Roney's 9 year old nephew!) channeling Tony Williams, and holy shit:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3Ow0YEO9qM