Ken Burns Says "Jazz" 3 Billion Times (actually 2.97 bn) in Under 3.5 Minutes (Single of the year?)

ilx's favorite era of jazz is the late 50s through the mid-70s, fwiw

Mingus doesn't quite fit the narrative, does he?

I can't remember how they deal with Sun Ra's long career ... surely not favorably

Ra is incredible and one of my favorites, but he's definitely an outlier. But Mingus played with everybody, was on the big jazz labels, was critically respected, he was a big deal.

Sun Ra wasn't even mentioned in passing (and, somewhat surprisingly, Ornette is given more time than Mingus is).

Given Ra's vast and deep influence across many areas of music and art, I don't know that "outlier" is accurate -- there's no Art Ensemble without Ra, and they got a couple of minutes.

The new music is often presented as "just a buncha weirdos at the margins, no need to pay them any mind." But when you look at contemporary issues of Down Beat -- say, 1960-67 or so -- the consensus is that the New Thing is indeed the new thing. The more mainstream critics obviously weren't fans, but they didn't dispute that it was the next major movement in the music. The prevailing attitude among critics seemed to be, "I know that this is the next big movement after bebop, but that doesn't mean I have to like it!"

Ra's hugely influential, yes. I meant "outlier" in the sense that he often seemed to be operating independently of the rest of the jazz world - he had his own circle of players, put out his own records, had his own way of doing things, was typically viewed as a bit crazy and as an outsider, no matter how much he leaned on his experience w/Fletcher Henderson to burnish his bona fides.

I feel like when he was really getting going in the 60s there was this mainstream jazz world - of labels, clubs, players, and critics - that he just wasn't a part of.

I dunno, I mean, John Gilmore had been in Blakey's Jazz Messengers; Pat Patrick recorded with James Moody and Jimmy Heath; and Julian Priester, Victor Sproles, and James Spaulding had been in the Arkestra. The "mainstream jazz world" in the '60s included John Coltrane's Quartet and Quintet, and Sonny Rollins' group with Don Cherry (to name just two off the top of my head), so there wasn't much of a divide between "mainstream jazz" and the new thing.

But granted, Ornette and Cecil were on Blue Note, Bill Dixon was on RCA, Ayler was on Impulse, and Ra didn't record for a major until the '70s (though he had recorded one album each for Delmark and Savoy in the '50s and '60s, respectively).

I knew about that Gilmore stint, the rest of those were news to me though!

my main gripe was the very chintzy coverage of bill evans.

and yeah: even coltrane's respect for gilmore is pretty well-documented.

#teamfuckwynton

my main gripe was the very chintzy coverage of bill evans.

I'm not a fan, but I agree, he should've gotten more coverage (though he was at least name-checked)...as should have Horace Silver and Bud Powell. I never understood the whole "welp, the series can't talk about everybody!" attitude. Not enough time? Make more episodes. Do a longer series. Problem solved.

not meaning this in a rude way at all, but in comparison to the other things and people covered, it doesn't matter if you're a fan of one of the three most influential jazz pianists to ever play the instrument. not saying he deserved an entire block or episode, but to shine him off the way they did was just insulting. it's just another fact that testifies for the series being a biased, purposely misleading mess.

Yeah, I was just pointing out that, while Evans was never my "bag," I do recognize that he was influential, and should've gotten more time. Whereas, if the producers of/consultants on the series weren't fans of an artist, they apparently refused to objectively consider that artist's importance and influence, so they gave them short shrift.

I'm with you on Evans being given more time, but for me personally, you might say that Everybody Digs Bill Evans But Tarfumes.

Everybody Digs Bill Evans But Tarfumes

lol