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I used to be a rock n roller. Always wanted to be the guy wailing away on the electric guitar.
No more; these days, I'd rather be Art Pepper than Johnny Thunders (well, except for the mutual smack habits both guys shared). Prolly 95% of my listening is jazz, I don't even look at the rock n roll stuff in the record stores any more, don't talk about music with any one except other jazz heads. It's getting worse and worse. I just looked at my "want" list and there's nothing on it but jazz. Any unsuspecting person taking a look at my iPod would be mystified. "Is Lester Bowie related to David?"
How did this happen? Ten years ago, I'd have probably run needles through my eardrums before I'd ever listen to, say, Freddie Hubbard. Now the man is all over my record collection.
I dunno. I blame you all here. Never touched the stuff till I started hanging around this joint.
___
The little old ladies wait in wild anticipation for the meetings of the Double-A-C-ASSN...
Follow Ups:
There seems to be a fair number of jazz cats here. I wish AA would have a dedicated "ward" for us. I'd love to exchange comments with other jazz fans that are also audiophiles. While there are a few jazz forums on the 'net, I don't find them very interesting.
Is Jazz on a diet?
Sorry OD...I had to take advantage of the straight line.
Ed
We don't shush around here!
Life is analog...digital is just samples thereof
Jazzophilia must be a sign of advancing years. I just hope if I ever get to be as old as you, I still have my hearing.
I became a teenager in 1955 which was the breakthrough year for R&R and I've continued to listen to that ever since. But growing up my dad played lots of earlier jazz and I had the seeds planted for Louis Armstrong and Jack Teagarden. By high school I was developing an interest in Miles and Brubeck and a few others and it only grew from there.
Perhaps surprisingly, my interest in classical grew out of jazz. The similarity of the counterpoint lines to jazz led me to appreciate Bach's Brandenburg Concertos, then on to several other Baroque composers and that led to exploring other periods of classical music.
Parallel to that I didn't like C&W for a long time. But my interest in folk music (from the revival in the late '50s, early '60s) led me to bluegrass and string band music. From there I've learned to enjoy at least some country music; Cline, Cash, Jones, Wills, etc.
Along the way a few other types of music have slipped into my consciousness such as Celtic and Middle-Eastern. So for me at least, the marvel is the association of one form to another and where that can lead us if we remain open to the journey.
"For a nominal service fee,
you can reach nirvana tonight."
I felt this way around 1976 upon hearing Return To Forever "Romantic Warrior" and John McLaughlin for the first time. I thought jazz-rock fusion might, by some miracle, take over music. I was in for a surprise when the Ramones came out. I developed a liking for it and still enjoy RTF and McL...only during separate listening seshes.
Freedom is the right to discipline yourself.
Been listening to Jazz for a mighty long time, but I have to say that rock has a sameness to it that has become boring and that not much new "rock" stuff ever reaches my system anymore.
Hope everything is fine with you.
it started as a child with the radio always playing--all different music-sabre dance to benny goodman. my father had been a bass player and my mnother loved music.
jazz usually swings in some way, that must be what got me. yup, i love me some rock and roll too, and classical etc.
for some good education, listen to some of the available on-line radio stations:
kkjz.org, kcsm.org, wbgo.org. all jazz stations with good DJs that can inform you.
for a change try kcrw eclectic 24. put it in the search engine, you'll find it. all different music, logs of indie, jazz, and just about anything. this all opens your horizons.
...regards...tr
KKJZ is broadcast from my undergraduate alma mater - Cal State Long Beach. My girlfriend's mother (now my mother in law) was for a while the excecutive assistant to the producer. I used to listen for hours while doing engineering calculations, and it saved my sanity more than once
Years later, Tom Schnable was a constant companion via KCRW's Morning Becomes Eclectic, while I was in graduate school at USC. I often found myself listening for hours while neglecting studies or teaching prep, and then staying up half the night to make up for it. But again, quality radio was a virtual refuge
Even though I have not lived in the US for over 20 years, I still listen to both regularly thanks to the miracle of inernet radio.
its all music, only on-line, and they dont play the same tune more than once in an hour, or so it seems to me.
jazz IS played on occasion but not primarily. i wouldnt know about any number of groups had i not started streaming this gem.
agreed that kkjz is tremendous, even in the face of dramatic changes. gary the 'wag man' wagner has returned after a few years of penance elsewhere once again manning the blues shows on the weekend afternoons.
...regards...tr
Hey Tom, and others interested in streaming jazz, give Jazz 88 a try. Since I like '50s-'60s music so much, I appreciate that they program a nice mix of classic with newer stuff. Great blues with T on Saturday evenings too.
"For a nominal service fee,
you can reach nirvana tonight."
I stream that quite regularly, and as a blues fan, their weekend afternoon blues shows are second to none, IMO.
Jim
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Now that sounds familiar. I've been playing the electric guitar in R&R bands for 30 years, still rock out occasionally. But yes, in my collection and daily listening also mainly jazz. Although i greatly respect the good jazz guitar players i have to admit the horn players usually have the better solos. Jazz is horn music, mostly in b keys: Eb, Bb, Ab.
I even took up the alto sax recently, scored an old alto on a sale. Man it's hard to blow those low notes. But what a cool instrument, just to look at!
"The torture never stops"Greetings Freek.
which is what started me on my decline. I had always liked long instrumental noodling, ala Grateful Dead, so I guess it was in me to like jazz all along.
And rock n' roll, sorry for saying it, seldom has much depth or power to it -- power not being defined as loud.
I went almost 100% jazz a few years back, but actually have diverged again. It is the nature of human life to change.
in the rock genre I always wanted the long solo/noodling/"popcorn" (Dead ala '77). From live rock (more blues based) to 'trane, Miles, ESPECIALLY Art Pepper. I went 90% jazz about 5 years ago also. Musical evolution.
Also, was watching Criminal Minds a while back and one of the profilers was talking about how music we gravitate to in our teens leads a permanent imprint as to what our (sic)"favorite" musical style will be. Don't know about hoe legit this is but at 14 I was buying Led Zep,Who, Elton John. Still like these now but not my tunes of choice.
Virgin Beauty , one of those unsung classics, featured collaborations with Jerry Garcia on three of the cuts.
___
The little old ladies wait in wild anticipation for the meetings of the Double-A-C-ASSN...
I own quite a bit of Ornette and that's one album I don't have. I need to get one to check it out but I am skeptical when I see any jam band affiliation. Just not my bag but I will give it a listen.
Before jazz, I was more into punk and metal and still listen quite a bit of noise rock, hardcore, abrasive stuff. But I heard Ornette in the movie "Naked Lunch" soundtrack and the rest is history. I started out with the triumvirate of the avant-garde, Ornette, Coltrane, and my all time favorite the great Cecil Taylor. Also love the musicians of that period: Dolphy, Ayler, Cherry, Sun Ra, Jimmy Lyons, etc... And then I work my way back to Bird, Diz, Monk, Mingus, Rollins, John Lewis, Bud Powell, Sonny Stitt, the underrated Lennie Tristano and Herbie Nichols, etc... in the bop era and then into swing era with giants like Duke, Hawkins, Tatum, Young, Webster, Billie Holiday, etc... and then into dixieland a la Armstrong, Earl Hines, Morton, etc... I am also fond of the European free music players like Peter Brotzmann, Evan Parker, Alex von Schlippenbach, Barry Guy, Paul Loven, Willem Breuker, AMM, etc... And then there's Chicago school with AACM, Anthony Braxton, George Lewis, etc... And then the cats of younger generation like Ken Vandermark, Dave Douglas, John Zorn, etc... It's an unending journey...
The Penguin Guide to Jazz is my favorite intro guide as I am already familiar with Cook and Morton's writing in British publications. One very influential book is Martin Williams' The Jazz Tradition; love his piece on Monk and Dolphy. Gary Giddins is also a very perceptive writer whom I enjoy reading a great deal. Nat Hentoff writes excellent liner notes on many classic records. Yes, I read a great deal on the genre and liner notes are a great way to study the history and much of it is anecdotal and told by the musicians and their peers and perceptive writers.
We are so fortunate to have these great masters recorded on vinyl but ultimately, jazz is best to experience it live. Go to a club and listen and watch quality musicians interacting and how they listen for their intro and timing. It can be scintillating.
Happy listening!
I picked it up without ever having heard it or heard of it because it was Ornette.
The music has a lot of layers and textures; it draws you in, especially the uptempo numbers.
The Chicago-school stuff isn't easy to find locally, at least not on LP, but I've managed to score some Art Ensemble and Lester Bowie stuff. Ayler's collaboration with Don Cherry was my last Jerry's Records auction win, though I haven't listened to it yet (my practice is to stuff the iPod with as much music as possible so that I have new stuff to play every day while I'm working).
You're entirely right, it's a never-ending journey; fertile ground for those of us who crave the new.
By the way--Doxy has reissued the two classic Ornette albums Tomorrow Is The Question! , and Something Else!!! . I've already got an original Contemporary pressing of Something so I haven't heard the Doxy, but Tomorrow on Doxy is excellent.
___
The little old ladies wait in wild anticipation for the meetings of the Double-A-C-ASSN...
That is ironic since the Dead credited the jazz bands that played the Fillmore back in the 60’s as inspiration for their own extended jams and drum solos.
"To Do Is To Be" Socrates
"To Be Is To Do" Plato
"Do Be Do Be Do" Sinatra
Improvisional style gets respect from me weather it's garage bands, groups of people getting together and just plain jammin, drumming circles where people don't know a note of music, etc. , doing riffs on the electric guitar all by yourself. It's just getting carried away by the music and expressing oneself.
back in the 70's.
I was into funk then, and Herbie Hancock had a couple funky albums that were hot back then, so started buying any Herbie Hancock album I could find, little did I know Herbie came outa jazz. Eventually I found the door, came upon an album called Water Babies by Miles Davis with Herbie listed on it...it was like, what the hell...lol. THen I followed Miles all the way back to Charlie Parker, and along the way heard all the Giants, Mingus, ROach, Monk, etc. etc.
THen at the end of that decade I picked up this album by Sun Ra...
"Funk is the Preacher, Jazz is the Teacher"
I surely wasn't a jazz guy in the 60's and early 70's through high school. But after Hendrix died and Cream broke up, the rock music scene turned in a way that no longer worked for me. I bought and listened to tons of experimental European rock and electronic music - and then I bought "In a Silent Way" and "Bitches Brew" because John McLaughlin played with this Miles Davis guy and this Tony Williams guy. Then I started buying older Miles LP's, which leads to Herbie and Wayne, and then Coltrane and Bill Evans, and eventually clear back to Bird - and then I was home!
I was lucky - I got to see people like Roland Kirk and Dexter Gordon and Mingus and Bill Evans and a host of other folks before they passed because I found out my love for jazz way back then. (I was sick when Art Pepper came to town - but I have the set he did that night on tape).
However, I still crank out rock music when the mood strikes - and lately the Who have been played a lot here.
Your brain is doing just fine - go with it. Saxophones and guitars rule.
that right there is a lifetime worth of incredible listening.
And following that branch of the tree ala MD, you have
another treasure trove of sounds.
My journey is similar to yours, but my Dad was a jazz drummer
so I was born into listening to the stuff.
Agree with you about the R&R and Mr. Ellington's statement
that there are only two types of music - good and bad.
Los Lobos is blasting right now!
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Back in Illinois growing up I became friends with a jazz DJ named Bob Davis. Bob won a Peabody for a series of interviews he did with Ellington. In them, Duke, for the only time known, spoke about how he was trying to use color in his compositions and arrangements. Very interesting stuff.
Bob took us to see Mercer Ellington in 1975, as he took up the reigns after his father's death. Cootie Williams was with the band then. I met him backstage and saw him warm up his horn. He didn't do section work by then, only his solos on certain well-known numbers.
I've got 150 titles by Ellington on LP, by far the largest in my collection. Just seemed like one of his song titles would make a great moniker here.
....of Jazz in my collection, going way back to the roots. I especially love the Jazz from the '20s, but it's all good.
That was ten years or so ago.
I still have some interest in Rock, and Classical. But my primary listening is Jazz.
nt
I know you're a jazzer, and thus biased, but as Jerry Seinfeld used to say, its not like that's a bad thing!
"Can you tell me why the bells are ringing? Nothing's happened in a million years. I've been sitting here since Wednesday morning. Wednesday morning can't believe my ears. Jazz Police are looking through my folders. Jazz Police are talking to my niece. Jazz Police have got their final orders. Jazzer drop your axe it's Jazz Police. Jesus taken serious by many. Jesus taken joyous by a few. Jazz Police are paid by J Paul Getty. Jazzers paid by J Paul Getty too. While there's any freedom-loving racist, I applaud the actions of the chief. Tell me now oh beautiful and spacious, am I in trouble with the Jazz Police? They will never understand our culture. They'll never understand the Jazz Police. Jazz Police are working for my mother. Blood is thicker margarine than grease. Let me be somebody I admire. Let me be that muscle down the street. Stick another turtle on the fire. Guys like me are mad for turtle meat."
At least that's what Leonard Cohen had to say about it.
-Steve
en-tee
___
The little old ladies wait in wild anticipation for the meetings of the Double-A-C-ASSN...
nada thing
Jim
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Playing a lot of classic rock myself ... Dylan, Dire Straits, Pink Floyd, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Marley, Supertramp, Steely Dan, David Brubeck, Duke, Miles, Coltrane, Ahmad Jamal - Poinciana, Ramsey Lewis Trio, The Kingston Trio, Haydn, Miles, Van Morrison, Leonard Cohen, Alan Parsons Project, Joni Mitchell, Tony Bennett, Sinatra, Les Elgart Band, Mary Kaye, Weavers, Elvis ... and on it goes, great American music.
the savor of everything - Bob Neill
Not quite all great American music...
Some credit for Canadians Leonard Cohen and Joni Mitchell, please!
And, I rather think Dire Straits, Pink Floyd, Supertramp, Van Morrison, and the Alan Parsons Project come from over the British Isles way.
Nonetheless, I like your taste, and the American market and taste helped all those artists become successful.
“Facts are stubborn, but statistics are more pliable.” - Mark Twain
Go Muffin!
Isn't Dire Straits all American?
the savor of everything - Bob Neill
No... from Wikipedia
Dire Straits were a British rock band, formed in 1977 by former journalist and teacher Mark Knopfler, initially composed of Knopfler (lead vocals and lead guitar), his younger brother David Knopfler (rhythm guitar and backing vocals), John Illsley (bass guitar and backing vocals), and Pick Withers (drums and percussion). The group split in 1995 when Mark Knopfler started his career as a solo artist.
I have to admit they sounded American.
“Facts are stubborn, but statistics are more pliable.” - Mark Twain
More than just the American market, America Itself.
There was an American invasion long before the British invasion, most of the people in that non-American list were knocked over dead by American bands, and that includes the likes of a young Ellington Band, big time! I remember listening to one of the Stones taking about seeing Duke Ellington, then of course Little Richard and that crowd... every crowd. They sucked it up like koolaid the we got the Beatles ... fair trade :) sides' we already had Elvis .
the savor of everything - Bob Neill
Agreed, and the American black blues players inspired Mayall, Alexis Korner, The Stones, Clapton, Page and so many others, who in a sense brought the blues back to the US in the British invasion.It was a British drummer who first played me Gene Krupa with Benny Goodman at the 1938 Carnegie Hall concert and changed my life.
“Facts are stubborn, but statistics are more pliable.” - Mark Twain
Edits: 02/09/12
Still miss my Mayall Diary of a Band LP that was with my first collection that I sold. Many good LPs but miss that one in particular, wasn't even in good shape, didn't matter.
Another favorite Mayall is Bare Wires, that's a masterpiece. Good one for the commute.
An of course the Mayall/Clapton was like my religion for a while :)
the savor of everything - Bob Neill
Once I posed the question to a good classical pianist.
The question went something like, "What is the higher form of art, interpreting a known work by Beethoven or some other composer, that has been interpreted by thousands of great players over and over again--or creating a singular work that defies duplication or interpretation?"
Being a Julliard grad and a semi-finalist in one of the Queen Elisabeth concerto competitions she predictably argued for the former. It was a long discussion. I gave her some Art Tatum recordings (even with her professional credentials she had never heard of Art Tatum) and several months later she said she was reconsidering her answer.
I think jazz sometimes does that to people.
to OPERA...ever...unless the occasional piece by Academy of Ancient Music with Emma Kirkby, because she didn't have some Fake Vibrato that sinks ships...just an amazing sweet voice...
Anyway, Vivica Genaux is completely ADDICTIVE, because she does the most amazing, REAL singing, without sinking ships, and simply so fast: she can do four trills, and grace before most singers get the next syllable...and there is something genuine in her singing which I find unique...: or thought unique, now Marijana Mijanovic, Joyce DiDonato...etc...and this is what has to do with JAZZ: Addiction...hehe
is Addiction....
You can see Vivica Genaux here (Amazing!)
We got to hear Genaux along with Europa Galante recently in concert (UApresents, University of Arizona) in a program of mostly Vivaldi. She, and they, were dazzling. We had gone to the concert feeling run-down and agreeing that we could leave at intermission if we were "Vivaldi-ed out." We stayed because it was exciting and wonderfully performed.
Well worth it!
Once your brain is gone you'll go back to rock & roll!
;^)
ps: I was just listening to an LP I posted last night in Spinin'. It's a Columbia two eye mono. I wish all my rock & roll was this well recorded. Maybe that part's of it? A lot and I mean a lot, of rock was/is not well recorded.
Anyway, I still love my rock, warts and all.
Happy listnin'....
Me too. I never listened to jazz before almost exactly two years ago. Now, it's almost all I listen to. And totally dominates the want list.
Glad I finally saw the light!
Listening to Miles Davis ESP right now. Is there a prettier record anywhere? It's insane!
I'm kind of the same way. I used to have some jazz, but was mostly a rock and roller. I still have more than twice as much r&r than jazz, but I mostly listen to jazz.
I guess that's what happens when you get old.
Chad
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