Art Pepper... Gerry Mulligan... Lee Konitz... Art Ensemble of Chicago...

In 1957 the Miles Davis band were out on the west coast and Lester Koenig at Contemporary Records put the group's rhythm section together with the alto player Art Pepper – one of a very select group of saxophonists who were not blatant Charlie Parker ripoffs and had forged their own style (while acknowledging the debt). In his autobiography, 'Straight Life,' Pepper tells of how he had not played for six months at the time, pieced together a battered old horn and ventured off into the jazz unknown. A nice story... although I just checked the discography and he is down as playing on three sessions between January 3, 1957 and the date for this recording – January 19 – two under his own name with different quartet personnel and one doubling on tenor and alto for a gig under Joe Morello's leadership (later to acquire much fame in Brubeck's quartet) which was also put out as a co-led band with Red Norvo later on – and under his own name much later again. A measurement of the vagaries of fame... So: print the legend... Whatever the circumstances, up against one of the great rhythm sections – Red Garland, Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones – he makes a pretty good fist of it, however prepared/unprepared. This is 'Star Eyes:' Red Garland leads in at a sprightly bounce before Pepper states the theme and takes the first solo honours. Piano next, the familiar joyous spring in Garland's fingers as Philly Joe rimshots here and there to keep his band partner on track. Chambers takes an arco spot over sparse comping and occasional drum prodding. Pepper returns – then Philly Joe goes for a quick batter around his kit before all return for the ending bars. There is a crisp purity to Pepper's tone, underlaid with an edge on the occasional slur and bend that became more pronounced in later years, signalling a move into a more overtly emotional music, under the sign of John Coltrane. Also: there is an influence from a previous generation of alto players that perhaps helped to balance off the the large shadow of Bird – he plays with the unruffled skill of Bennie Carter, for example. Classic modern jazz.

The Gerry Mulligan Concert Jazz Band could be considered in the lineage of the Miles Davis Birth of the Cool band, although let us not forget that Mulligan was a founding contributor to that lineage. He had worked alongside Gil Evans in the Claude Thornhill band during the 1940s when Evans was chief arranger, an outfit that pioneered much of the instrumental colouring that was to come: 'Mulligan and Evans agree that Thornhill never has been given his due as an influence in the evolution of modern jazz writing.'(From here... ). This cross-fertilisation bore heavier fruit when in collaboration with John Lewis and Miles Davis, Evans and Mulligan wrote and arranged much of the music for the Birth of the Cool sessions. Davis took most of the credit in the history books but those other contributions were equally important - especially from Mulligan, who was to further evolve his own style with his 50's quartet to solve the evolutionary challenges of bebop's rapid, cluttered chord sequences. Based on various interpretations of counterpoint, I would submit... Here, then, is 'Come rain or come shine.' Soft footing in before Mulligan takes the theme as velvet sonorities wrap around his throaty baritone saxophone, the bottom end ticked off by the bass – nary a drum to be heard at first – then a stop-time section to take it up – eventually to drop off back into the slow tempo. Varying textures behind the leader as he fires away into increasingly complicated double time figures – sometimes just a single instrument. Another indication, perhaps, of a horizontal, linear thinking as opposed to much conventional section writing in larger groups. Going into a sombre ending. A masterpiece...

Lee Konitz plays 'I'll Remember April.' A sardonic ellipsis committed on the theme - Konitz always seems to be improvising, restating, reshuffling from the get go. Similarities with the other great white alto player above, Art Pepper, playing with a powerhouse rhythm section - here, no piano, just Sonny Dallas on bass and the mighty Elvin Jones behind the drums. How far the rhythm had come since Philly Joe, an earlier master. Konitz plays with unfettered freedom over the strong bass pulse that is the fulcrum as Jones shifts it about, offering so many possibilities to bounce off. This track is taken from a 1961 date and seems to encapsulate what had gone before while hinting at what was breaking and what was to come...

The Art Ensemble of Chicago, recorded in 1970 during their tenure in France. 'Theme: Libre.' A percussion/drum-driven clattering, wilding blowout to clear the cobwebs – outside the sun is shining and all is suddenly well in God's Little Acre... trumpet and saxes rise out of the thunder and hissing spatters of cymbals, jumping across each other in a gloriously chaotic leap-frogging (no pun intended...)... Lester Bowie sounds the charge - and also signals periods of repose among the clamour as the flutes join in for a touch of pastoral evocation to ease on out with...





Art Pepper
Art Pepper (as) Red Garland (p) Paul Chambers (b) Philly Joe Jones (d)
Star Eyes
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Gerry Mulligan Concert Jazz Band
Gerry Mulligan (arr, bs) Bob Brookmeyer (arr, tr) Al Cohn, Johnny Mandel (arr)
Don Ferrara, Nick Travis, Clark Terry (t) Willie Dennis, Alan Ralph (tr) Gene Quill (as cl) Bob Donovan (as) Jim Reider (ts) Gene Allen (bs, b-cl) Bill Crow (b) Mel Lewis (d)
Come rain or come shine
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Lee Konitz
Lee Konitz (as) Sonny Dallas (b) Elvin Jones (d)
I'll Remember April
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Art Ensemble of Chicago
Malachi Favors (b, perc) Don Moye (d, perc) Roscoe Mitchell (ss, as, fl perc) Joseph Jarman (ss, as, fl, perc, bass, ob) Lester Bowie (t,, flug, perc)
Theme: Libre
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Lee Konitz... Art Pepper... Dave Van Ronk... Mance Lipscomb

A 1961 date for Lee Konitz playing 'All of me,' with the late Sonny Dallas on bass and Elvin Jones on drums providing his inimitable polyrhythmic fire. The initial chorus stands as a paradigm for jazz improvisation – the tune is hinted at, prodded, approached obliquely – simultaneously familiar – yet unfamiliar. Dallas provides firm-fingered support and Jones slaps out ever-shifting, edgy and always provoking rhythms across the bass player's steady four. Konitz plays wonderfully, calm and pipingly clear. Elvin takes a solo and some fiery exchanges with Konitz towards the end, on top of his game throughout... One of Konitz's best sessions -and there are, of course, plenty to choose from...

Art Pepper opens 'September Song' playing a long introduction over a minor two chord vamp before finally hitting up the main theme. The rhythm section, sprung on Mitchell's taut, wiry bass, provide a sympathetic backdrop. Interesting comparison to Konitz: Pepper has a sharper, more acrid and bluesy edge to his alto. Mitchell is very full in the mix, backlining the veteran Flanagan's piano somewhat to sparse chording and Higgins to a distant clatter of brushes. Maybe its my sub-woofer... The piano emerges eventually to take a thoughtful solo, followed by Mitchell, who seems to be having a good day. Pepper returns to emote over the returning minor vamp, sudden flurries erupting contrasting with some blues licks and long bent notes. Art in 1979, the September of his years...

Dave Van Ronk died a while back. Obscure, perhaps, with regard to the mainstream of popular music, he was, nevertheless, a seminal figure, via his influence on Bob Dylan and countless others during his tenure as the Mayor of Greenwich Village. A point I suddenly realised was close to home – an old face I knew back in Paris many years ago having just contacted me via the Mayoress of Bastille, la belle Julie – Sivert, who spent some time with Dave Van Ronk when he was in New York a long way back, encouraged by him – Sivert being a rather damn fine guitar player himself. And – one of the first finger-picking songs I learned was 'Tain't nobody's business,' via Van Ronk's version in the old 'Sing Out' mag.http://www.singout.org/ Days of innocence... This is 'Did you hear John Hurt,' a song about listening to 'a little old feller, play a shiny guitar.' Which just slides in under the wire demarcating patronisation and genuine affection. 'Old feller' in question is Mississippi John Hurt, that is, whose rediscovery fed another strong line into the development of acoustic guitar techniques and understanding of previous musical afro-american cultures. Van Ronk rasps his way through the song, his gruff ginmill voice complemented by solid, ringing clawhammer. 'Blackface' or 'Channelling?' To revive my categories... I would say the latter... Van Ronk found something in the old folk/blues of yesteryear that hit him in the heart – as did many of us. Which poses many questions...


Wassily Kandinsky, in his Introduction to 'Concerning the Spiritual in Art,' says:

'Every work of art is the child of its age and, in many cases, the
mother of our emotions. It follows that each period of culture
produces an art of its own which can never be repeated. Efforts
to revive the art-principles of the past will at best produce an
art that is still-born... Such imitation
is mere aping...

There is, however, in art another kind of external similarity
which is founded on a fundamental truth. When there is a
similarity of inner tendency in the whole moral and spiritual
atmosphere, a similarity of ideals, at first closely pursued but
later lost to sight, a similarity in the inner feeling of any one
period to that of another, the logical result will be a [REVIVAL]
of the external forms which served to express those inner
feelings in an earlier age. An example of this today is our
sympathy, our spiritual relationship, with the Primitives. Like
ourselves, these artists sought to express in their work only
internal truths, renouncing in consequence all consideration of
external form.' (From here...).

Many would allege that Van Ronk tapped in to that 'fundamental truth.' I'm a trifle uneasy with any revivalists raising up 'the external forms which served to express those inner feelings' and comparisons of white/black blues singers that look to find 'a similarity in the inner feeling of any one period,' but there is a basic emotional integrity to Van Ronk's music that overrides my general misgivings...

Mance Lipscomb was also recovered to a late career by the folk and blues revival. Some may have called him, and others like him, a 'primitive,' as folk musicians where regarded as such. With the best of intentions, no doubt – different times... But there is more skill resting in these musicians than may meet the conventional eye. Usually called a 'songster' (like Mississippi John Hurt and for the same reasons of repertoire) because he sang across the genres (as did Leadbelly before him, come to think of it), the Texan guitarist and singer had a unique style based on finger-picking over a monotonal bass (as in Mississippi Delta blues) – which he varied as and when – here, dropping in some nice boogie runs on 'Corrine Corrine.' One of my favourite versions of the old warhorse...

'Lipscomb represented one of the last remnants of the nineteenth-century songster tradition, which predated the development of the blues. Though songsters might incorporate blues into their repertoires, as did Lipscomb, they performed a wide variety of material in diverse styles, much of it common to both black and white traditions in the South, including ballads, rags, dance pieces (breakdowns, waltzes, one and two steps, slow drags, reels, ballin' the jack, the buzzard lope, hop scop, buck and wing, heel and toe polka), and popular, sacred, and secular songs. Lipscomb himself insisted that he was a songster, not a guitarist or "blues singer," since he played "all kinds of music.'

From here...


In the Videodrome...


Mance Lipscomb...

The Failed Nasa Experiment sent me this – Sonny Sharrock at the Knitting Factory...


Art Pepper...

Lee Konitz and co...




Lee Konitz
Lee Konitz (as) Sonny Dallas (b) Elvin Jones (d)
All of me
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Art Pepper (as) Tommy Flanagan (p) Red Mitchell (b) Billy Higgins (d) Kenneth Nash (perc)
September Song
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Dave Van Ronk (v, g)
Did you hear John Hurt
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Mance Lipscomb (v, g)
Corrine Corrine
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