Tim Fox's List: jazz appreciation

• Albert Murray has crafted an aesthetic out of the blues. 

  The novelist, writer and critic was on campus last  week talking about the basic elements of his own writing and the  relationship between the blues and all great art.
• Jazz comes from, and is a form of, blues music.

• Jazz comes from, and is a form of, blues music. 

  "The blues is a device for transcending, or at least coping with, adversity,"  Murray observed, calling jazz the music used to "stomp away the blues." In fact, he said, far from being maudlin, the blues -- as anyone who has been to a blues club knows -- can create an atmosphere that is "downright aphrodisiac."
• Great jazz artists, like all important artists, derive their styles from their  predecessors, Murray argued. One could, he said, describe the legendary founder of jazz,  turn-of-the-century New Orleans cornetist Buddy Bolden, as the music's Chaucer, and  Louis Armstrong, "who influenced all the rest,"  as its Shakespeare. "There wouldn't have been a Shakespeare without a Chaucer," he said.

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• McDowell was born in Rossville, Tennessee, near Memphis. His parents, who were farmers, died when McDowell was a youth.
• While he famously declared "I do not play no rock and roll," McDowell was not averse to associating with many younger rock musicians: He coached Bonnie Raitt on slide guitar technique,^[7] and was reportedly flattered by The Rolling Stones' rather straightforward, authentic version of his "You Gotta Move" on their 1971 Sticky Fingers album.
• McDowell died of cancer in 1972,

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• Coming to prominence in the 1920s as an "inventive" cornet and trumpet player, Armstrong was a foundational influence in jazz, shifting the music's focus from collective improvisation to solo performance.

• In his early years, Armstrong was best known for his virtuosity with the cornet and trumpet. The greatest trumpet playing of his early years can be heard on his Hot Five and Hot Seven records, as well as the Red Onion Jazz Babies. The improvisations he made on these records of New Orleans jazz standards and popular songs of the day are unsurpassed by later jazz performers. The older generation of New Orleans jazz musicians often referred to their improvisations as "variating the melody." Armstrong's improvisations were daring and sophisticated for the time, while often subtle and melodic.

   

  He often essentially re-composed pop-tunes he played, making them more interesting. Armstrong's playing is filled with joyous, inspired original melodies, creative leaps, and subtle relaxed or driving rhythms. The genius of these creative passages is matched by Armstrong's playing technique, honed by constant practice, which extended the range, tone and capabilities of the trumpet. In these records, Armstrong almost single-handedly created the role of the jazz soloist, taking what was essentially a collective folk music and turning it into an art form with tremendous possibilities for individual expression.

• Ellington wrote over 1,000 compositions. In the words of Bob Blumenthal of The Boston Globe "In the century since his birth, there has been no greater composer, American or otherwise, than Edward Kennedy Ellington."^[1]

• Duke Ellington's work has come to be recognized as a cornerstone of American culture and heritage. He is widely regarded as the most important composer in jazz; he was also a galvanizing bandleader who inspired many of his musicians to produce their best work, whilst himself being a significant exponent of jazz piano. His works have been revisited by artists and musicians around the world both as a source of inspiration and a bedrock of their own performing careers. Ellington's compositions are now the staple of the repertoire of music conservatories, and even high school band programs that have embraced his music continue to give it life and voice.

   

  His son, Mercer Ellington kept his big band alive after his passing. When Mercer died, Paul Ellington kept the Duke Ellington Orchestra going. It plays in concert halls around the world to this day.

• According to Mark C. Gridley, author of Jazz Styles: History and Analysis, “Coleman Hawkins loved to improvise on complicated chord progressions and invent solo lines whose construction implied that chords had been added. His recording of ‘Body and Soul’ demonstrates this.”
• “Body and Soul” has so many definitive versions that it is challenging to single out the most noteworthy. Coleman Hawkins’ version from 1939 (Body and Soul) is the standout among them and unquestionably one of the most significant recorded performances in jazz history,

• While Hawkins is most strongly associated with the swing music and big band era, he had a role in the development of bebop in the 1940s.^[2]

• Charlie Parker with Strings is a compilation album by jazz musician Charlie Parker, released by Verve Records in January 1995. It is based on recording sessions originally issued as two albums released in 1950 on Mercury Records.
• The sessions place Parker in the context of a small classical string section and a jazz rhythm section, rather than his standard bebop quintet. They were Parker's most popular sellers during his lifetime, and were admitted to the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1988.

• For Musicians Only is a 1956 jazz album by Dizzy Gillespie, Stan Getz and Sonny Stitt incorporating bebop influences.

• Late in 1954 a quartet under the leadership of Horace Silver was playing at Minton's Playhouse. As a result of earlier successes on the Blue Note label, Horace's star was in the ascendancy and Alfred Lion was anxious to record more of his brilliant hard driving piano. 
• "Doodlin'" is a 12-bar blues in which the tenor creeps below the trumpet at whole-tone intervals in the first 8 bars. Note too, the humorous use of staccato notes in bars 8 and 9. Note more particularly Horace's superb comping behind the Dorham and Mobley solos, in which he sometimes gets a 12-to-the-bar feel.

• The album was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999.^[2] It is included in Jazz: A Critic's Guide to the 100 Most Important Recordings at #34, where it is described by New York Times jazz critic Ben Ratliff as "one of the strongest studio albums up to that time".^[3]

• John never coasted. Every time I heard him, it was if he was playing the last solo of his life and wanted to get all of his life into it. Or, as his wife, Alice, said: "His music was never resigned, never complacent. How could it be? He never stopped surprising himself."
• While he was with Miles, Coltrane was tagged with the phrase "sheets of sound." Jazz critic Ira Gitler had first used it. These "sheets of sound" were multinote hailstorms of dense textures that sound like a simultaneous series of waterfalls. "His continuous flow of ideas without stopping really hit me," Gitler said. "It was almost superhuman. The amount of energy he was using could have powered a spaceship."

• Giant Steps is a 1960 studio album by jazz musician John Coltrane, released on Atlantic Records.

• Jazz musicians continue to use the "Giant Steps" chord progression, which consists of a peculiar set of chord progressions which often move in thirds, as a practice piece and as a gateway into modern jazz improvisation. The ability to play over the "Giant Steps"/Coltrane cycle remains to this day one of the benchmark standards by which a jazz musician's improvising skill is measured.

   

  The album is also considered to be Coltrane's farewell to bebop. He ventured into the territory of modal jazz shortly afterwards.

• A Love Supreme is a jazz studio album recorded by John Coltrane's quartet in December 1964^[13] and released by Impulse! Records (catalogue number AS-77) in February 1965. It is generally considered to be among Coltrane's greatest works, as it melded the hard bop sensibilities of his early career with the free jazz style he adopted later.
• A Love Supreme is often listed amongst the greatest jazz albums of all time.
• As further testimony to the recording's historic significance, the manuscript for the album is one of the National Museum of American History's "Treasures of American History", part of the collection of the Smithsonian Institution.
• The album's influence has been extensive and diverse. Musicians ranging from tenor Joshua Redman^[29] to the rockstar Bono of U2 ^[30] have singled out the influence of the album on their own work. Guitarists John McLaughlin and Carlos Santana have each credited the album as one of their greatest early influences.

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• "Birdland" is a jazz instrumental composition by keyboardist Joe Zawinul that debuted on the Weather Report album Heavy Weather in 1977. A jazz-fusion piece, it achieved unusual commercial success and became a jazz standard,
• The song is a tribute to Parker and the club that Zawinul frequented as a young musician (and where he met his future wife).