The Electrifying…

I don’t remember my parents being huge jazz fans growing up. I didn’t live with my father and the only thing I remember about my mother, is her casual love of music – I mean if it was on and she liked it, she would groove a bit.

When I was 6, my grandfather taught me to play Amazing Grace on the harmonica. I then saw a movie with a cat playing a saxophone, and to me, they sounded alike, the harmonica and the sax - and I knew I couldn’t play the harmonica in the school band. Thus began my love of the E flat Alto Saxophone.

There was a closet at home that was kind of a junk closet that no one went into unless some bit of nostalgia was being sought out or some more junk needed to be hidden. I noticed once that there were several boxes of record albums, and thus began the “diggin in the crates” era of my life. Around age 6 or 7, I got my first component set. It was a record player and 2 speakers. I had the equipment but not enough records to play. Around age 10, I started remembering that closet and those boxes so I began to hunt.

What a wealth of music! There was everything from the Temps, Blood, Sweat and Tears, Miles Davis, Carlos Santana, Earth, Wind and Fire, James Brown and a Saxophone player - a man intently blowing his horn on the cover that just captured my attention. “The Electrifying Eddie Harris”; I couldn’t wait to play it. I looked at the album cover all night. I read the notes, I studied the play list.

Saturday morning arrived and even before my cereal and Saturday morning cartoons, I played the first cut from this record. It was titled “Theme in Search of a Movie”. Of course being 10, the title was just weird, but the song was infatuating. I pulled out my horn and attempted to follow the melody. It was simple enough, but at that age, improvisation was a foreign concept. I learned the melody and was eager to go on to the next song. This tune, “Listen Here” was quite intimidating. It was as funky as any record I had ever heard and just beginning to play saxophone, the melody was much harder to catch and more notes in a measure than I had played before. Basically, I never learned to play it - at least not at that age.

The other thing that was incredibly interesting about Harris was he used a newly developed instrument – the Varitone saxophone. The Varitone was an electric saxophone that was developed by H&A Selmer, Inc. (see my favorite things) in 1965. Sonny Stitt (What's New? Sonny Stitt Plays the Varitone Roulette 1966) and Eddie Harris were the main practitioners of the instrument, and both of them continued to make it a staple in their recordings and live shows. The Varitone was essentially a saxophone with a built-in effects box and amplifier that could emulate the sounds of other instruments while playing along with the natural sound of the saxophone. This created a doubling effect that increased the complexity and richness of the sound. I always believed that‘s why he titled the record “The Electrifying...”

Though I’ve not heard and or scrutinized any of Harris’ music beyond this record, I always hold this one up as one of the favorite jazz albums I own – yes mama and pop, finders keepers. Beyond the use of the Varitone, Harris’ tenor sound is among the most full, most brilliant of any tenor sax I’ve ever heard. Though he has recorded quite a bit, as I discovered by perusing his site, viewing the discography and listening to the snips, I don’t imagine he received the kind of shine he deserves for his style, sound and innovation.

His debut recording, Exodus to Jazz included his own jazz arrangement of the theme from the movie Exodus. A shortened version of this track, which featured his masterful playing in the upper register of the tenor saxophone, was heavily played on radio and became the first jazz record ever to be certified gold.
However, many jazz critics regarded commercial success as a sign that a jazz artist had sold out, and Harris soon stopped playing "Exodus" in concert. He moved to Columbia Records in 1964 and to Atlantic Records in 1965. At Atlantic in 1965 he released The In Sound, a bop album which won back many of his fans and critics alike.
In 1967 his album The Electrifying Eddie Harris reached second place on the R & B charts. And since my folx weren’t huge Jazz fans I imagine because the record hit the R & B charts is the reason they acquired it.

I love Eddie’s music, or at least this record. Now I’m interested in hearing lots more!

**Note to self: Add Eddie Harris to the list of artists worth “diggin in the crates” for??

Live at Smalls

Still in the midst of the “all things old are new again” scrutiny phase of my record collection, I found a compilation disc on the Impulse imprint called “Jazz Underground – Live at Smalls”. I remember when I picked this disc up. I was at a used CD shop searching for new jazz music other than standards or interpretations of standards. Actually, Downbeat.com prompted me to seek this out record. I knew I had it, but hadn’t listened to it in quite awhile.
Smalls is a jazz club in downtown New York. Downbeat.com defines it like this, “Smalls has made its reputation as a spot with a more mainstream jazz orientation. Opening in 1994, Smalls became the Mecca for combos and big bands with a revolving cast of players, as well as a place for all-night jamming-the sort of jazz training ground largely missing from the scene since the '50s. It also has become a hangout for record producers seeking new artists, as well as a place for live recordings.”

My imagination runs wild with what I think Smalls performers and patronage would look like or what a night would be. I imagine young cats in bohemian type garb, carrying instruments and sheet music and playing with nerd like intensity. The front part of the audience being intense patrons of the music and the back, intense patrons of the scene – you know the yuppie set. And by midnite, the music would weed out the pretenders.
Jazz is intensely complicated music. I won’t ever pretend to have the “breadth of knowledge”, jazz education in school notwithstanding, to be a serious scholar of the music. I know what I like, what I don’t like, what’s easily understood and what would be considered highly complicated. But not knowing doesn’t stop me from wanting to know. And knowing what Smalls has become to the serious scholars and virtuosos, it, of course, piqued my interest.
If I listen to a CD when I’m home, I generally read the liner notes as I am listening. I can tell which is better, the notes or the music, by how much I retain from the reading. While I can walk and chew gum at the same time, retaining notes and listening to awesome jazz is more a challenge. The liner notes for this recording were a little difficult to read – meaning I think the music is phenomenal.
I have a huge interest in experimental jazz or experimental music in general. However it is always difficult for me to listen to and understand most of the music from the Free Jazz period artists such as Ornette Coleman. Okay, so if you’ve read other parts of my blog, you notice that I mention saxophone players first and mostly…well I’m partial. I think I don’t have enough imagination to hear the music without the accompanying pianist or guitarist. I have, at times, found much joy from listening to Branford Marsalis in Trio form with a bass and a drummer. His improvisations sans piano or guitar tend to be more palatable for me…and much easier to follow. I mention this because I thought this record would follow some of the same experimental lines. It does not. It falls quite short.
The first track on this document is a slow ballad titled “Kentucky Girl” by the Omer Avital Group. It features Avital on bass, an alto saxophone, 3 tenor saxophones and drums. If this group’s line-up can’t be seen as a definition of experimental, want else can?
The song title gives you an inkling of what this song may sound like. I immediately thought of Ray Charles’ Country & Western meets the big sax sounds traditionally associated with the Texas Tenors. Avital opens the track strumming his bass and if it were a banjo, and continues with a “banjo as bass” feel through out the tune. It is an interesting mix of Jazz and Country & Western music. I don’t know how much more this should be explored, but I did enjoy it.
The next tune by the Charles Owens Quartet is a standard swing piece that tends to be interesting only in places.
One of the most intriguing parts of this recording is the throwback to the Big Band era and these young cats that have the bravado to “take it there”. “Hexophony” is a tune penned by Jason Lindner and his Big Band made up of the usual suspects of the Smalls Family. This tune sounds like it came straight from the movie, ”The Mambo Kings” and landed right onto the set of the “I Love Lucy” TV show. Lindner also checks in with another big band piece, “Phat”, which, sonically, has the right title.
Loving this record would be saying too much for me. I found it to be at least interesting but nothing extraordinary. I assumed that it would be a record that would take chances and swing harder. After the first tune, it just kinda falls flat. It has heart but no beat. Being that I have never been to Smalls, I can’t speak to the type of musicianship or innovation that goes on there, but hearing this record kinda sounds like being at a high school jazz band competition. I imagine that the record company or at least I hope this was the case, only allowed a safe recording in the hopes of getting some sales. Several of the musicians featured here have release their own records for Impulse and other labels. If innovation is the backbone of smalls, I hope that their records reflect that kind of commitment.

Sights & Sounds

When I was a kid, my cousin Robert, a music-head also, and probably where I got some of my love and all of my education for funk - the wall behind his stereo was filled with album covers. He was not the only cousin that had album cover covered walls, but his I remember and those had the most effect. Apparently it was a throwback to seventies pop-culture and design, I guess. There were all the Parliament/Funkadelic Record Covers, Tom Browne, George Duke, etc.

One of the first times a traditional old school jazz album cover caught my attention, is part of the reason I started listening to the music. Today, I don’t really remember what record it was but what I do remember is how much the cover-art struck me. And the more interesting the cover of artists I didn’t know, the more interested I was in wanting to hear their music.

In my first apartment, I was searching for decorating ideas. I hated the way it looked because it was so plain. I wanted artwork, but didn’t have the kind of ends it would take to purchase what I liked because, tuition, well you know…

One nite, I was listening to Wynton Marsalis’ “Soul Gestures in Southern Blue – ‘Thick in the South’” I believe, and I was looking at the album cover which contains a collage by Romare Bearden. Now, I mentioned my tuition woes earlier, so framed prints by Bearden where certainly out of the question – I mean if I wanted to eat. Somewhere between classic solos by Marsalis, I had a bright idea.

I took the covers of all 3 volumes and had them copied and enlarged at a printer. Then I went and purchased 3 frames and hung the covers, matted and framed on the wall above my sofa. Turned out GREAT!!

At that point, I really got a new appreciation for jazz album covers as art. So while hanging out online today, I decided to add some new artwork to the blog. Once every couple of weeks I’ll add a favorite cover to my page.

Enjoy!

Bass Man Walk Downtown

Lately, I have had zero to no interest in finding new music. I know there are many new artists I have run across on the wonderful World Wide Web, but I’m not interested. I recently went thru a period of buying/acquiring, re-acquiring fists full of recordings, completing catalogs of my favorite artists – you know, just to have. I would listen to them once or twice and then shelve them. So, now, I have all these un-scrutinized recordings. The other day while sitting around in the midst of the collection, I found myself digging around in and wanting to listen too some of the past acquisitions.
Enter Lonnie Plaxico.

I first became aware of bassist Plaxico some years back thru his work with Cassandra Wilson, who happens to be my favorite singer – and one of whose catalog I was completing. It was Wilson’s ‘Blue Light ‘til Dawn’ recording that really captured my attention. There was something very haunting about the way his bass sounded on the opening cut – ‘You Don’t Know What Love Is’. It was this beautiful tone that seemed to strike at you every time he strummed a note. His strumming matched the mood of the song perfectly. Some years later, I ran across his MySpace page, which hipped me to his work as a composer/bandleader.

On his MySpace page, he was hawking the title tune called ‘Melange’ from, what I understand, his fifth document as a bandleader, ‘Melange’. What caught me from the beginning was the metering and phrasing of the keyboards and horn players. I began to think of the music as being part of the “avant-garde” period of jazz. The rhythms, patterns and the time signatures change throughout most of the songs. And I absolutely love the way the music continues to move. A four and a half minute piece will play like a ten minute fugue. The music is frantic but it never losses its direction, focus or sound. The music is challenging in the sense that if forces you to pay attention to the constant movement, however it stays very fluid.

The ballad ‘Darkness’ reminded me of what a good composer would write following the blueprint set by Miles’ Modal Jazz period, down to the muted lead trumpet. I guess it’s both accolades to Plaxico that he has the virtuosity to stand up to a Miles joint and Miles too, because imitation is flattery.

Track 4, ‘Short Take’ – The B Section grooves feel good, but some of the trumpet improv work leaves something to be desired. However the saxophone solos in these sections fit in nicely. Very cool!

The tribute to Miles plays like the rest of the album, a very solid blending of bebop and fusion.

Plaxico’s playing is flawless. As the original Liner notes states, “as a bassist, he switches from acoustic to electric bass as needed, without sacrificing either tone or speed.” And also, unlike a Stanley Clarke record, although Lonnie is a bass man, he doesn’t spend much if anytime featuring his bass work. In ‘Paella’, he does show his deftness in a soli section with his tenor man, by playing the opening run with him.

In short, this is a very cool document. All the be-bop to avant-garde to modal to fusion enthusiasts alike will enjoy the variety and virtuosity of this recording.

It is highly recommended and I’m certainly glad that I unearthed this from my collection.

HeadHunters

While digging in my crates, I ran across a recording from a wicked clan from my college days, the Digable Planets. Their debut record, Reachin – A New Refutation of Time & Space, brought back many memories of a time of emerging Black pride in Hip Hop, restless experimentation and interpolation of jazz infused with Hip Hop Beats by groups like A Tribe Called Quest and De La Soul . These groups and their sonic experimentation gave music heads who love Jazz and Hip Hop another kind of Fusion to love.

Two of the bes joints on "Reachin" contain samples from Herbie Hancock's - "HeadHunters" document.

As I remember over the years while reading different reviews about ‘Headhunters’ and Herbie Hancock, I believe it is one of, if not the best selling Jazz album of all time. This wouldn’t shock me at all.

My first experience with ‘Headhunters’ was the song ‘The Chameleon’. My middle school jazz band teacher introduced us to the song as a contest piece. It was the Maynard Ferguson big band version. Fortunately, my teacher was from the old, creative school and didn’t believe in playing pieces as written. There was always added flavoring that highlighted the strengths in the band. He also used the song to teach about the art of the groove. There is no bass line like the one from ‘The Chameleon’! It’s infectious and funky!

The long form musical composition is a lost art form in music - even Jazz. I blame TV and the “instant generation”. Seems the attention spans have gotten short over the years…and continue to get shorter. I bring up this point because the opening piece of this document clocks in at 15:41 seconds. The beauty of the length is it never gets boring and as the grooves change, you feel there is no end to the song. In fact, the song doesn’t end traditionally; it just fades away and sounds as if there was more going on.

Hancock and Reed man Bennie Maupin went to great lengths at texturing this document - matching the sounds of the synths with the horns. The texture and layering of Herbie’s ‘Headhunters’ is to Fusion Jazz what Miles’ ‘Kind of Blue’ has been to Modal Jazz – the standard. There’s not one Jazz Fusion document released afterwards that didn’t use the recording as a blueprint.

The reason the record came to remembrance from listening to "Reachin", was its sampling of ‘Watermelon Man’, which to me, is an ode to lazy day on the beach on some West Indian island. The groove that is this record seems to warm me up like a hot sunny day laying in the shade sipping mad amounts of rum punch - every sip in rhythm.

Percussionist Bill Summers used every trick in his bag to insure a tropical feeling came over the record. For examples of ‘Headhunters’ being the blueprint to Fusion, check for Bill Summers’ ‘Call It What You Want’, record featuring an oft sampled tune, including by the Digable Planets, ‘Summer Fun’.

Herbie himself remarked that, “after ‘Headhunters’ and ‘Thrust’, the Quintet kind of lost their fire”. Subsequent recordings, never reached the level of the first two. I guess that is the peril of creating a classic standard as the debut. I guess this might be another “similarity”, loosely speaking, to his mentor Miles.

For me, musically and sonically, ‘Headhunters’ is one of my most favorite records. When I listen to the tunes, I’m always amazed at how the pure groove keeps me interested and never takes a background. From the bass line on the Chameleon to Vein Meters’ slow infectiousness, there’s not a time when I don’t stop to enjoy this sound.

Jazz

Jazz is different things to different people. It has birthed many styles within the genre and from those styles all other forms of Western music have developed. For me, when Jazz is played at its highest levels, it invokes certain spiritual sensabilities. Jazz is a dialogue; Jazz is stylish; Jazz is intellectual; Jazz is ghetto; Jazz is inspiration; Jazz is walking in the rain with someone you love; Jazz is every shade of blue; Jazz is a storyteller; Jazz is a healer...

I am a purist of sorts. My listening tastes tend to lean toward the likes of Miles, Monk and Mingus - not necessarily in this order, I just dig the alliterative, rhymthic value of the names together - I'm always swingin! But my first jazz musical hero was David Sanborn. When jazz, true to its nature, was searching for new directions, he along with Ronnie Laws and the great Grover Washington, Jr. with his infamous ‘Mr. Magic’ captured my attention and my love for the music and its history. Even Miles stepped into the contemporary arena. If you’ve never heard ‘Tutu’ or ‘Amandla’ then you need to hit the record store immediately.

While I choose to listen mostly to swing, I’m not beyond listening to and enjoying some contemporar-ians with what I call traditionalist vibes. My love for Sanborn et al. encouraged me to search for their predecesors. There, I discovered a new love for Herbie Hancock and Chick Corea fresh out of their stints with Miles and discovering what synthisizers could do for Jazz sonically.

Here is where I'll write about the music I love. Dialogue with the people who too love the music. And share...That is what Jazz was meant to do.