Customer Reviews

Modern Jazz Stars (24bt)

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This is a great CD, in two respects it is wonderful, and in a third, the best ever.

First - Nostalgia - We read that jazz was once the music of the masses, in the days of Duke, Glen Miller, Benny, etc., but, at least for me, the sonic evidence usually does not bring that time to my consciousness. But this record does. This disc is a compilation of performances by various unidentified bands issued by Modern Records, but, from the album cover, and from other Modern Records releases, it is possible to identify some of the players, and they are the top guys, Wardell Gray, Jim Guiffre, Ben Webster, Howard McGee, and others. Many of the cuts are from live recordings. Modern Records had just released a live recording by this band - Wardell Gray, Erroll Garner, Vido Musso,, Arnold Ross, Red Callender, Harry Babison, Irving Ashby, Barney Kessell, Vic Dickenson, Jackie Mills, Don Lamond, Howard McGhee and Ernie Royal (how's that for a lineup?) and probably some cuts from that performance are on this CD. On the live recordings, you can hear the infectious crowd enthusiasm, and the shouts of encouragement from the band, as the soloists take flight. This CD gives you the `you are there' feeling. The arrangments are very loose, so, while there may be several horns in a band, they do not play en masse but rather in twos and threes for a harmonically complex and satisfyingly rhythmically free sound.

Now let me editorialize - reality is becoming less real, as you read this review you are not where you are - you have a physical location given by coordinates x and y, but, mentally you are in cyberspace. Your locale has disappeared. In our time, the reality of location, and along with it reality itself, is evaporating into cyberspace. Compare the political conventions of today, homogonized pre-processed pap for the electronic masses, to the wheeling-dealing political conventions of yesteryear. Modern cyber reality compared to the old location specific reality. I am nostalgic for the old reality, and this is one of the few discs that pulls me into it.

Second - this CD has some great tunes, great ensemble performances, and great solos. The tune `Why Not' is a version of Tadd Dameron's `Hot House', retitled for contractural reasons, that features a loose ensemble statement of the theme, and then many choruses of superfine tenor soloing by Wardell Gray.

Third - the CD contains one of the best ever recordings of a ballad, and a great mystery. `Deep Purple' is a live recording by an unidentified tenor player. The tenor sax ballad is a bromide, but, where are the great recorded examples? I have three nominees for greatest ballad ever recorded, Sonny's `God Bless the Child', Fathead's `Ain't Misbehavin', and X's `Deep Purple', and, if forced, I'd probably have to put `Deep Purple' on top. The playing is simple, there are no arpeggios, and yet every line in the tune is reshaped to bring your attention to the moment, to the player's intent. In a live performance, each second can be subdivided into 1000 instants, and there are infinite possiblities of when a note is started, how it is attacked, bent, how long it is held, and each one carries a different meaning. Over the course of a tune, millions of choices, and X made the right ones every time. (Needless to say - if you have any idea who X is email me immediately).

No comment on the price.