Date: Fri, 28 Jun 2002 11:22:36 -0500 From: Robert Pleshar <rpleshar@midway.uchicago.edu>
Is any musician / composer ever creatively relevant (or whatever we want to call it) for their whole career? (Excepting those who quit or die young)
Should we expect Brotzmann, Parker, et al to do anything different really? Why? It's true that when they started they were breaking new ground and that "free-jazz" is as solidified of a genre as hard-bop or trad or whatever, but so what? Dizzy Gillespie did his thing his whole life, why should it be different for Evan Parker or Mick Jagger? Can't we just say Brotzmann is a great free-jazz stylist and his style is popular?
This is one big difference. Jagger and the Stones have been on autopilot for decades now and they'll always have a huge fanbase who doesn't care whether they crank out the same, forgettable records each time. Someone like Cecil Taylor (minus the huge fanbase of course) doesn't work the same way. He's always challenged his audience and he always will. If that in itself is being repitious, so be it- that still means that whatever he releases nowadays will still be more interesting than whatever next Stones record sounds like. Of course, that won't stop me from seeing this Stones during their tour this fall, cranking out the same old hits. I respect innovation but I also dig history! Best, Jason -- Perfect Sound Forever online music magazine perfect-sound@furious.com http://www.perfectsoundforever.com
on 6/28/02 11:51 AM, Perfect Sound Forever at perfect-sound@furious.com wrote:
Someone like Cecil Taylor (minus the huge fanbase of course) doesn't work the same way. He's always challenged his audience and he always will. If that in itself is being repitious, so be it- that still means that whatever he releases nowadays will still be more interesting than whatever next Stones record sounds like.
If he's servicing his ongoing constituency by challenging them largely the same way every time out of the box, how can it be that he's not doing what the Stones are doing, except with a much higher degree of quality control throughout his presentation? skip h
skip Heller wrote:
on 6/28/02 11:51 AM, Perfect Sound Forever at perfect-sound@furious.com wrote:
Someone like Cecil Taylor (minus the huge fanbase of course) doesn't work the same way. He's always challenged his audience and he always will. If that in itself is being repitious, so be it- that still means that whatever he releases nowadays will still be more interesting than whatever next Stones record sounds like.
If he's servicing his ongoing constituency by challenging them largely the same way every time out of the box, how can it be that he's not doing what the Stones are doing, except with a much higher degree of quality control throughout his presentation?
Hi Skip, It's not the same because he's challenging his audience DIFFERENTLY each time out though still challening them each time neverthless. If he did come out with a record that sounded like the last one, THAT in itself would be radical (though likely an unwelcome) change for him, not to mention totally against everything he's worked for. Maybe a simpler way to explain this is to say that you would expect a Cecil record to be challenging each time and it is. That is in itself is not a surprise. What is surprising is how he challenges you each time. Best, Jason -- Perfect Sound Forever online music magazine perfect-sound@furious.com http://www.perfectsoundforever.com
on 6/28/02 12:08 PM, Perfect Sound Forever at perfect-sound@furious.com wrote:
It's not the same because he's challenging his audience DIFFERENTLY each time out though still
I don't see it that way. The instruments might vary, but the context throughout is user-friendly to the Cecil consumer.
challening them each time neverthless. If he did come out with a record that sounded like the last one, THAT in itself would be radical (though likely an unwelcome) change for him, not to mention totally against everything he's worked for.
Maybe a simpler way to explain this is to say that you would expect a Cecil record to be challenging each time and it is. That is in itself is not a surprise. What is surprising is how he challenges you each time.
I don't feel challenged by him. Entertained, very much so. he's fantastic. but i think being a cecil fan is like being a humphrey bogart fan. he has a definite stock in trade, his craftmanship is flawless, and he pretty much does the same job every time out -- splendidly. The challenge is in being edward g. robinson -- being little caesar -- who you hate -- one minute, a henpecked husband -- who you root for -- the next, and getting people to believe you equally both times as much. skip h (who thinks ornette colemen would issue more of a challenge to his audience playing on a diana krall record than he would by playing with dave douglas)
for Evan Parker or Mick Jagger? Can't we just say Brotzmann is a great free-jazz stylist and his style is popular?
This is one big difference. Jagger and the Stones have been on autopilot for decades
Is this really true? I had never heard a Stones record like 'Has anybody seen my baby' before, and I was shcoked that they rediscovered 'Like a rolling stone' after 35 years of the original release. If you really think The Stones are on autopilot, is there that much of a difference to the works of Brotzman. To me, he belongs to 'the ramones-league' of free music, as the loudest and most Germanly stubborn of all macho reed players for 33 caricatural years on end.
now and they'll always have a huge fanbase who doesn't care whether they crank out the same, forgettable records each time. Someone like Cecil Taylor (minus the huge fanbase of course) doesn't work the same way. I have always felt that Cecil Taylor advanced his music in the same way Thelonious Monk did: doing the same material over and over again. In the process, he's redefining only tiny bits to a degree that makes his body of work worthwhile to his 'fanbase' (include me in there, when talking solo and duo performances, I don't get most of his group work).
In the 'rock icon world' I always felt the live Bob Dylan worked, and still works in this vein of 'small changes and non-progressing'-circle. I suspect this very aspect might be applicable to the body of work of the Stones, too. I have no knowledge about the Stones' live output. So I can't really tell whether this same phenomenon works for them, making 250 seemingly the same bootlegs 'worth' getting (as with Monk, Dylan, Grateful Dead, Hendrix, Coltrane, Dolphy, Zappa or Phish). Regards, Remco Takken
on 6/28/02 12:43 PM, Remco Takken at r.takken@planet.nl wrote:
In the 'rock icon world' I always felt the live Bob Dylan worked, and still works in this vein of 'small changes and non-progressing'-circle.
Regards, Remco Takken
You wanna comment on the EMPIRE BURLESQUE era as having worked, go for it. But I don't think anyone's gonna back you up. sh
So I can't really tell whether this same phenomenon works for them, making 250 seemingly the same bootlegs 'worth' getting (as with Monk, Dylan, Grateful Dead, Hendrix, Coltrane, Dolphy, Zappa or Phish).
I never did understand this phenomenon. I can see the relevance for a scholar to compare the nuisances of any of these said musicians, but for most listeners (including many musicians and more than "casual" listeners in the bunch) the bootlegs are pretty much the same. Hearing different covers is one thing, but 100s of versions of the same tune!?! It could be something that I will never understand. Zach
on 6/28/02 4:01 PM, Zachary Steiner at zsteiner@butler.edu wrote:
So I can't really tell whether this same phenomenon works for them, making 250 seemingly the same bootlegs 'worth' getting (as with Monk, Dylan, Grateful Dead, Hendrix, Coltrane, Dolphy, Zappa or Phish).
I never did understand this phenomenon. I can see the relevance for a scholar to compare the nuisances of any of these said musicians, but for most listeners (including many musicians and more than "casual" listeners in the bunch) the bootlegs are pretty much the same. Hearing different covers is one thing, but 100s of versions of the same tune!?! It could be something that I will never understand.
Zach
Good point, but not universal. It relies on stuff like personnel -- is it the same guys coming fr the same approach etc -- and other agencies of musical change. In the case of the above-listed artists, I generally agree (except about Monk, but that's my fetish). But, with Charlie Parker, of whom there are thousands of tapes with nearly as many different combinations of players, there's a million really different Bb blues or rhythm changes variations, and it's pretty much worth hearing as a rule, and, because of the instability of personnel, pretty different throughout. skip h NP: Gene Ammons greatest hits
Ummm, did you mean "nuances" rather than "nuisances"? In my own case with King Crimson, I can offer a pretty simple answer, and one which probably applies in greater and lesser degrees to every artist in the list you quoted: Every single show included a great deal of improvisation - with Coltrane and Dolphy and Hendrix, the solos from night to night; with Phish and the Dead (and Crimson), long instrumental stretches between the set pieces, not to mention the covers as you did; with Zappa and Dylan largely the ever-changing set list but also rearrangements spontaneously conceived on the fly. In 1973-74, Crimson might improvise 40-60% of any given show - completely new music that would never be duplicated precisely - and even the feel, soloing and arrangements of the set pieces from their albums could change dramatically (even lyrics were subject to change, particularly in early versions of "In the Court of the Crimson King" in '69 and "Starless" in '74). That's why I'll never pass up a chance to grab a show I don't have from those years in particular. We're not talking about Janet Jackson's pre-programmed shows or even Genesis doing a note-perfect replication of "In the Cage." A hundred versions of "Easy Money" will vary as much as the moods and disciplines of four men on any given show might conceivably vary; a hundred versions of Coltrane and Dolphy playing "India" will be as different as a hundred days from a given year. Steve Smith ssmith36@sprynet.com NP - Sonny Sharrock, "Monkey-Pockie-Boo," 'Monkey-Pockie-Boo' (BYG Actuel/Sunspots) -----Original Message----- From: zorn-list-admin@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:zorn-list-admin@mailman.xmission.com]On Behalf Of Zachary Steiner Sent: Friday, June 28, 2002 7:02 PM
So I can't really tell whether this same phenomenon works for them, making 250 seemingly the same bootlegs 'worth' getting (as with Monk, Dylan, Grateful Dead, Hendrix, Coltrane, Dolphy, Zappa or Phish).
I never did understand this phenomenon. I can see the relevance for a scholar to compare the nuisances of any of these said musicians, but for most listeners (including many musicians and more than "casual" listeners in the bunch) the bootlegs are pretty much the same. Hearing different covers is one thing, but 100s of versions of the same tune!?! It could be something that I will never understand.
So I can't really tell whether this same phenomenon works for them, making 250 seemingly the same bootlegs 'worth' getting (as with Monk, Dylan, Grateful Dead, Hendrix, Coltrane, Dolphy, Zappa or Phish).
I never did understand this phenomenon. I can see the relevance for a scholar to compare the nuisances
Typo? I first read it as "nuances," but "nuisances" is a pretty interesting slantĀ Jon M.
of any of these said musicians, but for most listeners (including many musicians and more than "casual" listeners in the bunch) the bootlegs are pretty much the same. Hearing different covers is one thing, but 100s of versions of the same tune!?! It could be something that I will never understand.
I understand this phenomenon, although I don't really indulge in it beyond a few Coltrane boots. The Dead are probably the best example: their idiom was a sorta improv-rock hybrid with spotty results. I don't care for the Grateful Dead myself, but when they were on, they were really on, and of course for a dedicated fan, the "really on" moments are not so few and far between. Most of your list is performers known for improvising, generally in some sort of extended context, and the boot lover is after those really hot moments. I work with a guy who is a fanatical Who fan, to an almost pathological degree, and he has thousands of Who bootlegs, concert films, etc, spends all of his free time getting more such things, and so on. (Needless to say, he's heartbroken at the moment). It seems weird to me that he has no interest in even the Who's contemporaries - it's all Who, all the time. At 06:01 PM 6/28/2002 -0500, Zachary Steiner wrote:
So I can't really tell whether this same phenomenon works for them, making 250 seemingly the same bootlegs 'worth' getting (as with Monk, Dylan, Grateful Dead, Hendrix, Coltrane, Dolphy, Zappa or Phish).
I never did understand this phenomenon. I can see the relevance for a scholar to compare the nuisances of any of these said musicians, but for most listeners (including many musicians and more than "casual" listeners in the bunch) the bootlegs are pretty much the same. Hearing different covers is one thing, but 100s of versions of the same tune!?! It could be something that I will never understand.
Zach
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Chris Selvig
On Fri, 28 Jun 2002 14:51:01 -0400 Perfect Sound Forever wrote:
This is one big difference. Jagger and the Stones have been on autopilot for decades
And you don't think that a lot of improv these days is also on autopilot? Is the fact that not the same notes at repeated at every show sufficient to challenge an audience? I almost feel that a lot of improv these days is predictable in its... unpredictabilaty, the same way that white noise is unpredictable mathematically speaking, but after a few minutes, you don't expect anything new (you can skip the second set, you have collected enough data during the first one to predict the outcome of the second). Patrice.
participants (8)
-
Chris Selvig -
Jon Mooneyham -
Patrice L. Roussel -
Perfect Sound Forever -
Remco Takken -
skip Heller -
Steve Smith -
Zachary Steiner