lee konitz

And oh yeah, 'The Birth of the Cool'...

this is a live date from 1983. recommended.

anyways
anything lee recorded with lennie tristano will be worth hearing, although the sound quality is often poor for such classic records as the toronto [53 i think] cd. the wonderfully warm yet acidic tone [tonewise he copied parker better than anyone, maybe bettered parker at what bird was trying to sound like] is superbly recorded on the "lennie tristano" lp of 1955 - lee leads and solos on 5 out of 9 cuts, i think, on that: all the things you are and you go to my head are so sweet/sharp. those are my favorite recordings by konitz, i think.

apart from birth of the cool lee had two other very important sessions in 1949: the "intuition" recordings with lennie, which are credited in retrospect with prefiguring or outright inventing free jazz; and lee's own first dates as a leader, "subconscious-lee" which is nearly more deserving of the title birth of the cool than the miles sessions, i think, because most cool jazz isn't so well-rehearsed and orchestrated as botc - lots of it sounds more like subconscious-lee, in some ways.

stan kenton's recordings are of course difficult to navigate with a straight face for many, but city of glass / this modern world is a great place to start.

i never felt lee's work with mulligan gelled too well, but i think he's having a great time on the mingus dates he was invited to in the 70s.

''Verve have just this week re-released 'Motion', a fantastic 1961 alb that Konitz made with Elvin Jones (and a bassist whose name I can't recall) - incredible sustained improvisations, and that wonderfully dry, papery Konitz sound.''

got this last week. the name of the bassist is sonny dallas. beautiful improvisations and I think elvin Jones' playing keeps you on yr toes. I almost think he's gonna break the structure apart at times, he creates some wonderful moments of tension with Konitz and the bass is a wonderful link. At least that's what i got from the one listen so far.

Saw him last night in two settings: a wonderful quartet with Baron, Gress and Frisell (holy shit Sundar!!! you are so right -- this guy might be the greatest living guitarist), and an awful duet with Paul Bley. Seriously: Paul Bley: FUCK YOU, you are an asshole. Fucking awful overplaying indulgent mofo. no wonder annette left your ass.

But man: KONITZ. What a tone. What an absolute TITAN of the alto.

1. Parker
2. Coleman
3 Konitz

EVERBOdY ELSE

The encore was Frisell/Konitz duet and quite frankly I could live the rest of my days inside the music made by the two of them together. Almost wish the whole program was just that duet...

I never did get a hold of any more records with Sonny Dallas on them. But one thing's for sure- he never drops the ball on Motion.

rec: lone-lee.

EVERBOdY ELSE

-- Stormy Davis (electrifyingmoj...), January 29th, 2005."

You gotta go at least five deep: Johnny Hodges! Benny Carter!

Anyway, I've been really enjoying Subconscious-Lee. I couldn't parse this stuff when I was in jazz school for some reason, and even kind of turned my nose up at it. I had a big black/white jazz musician complex back then so that might have been the problem.

You're probably talking about "authenticity" issues, but [veering off topic here; I blame insomnia] race has been more a problem for listeners and promoters than for the actual musicians. I'll bet Benny Goodman took some flack for his integrated small groups in the 30's, and Charlie Parker would sometimes try to pass off Red Rodney as an albino during tours of the south a decade later.

The one example I can think of from a musician's standpoint is Charles Tyler quitting Albert Ayler's group over the impromptu hiring of Michel Samson one night in Cleveland, mentioned here.

Right. It wasn't that I wouldn't listen to white musicians, but only white musicians I felt could "swing" properly. I thought the Tristano school was all about some esoteric academic approach (which it was in a way, I guess) and that somehow diminished it as jazz. But I'm talking about me in high school, maybe early in college, that's all.

race has been more a problem for listeners and promoters than for the actual musicians

I'd imagine it was more of a problem for some in the 60s, when you had the increasing prevalence of black political movements. I have also heard one or two white musicians gripe about some big name black bandleaders today supposedly favoring black musicians. It always sounded like sour grapes to me, so I never paid it much mind.

BTW, I just read that Tristano apparently didn't like strong drummers, which might be another reason I didn't initially respond to Tristano-school records.

Inside Hi-Fi is worth a mention here. It's a delightfully simple album that swings hard and with some gorgeous lyricism.