Larry Kart

Best wishes. And don't let this place get you down.

You've got a treat coming.

And how about Walter Page!

Don't know about that one, but Woody Herman had a chart where the head was pretty much the solo Lester played on "Pound Cake." "Cousins" by John Coppola. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKIJEzl1CP0

The Cy Touff-Richie Kamuca line "Prez-ence" (on the 1955 Pacific Jazz album "Cy Touff, His Octet and Quintet") is based on Lester Young's solo on "You're Driving Me Crazy" (Aladdin). I believe that several Tristano-school lines (I'm thinking of Ted Brown, in particular) are similarly based on Pres solos but can't think of titles right now. Not quite the same thing, but on "On Stage -- The Bill Perkins Octet," the performances of "Song of the Islands" and "Let Me See" incorporate ensemble settings of Pres' solos on those Basie Band recordings. Similarly, the Woody Herman First Herd recording of "I've Got News For You," recorded Dec. 24, 1947 incorporates a splendidly played and scored (by Ralph Burns, not Shorty Rogers, to whom it long had been credited) sax section-setting for Bird's solo on take three of "Dark Shadows" recorded Feb. 19, 1947). "I've Got News For You" almost certainly was the inspiration for SuperSax.

I'm far from a Monday expert, but IMO there's a lot of pretty intense stuff happening there per unit of time. And she means it.

Creepy, sure, but it tells the story it aims to tell.

Now this IMO is another story: and for fairly clear reasons, no?

I have thought about it, Jim, and while I don't have a problem with Spalding being as popular as she can be, if I'm at all equipped to get what each of them is up to here, I think Bieber"s "One Less Lonely Girl" is a good deal more successful instance of what it aims to be than that Spalding's "Crayola" is of what it aims to be. The former is the musical equivalent of a pack of Chuckles (are they still around?) -- a slick, sugary experience that's over in a few minutes, is not good for your teeth, and (dropping the Chuckles analogy) tells a story. The latter is eight or so fairly long minutes of fairly bland noodling -- nothing I think that one would choose to pay much attention to unless one was told that it has to be Spalding or Bieber ... and why does it have to be? Are you saying that because Spalding is jazzy and Bieber is boyish-pop, that this in itself makes her better? I would think that runs counter to a whole lot of stuff you've said here in recent years.

And could Deion Sanders have covered Deion Sanders?

Right -- anyone's merits as an artist are beside the point.

I was talking to Alvin Fielder once and mentioned "the young drummer Mike Reed." Alvin's response was something like "he's in his thirties at least, so he's an old guy now!" and proceeded to ask whether there were any real young (under 23) drummers making a splash, and I actually couldn't think of any. Yes, Mike is in his mid-30s, but of very worthwhile drummers I know and get to hear a good deal, Marc Riordan (also an excellent pianist) is 29, and Dylan Ryan is 27. Other notable youngish players I'm aware of are altoist Nick Mazzarella (27), trumpeter Jaimie Branch (27) and Brooklyn-based trumpeter Jacob Wick (26).

Chicago ain't the world. Hell, Chicago ain't even America. It might be a toddlin' town, but it's a totterin' world elsewhere. Didn't say Chicago was the world or even America, but it ain't nothing, aesthetically and otherwise, and has been something for about the last fifteen years. As I see it, the reasons for this are perhaps fairly simple in principle but tricky in practice -- DIY presenters who are mostly musicians themselves and who really do "curate" things, fairly and around core, shared-but-broad musical principles (which encourages audiences that have been trained or led by being exposed to what they've already heard to take chances on players and music they don't yet know, which then in many cases becomes music they will seek out); decent places where those presenters can present things without any or any significant interference; all or almost all receipts go right to the players; a city where players can find neighborhoods to live in and where day jobs (if that's your route and/or need) can be found as well. And no doubt many more things -- all of them intertwined, and perhaps more delicately intertwined and balanced than I want to think about. Aside from the somewhat (though not solely) given quality of the players -- "not solely" because I've seen a good many already good players come here in the last decade or more and become better very rapidly because of who they interact with here and because of the scene's sound communal ethos -- the key factor I think is those DIY presenters, guys like Mike Reed and Josh Berman at The Hungry Brain, Dave Rempis at Elastic, Mitch (I'm blanking on his last name) at The Hideout, Frank Rosaly and Nick Mazarella at The Skylark, Jeff Kimmel at Heaven Gallery, etc., etc. How well they do the often difficult things they do, and how much seemingly ego-free energy they put into doing it when (except for Mitch, who doesn't play I don't think) they're all very active musically themselves, is kind of mind-boggling. Can any of this be transferred (in any sense) elsewhere? I have no idea. But it has been working for some time. P.S. About a year-and-half ago, some bigwigs from the Doris Duke Foundation came to town to mount a symposium on how to "save" jazz in Chicago (or some version of that topic). Maybe a hundred or so interested types (some invited by the DDF, others invited by those who already had been invited) gathered at tables at a downtown venue to talk and share (actually, it was more like "share") ideas for many hours, And what turned out to be almost comically force-fed (if not merely faked-up) key conclusion that the DDF people told us we had collectively reached? Chicago needed to build its own version of Jazz at Lincoln Center, a big, modern, centrally located edifice where concerts could be presented. Aiee!! Further, someone involved told me how much money it cost to put together this (at best) pointless symposium -- I think it was about $400,000. Imagine what could have happened in a single year (in terms of works commissioned, interesting bands/players brought in from elsewhere, special concerts mounted, etc., etc.) if that money instead was put in the hands of the people who already knew what they were doing. But, no -- the goal was to reinvent the wheel; or rather, to pretend that one was interested in wheels when one was really interested in edifices, power, and staff salaries.

Nobody stopping you these days unless what you're talking about is wanting to do other things instead. I do know a lot of very good young players who play jazz a whole lot of the time -- and not in a self-consciously "in the tradition" manner. Now if you're talking about the importance of there being a "scene" of some sort to bounce off of, absolutely -- and these players do have one. Chicago -- that toddlin' town.

Yes, gifted -- but not "precociously" so when someone is already 26. Speaking only of bassists, Scott La Faro was dead at age 25, Albert Stinson at 24. Also, leaving short life-spans aside, look at any list of notable jazz musicians and see how much many of them had accomplished by age 26. Chinen's "precociously" is P.R. talk. Lee Morgan -- now he was precocious. Bix recorded "Singin' the Blues" when he was 24. Pres recorded "Shoe Shine Boy"/"Lady Be Good" when he was 25. Earl Hines was 25 and Louis Armstrong 27 when they recorded "Weatherbird Rag." Lee Konitz was 21 when he recorded with Miles' Birth of the Cool band; Davis was 22. And on and on.

In today's NY Times, Nate Chinen refers to Spalding as "the precociously gifted, 26-year-old bassist." Precocious? At Spalding's age, Clifford Brown was dead. A little perspective please.

What's your opinion of Goldie Hawn? Reportedly, she smells bad, doesn't bathe very often.

Spalding in my experience (and I have heard her "live") is not-unpleasant and does have talent, but she strikes me as a lightweight at best. The media response to her music and her image, and this vote in particular, seem to me to be a latter-day form of Wynton-itis.

Haven't seen it in years and don't know what I'd think of it now, but the only that got under my skin IIRC was "Annie Hall." And I attribute a good deal of that to the vintage kookiness/charm of Diane Keaton.

Is it too much/too wrong to put early Chet Baker in here as well? In Jeoren de Valk's very sound Baker bio (sound in itself and also by contrast with James Gavin's "Deep In A Dream"), de Valk writes: "Critics compare the early Chet Baker with Bix Beiderbecke and Bobby Hackett. Even if there are similarities between these white trumpeters, there can be no question of influence. Chet [in his mid-teens] was already a fan of contemporary be-bop and took no interest in older jazz. 'I never heard that much about Bix ... Bobby Hackett doesn't go far enough for me. He plays the melody nicely, but there was not much real improvisation in his playing..., If I had to play that way every night, I would die of boredom inside of a month. (The Wire, Nov. 1985.)" OTOH and FWIW De Valk quotes Carol Baker as saying that Chet's father, who played western swing (banjo and guitar), "was a big fan of Jack Teagarden." The young Chet did sing on the radio with his father's band. I would say that Chet was just one of the world's ear players (although in his case that "just" is huge).

There was a mini-school of those bebop-Bobby Hackett guys, all of whom I think knew each other fairly well -- Ferrara, Joseph, Phil Sunkel, perhaps Tony Fruscella, John Carisi, John Wilson (who recorded early on with Jimmy Raney) probably a few others. John Eardley? -- maybe but not quite. I'm not saying they were bebop-Bobby Hackett guys in terms of actual origin, just that it sometimes sounded as though they were. Joseph and Fruscella were superb at their best; Ferrara I liked a lot, though he was so saxophonish/Tristano-ish at times that he could seem a bit at odds with his instrument.

Allen -- Margaret has no power to "quash" any discussion here; she was responding to you sarcastically -- sarcasm being a mode that is somehow unfamiliar to you? (That Margaret is an interested party here is clear; we can all make of that what we will.) Speaking of sarcasm -- perhaps you and 7/4 are old acquaintances who poke at each other quite freely, but on the face of it, your "When was the last gig you worked, David?" was well over the line of incivility. Stop it.

Re: What Jim said. By now, it's all about decayed politics (cultural/social, etc.) and would-be power operations of some sort, with the would-be factor paramount. We demand reparations from Al Hirt!

The early 1950s? How about (in the '20s) Bix, Teschemacher, Teagarden, Bud Freeman, Pee Wee Russell, Dave Tough -- etc. and ad absurdum?

Good thing this came up -- my Dec. 21 order arrived today.