Miroslav Vitous

[catesta]

Today while driving and listening to XM radio I hear a tune being played titled "Tramp Blues". It was Miroslav Vitous off this cd from 2003.

Universal Syncopations

It's sounds real good to me.

According to AMG this is his first jazz release since 1992.

Any thoughts/recommendations on this cd and the man?

Edited October 7, 2004 by catesta

[A Lark Ascending]

Lookee here...

http://www.organissimo.org/forum/index.php...miroslav+vitous

[catesta]

Thanks Bev. I did a search before stating the theard, but only went back a few months, silly me. B-)

[Free For All]

...and how the hell do you pronounce his name?

Is it MEER-o-slov vi-TOOSE?

[7/4]

...and how the hell do you pronounce his name?

Is it MEER-o-slov vi-TOOSE?

I think that's it.

[couw]

why, it's just Miroslav Vitous

Meer-os-law Vee-too-s

Twy to pronounce a weal "R" and pronounce the latter "-too" shorter than usual.

(and don't overdo it on the "eeeeee"'s either)

[GregK]

I love this album. I highly recommend it. Just listen to Chick Corea's piano on track 2. Beautiful playing

[Guest akanalog]

an album not mentioned in the longer vitous thread that i like is his album "magical shepherd" from around 1976. it also features herbie hancock, airto and jack dejohnette (he is only on like half the tracks-replaced by the more rote james gadson). this album has some good space-y funk on it. there are some female vocals and vitous plays this weird e-bass/e-guitar hybrid thing he made so he can play bass lines and lead guitar lines. this album is available on CD-check it out if you like this kind of stuff.

he has an album on arista which is pretty decent called "majesty music". this isn't available on CD. it is from 1975 or so and it is pretty interesting though not essential. lenny white drums on some songs and he is the only musician i can remember right now. i think the sax player is featured a lot and he is perhaps a czech compatriot of vitous. this album is better than "miroslav" which is on freedom from the same time period and has a smaller cast and features too much vitous arco for my tastes and is available on CD.

am i the only person who doesn't really like arco playing?

if you do like arco playing...check out vitous on larry coryell's "spaces". vitous is featured prominently. he even gets a version of "gloria's steps" mostly to himself solo-wise.

[GloriousBlues]

I like that CD a lot. One day I was listening to it at work, though, and guy came in to talk to me. When he head the music he asked, "You have muzak in your office?"

Obviously I wasn't listening to elevator music, but at first listen, with all that reverb on the saxophone, it does sound kinda whimpy.

ANyways, now I just listen to it at home and in the car.

[Guest akanalog]

who has heard garbarek's new one? that is muzak.

[king ubu]

Funny I just moved that disc on top of my listening pile - I liked it a lot when I heard it the last time.

ubu

[Shrdlu]

I was amazed when I read an interview with Joe Zawinul in which he weally panned Miroslav. I greatly admire Joe, but I strongly disagree. For me, Miroslav is one of the all-time greats on the bass. It's not just his early work, when he appeared like a meteor; he has been consistently good.

[Free For All]

I was amazed when I read an interview with Joe Zawinul in which he weally panned Miroslav.

Is that twue? That's not vewy nice.

[catesta]

I was amazed when I read an interview with Joe Zawinul in which he weally panned Miroslav.

Is that twue? That's not vewy nice.

Soundtrack

Madame Von Schtupp of Blazing Saddles fame.

Sorry, I couldn't resist.

[Free For All]

[Guest akanalog]

ubu-you mean you like the new garbarek? i am open to discussion since i just listened to soundbites. but it sounded like some canned cheesy electronic drumbeats behind some smooth keening saxaphone from my listen.

and yes, i remember zawinul really laying into vitous, saying he didn't have that funky thing weather report was looking for. i think he almost made it racial, which is ironic based on his own racial heritage and the eventual hiring of jaco (who was not too funky or soulful in my book, actually...) but i guess that is where alphonso johnson came in post-vitous. from my end, i often enjoy european bassists and vitous is no exception though i am not a big fan of the bow. i have heard some 1971 weather report live material where vitous is really laying down some funky but edgy lines.

[mikeweil]

Zawinul acts like a primadonna, every now and then. Remember his reaction when "Mr. Gone" - really not one of Weather Reports grand albums - got a one-star-review in down beat?

If you listen to Miroslav's series of quartet LPs for ECM with John Surman, where he redoes some tunes written for the first WR albums, you get the idea that a lot more of that band's early sound was Vitous than most of us thought. Shorter is the kind of personality that can step back when taking part in somebody's vision - Vitous will not. He is just as strong as a composer and arranger as Zawinul.

Magical Shepherd is available on Wounded Bird Records - certainly not erybody's cup of tzea, but one of my favourite space funk records.

[king ubu]

ubu-you mean you like the new garbarek? i am open to discussion since i just listened to soundbites. but it sounded like some canned cheesy electronic drumbeats behind some smooth keening saxaphone from my listen.

Will have to listen to it again, but yes, I quite liked it.

There's thread about it somewhere in the new releases part of the board.

Mike, that's one of the ugliest covers ever made!

ubu

[mikeweil]

Mike, that's one of the ugliest covers ever made!

I like it - the classical attributaries of the artist, like on an autoportrait of a Renaissance painter: a skull, a book, a candle, a mortar ...

[mikeweil]

I have heard some 1971 weather report live material where vitous is really laying down some funky but edgy lines.

Most musicians - and fans alike - expect funk to have repeating bass lines - ostinatos. Miroslav's bass lines were funky, but he changed the all the time, no two bars are played exactly the same way, even on his funky Shepherd album pictured above. I have found out many people have difficulties relating to that concept of playing all variations of the bass riff - I find it thrilling. But many musicians have trouble keeping the groove when you start to play variations of funky stuff in the ryhthm section. Guess they have to watch out too much and have to keep up their own rhythmic senses, and cannot slip that easily into their trance-like state of mind they like to improvise in.

Edited October 9, 2004 by mikeweil

[king ubu]

I have heard some 1971 weather report live material where vitous is really laying down some funky but edgy lines.

Most musicians - and fans alike - expect funk to have repeating bass lines - ostinatos. Miroslav's bass lines were funky, but he changed the all the time, no two bars are played exactly the same way, even on his funky Shepherd album pictured above. I have found out many people have difficulties relating to that concept of playing all variations of the bass riff - I find it thrilling. But many musicians have trouble keeping the groove when you start to play variations of funky stuff in the ryhthm section. Guess they have to watch out too much and have to keep up their own rhythmic senses, and cannot slip that easily into their trance-like state of mind they like to improvise in.

I love that concept of funk bass! I mean I also love a good ostinato if the bass player can groove it, but it gets really interesting once variations start, or if there is no real ostinato there. I just heard Kim Clarke two days ago, two hours of playing, and yes, she did a few simple licks here and there (obviously, as they were playing Hendrix compositions, see this thread), yet she did astonishing things, without EVER getting flashy (unlike all those Weather Report bassists who do get pretty flashy), and she HAS THE GROOVE! (Is Kim Clarke the Goddess of funk bass? I guess so...)

ubu

Edited October 9, 2004 by king ubu

[rockefeller center]

Zawinul acts like a primadonna, every now and then. Remember his reaction when "Mr. Gone" - really not one of Weather Reports grand albums - got a one-star-review in down beat?

Anyone interested in reading this interview (downbeat, Feb. 8, 1979) can download it here.

[rockefeller center]

which is ironic based on his own racial heritage and the eventual hiring of jaco (who was not too funky or soulful in my book, actually...)

What do you consider his bass playing on "Barbary Coast" from "Black Market", for example? You should hear him playing with Wayne Cochran & the C.C. Riders (1972) - very funky.

[Shrdlu]

I was amazed when I read an interview with Joe Zawinul in which he weally panned Miroslav.

Is that twue? That's not vewy nice.

The "weally" relates to Couw's explanation of the pronunciation of his name. It is not a typo.

I also had Elmer Fudd in mind.

[mikeweil]

I just heard Kim Clarke two days ago, two hours of playing, and yes, she did a few simple licks here and there (obviously, as they were playing Hendrix compositions, see this thread), yet she did astonishing things, without EVER getting flashy (unlike all those Weather Report bassists who do get pretty flashy), and she HAS THE GROOVE! (Is Kim Clarke the Goddess of funk bass? I guess so...)

I saw Kim Clarke in double bass backing Joe Henderson on his European tour with all-female backing (Renée Rosnes and Sylvia Cuenca were on piano and drums, all excellent). She was five months pregnant at the time and had to reach even wider over her belly for the bass strings, making it a little uncomfortable, but she swung the band! AFAIR she was with Material or some Jazz/Funk group of musicians as well etc. etc. - one of many underrecorded female jazz musicians.