Bill Evans-Complete Village Vanguard 1961

[JSngry]

Adam Gopnik of The New Yorker wrote of Evans’s playing in these recordings, “They are as close to pure emotion, produced without impediments - not at all the same thing as an entire self poured out without inhibitions, the bebop dream - as exists in music.”

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I find this statement to be troubling, and perhaps even outright bullshit.

[GregK]

I think I added it up a week or two ago and it came out to about 160 minutes with the new material.  But given the track lengths it couldn't be split onto just two CDs.

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Disc 3 is just over 36 min long

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The Japanese releases I have lists the 3 CDs as: 49:29,64:21.39:31 Total 152:81

@ CDs each 76:40, Is this incorrect ?

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I'm just going on memory-that timing for disc 3 is probably correct

[skeith]

I picked up the box and compared it to my japanese VICJ of Waltz for Debby.

What follows are first impressions, but the result of carefull listening:

the first thing I noticed is that the background noise ("tape hiss"?)on the box is almost nonexistent. The entire background on the box is darker, blanker, quieter. Not sure whether this has an effect on the rest of the sound.

and so is the crowd noise - it seems diminished and more in the background- which surprised me cause I thought this is something they emphasized in the box.

Also Motian drums are mostly in both speakers on the VICJ , but usually on one speaker on the box.

Some tracks which have clipped beginnings on Waltz for Debby also have it on the box, which is somewhat of a disappointment.

Whether you like one or the other version may depend on your rig and your ears, but they certainly are diffferent.

More later.

[RDK]

I picked up the box and compared it to my japanese VICJ of Waltz for Debby.

What follows are first impressions, but the result of carefull listening:

the first thing I noticed is that the background noise ("tape hiss"?)on the box is almost nonexistent.  The entire background on the box is darker, blanker, quieter.  Not sure whether this has an effect on the rest of the sound.

and so is the crowd noise - it seems diminished and more in the background- which surprised me cause I thought this is something they emphasized in the box.

Also Motian drums are mostly in both speakers on the VICJ , but usually on one speaker on the box.

Some tracks which have clipped beginnings on Waltz for Debby also have it on the box, which is somewhat of a disappointment.

Whether you like one or the other version may depend on your rig and your ears, but they certainly are diffferent.

More later.

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Hopefully they didn't use much/any NR on it - it'd be disappointing if they did.

I recently A-B'd (something I rarely do) the XRCD and a Jpn mini-LP of "Sunday" and I was really surprised by the difference in tonalities. A lot of EQ'ing and one (I think it was the XRCD) inserted a second or two of silence between tracks instead of the audience ambience edits of the other version.

[skeith]

RDK,

Not sure about noise reduction. It is not mentioned in the liners as having been used.

after my message of yesterday I listened also to the XRCD versus the box and I think the XRCD and box are closer in sound than the mini lp and the box.

DO you prefer the mini-lp or XRCD?

[skeith]

Japanese released it on 3 CDs,could have fit on 2. Must be money.

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Before you get all conspiratorial and go on about the evils of capitalism, I should point out that at every single retail outlet in NYC where I priced the box versus the 2 cds, the box came out cheaper. I presume that is true online.

[skeith]

On further listening I am beginning to think the sound is better on the box than it is on the VICJ and the XRCD, so after some initial trepidation- i recommend this box.

Yes the announcement are difficult to hear, but I like the idea of preserving the original sets in order - so that's a bonus.

Wish they had included copies of the original covers, which are two of my favorites, but they did not.

[jazzbo]

Thanks for the reviews skeith and G A. . . I ordered this from cduniverse this week and am looking forward to the set. I only have this material on the Riverside box set, and will enjoy the sonic upgrade and the presentation.

[Michael Fitzgerald]

For the record, the 12-CD Riverside boxed set *does* have this material in the exact order of recording, just like the new 3-CD set.

It lacks one track (the new Gloria's Step) and the announcements.

Mik

[skeith]

YOu are welcome Lon, I think you are going to be happy with this. I was reluctant at first to buy this material again, but I am pleased with this box.

You are right Mike, but I suspect that the sound on this new box is much better.

[J.A.W.]

Has anyone compared the redbook layers of the (admittedly expensive) Analogue Productions hybrid SACDs of Waltz for Debby and Sunday at the Village Vanguard to the same material in the box yet?

I compared them to the 20-bit K2 remastered XRCDs and mini-LP CDs I used to own; to my ears the redbook layers of the SACDs sounded so much better, less bright and fatiguing.

Edited September 17, 2005 by J.A.W.

[tjobbe]

Has anyone compared the redbook layers of the (admittedly expensive) Analogue Productions hybrid SACDs of Waltz for Debby and Sunday at the Village Vanguard to the same material in the box yet?

...

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no Hans, I only listened so far to the SACD layer versus the 3CD-Box K2's and can cast a similar vote for the AP's remastering.

Cheers, Tjobbe

[GregK]

For the record, the 12-CD Riverside boxed set *does* have this material in the exact order of recording, just like the new 3-CD set.

It lacks one track (the new Gloria's Step) and the announcements.

Mik

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On the Riverside box they are split across CDs, whereas on the new box each disc has complete sets

[nmorin]

Anyone know when or where All of You (take 1) was released?

Only that take and the Gloria's step werent released Waltz for Debby or Sunday at the VV.  Which makes me wonder why this needed to be 3 cds.  Did they add applause and announcements to justify the third disc?

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The take of "All of You" that wasn't on either Sunday... or Waltz... was on Time Remembered, which was an odds-and-ends release that also contained some tunes from the Shelly's Manne-Hole date in 1963 and the solo tracks ("Danny Boy", etc.) from 1962 that were recorded after his post-LaFaro hiatus.

[ghost of miles]

The take of "All of You" that wasn't on either Sunday... or Waltz... was on Time Remembered, which was an odds-and-ends release that also contained some tunes from the Shelly's Manne-Hole date in 1963 and the solo tracks ("Danny Boy", etc.) from 1962 that were recorded after his post-LaFaro hiatus.

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I think it was actually on ON GREEN DOLPHIN STREET, which is otherwise an Evans/Paul Chambers/Philly Joe Jones date from 1959.

Edited September 17, 2005 by ghost of miles

[ghost of miles]

Adam Gopnik of The New Yorker wrote of Evans’s playing in these recordings, “They are as close to pure emotion, produced without impediments - not at all the same thing as an entire self poured out without inhibitions, the bebop dream - as exists in music.”

←

I find this statement to be troubling, and perhaps even outright bullshit.

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Well, WTF is Gopnik doing writing about jazz for the New Yorker? My apologies if he's a secret jazz expert... but shouldn't he stick to his occasional notes from Paris?

[Michael Fitzgerald]

Truth be told, the first issue of that take of "All Of You" was in the 12-CD boxed set.

Subsequently it was used to fill out the "On Green Dolphin Street" CD, which mostly was half of the "Peace Piece And Other Pieces" Milestone 2-LP set (M 47024) which had come out in 1975 (and had the Everybody Digs... session - but still without Some Other Time - as its other half).

Mike

[Z-Man]

Well, WTF is Gopnik doing writing about jazz for the New Yorker?  My apologies if he's a secret jazz expert... but shouldn't he stick to his occasional notes from Paris?

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That's a very good question...and his notes from Paris are only a little easier to take than this drivel.

Back to topic - I'll be picking this box up tomorrow. I too only have this material in the 12-CD Riverside box, and look forward to the sonic upgrade and improved presentation. I'm not sure if there's enough to fill 3-CD's, but I would LOVE to see a similar treatment given to the Eric Dolphy Five Spot material.

[nmorin]

Anyone know when or where All of You (take 1) was released?

Only that take and the Gloria's step werent released Waltz for Debby or Sunday at the VV.   Which makes me wonder why this needed to be 3 cds.  Did they add applause and announcements to justify the third disc?

←

The take of "All of You" that wasn't on either Sunday... or Waltz... was on Time Remembered, which was an odds-and-ends release that also contained some tunes from the Shelly's Manne-Hole date in 1963 and the solo tracks ("Danny Boy", etc.) from 1962 that were recorded after his post-LaFaro hiatus.

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I had a brainfart. You are absolutely correct.

[paul secor]

Adam Gopnik of The New Yorker wrote of Evans’s playing in these recordings, “They are as close to pure emotion, produced without impediments - not at all the same thing as an entire self poured out without inhibitions, the bebop dream - as exists in music.”

←

I find this statement to be troubling, and perhaps even outright bullshit.

←

Well, WTF is Gopnik doing writing about jazz for the New Yorker? My apologies if he's a secret jazz expert... but shouldn't he stick to his occasional notes from Paris?

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Actually, if someone had told me that this appeared in the New Yorker, and omitted the author's name and the date of the article, I'd have guessed an old Whitney Balliett column.

It's a bit (and perhaps more than that) over the top, but I'm sure that I and others on this Board have been guilty of the same offense. Doesn't seem to be anything to get excited about. It's only an opinion - even if it did appear in a nationally distributed magazine.

At least he didn't write that about Wynton.

[JSngry]

Oh, it's not his opinion of the Evans material that bugs me. It's his comparison of "pure emotion, produced without impediments" to "an entire self poured out without inhibitions, the bebop dream" that send up all kinds of red flags.

I remove my previous qualifier - that is bullshit, and most likely racist, although certainly not, I hope, intentional. It's certainly not unusual, though. Whenever a white player produces a high level of work in jazz, there are always those who find themselves rushing to proclaim its difference, and, implicity, its superiority. That is bullshit, and that is wrong. If Bird wasn't "pure emotion, produced without impediments" expressed through music, then surely such a thing has yet to exist!

I would defy Gopnik (or anybody else) to define how the "pure emotion, produced without impediments" of Evans' Vanguard work differs from the "an entire self poured out without inhibitions" of, say, the best of Bird in a way that doesn't eventually come down to a matter of race, at least as ot pertains to the shaping of an artist's personal perspective through their cultural experience. Of course there are differences, but to say that one is "pure emotion" and that the other is "an entire self poured out", one "without impediments", the other "without inhibitions" seems to me to be somewhat self-contradictory, redundant (obviously?), even.

At the very least, it is an unconscious admission that the "impediment" that white jazz players often face comes from an "inhibition" about getting in touch with their own specific "pure emotion" in a jazz setting, which results in an "inhibition" about "pouring one's self out", which too often leads to imitation of one kind or another. But the irony of that is that black players often come up against the same hurdles and resort to the same solution - it's only the lesser degree of cultural separation that allows for that imitation to be achieved more, for lack of a better word, "transparently" and "comfortably". But hey - derivative is derivative no matter what. And in today's jazz world, it seems that damn near everybody is faced with the same barriers. But that's another kettle of fish...

The real difference between Evans (at least the Evans of the period under question in this set) and Bird (as the personification of "the bebop ideal", anyway) isn't that they were on different planes of emotion in terms of "intent", it was that each was on their own personal plane of same. And although the "wholeness" of expression of this particular perspective that Evans brought to his work here was indeed rare, it was not unique (Warne at the Half Note, anybody? Bix? Gil Evans?), and it was a difference solely of perspective, not of "quality" or "degree".

To take it beyond that is risky business indeed.

Edited September 19, 2005 by JSngry

[paul secor]

Jim, I agree with much of what you wrote. However, where you sense "red flags", I sense more of the ravings of a Bill Evans fan. I'm sure that there are a lot of Evans fans who would agree with what he wrote.

Racism is endemic in American society. It affects all of us in various ways. We can make choices about it, but we can't avoid it. I too sense those "red flags" in much of what's written about Bill Evans' music, pro and con, but I don't think that it serves any good purpose to classify Adam Gopnik (or at least what he wrote here) as racist.

As I say, I agree with much of what you wrote. I think that there's some common ground between us.

Peace - Paul

[JSngry]

Well, ok, "racist" was too strong a word, even if it was qualified with "unintentional". It's a loaded word, to be sure, and I should have been more careful in throwing it around as I did.

Perhaps "reflecting the cultural/environmental perspectives and/or biases of the author" would have been more accurate, but that's kinda lacking in zing, doncha' know.

Still, the point is taken, and taken well.

But as far as the "red flags" go, that's exactly what they are for me as a player. Whenever I meet a player, especially a rhythm section player, who does everything short of wetting their pants over Evans' "lyricism", "beauty", and things like that, I know (or more accurately, have over time come to realize) that we're not going to be able to have an effective musical relationship. Not because they value these qualities, but because, again, it seems, inevitably, they hear in Evans' work "qualities" that they don't hear in other types of jazz, which, truthfully, I find totally absurd. I mean, how can you hear the "emotion" in Evans' playing and not hear it in Bud Powell's (and yes, there are more than a few people out there who are like this, strange as it might seem). How can you hear the "lyricism" in Evans and not in Bird? How can you hear the "coherence" in Evans and not in Sonny Rollins? I could go on...

What irks me to no end about these type of people is that they almost inevitably latch on to Evans as some sort of personal validation, like since they dig Evans and his manifestation of certain qualities, they're not missing anything by not appreciating others' personal manifestations of those exact same qualities. That Evans himself no doubt felt, and felt deeply, these qualities in other, different, players (including those that his followers seem to have little, if any, use for) doesn't seem to matter to them. Well, it should. Such denial goes beyond "stylistic preference" into the realm of willful, in some cases malicious, ignorance, and with that I have little patience as a player or as a person.

So yeah, "racist" isn't quite accurate. David Duke is a racist. But thre's gotta be some kind of word for somebody who hears a white player doing what any great player in any type of music does and then proceeds to frame it as the ne plus ultra of the entirety of music, especially when that framing uses a comparison to "black" music (and no, bebop wasn't excluively a black music, but I think the author's meaning here, conscious or otherwise, was clear) as its foundation/specific point of reference.

Something weird about that, don't you think? Especially since Evans himself would probably have had no part of it whatsoever.

Edited September 19, 2005 by JSngry

[RDK]

I just thought it was poorly/sloppily written...

[Soul Stream]

I see Jim's point. Many who obsess over Evans, as players that is, are usually pretty lukewarm on the emotional front and don't respond well to others prodding them too much in the "let's stoke the fire"-kind of way. These are all generalizations, but I find them to be true many times. There's all sorts of jazz to be sure....