Dave Liebman

[A Lark Ascending]

With the forthcoming Select approaching, Liebman is likely to have a high profile in the world of jazz fandom.

What available recordings get a high recommendation?

And anyone know what happened to the rest of 'The Elements' suite. I was listening to and enjoying 'Water' today in the car. Any plans for Earth, Air and Fire?

Does the Arkadia label still exist? Its website doesn't seem to have been updated for a year.

[Philip]

I can recommend Double Edge (Storyville), a duet album with Beirach, a beautiful understated album which functions as a Coltrane tribute. I've just dug it out for the obvious reason. Listening to Classic Ballads (Candid) right now which has more of an ECM feel.

[Claude]

My favourites are "Miles Away" and "Trio+One", both on Owl. It seems they are both OOP, but I had to mention them.

[7/4]

and "Trio+One"

Cool disk. B)

[Rooster_Ties]

I really like his tenor work, more than when he's on soprano. (My problem is with the soprano, not as much with his playing of it.)

Love his work with Elvin on the live "Lighthouse" set from about 1972. Great band - great recordings!!!

Don't have a whole lot of him, but he does turn up here and there on a number of discs I own. He does occasionally transcend the soprano, enough that I can get past soloing in that octave. (I've got the same problem with Wayne, 'cept for some reason I can handle him better in Miles' electric context -- which is what most of my Wayne on soprano is from.)

[wesbed]

I’ve heard of Liebman but know nothing about the man or his music. When I first learned that Mosaic was releasing a Dave Liebman Select, my initial thought was, “who is this guy,” and “why would I want his music.” Before I viewed the Mosaic site, I was thinking Liebman was a flute player.

Upon listening to the Liebman/Beirach Select via the Mosaic page, however, my mind was quickly set straight. There is some great sounding music in the Liebman box. I’ll be ordering mine soon.

Edited March 23, 2004 by wesbed

[A Lark Ascending]

There's a wealth of information about Liebman here:

http://www.upbeat.com/lieb/

He's also touring in the States at present:

March: dates with Jurgen Friedrich trio in Germany; tour in Spain with drummer Guillermo McGill; Carnegie Hall Jazz Workshop, New York City; appearances on East Coast with the Dave Liebman Group including New Haven Lounge in Baltimore; the Opera House in Jim Thorpe, PA; Deer Head Inn, Delaware Water Gap, PA; One Step Plaza, Peekskill, NY; duo with Phil Markowitz at Manhattan School of Music; Washington Heights Synagogue, NYC; quartet with Markowitz, Jay Anderson and drummer Gene Jackson at Porters, NYC

April: with Dave Liebman Group at Birdland, NYC; Ryles, Cambridge,MA; Vermont Jazz Center, Brattleboro,VT; European tour with Steve Swallow and Adam Nussbaum.

I think I'm drawn to the duo album with Marc Copland Bookends and the unknown Jobim record at present.

[wesbed]

He's also touring in the States at present:

March: dates with Jurgen Friedrich trio in Germany; tour in Spain with drummer Guillermo McGill; Carnegie Hall Jazz Workshop, New York City; appearances on East Coast with the Dave Liebman Group including New Haven Lounge in Baltimore; the Opera House in Jim Thorpe, PA; Deer Head Inn, Delaware Water Gap, PA; One Step Plaza, Peekskill, NY; duo with Phil Markowitz at Manhattan School of Music; Washington Heights Synagogue, NYC; quartet with Markowitz, Jay Anderson and drummer Gene Jackson at Porters, NYC

April: with Dave Liebman Group at Birdland, NYC; Ryles, Cambridge,MA; Vermont Jazz Center, Brattleboro,VT; European tour with Steve Swallow and Adam Nussbaum.

Damn. Nothing in Phoenix or in the vicinity or Arizona.

[JSngry]

Liebman & Steve Grossman were THE saxophone gurus amongst the college set when I was that age, and they remained so for quite a while, but I was never particulary bit by that bug. His/their playing seemed to me then to be a bit too mathematical/theoretical in nature, and the "intensity" too often seemed "forced", or at least a little superficial. Other player and other bags reached me a lot deeper.

But I've mellowed on them and their approach over the years. I never had less than total respect for their abilities and sincerity, and have come to develop a bit more affinity to where they're coming from emotionally. Same for Beirach - an excellent player with a deeply personal approach, but the emotional connection has never really hit me where I live. But again, it's gotten closer as the years have passed.

That's a bit of a lukewarm recommendation, I know, and I feel a bit bad about that, because I've met Dave a few times, and he sat in with Quartet Out once while in Dallas, and he's a GREAT guy - prototypical "New York hipster" on the outside, heart of gold and true lover/fan of music on the inside, and somebody who will give you the kind of moral support you really need when you really need it. He gave us his personal contacts to several labels, and insited that we contact them using his name as a reference. INSISTED! None of them panned out, but that's business. And he's a tremendous educator, one of the best I've ever witnessed in action. I attended an Aebersold clinc in the late 70s where he was a clinician, and I learned more in theweek there than I had in my previous four years at North Texas, much more. All of which kind of makes me feel bad about not responding to him musically any stronger than I do. What can I say?

I really developed a new level of respect for him when he put down the tenor for over a decade(?) because he felt that he was not developing an individual voice by playing the instrument - he felt that he could not shake the Trane influence like he knew he needed to. So he played soprano almost exclusively (maybe a little flute here and there), and really DID develop a more personal voice. It takes guts to make a move like that, and it speaks highly of his musical and personal integrety.

[sal]

Elvin Jones' "Earth Jones" features some great Liebman playing.

[DTMX]

Any plans for Earth, Air and Fire?

They still tour, but Maurice White isn't with them. Serpentine Fire rules, though. And a guy named Azar Lawrence played keyboards with them - don't know if it's the same guy that was with Miles Davis (Dark Magus) and McCoy Tyner - just how common is the name Azar?

[Free For All]

A couple recordings I like-

Pendulum (Artists House) Vinyl only and out of print, I'm sorry to say. A great live (VV) recording- Randy Brecker, Richie B., Al Foster and Frank Tusa. This one needs to be reissued on CD. Prime Lieb. A burnin' version of Footprints.

Family (Sutra) Bob Moses' date w/Lieb, Terumasa Hino, Steve Swallow and Steve Kuhn. some very nice straight-ahead blowing. There's an interesting Lieb head on Autumn Leaves changes- "Autumn Liebs".

Speaking of Bob Moses, I just remembered a great side of his- "When Elephants Dream of Music". Anybody else hip to this one? Some nice writing by Moses.

[JSngry]

Speaking of Bob Moses, I just remembered a great side of his- "When Elephants Dream of Music". Anybody else hip to this one? Some nice writing by Moses.

Oh HELL yes!

How about BITTERSUITE IN THE OZONE? "Message To The Music Business" inDEED!

[A Lark Ascending]

Liebman & Steve Grossman were THE saxophone gurus amongst the college set when I was that age, and they remained so for quite a while, but I was never particulary bit by that bug. His/their playing seemed to me then to be a bit too mathematical/theoretical in nature, and the "intensity" too often seemed "forced", or at least a little superficial. Other player and other bags reached me a lot deeper.

But I've mellowed on them and their approach over the years. I never had less than total respect for their abilities and sincerity, and have come to develop a bit more affinity to where they're coming from emotionally. Same for Beirach - an excellent player with a deeply personal approach, but the emotional connection has never really hit me where I live. But again, it's gotten closer as the years have passed.

An interesting (and well balanced) reaction.

I think alot of this comes from the different 'triggers' in music we associate with emotion. People who associate jazz primarily with a blues base often find music lacking its triggers hard to warm to. I think that's the reason why ECM gets such a a hard time in some quarters - much of the music performed on the label operates from a different set of triggers - as does most European jazz in general.

Liebman and Beirach both strike me as musicians who have taken a few steps back from blues-based jazz in order to do something else (not something better, just something different).

I'm a great fan of Beirach's piano/violin/bass recordings on ACT which I could imagine sounding very cold to some ears. I find them very moving. I'm listening for different triggers that equate with emotion.

As a kid I never cared for blues or soul music. It sounded overwrought, forced, hysterical to my ears. It's something I've had to learn to love over the decades.

It's a bit like language in general. Certain words in English immediately trigger emotional connections. A non-English speaking Finn will hear none of that.

Which is why I alway think reviewers need to be cautious condemning music for being emotionless, soulless or whatever. They might just lack the language to hear it.

[shrugs]

A couple recordings I like-

Pendulum (Artists House) Vinyl only and out of print, I'm sorry to say. A great live (VV) recording- Randy Brecker, Richie B., Al Foster and Frank Tusa. This one needs to be reissued on CD. Prime Lieb. A burnin' version of Footprints.

Family (Sutra) Bob Moses' date w/Lieb, Terumasa Hino, Steve Swallow and Steve Kuhn. some very nice straight-ahead blowing. There's an interesting Lieb head on Autumn Leaves changes- "Autumn Liebs".

Speaking of Bob Moses, I just remembered a great side of his- "When Elephants Dream of Music". Anybody else hip to this one? Some nice writing by Moses.

Family was reissued by Soul Note. It is now called Devotion.

Further props for Elephants. It's a great date.

[Free For All]

Family was reissued by Soul Note. It is now called Devotion.

...and I see (via AMG) that it contains additional cuts. Are they from another session or just previously unreleased?

[JSngry]

Liebman pops up all over the Teo Macero CDs issued on Teo's own label that I've recently been delighting in, and I have to say that his playing in a variety of contexts ranging from all-out hard swinging post bop to neo-quasi-fusion to all out pop jazz in uniformly superb.

Of particular interest is "The Death Of The Devil" from THE BLACK KNIGHT, where Liebman plas as uniquely personal a soprano style as anybody over a computerized orchestral backdrop that is totally "avant-classical". It's a rather lenghty performance, and is musically stunning and emotionally gripping every second of the way. It's a shame that such a major performance (hell, a major RECORD for that matter) has gone so completely unnoticed. Were it not for being able to get it for $5 at CD Baby, I'd not know about it, that's for sure!

Although earlier Liebman still basically leaves me cold, the stuff of his I've heard from about the mid-late 80s onward has been much more to my liking. Problem is, I haven't heard all that much of it, so my opinion is still largely shaped by the Elvin/Miles/Lookout Farm years, where I still find his playing considerably less to my liking. But his work on all these Macero dates has me ready to look a little deeper into his more recent work. The guy's always been a player, no doubt, and maybe he's become one I will respond to better.

Edited April 1, 2004 by JSngry

[Alon Marcus]

I thought it would be nice to revive the thread. Liebman is coming to Israel soon (it's not his first time) and I'm listening to much of his music these days.

More threads with interesting thoughts about the guy are here:

cannonball-addict's discussion about David Liebman

My recommendation on Conversations

I also started listening to his "Elements - Water". It seems to be a deep album and probably it will take some time for the music to sink in my brain. I know that already like some tracks from that album (those I understood).

Edited March 4, 2005 by Alon Marcus

[slide_advantage_redoux]

Okay, I admit it. I am a self serving pig.

Buy my CD, recorded in '96, on which Liebman plays (along with Ed Soph, Dan Haerle, young guitar stud Tim Miller, et al.)

All original set of music. Lieb plays soprano on all cuts except one. He also plays some chinese wood flutes for color and effect.

What an artist. I will never forget the experience.

See this site for more info if interested, or just email me. Thanks

www.summitartists.com/jagremusic

Edited February 13, 2005 by slide_advantage_redoux

[Alon Marcus]

Thanks slide_advantage_redoux!

Another album I like with Liebman serving as sideman is

Conrad Herwig - New York Breed

[Guest akanalog]

i do not really like "drum ode" because of the production. for some reason, this is one album where the production sounds too clean to me. i can't really explain this better, but the sound is very sterile for this sort of electric ethnic jazz brew. to my ears, at least. besides that complaint it is a cool album though, and i am sure someone will be sampling the introductory vocals for some sort of electronic music sometime in the near future.

[slide_advantage_redoux]

One of my favorite Lieb releases is the live date on Artist's House with Randy Brecker, Richie Beirach and Al Foster.

I miss that label. Great attention to recording quality and the attention to detail (LPs I speak of) was special. All of the ones I saw have a leadsheet of one of the tunes recorded reprinted on the inside of the jacket.

Picadilly Lilly! I love that take.

[Chuck Nessa]

Sorry, I missed DL. Don't get it. He's a fine saxophone player, but.............

[slide_advantage_redoux]

Also worth checking out is "Songs for my Daughter"

Great writing and playing. Recorded with his working group with Juris, et al.

Highly recommended.

[Joe G]

Speaking of Bob Moses, I just remembered a great side of his- "When Elephants Dream of Music". Anybody else hip to this one? Some nice writing by Moses.

Was listening to this in the car last night. I love it. Bob wrote a book called Drum Wisdom, and I tried to track it down last night without success. Any leads?