Soft spots

[jlhoots]

Lem Winchester With The Ramsey Lewis Trio

[Gheorghe]

What does "Soft Spots" really mean ? Is this an earlier expression for what they later called "smooth jazz" ? 

I mean you can play soft on certain points and use it as a contrast, but not a whole album or concert.....

When I heard my first jazz on record more than 5 decades ago it was Miles´ "Steamin", and I loved that muted trumpet of Miles, but what really had fascinated me was that nevertheless there was a tension in it, with the rhythm section of Paul´s bass and Philly´s drums. And, listen on "Surrey with the Fringe on Top", or on "Diane" how it sounds when Trane starts his solo, and the block chords of Garland on the ballads, and Philly´s solo on "Salt Peanuts". So this was my true entrance to jazz and it has "soft spots" if you want to call it like that (I won´t) , but it´s not sleepin tunes. 

 

[Big Beat Steve]

NOT AT ALL, my dear Gheorghe.

See here, for example:
https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/have+a+soft+spot+for+(someone+or+something)

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/soft spot

So in fact linking this expession (which comes from everyday English language - you can have a "soft spot" for anything that you are able to muster feelings for at all) to anything even remotely resembling "smooth jazz " would be the ultimate insult.

In short, the subject of this topic is records or artists that you just happen to like or even love for very personal and not quite objective reasons that are very specific to your own tastes. They would be the classic case of records you just like enormously even though they may very likely neither be part of the "canon" of "immortal jazz recordings for the ages" nor (worse still) part of what (pseudo-?)enlightened jazz "aesthetes" consider "the recordings everyone MUST listen to and like in order to understand and appreciate 'jazz' at all". (Horror of horrors if this latter stance actually were a widespread and generally endorsed attitude. After all "jazz" is such a wide field and has so many facets that there are so many different ways of enjoying and appreciating "jazz" without embracing - or needing to embrace - EVERY style of jazz to the same extent and depth ...).

@all: Pleased to see Lem Winchester gets several mentions here. His recordings (which I discovered - and rounded up nicely on that Avid - yes!! box set) were ear openers to me too and do fill a gap where I have come to prefer him over various more renowned "name" artists.

Edited April 11, 2023 by Big Beat Steve

[Gheorghe]

24 minutes ago, Big Beat Steve said:

NOT AT ALL, my dear Gheorghe.

See here, for example:
https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/have+a+soft+spot+for+(someone+or+something)

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/soft spot

So in fact linking this expession (which comes from everyday English language - you can have a "soft spot" for anything that you are able to muster feelings for at all) to anything even remotely resembling "smooth jazz " would be the ultimate insult.

In short, the subject of this topic is records or artists that you just happen to like or even love for very personal and not quite objective reasons that are very specific to your own tastes. They would be the classic case of records you just like enormously even though they may very likely neither be part of the "canon" of "immortal jazz recordings for the ages" nor (worse still) part of what (pseudo-?)enlightened jazz "aesthetes" consider "the recordings everyone MUST listen to and like in order to understand and appreciate 'jazz' at all". (Horror of horrors if this latter stance actually were a widespread and generally endorsed attitude. After all "jazz" is such a wide field and has so many facets that there are so many different ways of enjoying and appreciating "jazz" without embracing - or needing to embrace - EVERY style of jazz to the same extent and depth ...).

@all: Pleased to see Lem Winchester gets several mentions here. His recordings (which I discovered - and rounded up nicely on that Avid - yes!! box set) were ear openers to me too and do fill a gap where I have come to prefer him over various more renowned "name" artists.

Thank´s for explaining, Steve. So it´s something else. Didn´t know that expression. Anyway  my first phrase was, what "soft spots" really means. 

[Big Beat Steve]

To give you an example closer to your home base:

If you were talking about the 60s Cannonball Adderley Quintet or Weather Report and Joe Zawinul as their common denominator in the lineup and if I were to tell you that I do like the early Joe Zawinul Austrian All Stars recordings (for more than just historical reasons) then you might dismiss them as not being representative enough of his OVERALL recorded output. And then I'd have to admit I just happen to have a "soft spot" for them (indeed I like that RST CD reissue of those recordings a lot ...).
 

[Larry Kart]

8 hours ago, Gheorghe said:

What does "Soft Spots" really mean ? Is this an earlier expression for what they later called "smooth jazz" ? 

I mean you can play soft on certain points and use it as a contrast, but not a whole album or concert.....

When I heard my first jazz on record more than 5 decades ago it was Miles´ "Steamin", and I loved that muted trumpet of Miles, but what really had fascinated me was that nevertheless there was a tension in it, with the rhythm section of Paul´s bass and Philly´s drums. And, listen on "Surrey with the Fringe on Top", or on "Diane" how it sounds when Trane starts his solo, and the block chords of Garland on the ballads, and Philly´s solo on "Salt Peanuts". So this was my true entrance to jazz and it has "soft spots" if you want to call it like that (I won´t) , but it´s not sleepin tunes. 

 

When you have a soft spot for something it means that your personal affection for it exceeds iis actual value.

[Dan Gould]

25 minutes ago, Larry Kart said:

When you have a soft spot for something it means that your personal affection for it exceeds iis actual value.

This is why I have had nothing to add myself to this thread ... I was thinking about your point of "sentimental value" as being a part of it, and I recalled that, to the best of my recollection, the first Ben Webster I heard was Atmosphere for Lovers and Thieves. But I can't think of it as exceeding actual value because I think it's a fine Webster recording, and also because it made Ben a figure of great musical interest, it brought many, many, many other fine recordings to my attention. So, sentiment, yes, just as Blue Hour introduced me to Gene Harris/Andy Simpkins/Bill Dowdy.

But also flawless or damn close to it.

[Teasing the Korean]

Larry, I think you have created a new radio genre imprint, like Quiet Storm!

[Gheorghe]

On 4/11/2023 at 3:33 PM, Larry Kart said:

When you have a soft spot for something it means that your personal affection for it exceeds iis actual value.

Thank you Larry !

So, if I understand it right:

Let´s say: Many folks say that Tadd Dameron was not really a piano player, he just played an "arranger´s style" , but me and a buddy of mine, when we were teenagers and eager studying jazz, we just loved his little miniature solos that you can hear occasionally on those Royal Roost live recordings. It´s mostly chords with maybe a few lines too, and many folks might say that let´s say Bud or Al Haig or Hank Jones would be better pianists, but we had....if that´s the right expression for it "a soft spot for his soloing". 

Our first attempts to form a still amateur band with sax, p, b, dr and later a guitar player to, that guitar player was a strange guy, he was ok and he comped nice but didn´t want to solo. "I cannot solo, why should I solo, I don´t need to solo....", but finally he played a sparse little solo for a half chorus, so we nicked him the "Tadd Dameron of Vienna" 😄

[Teasing the Korean]

Given the news, I am reminded of Ahmad Jamal's Live at Oil Can Harry's, an early jazz album of mine.

[Al in NYC]

This is pretty much the way I've always felt about Paul Chambers' Bass On Top or Ike Quebec on Blue & Sentimental, the Red Garland trio recordings, the Dizzy Gillespie Pablo stuff, or, for that matter, almost the entire career of Johnny Lytle.

[Gheorghe]

6 hours ago, Al in NYC said:

This is pretty much the way I've always felt about Paul Chambers' Bass On Top or Ike Quebec on Blue & Sentimental, the Red Garland trio recordings, the Dizzy Gillespie Pablo stuff, or, for that matter, almost the entire career of Johnny Lytle.

I´ll have to give PC´s Bass on Top another try. My favourite PC album remains "Whims of Chambers". I remember that "Bass on Top" is without horns, so maybe I didn´t listen very few times or just one time to it.
Red Garlands trio recordings, I don´t have very much, I like Red Garland very much but since he was the first pianist I ever heard (my first jazz album 50years ago was Miles DAvis "Steamin´) , it seems that I always was used to hear him with horns, let´s say with Trane, or his quintet albums. I think I have one trio album on Riverside, but maybe I have not listened to it in decades, I think it had a Neil Hefti tune on it and a very rare Bud Powell composition (So Sorry Please....it never entered Bud´s set lists . 

Dizzy´s Pablo stuff......, well I think I have listened mostly to "Montreux 81" with featured guests Milt Jackson and James Moody, that´s the Diz I used to hear when he was alive. Those late quartets with electric bass and electric guitar and mostly Mickie Roker on drums. The other ones...... hard to say. I have one Dizzy Jam 1977 also with Milt Jackson. And the more electric studio album with Lalo Schifrin. I got a nice album with Latin stuff with Dizzy, also on Pablo, my wife bought me to of them, one with guitars like Al Gafa, and one that I think is titled Dizzy´s Party or like that.....

Sorry I don´t know who is Johnny Lytle......

[Peter Friedman]

As best I recall, this Dexter album has usually been considered among his weaker recordings by reviewers and many listeners.

Yet though not one of my favorite Dexter albums, it is one I have long enjoyed quite a bit. 

[Niko]

1 hour ago, Peter Friedman said:

As best I recall, this Dexter album has usually been considered among his weaker recordings by reviewers and many listeners.

Yet though not one of my favorite Dexter albums, it is one I have long enjoyed quite a bit. 

Have a soft spot for this one as well...

[Dan Gould]

Can't say I do ... I think I did not get it for a long time, and when I did,, I said thank God for Daddy Plays the Horn because that other recording from the decade is so much more satisfying.

[mjzee]

6 minutes ago, Dan Gould said:

Can't say I do ... I think I did not get it for a long time, and when I did,, I said thank God for Daddy Plays the Horn because that other recording from the decade is so much more satisfying.

There are two others from the mid-50's:

[Dub Modal]

George Duke and those late 70s Crusaders albums. 

[Dan Gould]

47 minutes ago, mjzee said:

There are two others from the mid-50's:

Right, and all three rate higher than Resurgence. 

[Big Al]

Wes Montgomery's Verve output. I used to deride this as being commercial pap, and maybe it is, but becoming a dad some years after discovering Wes and reveling in his Riverside recordings made me realize there's nothing wrong with wanting to, y'know, succeed and pay bills and provide for your family.

[danasgoodstuff]

Soft spots of mine:

Early Stax, even when the singing is lacking and the songwriting nonexistent. 

Chess blues in the '50s by 2nd string players like those featured here 

5 Live Yardbirds and any number of things I heard early on.  And one late discovery, Billy Larkin and the Delegates, who are like a cross between the MGs and the Ramsey Lewis trio but not as good as either.

[Jack Pine]

I'm not that big on musical theater, but have to admit a deep fondness for a certain few shows: Brigadoon, Guys and Dolls, Oklahoma!, you know... the good ones 🙂 Also tap dancing.

[HutchFan]

Ross Tompkins and Good Friends (Concord)

 

Mike Wofford - Scott Joplin: Interpretations '76 (Flying Dutchman)

 

[Dub Modal]

13 hours ago, Big Al said:

Wes Montgomery's Verve output. I used to deride this as being commercial pap, and maybe it is, but becoming a dad some years after discovering Wes and reveling in his Riverside recordings made me realize there's nothing wrong with wanting to, y'know, succeed and pay bills and provide for your family.

Indeed. Wes paid dues on top of dues. 

[Dan Gould]

15 hours ago, danasgoodstuff said:

Billy Larkin and the Delegates, who are like a cross between the MGs and the Ramsey Lewis trio but not as good as either.

Have you heard the recording they did with Clifford Scott?  I find that one very satisfying.

[danasgoodstuff]

1 hour ago, Dan Gould said:

Have you heard the recording they did with Clifford Scott?  I find that one very satisfying.

Yes, that's probably the high water mark.  I have everything but their last one.