Blow, Brother Konitz, BLOW!

[Guy Berger]

What do folks think of the ECM Birdland album with Mehldau, Haden, and Motian?  I enjoy that one quite a bit, especially the “Oleo” that closes the album,

[mhatta]

Worthwhile Konitz is little known, but I think it is really worthwhile.  My favorite Lee.

 

Edited May 18, 2021 by mhatta

[Big Beat Steve]

57 minutes ago, Rabshakeh said:

So, other than the below, are there any “major” Konitz records that I am missing? (Major in either the objective sense ("history records this as an important/influential work") or subjective ("I like this record a whole lot").)

 

Ezz-thetic (Prestige, 1951-53, including a sessin wiht Miles Davis)

 

And though not wantin to toot the Eurojazz horn too much, give the following at least a try:

Young Lee (Vogue, Paris 1953)

Lee Konitz in Sweden 1951/53 (Dragon)

Cologne session 1956 (Konitz-Koller-Gullin, rec. for mod records, released on Carisch, reissued on the Mod records box set)

Zo-Ko-Ma (Attila Zoller-Lee Konitz-Albert Mangelsdorff, MPS 1968)

 

[HutchFan]

5 minutes ago, Big Beat Steve said:

Ezz-thetic (Prestige, 1951-53, including a sessin wiht Miles Davis)

Zo-Ko-Ma (Attila Zoller-Lee Konitz-Albert Mangelsdorff, MPS 1968)

Seconded!  

 

[JSngry]

Ok, this one is prioritizable...LP only to the best of my knowledge. Perhaps the sublimest of the sublime for this group.

 

[Guy Berger]

Konitz is one of those pre-NewThing musicians who really benefited from the new musical horizons that opened up in the 1960s.

[JSngry]

I liked his Varitone work as well. It made that "buzzing around in his own head" quality that's so beautiful about his thought process that much buzzier.

[Rabshakeh]

1 hour ago, Big Beat Steve said:

Ezz-thetic (Prestige, 1951-53, including a sessin wiht Miles Davis)

What is this one? A comp of 10"s? There seems to be no information out there that I can see; even discogs is pretty unhelpful. 

34 minutes ago, JSngry said:

Ok, this one is prioritizable...LP only to the best of my knowledge. Perhaps the sublimest of the sublime for this group.

 

It's weird how there's so many records even from the pairing that I still have to discover, even though I have spent a year listening to everything that they did together! 

23 minutes ago, Guy Berger said:

Konitz is one of those pre-NewThing musicians who really benefited from the new musical horizons that opened up in the 1960s.

I really agree. 

[JSngry]

6 minutes ago, Rabshakeh said:

It's weird how there's so many records even from the pairing that I still have to discover, even though I have spent a year listening to everything that they did together! 

The real Golden Age of that duo was the mid-70s, imo. They toured! Storyville did LPs and then expanded CDs (3, iirc) and they are all pretty much astounding. Wave did an LP.

But that Pausa LP...taking that one to heaven with me so if nothing else gets me in, being able to add that one to the library will. Especially if they've been waiting on the CD that never came.

[Milestones]

Oh, there are a ton of fine Konitz releases, and in fact I have mainly been fond of his work since about 1990.

Lee Konitz and the Jazzpar  All Star Nonet (1992)  - This features a mostly Danish group; in addition to the nonet numbers, quite a few pieces are duets.

Sound of Surprise (2000) - Nice record with Lee sometimes in a trio, sometimes in larger groups with Ted Brown (tenor) and/or John Abercrombie (guitar).

Angel Song (1996) - drummerless quartet with Wheeler, Frisell, Holland

Olden Times (1999) - drummerless quartet with Kenny Wheeler and two German musicians

And there are more!

Edited May 18, 2021 by Milestones

[colinmce]

On 5/18/2021 at 0:38 PM, Guy Berger said:

What do folks think of the ECM Birdland album with Mehldau, Haden, and Motian?  I enjoy that one quite a bit, especially the “Oleo” that closes the album,

I don't have it anymore, but I did like it when it came out. It's a very odd record; Motian barely playing, Mehldau playing very weird stuff, Konitz off in his own world practically .... I never even noticed what Haden was up to. It's an interesting one for sure that I might like to revisit. 

Edited May 19, 2021 by colinmce

[Rabshakeh]

Thanks for all the above recommendations.

On another point, does anyone know of any good videos of interviews with Konitz or of Konitz playing live? He seems very poorly served by YouTube when compared with other jazz musicians.

(Edit: Konitz, not Kibitz!!!)

Edited May 21, 2021 by Rabshakeh

[Д.Д.]

An excellent and unusual later-period Konitz that does not seem to be mentioned often is Jugendstil II on ESP Disk:

http://www.espdisk.com/4059.html?search=konitz 

It's a project of Stephane Furic Leibovici, to be exact.

I also like the quartet session "Round & Round" from 1988, but mostly for super-tight rhythm section of Fred Hersh, Mike Richmond and Adam Nussbaum.  

Edited May 21, 2021 by Д.Д.

[Rabshakeh]

13 minutes ago, Д.Д. said:

An excellent and unusual later-period Konitz that does not seem to be mentioned often is Jugendstil II on ESP Disk:

http://www.espdisk.com/4059.html?search=konitz 

It's a project of Stephane Furic Leibovici, to be exact.  

I love that one. I'm not sure why I left it off my initial list.

[Late]

On 5/18/2021 at 11:52 AM, Rabshakeh said:

What is this one? A comp of 10"s? There seems to be no information out there that I can see; even discogs is pretty unhelpful. 

Discogs

 

[JSngry]

Or, but this one!

and however:

There's 78s, those 10"s, but, hey OG 10" LP:

I love those old 1st-gen Prestige/New Jazz covers, they're like, yeah, this shit is OLD, but not so old you can't see yourself looking at it for clues.

[Joe]

Been enjoying this one lately.

[Rabshakeh]

4 hours ago, JSngry said:

I love those old 1st-gen Prestige/New Jazz covers, they're like, yeah, this shit is OLD, but not so old you can't see yourself looking at it for clues.

Ha!

I hadn’t realised that Prestige had changed its logo so many times. Shows me up as a vinyl lover but no real record collector.

Subconscious-Lee is such a killer album. It’s the one that really got me into Konitz the first time.

[JSngry]

I have yet to see an in-person copy of one of those 1st-gen Prestige/New Jazz 10" LPs. nor any of the 78s. 45s, yes, but not further back than that. They are...intensely different.

[HutchFan]

9 hours ago, Rabshakeh said:

Thanks for all the above recommendations.

On another point, does anyone know of any good videos of interviews with Konitz or of Konitz playing live? He seems very poorly served by YouTube when compared with other jazz musicians.

(Edit: Konitz, not Kibitz!!!)

Not a video, but this book amounts to one big extended interview:

 

Fascinating.  Even "essential" for Konitz-fans.

 

[sgcim]

5 hours ago, JSngry said:

Or, but this one!

and however:

There's 78s, those 10"s, but, hey OG 10" LP:

I love those old 1st-gen Prestige/New Jazz covers, they're like, yeah, this shit is OLD, but not so old you can't see yourself looking at it for clues.

The funny story I read in the Geo. Russell bio that I may have mentioned before, was that Miles couldn't cut the EZZ-Thetic head, because he was strung out (or whatever), so he tried to sneak out of the recording studio before they played it. Russell's wife was at the exit. and latched on to him like a pit bull, until George and the guys dragged him back in there.

George gave Miles a simple descending line to play in whole notes, and Lee played the heck out of the head, and played a great solo on the LFS changes.

I can never get enough Lee in the 50s, but he said to a friend of mine that the Kenton tour messed him up, and that he was never the same since.

[Bluesnik]

25 minutes ago, sgcim said:

I can never get enough Lee in the 50s

That's also my preferred period. His beginnings. Recently I got At Storyville, which includes At Harvard Square and Konitz from 1954 and 56 I think, both recorded for Storyville. They are excellent. But the aforementioned album, this one

2 hours ago, Joe said:

Been enjoying this one lately.

should also be great.

[JSngry]

If you want his beginnings, there's the solos with Claude Thornhill.

[Rabshakeh]

That At Storyville record is so beautiful.

 

 

3 hours ago, HutchFan said:

Not a video, but this book amounts to one big extended interview:

 

Fascinating.  Even "essential" for Konitz-fans.

For sure. Completely essential.

But what I was hoping for was Konitz actually there and moving. It is surprising that for a guy with such a long and storied career there seems to be little archival footage of any quality available. 

Edited May 21, 2021 by Rabshakeh

[Larry Kart]

On an OOP Swedisc LP (that's the label, not a typo for Swedish) LP "Sax of a Kind -- Lee Konitz in Sweden, 1951/53," there's a 1953 air check of a performance of "Loverman" from a Gothenburg concert with the Kenton band that must have been an out-of-body experience for Lee. I can't imagine the effect of playing that solo might have on a person. One of those nights when anything was possible.