Day 73: Glenn Gould "Glenn Gould at the Movies" & Jan Garbarek "Visible World"

Sliding through the crate it's two CDs that I thought would be a good idea to have but wasn't anxious to listen to immediately, or ever since they were never opened. Also, today we get to the 100th Amazon player widget. For those with adblock, it's a little player box above each post that allows you to listen to samples of the disc I'm listening to if it happens to be available for download at Amazon. So far, 100 of them have been.

Glenn Gould
Glenn Gould at the Movies

I was trying to think about what I'd say about Glenn Gould because classical CDs have proven to be a little on the difficult side for me to create content about and I realize something, I'm more interested in Glenn Gould as a character, or element, than I am as a performer.

There's that Cuban cigar element to his playing. That kind of thing where you think, "How much better can it really be?" until you actually hear it. Well, alright, that's pretty amazing in a world of just amazing piano players...big deal, right?

Except for what that means. I tend to think of Charlie Parker in the same way and have even used him in the Albatross that way. That monumental performer that sort of owns an instrument or a style in a way that sort of becomes unrepeatable. There have been great saxophonists since Bird, there have been great guitarists since Hendrix, and there have been great piano players since Gould. But they don't get 'the' spot. A transformational piano performer now will be the 'greatest since Gould...'

There is a novel I keep wanting to read (but c'mon, it's seriously a 200 page paragraph...) about the two piano players that show up to study with Horowitz at the same time as Gould and what that does to them. That's the kind of thing that fascinates me about Gould. Not so much the legendary status or what it was like to 'be Gould,' that kind of thing doesn't interest me. What interests me is what it's like to live in the immediate world someone like that creates, how does that change you're view of self if you're an amazing piano player in the same time and place as the amazing piano player?

This is stuff he either selected or recorded especially for films, or was used in films after his death.  The first half is a bunch of harpsichord pieces played on a piano, which always feels wrong to me, but there's nothing really behind that.

On the last track he goes with 'original instrument' by playing the Art of the Fugue on an organ.

Jan Garbarek
Visible Worlds

 So there was this CD I got as a promo, it was one of those rare 'classical sensations,' not as big as Chant, but did well. And this time, it was something I actually liked quite a bit. The vocal group the Hillard Ensemble recorded some motets and Norwegian saxophonist Jan Gabarek improvised over them. It actually sounded pretty cool, I loved it. I played the hell out of it at the store and even managed to lose it a few times as a personal copy and had to replace it more than once. In fact, I'm pretty sure I no longer have it, but here's hoping because on Amazon it ranges from fifty to seventy bucks, apparently.

I even attended a concert performance of that in the Grace Cathedral on Nob Hill seated right behind some important Norwegian, I don't remember now if it was a politician or a member of the royal family. All I can really remember is thinking it would be really funny to lean forward and ask if he knew of my mom's family. It was a good night for impulse control.

The success of that CD meant that there were suddenly going to be a lot more Jan Garbarek CDs. Awesome, I thought. Sucker. For the most part, Garbarek produces some pretty mild smooth jazz, though still manages to have long open solos instead of repetitive riffing, but that's what he plays. Which I guess goes to why they selected him of all people to perform with the Hillard Ensemble, but I was hoping for more experimental stuff. I mean, he is a European jazz artist, most of the European jazz artists I had run into were mostly pretty caustic free jazz artists.

Not Jan, he's mellow. And I have multiple CDs by this guy. As far as I know they're all like this.

There is no liner notes to explain the theme of this album, just this rather intense photo of Mr. Garbarek. He kind of looks like he's about to perform a feat of mentalism with his sax rather than play it.

I sound like I'm hating on him for not living up to my completely made up expectations of him and my own bias' against smooth jazz. And I guess I am, if I was fairer I'd not that he really isn't that 'smooth' with his smooth jazz, this stuff is just out there enough to avoid being played on the Quiet Storm.

I wasn't prepared for the last song to have lyrics. Of course, I have no idea what she's saying.

Day 72: Duke Ellington "Mood Indigo" & Don Byron "Romance With the Unseen"

You know what had to happen was that I mentioned that there were performers making several return appearances here and now they're all vying for top spot. Yesterday's Miles CD gives way to some more Don Byron (who has his third, I believe CD go on) and Duke Ellington who may or may not be pulling even. Peaking ahead there's even a Jacky Terrasson, but it's actually the exact same Jacky Terrasson that just went on the hard drive, so that hardly counts.

Duke Ellington
Mood Indigo

More Ellington. Another compilation, this one seeming on the cheaper 'might find this at a gas station' variety. These so far have been older, lower fidelity recordings of early Ellington. The liner notes are pretty sparse, containing an almost dry history of Ellington's beginning in music and a list of luminaries that he's performed with.

I tend to think of this kind of big band recording as 'cartoon jazz,' though that might conjure images of close harmony female vocals personified as singing flowers. It's not quite that, but it still has that mono recording quality, kind of muted sound that comes from a combination of old recording equipment and an air-tight horn section.

The back of the CD is laid out weird, too. It sets up columns for track title, composer, and publisher, all in equal font. It's such a strange way to lay the whole thing out. A lot of times the composer and publishing info is left out of the main listings, or if it's included it's much, much smaller. This kind of borders on data entry style. A little weird.

I'm sort of grasping at straws. Already with Ellington there's not much left to be said about him, but worse than that this is the fifth time he's come up. On the plus side, now I know the name of a song that I often would have in my head, Things Aren't What They Used to Be. And you can never have too many versions of Black and Tan Fantasy. Also, Sophisticated Lady ties Round Midnight for most represented song, which I didn't really see coming. Though it is a cool song. I play it every time I get a hold of a bari sax.

Don Byron
Romance With the Unseen

Don Byron is third on deck. I don't remember if this was the empty sleeve or not, but Byron was one of those artists whose labels would give me advance releases and then the actual CD when it came out. I would usually forget I had the CD originally and end up taking both. So there is a fair portion of of the Albatross that is duplicate CDs. At one point I had like five or six of the same Screamin' Jay Hawkins CD. Sadly, they all met unfortunate demises.

One thing I can say about the Don Byron CDs that have gone in, they so far have been three different CDs. The only thing that's really carried over from one to the other is his skill at the clarinet. In that respect this is perhaps the most 'straight ahead' of the three CDs. No crazy instrumentation, no wild arrangements, straight quartet...

Of course as soon as I say that, extended electric guitar solo. But still, the most straight ahead of his recordings.

I'm starting to think that I should keep track of Beatles tunes that appear on jazz albums, because there are a lot it feels like. Byron has chosen I'll Follow the Sun for his album. I guess I can't be one to judge, in my high school senior year jazz concert I did Yesterday with the guitarist.

This is always the ideal, is an artist who experiments, who tries and delivers different things. But the counter-argument is, I guess, that most people--and with reason--want the same thing, or at least a little bit of predictability. Because of the nature of my collection and the way I dealt with it, I haven't for the most part known which Byron album is which. But I have felt a need to listen to Byron only to find out that wasn't the Byron I was yearning for, it was instead the much different Byron of the CD I just put in.

If an artist experiments then there's the risk, or rather the near certainty, that the experiment won't be to your liking. Even if you're Miles Davis, you can find Davis 'camps' among those that appreciate him and there are those that like the fusion stuff and those for whom Davis more or less stopped playing jazz. I was able to see him about a year before he died, and during a brief moment where he thought he'd address us (by speaking into his bell mic) someone started shouting "Play All Blues." Jackass, this wasn't a shitty downtown jazz bar, he's not going to play All Blues, and now I won't know what he had to say. How did you buy a ticket for Miles Davis thinking that All Blues was even a remote possibility?

So anyway...

Some of it is not going to be something you're into. And so now the artist doesn't get the superlative, 'Consistent.'

It works for him, though, I guess. I mean, he kept releasing albums that I would get promos of, so that's good. It's good to hear some inconsistency now and then.

As part of the Albatross' effort to tie everything in, two days after the Basquiat CD goes in, a CD with a track called Basquiat goes in as well. I really should look that guy's art up some time. Basquiat turned out to be a kind of haunting track, really.

Day 71: Miles Davis "On the Corner" & Wayne Wallace "Three in One"

Once again the furthest away from another sampler. This is my second day into an actual CD case, a sort of make-believe apple crate that has been shaped into a single row to hold CDs. I collected as many of the wooden cases for holding CDs that I could come across in the attempt to pretend I was organizing them. It's also how I was able to make estimates as to how many CDs I have. Now I have a lot of beat up wooden racks that I drag around with the CDs and none of it is organized.

Miles Davis
On the Corner

Miles Davis continues to add to his lead as most represented artist in the Albatross. This time with one of his early fusion experiments. Not as 'grindy' as Bitches Brew, this one is a little more funk oriented. Not satisfied with having one fusion pioneer with him, the album has both Herbie Hancock and Chick Corea. And a bunch of other people that became prominent in the new fusion jazz. Because if you're in Miles' band, that kind of means something.

I know that I have two of this album because I know I've listened to it before but this one was unopened. I think it might have been a double set of On the Corner and Big Fun that I had, now that I think of it.

On the Corner might be that turning point, the sort of 'missing link' I've had with Miles Davis' fusion efforts where I've never been able to connect albums like Bitches Brew and Live/Evil to Tutu. On this album Miles discovered looping, over-dubbing, and using multiple tape machines. This is a kind of 'layered cake' recording that could be argued is anathema to jazz if one considered the interplay of the performers to be an essential element. In contrast, though, even in 'straight jazz' engineers had been stitching together solos and the like for a while. If Miles were to craft the texture over which he would select his soloists, whose to say that you can't do it that way?

While the tracks (four in total going for a little over fifty minutes) are long and have a tendency wander, this is still more accesible by bounds than the previous, more caustic fusion experiments. Which is not to say that there isn't some stuff on here that will make whoever else is listening ask you, "What the hell are you listening to?" (wah wah sitar...you heard me...)

This is about as far from the last Miles Davis that went in to the Albatross.

Even if it's fusion I'm still weirded out by the fade out.

Wayne Wallace
Three in One

Alright, so now I feel completely stupid scoffing at the notion of 'Cubop' and thinking it was made up for the first CD I came across that had it. I officially feel humbled and ridiculous in light of the fact that I apparently have been sitting on a small goldmine of cubop. I'm sorry. Can the Albatross stop mocking me now?

He's holding three trombones on the cover, so I was afraid that 'three in one' might be like the 'What More Flutes 4' thing where he just used three different trombones (well, bass trombone is pretty awesome...), but instead its a general philosophy "general representation of the African musical continuum through US and Caribbean." According to the liner notes, that is.

And Wallace doesn't leave you guessing what three elements he might have used on any particular track, on the back they're all labeled (including Cubop...).

This guy might have been my instructor had I not become obsessed with going to a UC. He's an instructor at CSU San Francisco where I had initially thought about double majoring in music and film. But instead I went to UC Santa Cruz. I liked the mascot...

I don't know what is about certain CDs or certain music, but every now and then I feel like I should be listening to it live in a beer garden. Not that I spend a lot of time in beer gardens, nor do they usually have music that would appear in the Albatross...but I get the impression anyway. This is one of those CDs.