Jammin’ With Gabriel

By BOB HERBERT
Published: August 25, 2007
They were rambunctious geniuses — Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Bud Powell and Max Roach — the nucleus of a group of immensely talented musicians who engineered a revolution in jazz as wondrous and profound as the birth of Cubism in painting.

Max was a tall, skinny kid who had grown up in Brooklyn and was so gifted a percussionist by his early 20s that Dizzy would express the mock fear that the angel Gabriel (the only trumpeter who could rival Dizzy at the time) might try to steal Max to play drums in some heavenly band.

He warned Max to stay put if Gabriel came to call.

I imagine they’re all jammin’ with Gabriel now. Max, the last survivor of that rowdy crew that created bebop, the stunningly complex and sophisticated music that ignited modern jazz, was buried yesterday. My great fear is that the music, underappreciated and poorly understood, is dying, too.

Max had an easy surface personality, which belied the torments he had to fight through as he adhered obsessively to the highest artistic standards, and the lifelong resentment he felt about the way the music was treated.

Elegant, husky-voiced and quick to smile, he was full of stories about the titans of jazz. I remember him chuckling one afternoon as he pointed to an elaborately carved straight-backed chair in his apartment on Central Park West. He was telling a story about Charlie Parker that went back to the 1940s.

Bird, peerless on the saxophone, was not only addicted to heroin, he was also phenomenally charismatic. His personal habits were as closely imitated by other musicians as his music.

“The guys would flop at my house in Brooklyn,” Max said. “My mother did day work, so we’d be there by ourselves all day. Now Bird was clever. He knew my mother was very religious and as soon as he’d hear her putting that key in the door, he’d pick up the Bible, jump in that chair and pretend he was reading it.

“My mother would say to me, ‘Why can’t you be like that nice Charlie Parker?’ I’d say to myself, ‘That’s my problem.’ ”

Like so many others in Bird’s orbit, Max became addicted, too. Bird would die at 34 from the effects of heroin addiction and alcoholism. Max was able to kick his habit. He then advanced the triumph of bebop with the creation of a stunning new sound — dubbed “hard bop” — that emerged from his alliance with the trumpeter Clifford Brown.

By the mid-’50s, Max was standing atop a pinnacle. Compulsively creative and an absolute virtuoso, he had almost single-handedly dragged the drums out of the shadows and demonstrated that they were much more than a mechanism to keep time for the rest of the band. They could be the expressive equal of any of the other instruments in the jazz repertoire.

And he was the co-leader, with Brown, of a phenomenal quintet that was recognized by critics and fans alike as a genuine artistic achievement. Brown, a modest, soft-spoken young man with a warm and powerful sound, was being hailed as the most talented trumpet player to emerge since Gillespie.

“Oh, man, he was something else,” Max said. “He was going to set the world on fire.”

The quintet was booked to play a gig in Chicago in the early summer of 1956. Brown, who was 25, and the band’s pianist, Richie Powell (Bud Powell’s younger brother), were to drive from Philadelphia to Chicago to meet Max and the rest of the band there.

Not long after midnight on June 26 the car in which they were traveling, driven by Powell’s wife, Nancy, careened off the rain-swept Pennsylvania Turnpike and plunged down an embankment. All three occupants died.

Max went into a tailspin. He drank heavily and sank into a depression.

But there was always the music, his recovery mechanism, and it was always fresh and inventive. “His artistic integrity was always intact and operating at a high pitch,” said Shannon Gibbons, a singer who was close to Max for many years.

Jazz no longer commands the attention it once did, and many of its greatest practitioners have slipped into the realm of the forgotten. (Your average person has never heard of Clifford Brown.)

Once when I was talking with Max in his living room, I noticed that his gaze had shifted to a spot over my shoulder, and there was an odd look in his eyes. Behind me, over the sofa, was a large photo of Max with Bird and Diz, Bud Powell and the bassist Charles Mingus.

Dizzy had only recently died. Remembering when they had all been young and wild and great together, Max said, “Damn, now all of those cats are gone.”

source: http://www.nytimes.com

Great article.

namepeace said:

One of my favorite albums...



...At Basin Street


Thanks for that post.


tA

Tribal Disorder

http://www.soundclick.com...dID=182431

Great...thanks!

That was interesting...

Interesting stuff.

As time passes, the loss of the greats leaves more of a vacuum, and imo there seems to be very little new, in jazz, rock or any other popular music form, to replace them.

We live in an age where faceless non-entities who can barely play an instrument, sing or write a song are viewed by some as 'geniuses'.

I wouldn't expect the general public today to have heard of Clifford Brown or Max Roach for that matter. Their heyday was over 50 years ago, but where are the modern equivalents of such artists?

Jazz as a truly 'new', creative music has arguably been on life-support since about 1970, despite a few noble attempts at resusitation (rock died in about 1980 imo, but that's another discussion), and I very much doubt that any major future innovators will come directly from the jazz world, as it has become too diffuse, obsessed with its own history and 'academised' if there is such a word, as a degree subject, the idea of which I suspect the likes of Armstrong and Bird would have found hilarious.

Moving away from Max Roach and jazz -

There is a sad irony that, by its very definition, the future of recorded popular music in all its forms, is rooted so much in its ever present past. We all need a 'base' from which to set out, after all. But when the past is percieved as being so strong and overwhelmingly 'great', then we have a problem, ultimately ending in the present and future being put in a musical stranglehold by the dead, whose achievements we could never possibly equal.

But perhaps that is modern music's glory and its final downfall. Well, that, business and the abysmal musical taste of modern pop music radio and its listeners .

Who stole the future? - The Beatles, Hendrix and Miles Davis had it for a bit, then passed it on; Prince got hold of it but fumbled and dropped it; hip hop and electronica defiled and 'blanded' it to death in equal measure and then ...???

If it's slipped down the side of the sofa, we want it back - now!

Miles said:[quote]Interesting stuff.



I agree, but I would say the FACES are exactly what contribute to the VIEW of them as "geniuses."

A question to add for the sake of argument.

To the extent that they do exist, would we as jazz lovers LET them flourish, or would they suffer from the comparisons to young musicians of days past that wanted to play the best they could.



Marc Cary and the Bad Plus are doing good things, among others who haven't succumbed to "smooth jazz's" tricky web.



Deep.

Miles said:

Very astute observations.

I'm constantly amazed at the number of young musicians that still respect the Jazz tradition of Music as Art and put in the time to learn their instruments.

Recently, the new Christian Scott album...



...Anthem.

A 23 year old trumpet player with a solid Jazz background but whose compositions incorporate contemporary sounds.

There's a 21 year old female bass player, Tal Wilkenfeld, that did a toe-to-toe with...



...Marcus Miller at the NAMM Show and was Jeff Beck's bass player at this year's Crossroads Festival

The girl can...



...JAM!


On a personal level, about a year ago I did a few gigs with a now 16 year old bass terrorist...



...Joshua Crumbly.

He and his young friends get together and jam on Giant Steps for fun.

Those are just a few and maybe they're not playing it just like the "Masters", but the fact of the matter is that there are some interesting young players out there even if you have to dig between those sofa cushions occasionally.


tA

Tribal Disorder

http://www.soundclick.com...dID=182431
[Edited 8/27/07 22:11pm]

theAudience said:

Then again, it's safe to say 'Trane didn't play "Summertime" or "My Favorite Things" as intended, so . . . methinks he's smiling somewhere when they jam on it.

namepeace said:

I'd agree.

But then many of the old school Jazzers took Pop tunes of the day and reinterpreted them.

I'm highly impressed that those younguns can so easily negotiate the Giant Steps chord changes.
Not an easy tune to fluently solo through at all.


tA

Tribal Disorder

http://www.soundclick.com...dID=182431

Miles said:

Valid Point.

theAudience said:

Agreed. The refreshing thing is seeing the appreciation for the art form of Jazz by todays youth because it indicates that the spirit/legacy of jazz will still live on.

I think jazz is fine - there are a lot of "undercover" jazz cats playing in churches - I've gigged with quite a few of them. They do the smoky club thing/weekly jams during the week, and do the Sunday church gigs for the steady paycheck (and let me tell you, some of the paychecks are quite generous). There are a number of jazz musicians who are making a decent living - they're just not in the spotlight. I think the underground is what keeps a music/music scene alive anyway.

Jazz requires a level of engagement that's not as disposable as more popular music. For the masses, that's a bit too much to absorb on a regular basis. That's why we have the Britneys and the Ciaras of the world. Nice, disposable music. Goes down easy. Just like fish food. But jazz will live on. There will always be a certain amount, however small, who will always aspire to a higher listening experience.

namepeace said:

Well, there is always the knee-jerk comparison to past greats - 'Oh, he's good, but he's just doin' a 'Trane variation'. 'Oh, yet another post Miles trumpet player'. When so much has already been done, today's young players can't win. I'd say the likes of Miles and Trane had it easier in some ways as less stuff had been done and discovered.

Also, the audience was quite small back in the '50s and '60s, but I suspect it was bigger than now, if spread less widely around the world. More people actually cared about what someone like Ornette Coleman or Charles Mingus were going to release next and how it might affect the wider current of jazz. Now things are so diffuse, the music industry is imo even more creatively bankrupt than ever, so even with the likes of MySpace, it is that much harder to stand out from the crowd.

National cultures, especially in the west, are also so much more diffuse. In Britain for example, the future of modern popular, jazz and classical music has in the past and may well in the future involve drawing upon the ever growing ethnic minorities, especially the Asian and African imo, but the mainstream culture knows little or nothing of such musical fusions, their potential and their histories.

Can there be another Duke Ellington today, tomorrow or the day after? In theory, yes. The 20th century doesn't have a monopoly on musical creativity. The 'new Duke' to use such a slightly pointless term (ie meaning a composer/ instrumentalist/ recording artist/ bandleader in the jazz tradition and of true genius), is probably out there now, and is maybe some unknown genius who has never set foot in a music college, but has internet access, a small studio, wide ears and a wider vision and finally a big chip on his/her shoulder. They could be living anywhere from Lake Superior to the Sahara Desert. Jazz is 'spoken' in many different countries in a huge variety of 'accents'.

Maybe they have an account on the Org .

But who would support such an individual, financially and in terms of popularity? Where today is the common musical vocabulary and cultural references that earlier generations of jazz shared that gave it a distinctive identity, even beyond the artist, which normally enables you to 'date' a given classic jazz tune by the sound/ style of the music?

If there is to be a 'new Duke' or Miles etc, my hunch is she is playing bass or keyboards in a 'normal' band doing small gigs in a provincial town for beer money, and/ or recording tunes on her computer that she thinks no-one will like as they're too wierd and don't fit the current trends.

But then, in Duke Ellington's own lifetime, things weren't always a bowl of cherries for him recognition-wise either, but he kept on truckin'.

So, a modern jazz artist has three choices it seems -

1. Either he/she plays in the 'tradition' to some extent, whether it be Wynton Marsalis, respected curator of the acoustic jazz museum , and get damned 'cos they're 'copying' old stuff, (like many modern hard bop groups which imo are little more than the jazz equivalent of rock 'n roll nostalgist 'tribute bands', reviving a 'dead' form in the shadow of masters they will never overtake), and the legion of post 'Trane and Miles players. Or -

2. They dump most of the 'tradition' and play for the ears of today with the instruments of today and reflect the times, covering the modern songs and writing modern originals, just as every previous era of jazz was a very personal group of commentaries on the times the artists lived in. Then they're damned by the traditionalists but ce la vie. In some ways. for example, I'd have more respect for a modern jazz singer who did some interesting modern jazz version of Nirvana's 'Come As You Are' or the Sex Pistols' 'Pretty Vacant' than yet another coma-inducing rendition of 'My Funny Valentine', nice as it may be.

3. I like tA's story of young musicians having fun with music and metaphorically drawing a moustache and breasts on 'Giant Steps' . I'd call this the Frank Zappa approach to jazz. Don't take the music so seriously but still make sure you're damn good at what you do. Also, most importantly, never use the 'J' word in polite conversation, as it will be commercial suicide for you. . 'Giant Steps' creator, John Coltrane, while imo in the end something of an over-earnest jazz monk, chewed up tunes like 'My Favourate Things' and spat them out through his ever verbaceous horn as personalised statements that were different every night. But I wonder what he would have made of Miles' later electrical experiments?


On a related note, just a few thoughts I had on so-called 'modern jazz' (ie post bop music and to an extent, jazz-rock fusion) which, depending on my mood, I sometimes have mixed feeling about -

I agree with some critics that be bop, a fresh direction as it was, may have indirectly spelled the death knell of jazz as a popular music, with its elitism in terms of playing and understanding the music and 'not dancing', as the notices in many clubs used to say. Louis Armstrong's music says 'Come on in, grab a pew,', while bop, which I greatly respect, kind of says, 'Dig all you hip cats and the huge rest of you squares go off to Julliard, learn your flatted fifths and bop harmonic theory and when you show your diploma, goatee beard and beret at the door, and we'll let you in'.

These are the jazz equivalent of classical music snobs, who get off on feeling 'superior' to others due to their knowledge of technical virtuosity - the anathema of the main roots of jazz - the blues, a highly personalised, self or one mentor taught group of folk styles, that anybody who had access to a piano, or a wooden box and gut strings could pick up and make on impression in the neighbourhood. It was about 'This is me, not you, sucker, like it or not,' 'Not, this is what I've learned at uni and here's how fast and in how many different keys I can play it.

All I can say in the end, after all that verbeage, is if there are some truly interesting new/ recentish jazz artist out there, tell me and the Org about 'em
so they get more support.

God knows they probably need it.

I recently revisited this album: The Bad Plus, These Are The Vistas. It includes a rendition of Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit."

Miles said:

Even if I took that to be true, and I do trust your analysis on these topics, I don't think it started out that way. Wasn't bop designed in part to promote greater artistic freedom and improvisation for artists used to playing in the swing/big band format?

"New wave" snobbery is nothing new. Music snobs always brag on their obscure bands/acts no one's heard of before to validate themselves. That doesn't necessarily make the music to blame, does it? Heck, I'll tell anyone who'll listen about Madvillain or J Dilla or any other obscure act I luck up on. I prolly have a little "jazz snob" in me too, if only because I feel jazz is increasingly ignored. But I don't put that on the artists. Necessarily.

namepeace said:

Well, I must admit I was slightly exaggerating my opinion for effect in my last, rambling post.

I would exempt the likes of Charlie Parker, Dizzy and Monk from my accusation of musical snobbery, as they were among the originators of the bop style (even tho the ever contrary Bird apparently disliked the name 'be bop'). Dizzy Gillespie, who invented some highly advanced musical concepts, was one of the greatest music teachers of his generation, and was an entertainer almost in the vain of Louis Armstrong, at times singing and goofing around to the extent was accused of 'Uncle Tomming' by some.

The above musicians didn't 'put on' their style, it was who they were.

As you probably know, Bop evolved at least partly as a result of the intensely inspired and competitive jam sessions at Minton's Playhouse, New York in the late '30s - early '40s, where many a bored swing band member would attend after hours to get some 'proper music' time in, as they saw it. It was also, I suspect, partly an effort by certain musicians, bored with the same old swing arrangements, to 'get one over' on other musicians, by being 'cooler' and more musically advanced. There was also a parallel 'advanced' scene going down in Kansas City at the same time, where Bird picked up a whole lot of stuff from the likes of Lester Young and Bird's main mentor Buster Smith, who apparently influenced Bird's dramatic tempo changes etc.

But while I like the incredible '40s bop stuff, like Bird's godlike playing on 'Koko' and the wit and quicksilver artistry of Dizzy's trumpet playing, and to a lesser extent the later hard bop which doesn't do that much for me in general, I stand by my point that jazz began to die when it, in the natural scheme of things, ceased to be the main flavour of pop music, and was moved into a more elitist, 'cool' corner. While there can be many creative rewards,and we small number of fans may like it, pushing your music into an obscure corner can only end in the music being less popular in the long run, as more people feel intimidated by it, and don't understand it - hence, I suppose, the more 'easy', populist hard bop . And we had further fragmentation, when Ornette started his thing, claiming that Bird would have approved of what he was doing. And then we had the rest of the 'free' movement(s), the mixed blessings of fusion and whatever we have now.

So, as trends naturally changed from the glory years of the '20s and '30s, through the bop years and into the '60s, where we have Frank Zappa famously calling jazz the 'music of unemployment' for musicians .

I'm not condemning any artist or style really, as I find interest and enjoyment in them all. I'm just giving an observed opinion on the historical development of the main currents of jazz since the war, and maybe trying to shed light on the reasons why it has become such a minority 'sport'.

I have no real conclusions as to the dilemma of modern jazz - to be 'popular' and risk 'selling out' or to be 'artistic' and true to your vision, and risk poverty and obscurity. Compromises need to be made in the real world, and if you want a more comfortable life, then as a musician you may have to join that cheap chat show orchestra, or if not, then be like the pretty brilliant John Zorn and do it your own way.

But, financially speaking, in the wise words of Prince, 'Life ain't very funky, unless it's got that pop.'

namepeace said:

I think I might have heard about that somewhere, hence my mentioning Nirvana. I also think I heard a track by the Bad Plus on the radio the other week, and was quite impressed - I need to check out this band.

Miles said:

Valid points.

JesseDezz said:

So very true.

MsLegs said:

Very well said.

Miles said:

IMO, Miles (Davis that is) was hip to the potential exclusionary nature of the Jazz genre if it became stagnant and didn't expand early on...

I never thought that the music called "Jazz" was ever meant to reach just a small group of people, or become a museum thing locked under glass like all other dead things that were once considered artistic.

...New Directions in MUSIC (as a subtitle) was probably a preemptive strike against the Stanley "the Grouch" Crouch types who were sure to attack Bitches Brew.

This is one of the reasons i'm kind of high on this young cat Christian Scott.
Not only is he putting his form of "the J-Word" in a contemporary package, he echoes the same sentiment that Miles Davis had about the music in general

I never had those elitist views about music and especially Jazz. Because i'm from a place where Jazz is for everyone.

~Christian Scott

As for the Boppers showing off their technical virtuosity, my take is that this music was never primarily for public consumption. They were jam sessions where the musicians could stretch out after they'd done their "public" gigs. The purpose was a friendly (maybe sometimes not so friendly) rivalry designed to push each other's abilities.

As a way of discouraging lightweights from sitting in and dragging down the proceedings, the regulars would call standards but in odd keys and play them at blazing tempos. (Or switch keys in the middle of a tune.)


tA

Tribal Disorder

http://www.soundclick.com...dID=182431

theAudience said:

I agree with Miles' (Davis ) views that jazz should get out of the museum and live a little, otherwise it's a dead form.

And, while I respect a lot of the thoughts of my hangin' buddies Stanley Crouch and Wynton Marsalis on jazz up to the bop era, imo their voices have been a little too loud over later developments in the jazz world (ie 'fusion' - I hate that word, but other alternatives like 'electric jazz' are little better or more accurate).

But hey, Stanley's gonna attack 'Bitches Brew'; it's as predictable as a grandfather telling his unruly grandson to turn that racket down.

The irony of course, was that Miles was nearly 20 years older than Stanley, and only a madman could call the likes of 'Bitches Brew' and 'On the Corner' 'sell-out' records. Unless Stanley thinks that the 20 + minutes of dark, brooding noise that is 'Bitches Brew' (title track) was a surefire hit single in 1969-70. And I can't imagine the wierdly mixed, Stockhausen-meets-Sly abstract space funk of 'Black Satin' et al giving the Carpenters a run for their money in 1972 either.

If Miles had wanted to 'sell-out', he could've recorded with Motown or gone the Herb Albert route (Lord save us ), or even invited himself to a Beatles, Santana, Led Zeppelin or Norman Whitfield Temptations session (any could've been interesting imo).

Having said that, it's probably best that we draw a veil over Miles 'collaborations' with Toto and Scritti Politi in his musically so-so, truly more 'commercial' 1980s era ...

Of course, Miles' 'New Directions' were all very well 40 years ago, and while there may be yet more lessons to learn from Miles' deep music of the first electric period, there also needs to be a few new templates for future jazz. Imo, some of the best 'jazz-inspired' music of recent times has been coming out Scandinavia of all places, from the likes of inventive 'Trane disciple Jan Garbarek's recent records to the now admittedly slightly dated late '90s released mid-'70s Miles inspired ambient electronica of post Miles trumpeter Nils Petter Molvaer and his partner in Nordic jazz-techno-doom guitar mincer Aarvind Aarset. At least these artists are/were running with the ball, so to speak.

I shall also do some research on this Christian Scott you mention , tA.

And, back in full Stanley 'Grouch' mode, don't give me these so-called 'modern jazz greats' like Jamie Cullum (not a bad piano player but they're two-a-penny), who imo is the modern Georgie Fame (UK orgers may know of this veteran pianoman/ singer who borrowed most of his style from Mose Allison imo, but I digress ).

And then there's the hellish and appropriately named Amy Winehouse, who is imo more like a drag queen doing a third rate Fontella Bass impression (I don't know why I'm hearing Fontella echoes when I hear Winehouse, just a gut thing). Not a bad voice, but she's supposed to be the new Billie Holiday because she's a vaguely 'soulful' singer who's had a bad private life recently? And how many of those have there been over the years - and most of whom were greater artists than Amy, even at her tender age? Hmmm ...

Miles pushes shades further up nose and adjusts gold cuff-links in preparation for possible Winehouse fan backlash and makes a hasty retreat... .
[Edited 9/6/07 12:50pm]