Appreciating Christian McBride

Friday night chill-out music

Protean bassist Christian McBride has played with everyone, recorded countless albums, and played in many styles, from straight-ahead to fusion. Here’s one small but consistent way that I appreciate McBride’s music: I often play his 2001 album, Sci-Fi, early on Friday evenings. It’s a fine way to decompress at the end of the week and anticipate the weekend. The music on this album is both relaxing and energizing. I usually don’t get through more than the first two tunes:

• "Aja": Steely Dan’s tune arranged in a moderately spacey way
• "Uhuru’s Moment Returned": McBride says in his album notes that this tune is a combination of the Star Trek theme and "Stolen Moments" by Oliver Nelson. I recall reading an interview with him in which he said he loved to watch Star Trek just for Uhuru. This tune has a magnificent solo by guitarist David Gilmore — not David Gilmour of Pink Floyd, David Gilmore the jazz guitarist. His solo simmers steadily, reaching a thoughtful, expansive high point.

This much of Sci-Fi is usually enough to create the chill-out effect I seek. But there’s much more on the album, including a version of Sting’s "Walking on the Moon" with James Carter on bass clarinet, and "Via Mwandishi," a tune dedicated to Herbie Hancock’s early-70s spacey electronic band.

I saw McBride last month at Jazz at the Bistro in St. Louis with the Ray Brown Tribute Band, a trio with Benny Green on piano and Greg Hutchinson on drums — fat swinging grooves and spectacular musicianship.

As I post this, there’s still time to download Sci-Fi (Amazon) for Friday night chill-out. Or next Friday, or any time ...

Can you hear the smell of dried fish cooking?

Appreciating Ellington's "Harlem Air Shaft"

Sketch for the fourth chorus of "Harlem Air Shaft"

Duke Ellington famously claimed that he packed his tune, "Harlem Air Shaft," with musical analogues of his memories of seeing, smelling, and hearing things channeled vertically through the middle of a Harlem apartment building.

Many observers say Ellington must have made up the claim long after he composed the tune, and musicologist Edward Green works to get to the bottom of this question. He examines the tune, measure by measure, in his article, "‘Harlem Air Shaft’: A True Programmatic Composition?" in the current issue of the Journal of Jazz Studies, published by the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University. This article provides way more than you may want to know about the matter, but you can read all about it at the open-access online journal. The journal and the institute's archives are available for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons license — which means I can reproduce this sheet music (above) without getting sued.

Green quotes Ellington from a New Yorker interview published on July 1, 1944:

"Take ‘Harlem Air Shaft,’ Duke said. "So much goes on in a Harlem air shaft. You get the full essence of Harlem in an air shaft. You hear fights, you smell dinner, you hear people making love. You hear intimate gossip floating down. You hear the radio. An air shaft is one great big loudspeaker. You see your neighbor’s laundry. You hear the janitor’s dogs. The man upstairs’ aerial falls down and breaks your window. You smell coffee. A wonderful thing is that smell. An air shaft has got every contrast. One guy is cooking dried fish with rice and another guy’s got a great big turkey. Guy-with-fish’s wife is a terrific cooker but the guy’s wife with the turkey is doing a sad job." Duke laughed. "You hear people praying, fighting, snoring. Jitterbugs are jumping up and down always all over you, never below you. That’s a funny thing about jitterbugs. They’re always over you. I tried to put it all the in ‘Harlem Air Shaft.’"

What do you hear in this tune? Use the comment feature to weigh in.

"Harlem Air Shaft" is one of my favorite Ellington tunes because of its rapid slideshow of brief, interlocking segments. Apparently I have never listened to it closely enough to understand exactly how the parts interlock, but Green has done this work for me. The tune takes the form of a book. The intro has a "table of contents" of three 4-bar segments, followed by three 32-bar "chapters" as promised. I have noticed that within the chapters, many exciting scenes unfold.

One way to "see" this music is to watch it being performed by a dance troupe:

Update: Appreciating Mary Halvorson

Find more Mary Halvorson Trio & Quintet songs at Myspace Music

I have never visited MySpace, but my quest for representative audio clips by Mary Halvorson led me there. Without creating an account, I believe I have set up a link to one of the tunes on her recent album, "Saturn Sings."

Sea Seizure (no. 19) by Mary Halvorson Trio & Quintet http://t.co/vscBfrW Also, this blog post: http://t.co/KjZENR3

Is it ever OK to diss Horace Silver?

Appreciating reasoned criticism among musicians

Because jazz occupies such a tiny niche in the world of music, internal dialogue among musicians tends to be either sickeningly praiseworthy or bitterly confrontational — flattery fests or tempests in teapots. Rarely to you ever hear a musician engage publicly in measured criticism of another artist.

Pianist Fred Hersch, in the "Blindfold Test" in the April issue of Downbeat, makes surprisingly critical assessments of tunes that are revealed to be performed by great artists and Hersch’s colleagues. For each critical assertion, he presents concise reasons to support his point of view. The article is not available online, so I’ll have to quote it the old fashioned way, presumably in excerpts that qualify as fair use.

Responding to "Mexican Hip Dance" by Horace Silver, Hersch says, in part:

It didn’t feel like the ensemble was going anywhere, and the pianist couldn’t get anything going. His left hand was completely clunky, just stabbing dotted quarter notes ... But when he tried to do some interesting things with his right hand, he’d break off. So the tune never took flight.

Upon being informed of the artist’s name, Hersch says, "I’m sorry I dissed Horace, but it just wasn’t that good. It certainly wasn’t as when he played with his A-band that had Joe Henderson or Freddie Hubbard."

Hersch goes on to criticize another pianist, citing rhythmic and harmonic aspects of a recorded piece. When informed of the name of the artist, Hersch says:

It’s Jason Moran? Wow! Jason is a close personal friend and colleague. He’s going to be annoyed at me, but I still have to say that this piece didn’t work for me.

I’d like to hear Moran’s reaction. Even if he were annoyed, it’s possible that he’d respect Hersch’s critique because of its reasoned presentation. Or maybe not. In any case, it's refreshing to hear Hersch's strong and coherent point of view.

Hersch is not totally grumpy in the Blindfold Test. He likes selections by Art Tatum and Andrew Hill.

Appreciating "Let My Children Hear Music"

Is this the best album by Charles Mingus?

Can’t say. But it is a great achievement demonstrating his episodic approach to composition. The listener really gets slapped around through all the starts and stops of "The Shoes of the Fisherman’s Wife Are Some Jive Ass Slippers," "Don’t Be Afraid, the Clown’s Afraid Too," and "The I of Hurricane Sue."

The album has some great solos from James Moody and Charles McPherson, but Mingus the composer is the main event here. His ambition and passion are present at every turn.

Mingus’s explanation for his curious song titles was deceptively simple: They’re just something to think about while you’re listening to the music. The titles referenced above create a spectrum of thought possibilities: 

• "Shoes" — Inscrutable to me. No amount of thinking is likely to reveal the title’s connection to the music.
• "Clown" — Straightforward programatic title that reflects the music. 
• "Sue" — Presumably a musical essay about his tumultuous yet loving marriage.

My favorite thought-provoking title is "Remember Rockefeller at Attica," which I know from his 70s album, "Changes One." The title forces the listener, at least for a moment, to confront a political question. No matter where you stand on the issue, the title evokes images that completely ruin the experience of listening to this breezy tune — a mind game that Mingus probably enjoyed whenever he thought about it.

The music of Charles Mingus lives on through the industrious and creative work of his wife, Sue, and the multitude of bands she commissions through her organization, Jazz Workshop, Inc.

Appreciating the Crescent Double Quartet

Strings swing

Aart Van Bergen, the leader of the Netherlands-based Cresent Double Quartet, followed me on Twitter this morning. The connection led me to YouTube, where I found a video he posted on Friday of the group rehearsing their new project, "Radio Mundial," along with an earlier video of the group performing "Naima." So, within 20 minutes, I had gained a reasonably complete understanding of a group about which I knew nothing up until today, and which I intend to follow as they continue to develop their music. Moments like this one make all the noise and blather of social networking seem worthwhile.

The group’s instrumentation combines a string quartet (2 violins, viola, cello), with a jazz quartet (piano, bass, drums, tenor). Before listening, I was skeptical of the suggestion of combining jazz with classical. I have found that most such efforts result in coexistence, not synthesis, and not pleasurable as jazz. The main problems are that the classical musicians can’t improvise and can’t swing, and the jazz musicians tend to restrain themselves.

However, I had always imagined the possibility of strings playing jazz in a jazz ensemble. The opportunities for luscious sonorities and lively counterpoint seemed there for the taking, if musicians would want to try it. The Cresent Double Quartet has converted my imaginary music into reality.

The rehearsal video demonstrates how the strings enhance the gorgeous melodies that Van Bergen articulates on soprano. The "Naima" video shows how the group realizes this effect in performance — and they do so much more. The drummer breaks up rhythm into the highly engaging complex swing that I believe began with Elvin Jones. Best of all: the first violinist can really play. I would have enjoyed at least one more chorus from her. Near the end of the piece, when the band shifts from medium tempo back to slow, would have been a great place to take the music "out," at least briefly.

Congratulations to the Crescent Double Quartet for making distinctive music, and making their music known.

Appreciating the SF Jazz Collective

Tyner project taps into 70s-80s energy

One of the best listening experiences I've had in the past half-decade is the SF Jazz Collective's Live 2009: The works of McCoy Tyner Plus New Compositions.

The group is sponsored by SFJazz, the Bay Area nonprofit that presents an annual festival and performances throughout the year. Each year, the Collective plays at the festival and tours nationwide, performing the music of one noteworthy musician as well as original work by members composed especially for the group. The lineup changes every year.

The 2009 unit played the works of McCoy Tyner, whom I saw many times in the 70s. Memories of those performances remain soldered onto my hippocampus: Tyner pounding the keys, his left hand regularly rising up clawlike to pounce on another chord cluster, sweat pouring from his chin beard. The rhythmic power of the music set me up, and the water-cannon solos knocked me down.

In any case, the 2009 unit — Joe Lovano (tenor saxophone), Dave Douglas (trumpet), Renee Rosnes (piano), Miguel Zenon (alto saxophone and flute), Matt Penman (bass), Robin Eubanks (trombone) and Eric Harland (drums) — channeled that energy and found new ways to explore Tyner's compositions. There's some astonishing playing by Douglas and Zenon, and Rosnes has a great time channeling the maestro without mimicking him. And Harland on drums delivers heavy-hitting, hard driving swing throughout, with explosive accents.

The album is not cheap ($35), but it's a live, two-disc set, so you get value. It's available only at the SFJazz Web site: http://www.sfjazz.org/shop/music/collective/cd_2009.php