A little Trane

I have added some Coltrane to my L365 station.  I finally got around to purchasing Interstellar Space (1974).  I believe it was Trane's last studio album.  It's a duet with  Rashied Ali on drums.  It is very avant garde in spirit, but any Coltrane fan will appreciate it.  I am playing 'Venus'.

I also added 'The Believer' from the box set Fearless Leader.   This is from an album released ten years earlier but was recorded in 1958.  That was the title cut.  I am adding another cut from the same sparse album 'Do I Love You Because You're Beautiful'.  The Believer featured the great rhythm section of Garland, Chambers, and Taylor.   This was the heroic period in jazz. 

• Bass – Paul Chambers (3)
• Drums – Arthur Taylor* (tracks: B2), Louis Hayes
• Piano – Red Garland
• Tenor Saxophone – John Coltrane
• Trumpet – Donald Byrd, Freddie Hubbard (tracks: B2)

Red Garland & Paul Chambers

 

Pianist Red Garland shares at least one honor with John Coltrane, besides often playing behind Trane.  Both were fired by Miles Davis.  I finally got around to adding Red Garland Revisited to my collection.  The cause in both cases was heroin.  

Garland, bassist Paul Chambers, and drummer Philly Joe Jones were often referred to simply as the rhythm section.  That is mostly due to their work as the platform for Davis and Trane in Miles' first great quintet.  You can find Garland and Chambers on a lot of seminal albums in the late fifties. 

I finally got around to adding Red Garland Revisited to my collection.  It is a superb showcase for Garland's talent and also features some fine work by guitarist Kenny Burrell.  I am playing the two cuts with Burrell on them, both Miles Davis standards: 'Walkin' and 'Four'.  Chambers plays bass and Art Taylor is on drums.  

I bought the album on the recommendation of the Penguin Jazz Guide 1001.  Shortly after the entry on the above disc, I read one on Paul Chambers Bass On Top.  Had to have it.  Burrell shows up again, as does Art Taylor.  Hank Jones plays piano.  This is a great one for bass fans, especially if you like jazz bass played with a bow.  I am playing another piece from the Davis playlist: 'The Theme'. 

A little more Red

I have mentioned pianist Red Garland on several occasions.  One reason he is kinda special is that I really began my serious (=systematic) jazz collecting with Miles Davis' first quintet.  I have been traveling of late, hence the gap in posts.  This afternoon I stepped out of my car into an honest Dakota rain and walked into a used CD shop in Sioux Falls.  All I found in their four foot square jazz section was Red Garland's Groovy. 

It's not a great piece of jazz, but if you like bop piano trios, you'll like this.  Paul Chambers plays bass, and Art Taylor beats the skins.  Here is a sample, with Chambers using the bow.  Garland clearly had that feelin'. 

Red Garland Trio/What Can I Say (After I'm Sorry)?/Groovy

You gotta love that title.  Garland carries his own jazz club with him.  Listen a bit and it closes around you, with a sexy and somewhat tragic young lady pouring you a beer.  Try it. 

Kenneth Caldwell Blanchard Sr. 1923-2010

My father passed away on January 27th.  As a practitioner of  Zen Buddhism, I suppose I will have to begin celebrating that day in the future, as that is what Buddhists generally do.  There is a kind of appealing symmetry in replacing the birthday with the day of passing.  

My father had enormous reserves of good humor, love, and devotion.  He served in the Pacific in World War II, along with three of his brothers.  One of these heroes of the Republic, my Uncle Bill, did not make it back.  Dad lived life on his own terms.  He was one of those people who genuinely liked nearly everyone he met, and as a result everyone who knew him was better off for it.  Dad was not a jazz fan.  In fact, he had a tin ear.  But he would have been amused to know that I am eulogizing him on this blog.  

It only occurred to me tonight that Dad was born a couple of months after the great bop piano player Red Garland.  So I decided to offer this post on Garland and John Coltrane in my father's honor.  Garland was part of one of the most famous rhythm sections in modern jazz, playing behind Miles Davis and John Coltrane in Miles' first great quintet.  He recorded a number of fine albums as leader, including four with Coltrane: High Pressure, Dig It!, Soul Junction, and All Morning Long. 

Here is a sample from the last in the list.  Donald Byrd plays trumpet, George Joyner bass, and Art Taylor drums.  It is a bit longer than the samples I usually include, but this is a special post. This recording was made, as it happens, a few months after yours truly arrived on the scene. 

Red Garland Quintet/All Morning Long

My readers will know that I offer these samples to illustrate my criticism and to encourage them to obtain the recordings.  My old file sharing service, drop.io, expired without warning and I have switched to a new one, dropbox.  Unfortunately, all the older links are now useless.  

But here is a very useful tip: the above recordings are part of a box set of Coltrane recordings, Side Steps.  You can get this collection of Trane's work as a sideman very cheaply from two sources.  One is eMusic.  The other is Hastings, which is letting it go for $19.99.  That is a steal. Pick it up at Hastings.  You get the booklet and photos. 

And here is another offering from a Coltrane box set: The Classic Quartet: The Complete Impulse! Studio Recordings.   It is from the album First Meditations, recorded in 1965 (John Coltrane (ss, ts) McCoy Tyner (p) Jimmy Garrison (b) Elvin Jones (d)).  Again, in my Father's honor:

Love

So the Zen patriarch was watching a flock of ducks fly overhead.  After they were gone he turned to a monk and asked: "What happened to the flippin' ducks?"  The monk answered "they have flown away."  The patriarch reached over and twisted the monk's nose good and hard.  "Shit!," he cried, "why did you do that?"  The old man replied: "how could they possibly have flown away?"  

Commentary: the only ducks that there ever are are the ducks that are here.  There is no such thing as a duck that has flown away.