One thing I can never get
enough of is Kind of Blue. For all sorts of reasons, it is generally
acknowledged as one of the best albums every produced. It is certainly the best selling jazz
album. I first heard it after I joined
the Columbia Music club. Four free jazz
albums! I also got Ornette Coleman’s The Shape of Jazz to Come. That was worth whatever I paid.
Tonight I am reviewing Blue, a note by note reproduction of KOB
by a group called Mostly Other People Do the Killing. Here is some info:
The audacious project, first conceived by Moppa Elliott and
Peter Evans in 2002, intends to challenge the way people listen to jazz. By
transcribing and recording what is arguably the greatest jazz album of all
time, Mostly Other People Do the Killing affirms the greatness of the original
while questioning the direction of jazz in the 21st century. The
thought-experiment-cum-album forces to listener to examine what makes jazz
actually jazz and brings the non-notatable elements music to the foreground:
timbre, articulation and the ineffable nature of tone and feel.
Standing in for Davis' classic band are Peter Evans on
trumpet, Jon Irabagon on alto and tenor saxophone, Ron Stabinsky on piano,
Moppa Elliott on bass and Kevin Shea on drums.
I am not sure about the “questioning
the direction of jazz in the 21st century” part. Maybe this is a protest against the hold that
jazz classics have and the situation of contemporary artists in breaking
through that glass ceiling. I must
confess, but my jazz station and this blog certainly are stodgy in that
regard.
So what if someone reproduced
KOB so accurately that it is indistinguishable from the original? Would that mean that the greatness of the
album was a mere accident of history?
Maybe. But history is not to be
denied.
I haven’t yet digested this
recording, but I do wonder whether one could tell which was the real one and
which was Memorex. So give it a listen
and let me know what you think.
