Entire genres that only need one thread #1: "Jazz"

[doug rr]

happy bday buddy...

[Kevin Davis]

Got "Thelonious in Action" going right now -- one of my all-time favorite artists. Happy 100, TSM!

[Higgs]

5 Disc "Complete Originals" set playing through in order.

[Kevin Davis]

5 Disc "Complete Originals" set playing through in order.

Nice!

[contamination]

I've never been a fan of the big band sound, but here I think it works marvelously:

[Kevin Davis]

From the Beck thread:

i need some Miles recommendations from these bootleg series. haven't looked into them.

Vol 1: Live in Europe 1967
This is my personal favorite volume in the series, just because I am such an enormous fan of his mid-60's band with Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter, and Tony Williams (I typed everyone's name out because no one in this band deserves to be relegated to an "etc."). Lightning fast, telepathic interplay by one of the greatest five-person ensembles in music history. Recommendation level: Default on loans if it means having enough money to get this.

Vol. 2: Live in Europe 1969
Early electric Miles, and significant for being the only proper release to feature his "great lost quintet" (Miles, Wayne Shorter, Chick Corea, Dave Holland, Jack DeJohnette). Sonically, a little less sharp than the other volumes, but the music is frequently brilliant and the sense of discovery within the band (who'd all just been told by Miles to start playing electrtic instruments after careers of playing acoustic jazz) is palpable. Recommendation level: Prioritize basic necessities, but get this before you get the new Beck album.

Vol. 3: Live at the Fillmore 1970
These are the "complete" sets that comprise the notoriously butchered 1970 live album "Miles Davis at Fillmore," and if you like Miles right in this sweet spot of his "Bitches Brew"/"Jack Johnson" era, you'll love this. There are a lot of live albums from 1970, so if you're not a completist-type and already have a couple, this may feel redundant. But if you have none, this is the one I'd recommend, especially since the Cellar Door box probably goes for over $100 now. Recommendation level: Somewhere between the first and second volumes.

Volume 4: At Newport, 1955-1975
If you only get one of these, this is probably the one to get -- as the title suggests, it's a collection of all of Miles's sets from the Newport Jazz Festival from the date range above, and it covers a ton of variety: 1955 mini-set with T. Monk, 1958 set with Coltrane and the "Kind of Blue" band, two superb sets from 1966 and 1967, and a variety of fusion-era stuff that ranges from electric-jazzy to violent-noisy. Recommendation level: Worth rushing to the record store for the last copy of, but only worth a Black Friday-style parking lot fight if you're sure you'll win.

Volume 5: Freedom Jazz Dance (1966-67 Studio Sessions)
This release is not to my taste -- it's a "complete" studio session with banter and false starts and everything, which would be more exciting if all the (universally fantastic, admittedly) full takes weren't previously released. Would have been more compelling as a DVD/Blu-Ray release, though I'm sure that would have been impossible. Recommendation level: If you don't have the original albums ("Miles Smiles," "Nefertiti," "Water Babies"), get those instead; if you do, just do your own Miles impression (raspy voice, lots of swearing) in between the tracks for the full effect.

[washing machine]

I was listening to some Louis Armstrong the other day and came across this morbid little number. The lyrics are laugh-out-loud funny the way Satch delivers them.



Now I'll be glad when you're dead, you rascal you, uh-huh
I'll be glad when you're dead, you rascal you, oh yeah
Well I let into my home, you gonna leave my woman alone
I'll be glad when you're dead, you rascal you

Now I'll be glad when you die, you rascal you, uh-huh
I'll be glad, oh I'll be tickled to death when you leave this earth it's true, oh yeah
When you're lyin' down six feet deep, no more fried chicken will you eat
I'll be glad when you're dead, you rascal you, oh yeah

Ah, you just ain't no good! oh, you dog

Now listen here, I'll be glad when you're dead, you rascal you, uh-huh
I'll be glad when you're dead, you rascal you, oh yeah
I'll be standin' on the corner high, when they drag your body by
I'll be glad when you're dead, you know I'm gonna be so happy when you're gone you dog
I'll be glad when you're dead, you rascal you

[contamination]

Sooo goood

[bada]

Someone should post a nice intro to jazz mix for us unsophisticates.

[Brett]

Someone should post a nice intro to jazz mix for use unsophisticates.

I like this idea. I'm not a complete neophyte to the genre, but it would be cool to get a sample of what's considered important and/or essential stuff.

[Kevin Davis]

I'd enjoy assembling something like that but won't be able to put one together soon. So instead I'll re-share this for the holidays.

Not sure if this would be of interest to anyone here, but this is a little project I have been slowly but steadily working on for the past 2-3 years or so and wanted to share the details of it here.

In the summer of 2012 I read the Thelonious Monk biography "The Life and Times of An American Original" by Robin Kelley. Monk has long been a favorite composer and performer of mine, but reading this biography really pushed me off the deep end. I was particularly struck by a comment that I had read there and elsewhere which stated that Monk is the second most "covered" jazz composer of all-time, behind Duke Ellington. However, while Ellington had thousands of copyrights to his name, Monk only had something like 70 -- songs which he recorded over and over again, some which he never recorded at all, but still, a small body of work considering his reputation as one of the art form's great composers.

So it seemed like tracking down at least one version of every original song he recorded ought to be a relatively doable task, and for a few years I steadily sought out Monk releases with this goal in mind. Somewhere along the way, it dawned on me that it would be cool to compile an anthology of sorts -- personal favorite versions of each composition, but with every composition represented once. Finally, after a leisurely three years of putting it together, the comp is done.

The collection spans six discs and covers 21 years -- from 1947 to 1968. Minus a few oddball tracks that Kelley and other students of Monk's music have reasonably deduced are either unfinished pieces or improvisations, this should be every Monk composition that he recorded his own version of (I used the appendix in Kelley's book as my reference material, so there shouldn't be any holes). All the recordings are sourced from my personal CD collection, ripped to iTunes as WAVs and then converted to FLAC via Poweramp. I am too inept of an engineer to do much audio manipulation, but I did fade live tracks in and out for continuity purposes, and tweaked the overall volume of a couple tracks ever so slightly, but these are still sourced from a variety of different CD's from a variety of different labels that were all mastered and remastered and re-remastered at various points in time and therefore don't sound perfectly continuous from a sonic standpoint. But from a musical standpoint, it's six discs of bliss.

Thelonious Monk -- Complete Originals

Spoiler: show

Disc 1

1. Thelonious (10/15/47, WOR Studios, NYC)
2. Humph (10/15/47, WOR Studios, NYC)
3. Ruby, My Dear (10/24/47, WOR Studios, NYC)
4. Introspection (10/24/47, WOR Studios, NYC)
5. Who Knows (11/21/47, WOR Studios, NYC)
Taken from the Blue Note release “Genius of Modern Music, Volume 1”

6. Criss Cross (7/23/51, WOR Studios, NYC)
7. Eronel (7/23/51, WOR Studios, NYC)
8. Skippy (5/30/52, WOR Studios, NYC)
9. Hornin’ In (5/30/52, WOR Studios, NYC)
10. Sixteen (5/30/52, WOR Studios, NYC)
11. Let’s Cool One (5/30/52, WOR Studios, NYC)
Taken from the Blue Note release “Genius of Modern Music, Volume 2”

12. Bye-Ya (10/15/52, WOR Studios, NYC)
Originally released on the Prestige album “Thelonious Monk Trio”
Taken from “The Complete Prestige Recordings”

13. Let’s Call This (11/13/53. WOR Studios, NYC)
Originally released on the Prestige album “Monk”
Taken from “The Complete Prestige Recordings”

14. Friday the 13th (11/13/53, WOR Studios, NYC)
Originally released on the Prestige album “Thelonious Monk and Sonny Rollins”
Taken from “The Complete Prestige Recordings”

15. We See (5/11/54, Van Gelder Studios, Hackensack, NJ)
Originally released on the Prestige album “Monk”
Taken from “The Complete Prestige Recordings”

16. Work (9/22/54, Van Gelder Studios, Hackensack, NJ)
Originally released on the Prestige album “Thelonious Monk and Sonny Rollins”
Taken from “The Complete Prestige Recordings”

17. Bemsha Swing (12/24/54, Van Gelder Studios, Hackensack, NJ)
Originally released on the Prestige album “Miles Davis and the Modern Jazz Giants”
Taken from “The Complete Prestige Recordings”

Disc 2

1. Brilliant Corners (10/15/56, Reeves Sound Studios, NYC)
2. Ba-Lue Bolivar Ba-Lues-Are (10/9/56, Reeves Sound Studios, NYC)
3. Pannonica (10/9/56, Reeves Sound Studios, NYC)
Taken from the Riverside release “Brilliant Corners”

4. Reflections (4/14/57, Van Gelder Studios, Hackensack, NJ)
Taken from the Blue Note release “Sonny Rollins, Volume 2”

5. Functional (4/16/57, Reeves Sound Studios, NYC)
Taken from the Riverside release “Thelonious Himself”

6. Well, You Needn’t (6/26/57, Reeves Sound Studios, NYC)
7. Off Minor (6/26/57, Reeves Sound Studios, NYC)
Originally released on the Riverside album “Monk’s Music”
Taken from “The Definitive Thelonious Monk on Prestige and Riverside”

8. Trinkle, Tinkle (7/57, Reeves Sound Studios, NYC)
Originally released on the Riverside album “Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane”
Taken from “The Definitive Thelonious Monk on Prestige and Riverside”

Disc 3

1. Monk’s Mood (10/29/57, Carnegie Hall, NYC)
2. Evidence (10/29/57, Carnegie Hall, NYC)
3. Crepuscule With Nellie (10/29/57, Carnegie Hall, NYC)
4. Nutty (10/29/57, Carnegie Hall, NYC)
Taken from the Blue Note release “Thelonious Monk with John Coltrane At Carnegie Hall”

5. ‘Round Midnight (7/9/58, Five Spot Café, NYC)
Originally released on the Milestone compilation “Blues Five Spot”
Taken from the CD version of the Riverside release “Thelonious in Action” (it appears as a bonus track)

6. Light Blue (8/7/58, Five Spot Café, NYC)
7. Coming On the Hudson (8/7/58, Five Spot Café, NYC)
8. Blue Monk (8/7/58, Five Spot Café, NYC)
Taken from the Riverside release “Thelonious in Action”

9. Blues Five Spot (8/7/58, Five Spot Café, NYC)
10. In Walked Bud (8/7/58, Five Spot Café, NYC)
Taken from the Riverside release “Misterioso”

11. Little Rootie Tootie (2/28/59, Town Hall, NYC)
Originally released on the Riverside album “The Thelonious Monk Orchestra at Town Hall”
Taken from “The Definitive Thelonious Monk on Prestige and Riverside”

Disc 4

1. Jackie-Ing (6/4/59, Reeves Sound Studios, NYC)
2. Played Twice (6/1/59, Reeves Sound Studios, NYC)
3. Ask Me Now (6/2/59, Reeves Sound Studios, NYC)
Taken from the Riverside release “5 By Monk By 5”

4. Round Lights (10/21/59, Fugazi Hall, San Francisco, CA)
5. Bluehawk (10/22/59, Fugazi Hall, San Franscisco, CA)
Taken from the Riverside release “Thelonious Alone in San Francisco”

6. Hackensack (4/14/61, Olympia Theatre, Paris, France)
Taken from the Riverside release “Monk in France”

7. Epistrophy (4/21/61, Concert “Teatro Lirico,” Milan, Italy)
8. San Francisco Holiday (4/21/61, Concert “Teatro Lirico,” Milan, Italy)
9. Rhythm-a-Ning (4/21/61, Concert “Teatro Lirico,” Milan, Italy)
Taken from the Riverside release “Monk in Italy”

10. Monk’s Dream (11/2/62, 30th Street Studios, NYC)
Taken from the Columbia release “Monk’s Dream”

11. Think of One (2/26/63, 30th Street Studios, NYC)
Taken from the Columbia release “Criss Cross”

Disc 5

1. I Mean You (12/30/63, Philharmonic Hall, Lincoln Center, NYC)
2. Misterioso (12/30/63, Philharmonic Hall, Lincoln Center, NYC)
3. Oska T. (12/30/63, Philharmonic Hall, Lincoln Center, NYC)
4. Four In One (12/30/63, Philharmonic Hall, Lincoln Center, NYC)
Taken from the Columbia release “Big Band and Quartet in Concert”

5. Stuffy Turkey (1/30/64, 30th Street Studios, NYC)
6. Brake’s Sake (2/10/64, 30th Street Studios, NYC)
7. Shuffle Boil (3/9/64, 30th Street Studios, NYC)
Taken from the Columbia release “It’s Monk’s Time”

Disc 6

1. Children’s Song (That Old Man) (10/7/64, 30th Street Studios, NYC)
2. Teo (3/9/64, 30th Street Studios, NYC)
Taken from the Columbia release “Monk.”

3. North of the Sunset (10/31/64, unidentified studio, Los Angeles, CA)
Taken from the Columbia release “Solo Monk”

4. Gallop’s Gallop (11/1/64, It Club, Los Angeles, CA)
5. Straight, No Chaser (10/31/64, It Club, Los Angeles, CA)
Taken from the Columbia release “Live At the It Club – Complete”

6. Monk’s Point (11/2/64, unidentified studio, Los Angeles, CA)
Taken from the Columbia release “Solo Monk”

7. Bright Mississippi (11/4/64, Jazz Workshop, San Francisco, CA)
Taken from the Columbia release “Live at the Jazz Workshop – Complete”

8. Locomotive (11/15/66, 30th Street Studios, NYC)
Taken from the Columbia release “Straight, No Chaser”

9. Ugly Beauty (12/14/67, 30th Street Studios, NYC)
10. Raise Four (2/14/68, 30th Street Studios, NYC)
11. Boo Boo’s Birthday (12/21/67, 30th Street Studios, NYC)
12. Green Chimneys (12/14/67, 30th Street Studios, NYC)
Taken from the Columbia release “Underground”

I don't feel like going back and typing out the personnel for each track, but information should be easily available by searching the original albums, and suffice it to say Monk's supporting cast throughout this set includes Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins, Max Roach, Percy Heath, Johnny Griffin, and the soulmate of his later years, tenor man Charlie Rouse, among many other capable henchmen. Hopefully this is of interest to at least a few of you -- feel free to drop me a line to discuss it further. Merry early Christmas to all

[Brett]

Nice! Thanks Kevin, I definitely intend to check that out.

[doug rr]

here we go, finally...just pre ordered the vinyl. it ships late March

[Kevin Davis]

Ordered it too. March can't come soon enough.

[contamination]

Oh man, I just love Monk so much

[bodysnatcher]

here we go, finally...just pre ordered the vinyl. it ships late March

missed this post, but just saw this on a record blog i frequent. pre-ordering now.

been on a HUGE jazz kick lately. going to re-read this thread and get some new recommendations

[doug rr]

here we go, finally...just pre ordered the vinyl. it ships late March

missed this post, but just saw this on a record blog i frequent. pre-ordering now.

been on a HUGE jazz kick lately. going to re-read this thread and get some new recommendations

get it..i have the 4 disc bootleg set from the mid 90s

[doug rr]

also, nice grab on the ESP...what an album and line up

[bodysnatcher]

i dunno what the style is actually called, but i've been into "muted jazz" pretty big this winter. goes perfect with the dreary weather.

[contamination]

I like her sound: