PDX Jazz, 50 Years of Impulse!, ECM On Sale, & What I've Been Listening To

A lot has been going on in Jazz this year, and I'm having a hard time keeping up with it. For starters I just noticed PDX Jazz Founder and Artistic Director Bill Royston has retired. I'm sure the fest will be in good hands with the board and Don Lucoff. I wish Bill the best. I have gotten to see Ornette Coleman, Lou Donaldson, Bobby Hutcherson, Pharoah Sanders, and The Bad Plus thanks to his curating.

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All ECM albums are on sale at Music Millennium:

Please take advantage of this special offer from Music Millennium - and ECM Records of 20% off all ECM titles from now until the end of June.

The first place I worked when I moved to Portland was Music Millennium in NW Portland (up until it closed). I was a floor supervisor and oversaw the Jazz collection. Let me tell you, they have an impeccable collection of ECM titles. Although this sale could be dwindling their stock fast. Music Millennium is in Portland on East Burnside and 32nd Ave. You can also shop online.

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It has been 50 years of enjoying Impulse! Records. Some nice releases are/will be available to commemorate this milestone.

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I've been enjoying a lot of Destination:Out recently. They have been providing some notable articles on Sun Ra and George Lewis (and here).

I haven't had a whole lot of time to get into some new music. I've been listening to a lot of Braxton Montreux/Berlin Concerts, and an extreme amount of Don Cherry. Particularly his Blue Note sessions and the ESP-Disk' Café Montmartre volumes. Which offer beautiful, low produced clones of segments of his suites from those Blue Note recordings.

As far as Braxton, put him with Dave Holland and Barry Altschul, alongside either Kenny Wheeler or George Lewis and my day instantly gets better.

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I just bought an iPad and will be using BlogPress. If you see the below signature attached to any post, it pretty much means I'm trying to justify any typos, weird capitalization, or awkward formatting issues.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Happy Birthday Don Cherry!

All About Jazz on Don Cherry

Beer & Album Pairings

It seems this blog is becoming more libation friendly. I'll work on a new album write-up soon for this month. I just want to direct attention to a Beer and Album pairing piece I did for Brewpublic.com. The site's host, Angelo De Ieso II, wrote a wonderful forward to my entries. Keep following Brewpublic as there will be more contributions from other beer and music nerds. Below is one sample I did, but please check out Brewpublic for the full read.

Cheers!

Don Cherry, Where is Brooklyn? / Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout

Where is Brooklyn? Well, Brooklyn Brewery pumps out some of the best brews in the Northeast and their Black Chocolate Stout is fitting for this adventurous album by Don Cherry on Blue Note. Recorded in 1966, we hear a piano-less quartet that’s similar to Ornette Coleman’s classic Quartet earlier in the decade but oh how different it is. Pharoah Sanders’ more haunting, spiritual tone completely contrasts the melodic blues and boogie aesthetic of Coleman’s. It’s a jarring album of collective improvisation and connectivity. With Brooklyn’s Black Chocolate Stout we’re offered a robust, sweet, chocolaty brew. Enjoy it slowly along Cherry’s slurring and vivacious cornet playing. Black Chocolate Stout is thick yet has a smooth texture on the palate much like Ed Blackwell (drums) and Henry Grimes (bass) as they back up the two horn players.

"Symphony For Improvisers" - Don Cherry

This is a great performance lead by Cherry.  You get two different dimensions of sax coming from the jagged sounds of Pharoah Sanders and the more straining sounds of Gato Barbieri.  And when Sanders plays his piccolo, it really makes an interested contrast to Cherry's horn playing.  The best is when the musicians sort of sync up for those brief sublime moments, and the listener is unsure if they are just playing an arranged part, or if their ears are just adjusting to the actions of the musicians.  I love Karl Berger's vibe playing as well, and the way he follows Don Cherry's playing adds a nice effect.  Around 9:30 into the album title tracked, the group plays an ensemble part that is just breathtaking and is than followed by a swinging solo by Blackwell.  "Manhattan Cry" starts off almost like a ballad, but steadily evolves into a freeing collective of sounds that sticks with the album's theme.

1966 - Blue Note.

Don Cherry - Cornet, Trumpet; Ed Blackwell - Drums; Gato Barbieri - Sax (Tenor); Henry Grimes - Bass; Jean-François Jenny-Clark - Bass; Karl Berger - Piano, Vibraphone; Pharoah Sanders - Piccolo, Sax (Tenor).