It gives me great pleasure to hand this post over to the illustrious Bob Cornwell – film buff, crime fiction expert and music aficionado – to discus the music that popped up recently via his iPod shuffle. [Just as it is with books, other people’s music libraries are often far more diverse and interesting than one’s own.]
Ysabel’s Table Dance (Charles Mingus)
Aftermath (Kevin Eubanks)
Third Rate Romance (Amazing Rhythm Aces)
Here Comes the Honeyman (Norma Winstone with the NDR Bigband under Mike Gibbs)
This Girl’s in Love with You (Dionne Warwick)
Donna Lee (Charlie Parker)
Rustat’s Gravesong (Michael Garrick Orchestra)
I Want You (Jewels and Binoculars)
Downtown Train (Tom Waits)
O Deserto (Mariza)
Dance You Monster to My Soft Song (Maria Schneider Orchestra)
Moon Mist (Duke Ellington and his Famous Orchestra)
No day that starts with this passionate, mercurial music from Tijuana Moods (1957), my favourite Mingus album and one of only three (all for Mingus)) that feature the wistfully lyrical trumpet of Clarence Shaw, here in teasing fragments.
The ‘day’ job for some years for under-rated guitarist Kevin Eubanks, was with the house band on Jay Leno’s Tonight US TV show in the 1990s. This is from Turning Point, his first album (1992) for Blue Note, bristling with excellent Eubanks originals and supported, amongst others by Britain’s own Dave Holland and Mark Mondesir.
The 1970s generally get a bad rap, for its politics of course but also for its music. Not in my book, notable as the period was for great British big bands. Think Neil Ardley’s New Jazz Orchestra, Chris McGregor’s anarchic but always exhilarating Brotherhood of Breath, the Mikes Westbrook, Gibbs and Garrick, and then on into the 80s with the various Graham Collier aggregations. Here Comes the Honeyman is later Gibbs. from his wonderful 2011 album, Here’s A Song for You, featuring Norma Winstone with the NDR Bigband (Mark Mondesir guesting on drums). This includes some very individual interpretations of material from Nick Drake, Sting and Joni Mitchell as well as a few classics from Fats Waller, Duke and Billy Strayhorn. And in the closing moments of this track, can I hear a brief homage to the sinuous horns and woodwind that accompany Miles on the fragmentary (1m 18sec) version of this tune on Porgy and Bess (1958), arranged by Gil Evans.
Rustat’s Gravesong meanwhile originates from Michel Garrick in 1968, the innovative Jazz Praises suite (Garrick on the organ of St.Paul’s Cathedral for instance). This version comes from an undated but much later (early 200s?) now with a young band that included two of his sons.
No Dusty (or Lester) this time round. Instead the Apple logarithm glides mysteriously from a sublime Dionne Warwick in 1969 to an intense Charlie Parker in 1947 with an ‘all-star’ group that includes Miles Davis, Bud Powell and Max Roach, in Parker’s first ‘illicit’ session for Savoy (he was contracted to Dial at the time).
A Bob Dylan inspired jazz album? Three in fact, all from woodwind specialist Michael Moore (no relation) and his band called Jewels and Binoculars, completed by bassist Linsdey Horner and percussionist Michael Vatcher. Ths jaunty version of I Want You comes from Floater, the second album (2003), one of many jewels on this record.
Fado singer Mariza’s O Deserto (The Desert) comes from her international breakthrough album Fado Curvo, the latter obligingly translated on the CD as “inclined forward”, as she strove to incorporate new influences both poetically and musically. Here’s a nod to jazz, her glorious voice accompanied here on Portuguese guitar by Mario Pacheco, a giant of that instrument and, on trumpet Quiné (a role taken by Guy Barker on a later appearance in London’s Festival Hall).
The great big band of our day, in my opinion, is that of Maria Schneider. Here’s an altogether more extrovert version of a track from 2014 that first showed up on Evanescence (1994) her first album, Gil Evans a clear influence – and perhaps too, Paul Klee? NB If you can get down to Ronnies in early July when Schneider appears at the club as guest conductor, not to mention composer-in-residence, with the Ronnie Scott Jazz Orchestra.
Finally, another perennial, Duke Ellington. Most of the seminal collection Never No Lament (the Blanton/Webster-Band, 1940-1942) has ended up on my iPod. This is a lesser known item, led by Ray Nance on violin, from January 1942 that you’d swear came from the pen of Billy Strayhorn. But no, it’s a gentle original from a young Mercer Ellington, that let’s you down gently after the fire of Maria Schneider. And reminds you that it’s about that time – coffee time.
Some Days You Do ... 