Jacques Loussier - Play Bach (rec. circa 1965 - I think - this compilation dated 1987)

Charity shop acquisition that caught my eye a couple of weeks ago, that cheap 'n cheesy cover art instantly bringing to mind the hilariously badly-adorned 80s reissues of Tangerine Dream's first four albums.  This album is no more 80s-sounding, electronic or retro-futuristic in any way - it's a collection of jazz piano trio recordings.

Angers-born pianist Jacques Loussier (1934-2019) and his trio of bassist Pierre Michelot (who was also part of Miles Davis' Ascenseur Pour L'échafaud lineup) and drummer Christian Garros occasionally varied their repertoire, but are largely notable for one thing.  It's in the title of this CD, and in the titles of dozens of LPs released from 1959 onwards (why not run a good pun into the ground?) - yep, the Loussier Trio's USP was to arrange the music of J. S. Bach for jazz trio.  They did it a lot (including updated recordings of the same pieces), and they did it very well.

This made the random find of a 1987-compiled CD on the Accord label - with no recording dates or any other source information - a bit baffling at first.  Eventually I narrowed down, with reasonable certainty, to this collection being sourced from live recordings originally released in 1965 as a double LP titled Play Bach Aux Champs-Élysées.  The 20-minute Partita In Se Bémol matched an Aux Champs version on YouTube, and the rest kind of fell into place from there.  Oh, and one other head-scratcher with that particular track: it briefly pauses for applause just before the eight-minute mark; the disc plays a track split here, but the Partita is listed as one continuous track on the back and inners (the disc thus knocking the rest of the track numbers out of sync with the tracklist).  I've edited the Partita back together here to match the original release, and because Accord's 80s compiling standards were starting to give me a migraine.

A fun-ish week of detective work aside, this stuff sounds really nice, and works.  Loussier (or Michelot) more often than not plays a few bars straight, then the melody gets jazzed up a bit, then the performance spins out into genuine piano trio interplay.  That's about it.  The fact that these are live recordings probably helps focus the extemporisations into something next-level and highly enjoyable.  And there's undeniably something quite "purest source" about using Bach as a springboard for the melodic, harmonic etc improvisations of jazz.  Wouldn't mind exploring more Loussier in future.

link

pw: sgtg

Frank Zappa - Petit Wazoo (live 1972, rel. 2006 & 2016)

Following on from the "Wazoo" big band, Zappa spent October and November 1972 taking a slimmed-down version of his jazz ensemble on the road.  This became known as the "Petit Wazoo" band, and in Zappa's late life and after his death an official document of this group became one of the most sought-after releases by fans.

Well, he had been working on one.  When the keepers of The Vault looked for Petit Wazoo tapes in the mid-00s to compile into an album, they found tapes cut, sequenced and mixed by Zappa periodically between 1972 and 1977.  This was released in 2006 as Imaginary Diseases, and has the unmistakable stamp of being Zappa's own concept.  A couple of short pieces lead into a lengthy minor-key blues, and the album's just warming up.  A belter of a Farther O'Blivion follows, including a great drum solo by Jim Gordon, then another slinky groove-improv.  The highlights keep coming in the form of the title track and the final piece, a jam from Montreal, capping off an extremely satisfying album of great arrangements and top-notch guitar playing.

link

pw: sgtg

Plans for the 'vault release' of Petit Wazoo music were then shelved - for no less than a decade, for whatever reason (no less than 30 albums separate the two releases, so possibly the Zappa Family Trust just like to keep things varied, and certainly can't be viewed as stingy to fans, as new archive releases continue unabated to this very month).  In any case, Little Dots came out in 2016 as a vault-selected companion piece to Imaginary Diseases, and contained a couple of non-instrumentals this time: a fine but no great revelation Cosmik Debris, and a full-length (literal) shaggy-dog story Rollo.  

 

Added to this are more jam-based pieces from Kansas City and Columbia, and the two-part composition that gives the album its title.  All great to hear, and the players interact brilliantly once again, but I think the Zappa-conceived sequence of Imaginary Diseases just edges it slightly as an overall album experience.  Great to have both to listen to side by side though, as a two-hour insight into this all-too short-lived ensemble.

 

link

pw: sgtg

Frank Zappa at SGTG:

Lumpy Gravy

Waka/Jawaka

The Grand Wazoo

Wazoo (Live 1972) 

Road Tapes Venue #2 (Live 1973)

Roxy & Elsewhere

One Size Fits All

Orchestral Favourites

Sleep Dirt

Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar

Boulez Conducts Zappa - The Perfect Stranger  

Jazz From Hell

You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore, Vol. 2: The Helsinki Concert

The Perfect Stranger (live 2018)

Total Immersion at The Barbican, London (live 2022)

The Byrds - (Untitled)/(Unissued) (deluxe edition 2000, orig. 2LP rel. 1970)

I used to reach for this one a lot at the turning of the seasons, and dug it out for a fresh appraisal the other day.  First released in September 1970 as a live record/studio record double, (Untitled) put in place the Byrds lineup that would prove most stable, carrying them through to the end (apart from the original lineup's reunions).  Roger McGuinn, Clarence White, Skip Battin and Gene Parsons proved to be a tight, adventurous live unit, and the collection of concert recordings that open the collection rip through material old and new culminating in a 16-minute jam around Eight Miles High.

The studio album is equally revelatory, marking a fresh high point in Byrdsian songwriting.  McGuinn at the time was attempting to write a musical entitled Gene Tryp, based on Peer Gynt and in collaboration with Jacques Levy (later Dylan's Desire co-writer).  As well as the live opener Lover Of The Bayou, songs from this abandoned project appearing on (Untitled) are Chestnut Mare, All The Things and Just A Season, working just fine as quality standalone songs.  Skip Battin comes to the fore as a writer too, on the memorable Vietnam-themed closer Well Come Back Home, and collaborative efforts Yesterday's Train, Hungry Planet and You All Look Alike.

Live and studio together, this 70 minutes of music add up to one of the strongest albums ever released under the Byrds moniker, but even more was recorded - and released as a bonus CD 30 years later.  This was my first exposure to (Untitled), on receiving a mix tape from someone with the gorgeous acoustic take on Lowell George's Willin' and seeking out the source.  The (Unissued) disc took a mirror approach to the original album, starting out with 20 minutes of studio outtakes then adding 25 minutes of further live material - and a neat little hidden extra in an accapella Amazing Grace.

Disc 1 link

Disc 2 link

pw: sgtg

Previously posted at SGTG: Sweetheart Of The Rodeo

George Russell - Listen To The Silence (rec. 1971, orig. rel. 1973)

Back to George Russell with another commissioned work, this time for the 1971 Kongsberg Jazz Festival, and recorded at its live premiere performance (with some studio effects added later) on 21st June 1971, Kongsberg Church, Norway.  Taking some lines from Rainer Maria Rilke, Maurice Nicoll, Dee Brown and snippets from Newsweek and the New York Times for its libretto, Listen To The Silence is a choral work calling for two choirs as well as jazz ensemble.  

 

The chanting voices get things underway before Russell, Garbarek & co enter to drive the music forward, and the work continues in this manner with the church acoustics giving the stentorian vocal delivery a definite atmospheric boost.  The instrumental sections are frequently more minimal and stripped-down compared to Russell's other work of the era, but this works in favour of the overall stark mood, and makes the Garbarek-Rypdal section at the start of Event IV all the more outstanding.  Subtitled "A Mass For Our Time", Listen To The Silence might be a bit 'of its time' in subject matter, but it remains a captivating listening experience to this day.

link

pw: sgtg

Previously posted at SGTG:

Electronic Sonata For Souls Loved By Nature

Trip To Prillarguri

Othello Ballet Suite

Vertical Event VI

John Adams - Harmonielehre (BBC SSO & RSNO, 9th February 2022)

A live concert broadcast from back in February, and a joining of forces to mark the Association of British Concert Orchestras' 2022 conference in Glasgow.  The hundred-plus combined might of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and Royal Scottish National Orchestra renders John Adams' mid-80s work in fine detail, but first up is a UK premiere.  Samy Moussa's Elysium is inspired by views of the afterlife in classical Greece, and shimmers into view before building in grandeur.

The solo spotlight for the programme falls on 19-year old Spanish violinist María Dueñas, who lives up to her "rising superstar" billing in a great rendering of Shostakovich's 1st Violin Concerto.  After the interval, the double-orchestra gives its full energy to John Adams' wondrous Harmoniehlehre.  Taking fresh inspiration from imagery in his dreams, Romantic music and harmonic exploration, Adam's three-section work from 1985 barrels along in unforgettable style.

link

pw: sgtg

 

Samy Moussa at SGTG:

A Globe Itself Infolding 

 

Dmitri Shostakovich at SGTG:

Symphony No. 15 (live 2017, scroll past main post)

Symphony No. 15 (live 2022) 

John Adams at SGTG:
Shaker Loops (orchestral version)
Shaker Loops (original version) / Light Over Water
Grand Pianola Music 
The Chairman Dances, etc
The Chairman Dances (live 2020)
Road Movies, Hallelujah Junction etc
Harmonium etc (scroll past main post)

Naive And Sentinmental Music (live 2019)

Miles Davis - Aura (rec. 1985, rel. 1989)

A suite of music composed for Miles by Palle Mikkelborg in 1984, and recorded in early 1985.  Contractual hurdles delayed its release until 1989, but it was worth the wait - Aura is nothing less than Miles Ahead for the 80s, lushly orchestrated but with the sound right up to date for its era.  Elements of rock, reggae and electronic music are all woven into the multi-colour suite, which is musically germinated from a ten-note theme based on the letters in "MILES DAVIS", a la B-A-C-H.  Sometimes eerily ambient, such as the opening minute with the calm broken by John McLaughlin introducing the theme, sometimes hard-edged and frenetic, Aura is a great album that finds Miles with plenty of spark left in him.

link

pw: sgtg

Miles Davis at SGTG:
Conception
Walkin'
Blue Moods
Bags' Groove
Miles Ahead (with Gil Evans)
Sketches Of Spain (with Gil Evans)
Quiet Nights (with Gil Evans) 

A Tribute To Jack Johnson

Live-Evil
On The Corner

In Concert

Big Fun
Agharta

Dark Magus

We Want Miles

Frank Zappa (BBC Symphony Orchestra / uBu Ensemble) - Total Immersion at The Barbican, London (19th March 2022)

With the Proms posts over, here's a 'Total Immersion Day' broadcast from earlier in the year.  Taking a fresh look at the Zappa music of the London Symphony Orchestra, Perfect Stranger and Yellow Shark eras, and more besides, the day's events also threaded in Zappa's formative influences as a composer.  This gives us a great take on Varèse's Intégrals as well as some lesser-known Stravinsky, in his late work written in memoriam of Aldous Huxley and the miniature song-cycle Pribaoutki from 1914.

For Zappa's music, the 'Total Immersion' concerts were divided between the full force of the BBC Symphony Orchestra to play the LSO-era works, and the contemporary ensemble uBu for the rest.  From the former, we get the lushly-orchestrated version of Pedro's Dowry, the complementary ballet pieces Bob In Dacron and Sad Jane, and the full-length Mo 'N Herb's Vacation.  The ensemble play The Perfect Stranger, Outrage At Valdez, Dog/Meat and Be-Bop Tango, giving full vivid life to Zappa's musical colourings.  Taken together, this broadcast is a great presentation of unique music, made even more informative by a couple of chats with Negative Dialectics Of Poodle Play author Ben Watson.

link

pw: sgtg

Frank Zappa at SGTG:

Lumpy Gravy

Waka/Jawaka

The Grand Wazoo

Wazoo (Live 1972) 

Road Tapes Venue #2 (Live 1973)

Roxy & Elsewhere

One Size Fits All

Orchestral Favourites

Sleep Dirt

Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar

Boulez Conducts Zappa - The Perfect Stranger  

Jazz From Hell

You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore, Vol. 2: The Helsinki Concert

The Perfect Stranger (live 2018)

Weather Report - Tale Spinnin' (1975)

Percussive fireworks and melodic fusion from Weather Report at the top of their game.  In his only appearance with WR, Leon 'Ngudu' Chancler of Herbie Hancock/Santana/many others fame is the drummer, with Alyrio Lima handling percussion and the core trio of Zawinul, Shorter and Johnson carried over from the previous album.  Tale Spinnin' gets off to a flying start with one of Weather Report's most memorable album openers, Man In The Green Shirt, and grooves onwards with a sublime Shorter composition and another lengthy Zawinul piece.  It's not all funky fusion - the highly atmospheric Badia is a definite standout, with Zawinul's eerie electronics continuing the band's early experimental strand.

link

pw: sgtg

Previously posted at SGTG:

s/t debut

I Sing The Body Electric

Mysterious Traveller 

Black Market

BBC Proms 2022: Marius Neset / London Sinfonietta - Geyser (3 Sept 2022)

The last post from this year's Proms is another world premiere, in this work composed by Norwegian saxophonist Marius Neset.  Playing with the London Sinfonietta, Neset took his geologically-inspired suite from its calm beginnings to frenetic interlocking patterns with great solos and on to much more besides.  Don't take the track splits I've added in as necessarily accurate - this was mostly guesswork as only the first couple of sections are applauded, all the rest segues, and I had nothing else to refer to.  But do enjoy all the twists and turns of this incredible work, with Neset's core quintet blending wonderfully with the ensemble.

link

pw: sgtg