As the title of this piece indicates, we’ve been down this road many a time.
What makes for the communal pool of knowledge and musical material into which jazz musicians leap—and will leap in the future? Or is that pool just dry? I’ve not yet fully worked out my feelings about Schwarz’s piece. I want to know how you feel about it.
1. I don’t think the pool is dry – the tradition has the seeds of its own development through gospel, blues, funk and even classical and R&R.
2. Is it commercially viable? – well more so than ever in the sense that with technological conduits by-passing major labels, Jazz should no longer be something deemed as esoteric and artists can connect directly with fans.
3. Stop fretting about it – to preserve it by design or make it “relevant” are both rationalistic and counter-productive, undermining its natural adaptive dynamism.
This photo of Louis Armstrong is part of a new exhibit “In Vibrant Color: Vintage Celebrity Portraits from the Harry Warnecke Studio.”
A nice piece on WM: he may not be my favourite trumpeter, but he does good work. I don’t know exactly why he gets a lot of stick – too traditionalist perhaps? He’s a very articulate, modest and compelling guy doing good stuff with a variety of people including of course Simon Rattle – now if that’s not validation enough, what is?
“Jazz music is a music of communication. It’s only about us listening to other people and trying to figure out what are they playing.”
“Am I better than Louis Armstrong? That’s not possible,” he said. “Could he do everything that I can do? No. But why would he want to do that, when he could do all the things he could?”
Here is a link to an article that should be of interest to you all in the media (film, television, online) as well as those with an interest in international development and social entrepreneurship.
Though Canada is the primary reference point, everything said here can be extrapolated for most other territories. Without doubt, all these predictions will come to fruition: if not exactly as predicted, pretty darn close – the writing is on the wall! Not only will it affect the developed nations for the good, it will affect so much of the developing world for the good.
I’m hoping that some of you will be inclined to add your “two-cents” worth: by engaging in this discussion, it can only add to the groundswell of “cord-cutting” that already has a significant amount of momentum.
That aside, if like me you don’t appreciate the gatekeepers’ monopolies, the self-appointed arbiters and peddlers of “dumbed-down-lowest-common-denominator-crap” as well as the tiresome adverts – then you’ve pretty much got the motivation behind this article.
I notice that Rodders’ autobiography is released today, not surprisingly, already #113 on Amazon. I hope it’s as cracking a read as Keef’s book released two years ago. I also notice that A Companion to Michael Oakeshott is doing exceedingly well (#115,780) which for a purely academic book is pretty darn amazing (assuming of course there is substance to Amazon’s metric).
I want to give a plug to this book on a fascinating topic – thank goodness for scholars such as Mikhail (a chum from my Oxford days), who so painstakingly pull together these projects.
Decent theatrical documents of rock concerts are few and far between. Only two come to mind: The Last Waltz and Stop Making Sense. Previous efforts such as The Song Remains the Same and Shine a Light while they have their moments, are in the case of the former, a bit tiresome, and in the case of the latter, well-executed by ultimately quite flat. It is clear that the film-makers have learnt from the mistakes of other efforts. Celebration Day sets the bar for putting the viewer at the centre of an amazing qualic experience, with more contrived excitement than might have actually existed in reality – but hey, that’s the idea of making this modality work. Of course, the specialized theatre technology heightens the effect, something that would lose its potency on the home screen, but having seen the film in its full glory, I will have no compunction to be reminded of the experience, albeit in an attenuated form.
Substantively, the music was up to scratch as well and one of the charms being that it had a live rawness to it – some mistakes, missed cues, and some genuine spontaneity, rather than being overcooked in post-production. The set list was immaculately and imaginatively chosen. Plant no longer has the range he once had but given that he arguably had the most powerful voice around, he still has a great deal to work with. Page – fascinating to watch: often it looks as if he’s suffered a stroke. No-one besides Hendrix gets such a big and “experimental” sound. Jones is superb and reaffirms the importance of the “quiet one” to the Led Zep sound. And Jason – wow! Here is a guy that does not have to live in his dad’s shadow – he cut’s the mustard all on his own and in his own way. An interesting feature was the protective huddle they almost seem to be in on stage with the lovely gesture of the three surviving members all facing Jason for the final number (explained by JPJ in the press conference).
Led Zep are well and truly a blues band, something that many fail to see. Their roots tacitly and explicitly are in the south – Robert Johnson, Blind Boys of Alabama, “Fats” Domino and more besides and as Plant says in the press conference, outside of New Orleans labels, only Atlantic was special. One of the meta-highlights was the gospel-inspired In My Time of Dying. This is where Plant comes into his own these days – just listen to the fantastic rendition Plant did of Valley of Tears for “Fats'” tribute album.
It was good to see Plant and Page in conventional trousers with belt, at least in Plant’s case, no tight jeans emphasizing the lunchbox region, and Page out of the custom outfits of Led Zep’s heyday. I was quite pleasantly surprised by the demographic of the film’s audience – I’d guess that 60% were in the 30-40 year old age range – those in Jeremy Clarkson jeans and jacket brigade (my age group) were in the minority.
So a doff of the hat to Ahmet Ertegun – the only person that could have got Zep back together. Shame it took his unfortunate death, ironically set in motion backstage of the filming of Shine a Light. I can’t see Zep ever touring – the physical arduousness demanded, however enjoyable they might have found this one-off, would be brutal, and would tarnish this moment. Led Zep are still a powerhouse, musically relevant as ever, while still retaining their dignity. Not many, if any, bands can lay claim to that.
manwithoutqualities 