Jimmy Giuffre / Paul Bley / Steve Swallow - Emphasis & Flight 1961

Nate Dorward · September-10th-2004, 01:54 AM

Just been litsening to this reissue again--more than ever this seems to me stunning music. The relation to the studio sessions is rather like than between the Bill Evans/LaFaro/Motian trio sessions in the studio + live: the sense that within a very short space of time there's fresh development happening every time they touch a piece, a sense that every performance is built on the last & is full of further implication. The increasing microtonality of the music is striking (Giuffre in particular but also Swallow's use of sweeps & bends & glisses, & Bley's jangly prepared piano, which is very prominent on Emphasis in particular), & also other things like the greater tendency to ignore chorus-structure, & the way that improvisations tend to reach a point of maximum entropy/out-on-a-limbness, to the point that they collapse into silence, before the return of the head. Some remarkable rethinkings of previously recorded pieces: e.g. "Jesus Maria"'s near-motionless dance on the original Verve recording gets a much more peppery reading, with a real Spanish tinge (though the "Peace Piece"ish opening is fairly similar in both versions).

BTW anyone with sharp ears decipher what Giuffre says after "Postures"? Something like ".........I would have played that forever."

Anyway, it's great music--hard to believe it sat on the shelves till the 1990s.

LeMo · September-10th-2004, 06:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nate Dorward

Anyway, it's great music--hard to believe it sat on the shelves till the 1990s.

It's a radio recording.

Like the live version of "A Love Supreme" on the Deluxe ed. Like "Mingus At Antibes" or the "Great Concert Of Charles Mingus". Like "Miles Davis in Europe" or the entire Horo's catalogue, etc...

The archives of the radio in Europe are full of burried treasures.

Belgium has, by exemple, recorded every edition of the festival of Comblain-la-Tour (Coltrane, Rollins, Blakey, etc...).

France has thousand of tapes from Antibes, Chateauvallon and also from gig recorded in clubs (I remember to have listen to a live broadcasting of the Sam Rivers Trio on France Musique(s) in the seventies), etc.
And all of this are sleeping in those archives because nobody really has ever try to check them (I know it's a difficult and administratively painful work) and to purchase the rights to publish them.

Too bad.

Gary Sisco · September-10th-2004, 08:15 AM

Yes, there should be a concerted attempt to transfer these recordings to another format quickly or they'll just self-destruct from age. There are probably all kinds of touring lineups that were never officially recorded.

LeMo · September-10th-2004, 08:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gary Sisco

Yes, there should be a concerted attempt to transfer these recordings to another format quickly or they'll just self-destruct from age. There are probably all kinds of touring lineups that were never officially recorded.

All the archives of the French TV (who was an all public TV until the end of the eighties), I say ALL, are preserved in an "institution" called INA (Institut National de l'Audiovisuel) where their "mission" is to conserve, in the best condition possible, their archives.

So I'm not too worried about the state in which they are (could be different for other country, but I think than in Great Britain, a country of gret tradition in the radio and television field it must be about the same) today and I know INA has started years ago to digitalize all their archives, sonore or visual.

The real problem is: how to get this to be exhume and publish?
Why nobody, really, try to to do it. And to do it in the right way, meaning respecting artits or estate rights?

You know, the live version of "A Love Supreme" in the Impulse double CD is not only a sound recording, it has been filming - when will we have a DVD with CD quality sound of this stunning concert?

Maybe this could be another step to take for the disc industry when you see how DVD are growing incredibly fast on people.

I have myself a good (bootleg) version of a concert of Lennie Tristano in Copenhagen from 1965 recorded and filming by danish TV.

The sound is in good mono and the pictures are in decent black & white.
The shouting is of a standart TV quality (far, close, the face, the hands).

And it's great. I've shown it to Noah Rosen who was absolutely mesmerized by it.
It's, really, a fascinating stuff.

Nate Dorward · September-10th-2004, 10:42 AM

Yep, there much be a lot of great stuff in the archives. Though I gather that the BBC at least often conducted purges of their collection of tapes in past years... >shudder<. Who knows what was lost.

Nefertiti · September-11th-2004, 06:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LeMo

I have myself a good (bootleg) version of a concert of Lennie Tristano in Copenhagen from 1965 recorded and filming by danish TV.

The sound is in good mono and the pictures are in decent black & white.
The shouting is of a standart TV quality (far, close, the face, the hands).

And it's great. I've shown it to Noah Rosen who was absolutely mesmerized by it.
It's, really, a fascinating stuff.

The Storyville DVD of this concert has excellent picture and sound quality. An essential document.

Too bad that most european jazz TV recordings are not available commercially. For me it is more important to see the artists play than to hear another live version of an often played tune, as is the situation with Monk's, Mingus' or Coltrane´s european tours, which are available on many records/CDs but not on film.

Steve Reynolds · September-11th-2004, 06:27 PM

there is a very good VHS of a Mingus concert from Europe 1964 with Dolphy, Byard, Jordan & Richmond

Tanager · September-11th-2004, 06:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Steve Reynolds

there is a very good VHS of a Mingus concert from Europe 1964 with Dolphy, Byard, Jordan & Richmond

Title, and is it commercially available?

Pete C · September-11th-2004, 06:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nefertiti

Too bad that most european jazz TV recordings are not available commercially. For me it is more important to see the artists play than to hear another live version of an often played tune, as is the situation with Monk's, Mingus' or Coltrane´s european tours, which are available on many records/CDs but not on film.

Agreed. I collect jazz videos, both commercial & bootleg (there's a guy at a flea market in NY with some good stuff). The one commercially released Mingus/Dolphy 1964 performance is out of print, I'm pretty sure. I have a bootleg video of Trane at Antibes in 1965, but it's the other night of 2 he played--not the one with A Love Supreme.

Richardo Caerleoni · September-12th-2004, 06:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LeMo

It's a radio recording.

The archives of the radio in Europe are full of burried treasures.

Belgium has, by exemple, recorded every edition of the festival of Comblain-la-Tour (Coltrane, Rollins, Blakey, etc...).

France has thousand of tapes from Antibes, Chateauvallon and also from gig recorded in clubs (I remember to have listen to a live broadcasting of the Sam Rivers Trio on France Musique(s) in the seventies), etc.
And all of this are sleeping in those archives because nobody really has ever try to check them (I know it's a difficult and administratively painful work) and to purchase the rights to publish them.

Too bad.

LeMo - I grew up in France in the 60s - Every sunday night there would be a major concert on Frence Radio - From Fats Domino/R&B to Max Roach, Miles to Mingus, Blakey, Ray Charles to Trane. And a mass of European musicians - Barney Wilen, Bobby Jasper, Rene Thomas etc.

I have a Ray Charles bootleg tape - bought in Italy - but from French Radio in Paris 1961 - which is far better - in terms of sound quality and the band (kicking) and Ray is out of sight - than anything released on conventional labels. The problem is copyright and artist approval. Ray would never let this go - money, whatever. Some material has now come out on the Europe No1 Double Cds...

We just have to keep on pushing!

The BBC also have a mass of tapes (some "cleaned" - like Ayler) but still there if there is enough demand....

Nate Dorward · October-1st-2004, 02:57 AM

If anyone's curious there's the longer, more formal writeup of the Giuffre discs I did here:

http://www.paristransatlantic.com/ma...ct_text.html#8

(you'll need to scroll down a bit, as Dan doesn't put in anchors for all the reviews.)

Does anyone agree with me about the link between "Flamenco Sketches" & "Jesus Maria" by the way?