[Dixielandjazz] Does anybody love Bop?

[Larry Walton Entertainment - St. Louis]

Endless and equally mindless drum solos are thankfully (I hope) a thing of 
the past.  You are absolutely right and they ended  rarely ever close to the 
tempo that it should have been.  I think the tune "wipe out" may have ended 
the fad in thousands of flying sticks across the country.
Larry Walton
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Charles Suhor" <csuhor at zebra.net>
To: "Steve Barbone" <barbonestreet at earthlink.net>
Cc: <dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com>
Sent: Wednesday, January 10, 2007 5:25 PM
Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] Does anybody love Bop?


> While claiming that I love bop for its own sake I have to admit that
> when it came out, and probably even today, many young players were
> dazzled by the fast notes alone. ("Man, what technique!") Same with
> Maynard. ("How DOES he play those fantastic high notes?")--instead of
> listening for the ingenuity and beauty of the lines, and being turned
> of when there was none. I think that the critics and musicians
> themselves pointed this out over time and educated jazz listeners who
> cared enough to truly listen.
>
> Also, the worship of chops went back to the swing era, at least for
> drummers. Guys thought that they'd be Gene Krupa if they just played
> fast enough. Some Jimmy Vincent records with Louie Prima illustrate
> this--indeed, at times Krupa himself did. They lost the sense of form
> and color that Dodds, Zutty, Spargo, Bauduc, Wettling and others
> brought to the music and would thump away at the bass drum in a tedious
> flat 4, then bang everything in sight on solos, never counting but
> bringing the band in on a preset cue. The sonic potential of the drum
> set and the swinging logic of solos was restored and developed by  the
> be-boppers with Max Roach as the true genuis/exemplar.
>
> Charlie Suhor
>
> On Jan 10, 2007, at 4:12 PM, Steve Barbone wrote:
>
>> Dan Spink at dwsi at aol.com asked:
>>
>>> I have a naive question. Many listmates obviously are not big fans of
>>> bop, but
>>> some are. For those who are: Q. Does anybody really LOVE bop? All I
>>> hear is
>>> how much I should admire the talent it takes to play it--and how fast
>>> the
>>> notes come. Is that what boppers dig? What happened to loving the
>>> music
>>> itself? Maybe I'm just old fashioned.
>>
>> Hi Dan:
>>
>> I admit that I love bop and appreciate it just as much as I do OKOM.
>> And I
>> admit that I love the music itself inherent in bop.
>>
>> Like OKOM, some of its songs are superb and some its songs suck. But
>> the
>> music is certainly there if your ears are ready for it.
>>
>> Want to listen to some superb Bop? Try Bird's "Embracaeble You". Or
>> dig some
>> mellow Clifford Brown, like "Willow Weep For Me", or the more rapid
>> "Sweet
>> Clifford". Or hear fellow pianist Bud Powell's version of "Round
>> Midnight".
>>
>> There is a ton of extraordinary Bop out there. And IMO most boppers
>> dig the
>> music, not what it takes to play it. They hear the melody that guys
>> like
>> Bird, Diz, Bud or Trane (prior to 1957 when he left for avant garde),
>> play.
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Steve Barbone
>>
>>
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>
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