[Dixielandjazz] Roy Eldridge followed Louis Armstrong?

Tue Apr 11 11:25:41 EDT 2017

Much of what Charlie Suhor and Jack Wiard wrote resonates with me.

  I continue to enjoy almost everything that Miles played up until the 
'60s. (I'm in the middle of writing a 2,000 word piece about his 
wonderful 1961 Carnegie Hall concert) up until and including 'In A 
Silent Way' and 'Bitches' Brew). He created gigantic classics with the 
Gil Evans collaborations 'Miles Ahead' and 'Sketches Of Spain'. 'Kind Of 
Blue', a masterpiece, remains the best selling jazz album of all time, 
and deservedly so. At least two excellent books have been written 
devoted to that one album, and I have another very good book on 
'Bitches' Brew'.
So, up to that point, 'Bitches' Brew', the man was one of the all time 
greats, with various elements of his work (improvisation, composition, 
forward-looking awareness, imagination, bandleading) ranking him with 
earlier giants like Armstrong and Ellington.
Charles Suhor spots the switch into rock, where Miles would stick a few 
phrases into ten minute pieces. Quite so. Miles listened carefully to 
the bands who were playing the most successful rock and drew elements 
from them in what seems to me an unfortunately cynical way in order to 
make a great deal of money. Only last week I bought a much acclaimed (by 
rock people) CD of his famous Isle Of White performance and some stuff 
from the 1969 Newport Jazz Festival. There is virtually nothing, amid 
the overpowering and unsubtle rock music, to please Miles's admirers. 
(Duke suffered an almost comparable descent with his latter-day 'Sacred' 
music.
  I was fortunate enough to meet both Miles and Duke. I live in 
Liverpool, a couple of hundred miles from London. When Miles first came 
over the editor of the Melody Maker, for which I then wrote, 'phoned and 
asked me if I'd interview Miles when he came to Liverpool. I agreed to.
  It was only after the call that I remembered that the warning had gone 
round that Miles was travelling with two body guards and neither he nor 
they had any compunction about thumping people. None of the Melody 
Maker's other writers had wanted the job.
   Miles was to play at Liverpool's Philharmonic Hall - with a good band 
including Wynton Kelly and Sonny Stitt).
   I arrived 90 minutes early and went to the Philharmonic pub over the 
road where, nervous, I drank three pints of bitter to bolster my courage.
   Then into the hall and round to the Green Room, where I knocked on 
the door, ready to flinch if a bodyguard opened it.
   But it was opened by Miles himself, who had one hand behind his back.
   'Oh God,' I thought. 'He's going to knife me'.
   I handed him my card and asked if we could have a few words. He read 
the card and brought his hand from behind his back. It held a bottle of 
Scotch.
   'Come in, Steve, and have a drink,' he said, handing me the bottle.
   I did, and as I drank, I must have leaned back too much, for I felt 
myself tread on someone's foot. There followed a string of invective 
which to this day holds me in awe. The only repeatable bit was that I 
was a white mother-...... I had stood on the foot of a strung-out Sonny 
Stitt.
  And Duke? He gave me a drink from Billy Strayhorn's bottle of gin. But 
that's another even longer story.
Steve Voce

On Apr 10, 2017, at 10:07 PM, jack wiard <jack_wiard at hotmail.com> wrote:
>> Hi Charles,
>> My first hearing of Miles Davis was at the Jazz Workshop in San Francisco in the 1960s. Not liking the music at all but believing one should hear someone at least three times before forming an opinion, I heard M . Davis again a few years later at the BOTH/AND CLUB in San Francisco.  I had a front row seat. Miles was introduced to huge applause.  The rhythm section set up an up tempo  c minor chord  [nothing else, just c minor].  Miles did a long solo, then the rhythm  [bass and  [too loud] drums only, then Miles again.  Tonally, one chord for  the  25 minute length of the song was very ,very boring.  I might add that during much of his solo, Davis faced the wall, so he could hear himself better. That meant the audience got to look at his backside for 25 minutes.  Of course, I liked the tone and flawless execution but for me, on this number, the music element was not evident.  At the end of the performance, the name of the 'song' was not announced, so even if one liked the 'song', you would not know what to ask for in the music store to buy it.  The applause was huge and there was not the slightest hint of a smile. He then walked off for a 30 minute break.
>> But wait,theres' more.  In the early 1970s, Davis appeared at the Sydney [Australia] Entertainment Centre [sold out 12,000people] with  a rock band.  Davis  would just blurt out a few notes to establish a rhythm pattern  for the guitars/drums to play  and then he would play for 1-2 minutes in a 10-12  minute  song.  He played 2 x 46 minute sets. Being a masochist, I stayed for all of it but by the end of the 1st set, about one third of the audience had  left  to go home.  Someone at the concert actually yelled out  'PLAY SOME JAZZ'.
>> Davis approached a microphone and said  'I DON'T PLAY TO ORDERS'.    That was the only announcement he made all night. Wow, such stage pressence [NOT].. And   that[hand on heart]is a true account of my three encounters with Miles Davis.
>>    Cheers   JACK WIARD
>> From: Charles Suhor <csuhor at zebra.net>
>> Sent: Tuesday, 11 April 2017 10:22 AM
>> To: jack_wiard at hotmail.com
>> Cc: Dixieland Jazz Mailing List
>> Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] Roy Eldridge followed Louis Armstrong?
>>   
>> Apology accepted, with respect. Re Miles, I lost interest in his playing with the famed “Bitches’ Brew” rock/jazz synthesis, though I believe his playing until then was often brilliant, sometimes transporting. I don’t relate at all to the post-Coltrane improvisers for whom formlessness is a stimulus. Random invention is sometimes fun to watch on site—they’re trying their luck in real time. But without physical presence, there’s not even the wonderment of  unfolding-in-the-moment. Why listen to something that has become a non-event? That’s my hobby horse, time to dismount.
>>
>> Charlie
>>
>>
>>
>>> On Apr 10, 2017, at 6:31 PM, Marek Boym <marekboym at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> Sorry.  I didn't mean to be offensive.
>>> I made the journey the other way round: I started listening to everything when in my teens. including rock and roll, which in my native Poland (and later here in Israel) was considered jazz, and became greatly disappointed by modernists, in particular by the then greatest hero, Miles Davis, before I ever heard Wild Bill Davison.  I had known the Brubecks ("Blue Rondo a la Turk," for example) and the MJQ records by heart before I ever heard ABOUT Wild Bill.  Gradually I lost all interest in their cool, to my ear - lifeless - music.  By the mid 1960's  I dropped most "modern" jazz and concentrated on jazz and swing.  I cannot see the connection between Miles Davis and jazz.  nothing wrong in liking Miles Davis - it just does not sound like jazz.  Eddie Condon had something to say on the subject: "A terrible thing has happened to jazz: it became respectable."  That must be the reason while so many musicians want their music classified as jazz.  I wish I could claim this is an original idea, but the explanation comes from Hughes Panassie's "The Unreal Jazz."
>>> I apologize again,
>>> Marek
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 11 April 2017 at 00:42, Charles Suhor <csuhor at zebra.net> wrote:
>>> Marek, I came by my fandom honestly. Born and raised in New Orleans; before my teens, enchanted (still am) by Bunk, Louis, Bechet, and others. Moved along, without burning the bridges of my love for early jazz, to enjoying and playing drums in many styles. Gigged with big band and modern jazz groups on some weekends, on others with Armand Hug, Chink Martin, Paul Crawford, etc. But from inside your bubble, I’m not a jazz fan. You’re entitled to your opinion, man, but that’s an insult.
>>>
>>> Charlie
>>>
>>>> On Apr 10, 2017, at 3:20 PM, Marek Boym <marekboym at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> some of us do not consider Miles Davis followers jazz fans, which makes the preceding part of this post irrelevant.
>>>>
>>>
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