What are you listening to?

[Valmy]

Bach's Brandenburg Concertos

Which recording?

The one where he's drunk out of his mind and ends up just hurling abuse on the crowd after being triggered by some heckler.

Well that explains his 'to all my haters' concerto in D minor.

[Liep]

Screaming Females - Rose Mountain

[Eddie Teach]

Bach's Brandenburg Concertos

Which recording?

The one where he's drunk out of his mind and ends up just hurling abuse on the crowd after being triggered by some heckler.

Well that explains his 'to all my haters' concerto in D minor.

Johann Sebastian was the Taylor of his day.

[Ed Anger]

Smashing Pumpkins- Zero

Might as well start cutting myself.

[The Minsky Moment]

Sonny Clark - Cool Struttin' (1958)

In mainstream modern jazz, the piano player "comps" - plays chords corresponding to the harmonic structure of the song - while the horn players solo.  The key is rhythm and timing - playing in such a way to give drive and tension.  Seems simple but hard to get it right.  Sonny Clark was a master at it, and it made him in very high demand as a sideman.  So no surprise when he took a date as a leader, he could get the best.  The rest of Miles Davis' rhythm section is here - Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones - and they play the shit out of the session.  Jackie McLean on tenor and Art Farmer on trumpet.

Sadly Clark would be dead a few years later, in his early 30s.  Mr. P.C. died not that long afterward. 

[Eddie Teach]

Yesterday- Nevermind and Superunknown
Now- The Downward Spiral

[Eddie Teach]

Turandot by Puccini. Several other names mentioned, I caught Pavarotti and London Philharmonic.

[The Minsky Moment]

Ahmad Jamal - At the Pershing (1958)

Jamal got criticized by some at the time as being a glorified cocktail pianist, but Miles Davis praised him highly . . . Miles was right. In the usual trio, time is marked out by a walking bass, and the drummer, freeing the pianist to play melody and solo.  In Jamal's group everyone marks time and no one does.  The rhythm shifts a lot in these tunes, and Vernel Fournier on drums often plays rhythmic counterpoint to Jamal.  Meanwhile Israel Crosby plays bass in walking style but does not always mark out a strict 4-4; he plays a kind of quieter and more subtle version of what Scott LeFaro would do with Bill Evans a couple years later.

I believe this was the first recording of "Poinciana" which hit the mainstream Billboard charts and stayed on for several years.

Jamal is his mid-80s now - and has released several albums over the last decade or so, he's been doing some of his best work since the 1980s.

[garbon]

The Cure - A Letter To Elise
Simply Red - Holding Back The Years

[Savonarola]

Mussorgsky - Pictures at an Exhibition

While I do like Ravel's orchestrations, I prefer the Promenades and The Great Gate of Kiev in the original.  In those pieces I think understatement worked better.

[Josephus]

ELP. Pictures at an Exhibition

[Savonarola]

Holst - The Planets

I learned that this began life a work for two pianos (but was arranged for full orchestration before the original premiers.)  I also learned that, even though the movements were premiered; Holst hated it when people played the planets out of the order that he wrote them (often orchestras will end with Jupiter rather than Neptune.)

I prefer the orchestrated version of this one, but the piano pieces aren't bad; except Mars, that really doesn't work that way.

[Tonitrus]

Bob Dylan - Tomorrow is a Long Time

[PDH]

Skinny Puppy - Assimilate

[Tonitrus]

Bill Withers - Take It All In And Check It All Out